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Kemp LoadMaster vs VMWare Avi Load Balancer 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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Kemp LoadMaster
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
8th
Average Rating
9.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
49
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMWare Avi Load Balancer
Ranking in Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
11th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) category, the mindshare of Kemp LoadMaster is 7.3%, up from 7.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMWare Avi Load Balancer is 4.1%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC)
 

Featured Reviews

PeterForster - PeerSpot reviewer
A highly stable and scalable load-balancing software that offers great technical support
My company is really happy with Kemp LoadMaster as a product. My company is also happy with the support we receive from Kemp LoadMaster. I want Kemp LoadMaster to provide users with better reporting capabilities in relation to TCP packets. In general, the connections that are present in the system require improvement. Feature-wise, Kemp LoadMaster has everything that our company's customers require. Kemp LoadMaster also has features that have supported our company's past projects.
Richard Polyak - PeerSpot reviewer
Easy to set up and has good integration into the host environment but needs better third party integration
I'm not sure which version number we are on. It's one of the latest, I assume. We don't run the latest. We usually are either one or two versions behind. It is something we are exploring. We do have use cases and it will compete against our existing product line. That would have to go in the second half of this year. Right now, it's more of a comparison of how we use it right now. We don't use it really in production. We are going to definitely explore it and do our comparison and more in-depth analysis of the product and compare it against our existing product line. I'd advise potential users to do a very in-depth analysis of the products in comparison. And don't just look at the cover of it - really look into the detailed backend support infrastructure and if it can be implemented the way you need it to be. I'd rate the solution five out of ten. It's not a fully mature product.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Failover is seamless and our services are rock solid."
"Persistence is very valuable. This holds the connection information of the source and that connection is important to RDP and our APO calls. The connection has to be persisted to the original source to operate properly. We also use the subsections for sub-services to create services inside our services for our API resources, this is most awesome. We would not be able to do this without Kemp and offer this type of sub-service to route based on an API instance. It routes the traffic properly based on the sub-service type."
"The most valuable features are synchronizing email with mobile devices and synchronizing with Outlook."
"When you configure the listening services, you can implement a lot of security features like the Edge Security Pack that intercepts the requests and processes those before they are sent to the real servers."
"I like the way this solution handles multiple SSLs in different domains while still load balancing."
"It helps with efficiency and reactivity, in case of assistance needs."
"I like that this is a Network Load Balancer that can be used practically with any application in the backend. They have how-to guides on how to set up Kemp NLB with Exchange, but you can use it as well for Sharepoint, RDS, or any other back end server."
"The DNS Load Balancer makes it so that I don't have to worry about site failures."
"Its visibility and login mechanism are the best parts. In addition to the great visibility it has a great dashboard and an easy to configure graphic user interface, a beautiful GUI."
"The interface and software features are the most valuable aspects of this solution."
"The most valuable feature of the solution for my organization is its UI since it allows us to see the clusters while providing a very specific and good overall understanding."
"What's most valuable in Avi Networks Software Load Balancer is its deployment capability, the ability to deploy in a dispersed service, with the service engines that can disperse and have a single control plane that can control the load balancing services across any available platform, wherever needed. The analytics of Avi Networks Software Load Balancer and flexibility of deployment are its most valuable features and the reasons why many people buy it."
"The solution has simplified our network infrastructure management."
"The WAF - the web application firewall itself - is great."
"The friendly user interface is valuable."
"The solution is stable."
 

Cons

"In the web interface, there are a lot of settings in the different menus and it would be helpful if there were an interactive help system or tooltips to help the administrators find and configure the right settings."
"In my opinion, the layer seven loads balancing that we're mainly using for web servers, doesn't seem to pick up when there are issues at the application level."
"It would be much easier to have the management interface directly integrate with the Kemp Support library, allowing you to choose the desired template from the online catalog to then directly download to the LoadMaster."
"They were still in the process of development, and for example, we set it up in a cluster. So it was one logistical unit built out of two physical devices. And the expected behavior, which I know from other devices, will be formed into a logic cluster. It's that you configure one unit. Then you bring the second unit into this cluster with the already configured primary unit. So the secondary box pulls all the configured ones from its neighbor, does everything automatically, and then synchronizes with this primary neighbor. And then it works, like, one logical unit. And this didn't work with the Kemp's initially, where they caused a lot of issues when building up a cluster, so there were some specials on how to set this up. When we built or set them up for the first time and the months afterward with no new software releases, there were a couple of problems, but in the end, they worked fine. So, they developed a lot and learned from what they've responded to, what we responded to them, and what needs fixing."
"I would like to see more automation and control of overactive and inactive resources. If I could schedule these around our updates then it would be all automated. I would like to set up an automated script to coincide with the scripts I use to update resources and servers."
"To make it a perfect ten out of ten it would need better connection logging. If there is an active connection, that there is better logging. It should also have better management monitoring tools."
"If you want logging for SMTP traffic, you have to enable ESP, which requires you to define allowed IP addresses. That’s irritating, to say the least."
"The GUI is rather technical and complex, so it could be improved by making it simpler and more user-friendly."
"One struggle with Avi Networks Software Load Balancer is its integration with other VMware products. Integration could be improved in the solution so that you have a more unified control plane with it and other data center security and networking products that VMware sells. There has been a bit of a lag on the roadmap of new features that have come out there recently, but better interoperability with the hyperscale environments such as the AWS, Azure, GCPs of the world, and simpler deployment and interoperability with those existing tools, are areas that are receiving attention and could use additional attention today. These are the areas for improvement in Avi Networks Software Load Balancer."
"I did not go with it because their APM module is a different product altogether. It's a common thing that companies do. They sell something and then they add on top of it as a different product. It is a type of marketing strategy. But when it comes to the overall management, it takes a lot of time to really look into it."
"The initial setup is a bit complex."
"In terms of improvement, the pricing and documentation need improvement. We have had problems getting the documents."
"IDS and IPS sites need to be more progressive."
"Avi Networks Software Load Balancer needs to improve its documentation."
"The network analytics and monitoring features are not effective."
"It doesn't match the development structure or user community of our existing product. It pales in comparison to that."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The Kemp LoadMaster is a tremendous value."
"Download Kemp's VLM trial and take it for a test drive; you will be impressed."
"This product has good value and features for the money."
"They have multiple tiers of licensing and you can upgrade it easily."
"KEMP gives away free trials for 30 days. This can be stretched if you want. During the test, you will have access to KEMP support.​"
"Licensing is yearly and I am going to guess that it is CAN $2000.00."
"​I have control on the licensing and all the prices since I work for a partner.​"
"The price of the solution is cheap."
"With Avi Networks, you can buy a 10-Gig license and, if your primary data center goes down, in the flick of a switch you can move that license to your backup data center and it will generate the traffic... there are a lot of cost-effective measures."
"The tool is expensive."
"I rate the solution price a four to five on a scale of one to ten, where one is low, and ten is high, since it is an affordable tool."
"The licensing costs for Avi Networks Software Load Balancer are really variable. The product can be sold from a bandwidth utilization perspective. It can be sold from a per CPU perspective, depending on if you're looking at on-premises or hyperscale environments. Licensing costs vary quite a bit if you're familiar with the AWS Calculator, where you can see that it can widely vary per licensing model. On a scale of one to five, with one being not very good value for the money and five being great, I would rate the pricing for Avi Networks Software Load Balancer a five because its pricing is extremely competitive. Not all features are included with the license, for example, there's single licensing."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
65%
Computer Software Company
7%
Government
3%
Financial Services Firm
3%
Financial Services Firm
23%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
9%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Kemp LoadMaster?
Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten...I rate the technical support a ten out of ten...The initial setup of Kemp LoadMaster is very simple.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Kemp LoadMaster?
LoadMaster is cheaper than some other solutions. It has a perpetual license, so it's a one-time cost.
What needs improvement with Kemp LoadMaster?
There are some challenges with updates on certain models that don't have a few features. The support team often takes a lot of time to provide resolutions for issues. Also, I could see more capabil...
What do you like most about Avi Networks Software Load Balancer?
The solution has simplified our network infrastructure management.
What needs improvement with Avi Networks Software Load Balancer?
The network analytics and monitoring features are not effective. The product does not provide deep troubleshooting features. The solution must provide public IP features. F5 provides such features.
 

Also Known As

LoadMaster Load Balancer
Avi Software Load Balancer
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Kent County Council, KEMP, SMA Solar Technology AG, RT€ Player , Victrix (Quebec, Canada), Texas A&M, Macmillan Cancer Support, Cisco, Austin Bank
Palo Alto Networks, DGDean, Swisslos
Find out what your peers are saying about Kemp LoadMaster vs. VMWare Avi Load Balancer and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,020 professionals have used our research since 2012.