AWS WAF vs. F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
AWS WAF
Score 7.3 out of 10
N/A
Amazon Web Services offers AWS WAF (web application firewall) to protect web applications from malicious behavior that might impede the applications functioning and performance, with customizable rules to prevent known harmful behaviors and an API for creating and deploying web security rules.
$0.60
per 1 million requests
F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
F5 Networks offers the F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager, a firewall software combining a number of features including DDoS, DNS security, and other protections.N/A
Pricing
AWS WAFF5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
Editions & Modules
Resource Type - Request
$0.60
per 1 million requests
Resource Type - Rule
$1.00
per month (prorated hourly)
Resource Type - Web ACL
$5.00
per month (prorated hourly)
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
AWS WAFF5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
AWS WAFF5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
Features
AWS WAFF5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
Firewall
Comparison of Firewall features of Product A and Product B
AWS WAF
-
Ratings
F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
8.6
Ratings
0% below category average
Identification Technologies00 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Visualization Tools00 Ratings7.00 Ratings
Content Inspection00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Policy-based Controls00 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Active Directory and LDAP00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Firewall Management Console00 Ratings7.00 Ratings
Reporting and Logging00 Ratings8.00 Ratings
VPN00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
High Availability00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Stateful Inspection00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Proxy Server00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
User Ratings
AWS WAFF5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(0 ratings)
8.3
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
9.0
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
AWS WAFF5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)
Likelihood to Recommend
AWS WAF is highly appropriate to interrupt or prevent cyber attacks because when implementing rules, whether they are specific or centralized, so any application that has these vulnerabilities is protected.
Implementing managed rules creates greater security to protect both API and applications. If implemented along with other AWS tools, the security is much better, so if you want to protect applications against more specific attacks, it is ideal to integrate with Amazon CloudFront, which is a great benefit because it warns when thresholds are exceeded or specific attacks occur. AWS WAF is ideal to avoid common web attacks. For more specific attacks and scenarios, I don't recommend this.
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We were able to eliminate a firewall from our network architecture by integrating the module into our existing F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM). This allowed us to save on tech refresh costs, since the F5 was able to handle the module without much additional strain on the device. However, if a firewall had features that the AFM lacked, then using that firewall in tandem with an F5 would be preferable.
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Pros
  • AWS WAF has the most developer-friendly API to create firewall rules.
  • AWS WAF provides OWASP security controls, which reduces developers' burden (i.e., SQL injection and cross-site scripting).
  • AWS WAF has customizable web security rules. The user can even push the rules through the API available, which is the great feature and helped me a lot.
  • It protects applications at layer 7 (HTTP) of the OSI model and not just layer 4 (TCP).
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  • Port based controls
  • Ease of using address objects
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Cons
  • The documentation offered is somewhat confusing, so it would be ideal if it were much more direct and precise.
  • Your initial configuration may be confusing, so the best option is to use the rule templates provided by AWS.
  • Its configuration is not unified with AWS, so it must be done separately and it takes some time.
  • The number of rules to be established is somewhat limited.
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  • More intuitive user interface
  • Better naming conventions
  • Fewer navigation steps to prevent abstraction
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Likelihood to Renew
We have been using AWS WAF for the past 3 years in front of our websites. We find it useful in preventing data crawling, DDOS attacks, etc on our websites, and hence we are going to use it in the future as well. AWS WAF is one of the best Firewalls in business.
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Usability
The product is highly scalable. It is easy to configure the rules and thereby helps us to mitigate many vulnerabilities. The interface and programming of the firewall provisions were easy to setup. Amazon clearly spent a lot of time figuring this out and perfecting it. It allows users to do customized configurations based on their needs. It provides protection against a number of security issues like XSS, SQL injection, etc. I would definitely recommend this for protecting your infra as you scale, since this basically protects and filters all requests hitting your application server.
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No answers on this topic
Support Rating
If you're intending to use AWS WAF, I would say that you absolutely should sign up for support. AWS Support is excellent and they can help you in a really good way to solve your issues.
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F5 Advanced Firewall Manager has been a solid, strong solution to both keep our systems safe and being seamless for our end users. Most of the time, the end-user is not impacted and does not even know F5 Advanced Firewall Manager is running which is exactly what we are looking for.
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Alternatives Considered
Easy of use. Setup and configuration is fairly quick. There are the usual advantages of it being a cloud solution where you can buy into the solution, configure it and set it up and get it up and running. If you are already a subscriber to AWS, having a native service has its advantages.
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Both F5 [BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager] and Radware require training as they are not easy to use. But Radware uses some configuration that needs deep learning and proper labs. From an admin's perspective, Configuration and management for F5 [BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager are] less. Also, the cost of implementing F5 [BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager] is lesser than that of Radware Alteon.
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Return on Investment
  • Somewhat costly if specific needs are not there.
  • If security is concerned than comparatively is beneficial.
  • All those price that spent on AWS WAF in return gets saved in man hours.
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  • Easy maintenance reduces support hours.
  • Consistent experience reduces user learning curve.
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ScreenShots