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F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs Symantec Web Application Firewall comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Man...
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
120
Ranking in other categories
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) (2nd)
Symantec Web Application Fi...
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (40th)
 

Mindshare comparison

F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) and Symantec Web Application Firewall aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) is designed for Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) and holds a mindshare of 15.0%, down 16.1% compared to last year.
Symantec Web Application Firewall, on the other hand, focuses on Web Application Firewall (WAF), holds 0.2% mindshare, down 0.2% since last year.
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Featured Reviews

Richard Polyak - PeerSpot reviewer
Jun 21, 2022
Reduces maintenance downtime and has a strong user community
Our primary use cases for F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager are high availability for applications and SSL offload certificates F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager helps reduce our downtime for maintenance purposes. It also offers us ease of use for the deployment of certificates onto a central…
reviewer1231533 - PeerSpot reviewer
Mar 31, 2021
An excellent up-to-date data repository handling external threats successfully
We have multiple applications that we wanted to ensure were protected and we chose Symantec for that. I'm the head of IT infrastructure and we are partners with Symantec.  Symantec has specifically helped connect external users to our internal network. It has also enabled us to ensure that those…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"F5 Big-IP Local Traffic Manager has better modular features especially LTM, which according to the clients, is very beneficial. Most of the users opt for a combination of big IP LTM and WAF which helps them to leverage application load balancing and enhance application security many-fold."
"I've worked a little bit with iRules and it is amazing."
"Currently, it's distributing the load perfectly, as per my understanding of our requirements."
"The setup is pretty easy."
"The most valuable feature is being able to manipulate the iRules, so you can send traffic to different avenues."
"F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager is a stable and reliable solution."
"If I were to choose one key feature in particular, perhaps it would be the iRule feature. It’s a really versatile tool."
"It is a fast and available solution."
"The solution has an up-to-date data repository to deal with external threats."
"The setup was straightforward."
"The interface is user-friendly."
 

Cons

"LTM's cloud capabilities could be improved. Cloud providers all offer load balancing, but you can't get the same level of security. F5's cloud service is still not on par with its on-prem service."
"The deployment could be simplified."
"The analytics should provide insight into latency across various traffic routes and virtual servers."
"I would like to see improvement in the manageability and easier setup."
"We would like to have integration into encryption and PKI integration with SafeNet. That is probably the key component in using External PKIs, letting people bring their PKIs with them."
"Implementing whitepapers with a lot more applications could easily be added."
"I used GitHub for autoscaling CloudFormation, and I found two bugs and I submitted them. Their implementation in GitHub could be cleaner and allow for a bit more customization."
"Cloud native integration should be provided."
"Sometimes scanning slows down the endpoints."
"It would be an improvement if the management dashboards were not reliant upon Java."
"I'm not convinced that it's necessary the best solution going forward in the future."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Though functionality is high, its cost can be considered slightly higher than its competitors​."
"If your IT budget is good, go for it."
"LTM is a good product, but it's expensive. They should make it more competitive because cloud providers offer free load balancing. Cloud providers can't cover all the security aspects of F5, but you get a decent amount of security. Cloud environments are becoming the norm across the IT industry. Many of the larger companies that previously used on-prem infrastructure are switching to the cloud, so companies like Fortinet and Palo Alto are reducing their prices. Otherwise, they can't compete in the cloud."
"The licensing pricing seems relatively easy enough to get your head around. I would advise anyone to ensure that you have a conversation with an F5 consultant before purchasing, as you would with most products."
"There are no additional fees to the standard licensing fee; everything is paid once."
"It is a little pricey. I wish the pricing was cheaper, but I wish the pricing was cheaper for everything."
"The price of F5 BIG-IP LTM could improve."
"I am not aware of the exact cost of the product. However, it is expensive."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
14%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
6%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP?
Price is an area of the tool where improvements are required. I want to see CDN capabilities in the product.
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

F5 BIG-IP, BIG-IP LTM, F5 ASM, Viprion, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition , Crescendo Networks Application Delivery Controller, BIG IP
Symantec WAF, Blue Coat Protecting Web Applications
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Riken, TransUnion, Tepco Systems Administration, Daejeon University, G&T Bank, Danamon, CyberAgent Inc.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) vs. Symantec Web Application Firewall and other solutions. Updated: September 2020.
815,854 professionals have used our research since 2012.