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Fortinet FortiADC vs NGINX Plus comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
6.6
Fortinet FortiADC is chosen for reliable load management, security, and support, offering moderate ROI and essential performance.
Sentiment score
7.4
NGINX Plus improved website speed, reduced costs, and enhanced application accessibility, offering varied returns despite higher costs than alternatives.
The alert system is efficient, sending alerts within a fraction of a second if any power issues arise.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.1
Fortinet FortiADC customer service is praised for effective support but varies in response time and relies on ticket prioritization.
Sentiment score
6.8
Most users rely on community resources and documentation, but those who use technical support rate it effective despite variable response times.
The support team is knowledgeable and efficiently assists with automation and configuration problems.
The service is helpful yet not excellent.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Fortinet FortiADC provides scalable solutions with virtual and cloud options, though performance varies by model and infrastructure needs.
Sentiment score
8.0
NGINX Plus is highly scalable, adaptable to configurations, and efficiently manages load balancing, especially on AWS or GCP.
It is scalable for some versions, however, as components reach their end of support, upgrades are necessary to maintain scalability.
While some people use NGINX for web servers, my current use case focuses on networking and tunneling, which does not necessitate much scaling.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Fortinet FortiADC is praised for stability, reliable operation, effective support, and minor issues resolved through firmware updates.
Sentiment score
7.9
NGINX Plus is stable and reliable with minor concerns, often attributed to configuration, performing well in production environments.
The support system is reliable when issues like automation or configuration arise.
I require ninety-nine point nine percent uptime, and NGINX has been pivotal in helping me achieve this along with our other DNS services.
 

Room For Improvement

Fortinet FortiADC needs advancements in algorithms, UI, support, documentation, scalability, features, pricing, licensing, performance, cloud, and AI integration.
NGINX Plus needs improvements in scalability, ease of use, pricing, performance, security integration, and standalone deployment options.
The limitation of managing all components and the differing versions pose challenges.
If I need design help, they do not assist; they say it is a design issue they cannot support, and I must approach the system integrator.
NGINX could provide a means to generate self-signed SSL certificates.
As with any application, there were initial issues, however, after receiving support, everything was rectified.
 

Setup Cost

Fortinet FortiADC is affordable compared to competitors, with flexible licensing, varying costs, and potential discounts based on configurations.
NGINX offers a free version, while NGINX Plus requires a paid license with flexible, feature-based pricing options.
This solution is quite expensive compared to Kemp.
My use case involves using the free and open-source version of NGINX, making it cost-effective as I haven't incurred any costs.
The solution offers a cost advantage.
 

Valuable Features

Fortinet FortiADC excels in load balancing, security, and ease of integration, offering scalable, reliable, and comprehensive traffic management solutions.
NGINX Plus provides efficient load balancing, caching, and security with high performance, modularity, and seamless integration for flexible traffic management.
I use server load balancing and employ layer seven features, which provide more granular traffic shaping and detailed logs.
FortiADC provides load-balancing capabilities needed for integration with other Fortinet platforms.
For API management, the WebSocket, and the WebServer, NGINX provides a cost advantage, value addition, and effective support.
 

Categories and Ranking

Fortinet FortiADC
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
7th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NGINX Plus
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
6th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
Application Infrastructure (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) category, the mindshare of Fortinet FortiADC is 9.8%, up from 7.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NGINX Plus is 8.3%, down from 9.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
 

Featured Reviews

Saeid Khanipour Ghobani - PeerSpot reviewer
High-level load balancing and routing protocols but scalability is limited to 200 gigabits
The initial setup and configuration are very easy because the solution includes a simple OS. Initial configuration takes about ten minutes for simple environments. It is important to assess the environment and decide what services, servers, and web applications are needed. The solution can be configured in router mode or one-arm mode which uses source NAT as destination NAT to send traffic to the firewall. One-arm mode is more complex and requires discussions with our engineers. For example, you have a website with Node.js for your programming language, Amazon S3 for your CDN, NGINX for your web server, and you use both React and reCAPTCHA. Our team meets with your developer to learn your website and OS through a multi-step process and then we configure the solution to protect everything.
Ritesh-Bakhru - PeerSpot reviewer
Quick installation and very easy to manage while doing orchestration or automation
NGINX cannot be a replacement for your traditional load balancer with what we use in the network today. However, with applications going toward microservices, NGINX is definitely a way forward. F5 has many traditional load balancing features, so they still need to bring some of those features to NGINX. NGINX is a very basic load balancer and cannot do as many customizations as F5. I think F5 is trying to implement those features in NGINX so they can improve the balancing on NGINX, but I think that will take some time. With the traditional F5 set up, the same OS can do load balancing, firewalls, and even policy enforcement. If we are able to bring some of those capabilities to NGINX, I think it would become a versatile solution and usage would definitely increase.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Educational Organization
5%
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Is Citrix ADC (formerly Netscaler) the best ADC to use and if not why?
For ADC, any ADC can do a good job. But in case if you want to add WAF functionality to the same ADC hardware you have to look for other ADC's like F5, Imperva, Radware, Fortinet, etc.
Do you recommend Fortinet FortiADC?
I recommend Fortinet FortiADC. My experience with Fortinet has been very positive. Our company has been using it for around five years. We mainly use FortiADC for the load balancing of application ...
What do you like most about Fortinet FortiADC?
The user interface is very easy and integrates with Sandbox easily.
Which is better - IIS or NGINX Plus?
IIS is a flexible, secure, and manageable web server to host anything on the web. IIS’s scalable and open architecture can handle the most demanding tasks. From media streaming to web applications,...
What do you like most about NGINX Plus?
It performs very well. That's one of the primary reasons we use NGINX.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NGINX Plus?
My use case involves using the free and open-source version of NGINX, making it cost-effective as I haven't incurred any costs.
 

Also Known As

FortiADC Application Delivery Controller, FortiADC
NGINX
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Black Gold Regional Schools, Amadeus Hospitality, Jefferson County, Chunghwa Telecom, City of Boroondara, Dimension Data
Locaweb, AppNexus, Wix, Reliam, Montana Interactive, MuleSoft, Warpwire, Discovery Education, InkaBinka, WordPress.com, Gogo, GOV.UK, NASA
Find out what your peers are saying about Fortinet FortiADC vs. NGINX Plus and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.