Kemp LoadMaster Reviews

Our primary use case was traffic load balancing and distribution. The solution was essential for managing all inbound client traffic, including HTTPS and DNS requests, by routing it through our firewall cluster.

The load balancer intelligently distributed this traffic to our Synergy Blade servers, which are the core of our Software-Defined solution. These servers host our websites, Active Directory (AD/DNS), and various other applications. This approach ensured both optimal performance and high availability, preventing any single server from becoming overwhelmed. The solution’s ability to manage traffic flow bi-directionally guaranteed a seamless and reliable connection for both internal and external users.

Kemp LoadMaster has significantly improved Data Flow in the Data Center by ensuring the high performance, availability, and reliability of critical services. It prevents any single server from becoming a bottleneck.

The solution has also reduced latency and improved response times for both internal and external users.

The Kemp LoadMaster works seamlessly with a firewall cluster to ensure all client requests are handled logically and securely. Overall, the Kemp LoadMaster has been an integral part of the infrastructure, transforming the environment from one with potential vulnerabilities into a high-performing, highly available, and resilient system.

The most valuable features are its High Availability and intelligent traffic distribution, which together eliminate single points of failure. The LoadMaster constantly monitors our servers and, if one goes down, it instantly reroutes all traffic to the remaining healthy servers. This ensures seamless continuity of our services and prevents any single server from becoming a bottleneck by evenly distributing the workload.

Furthermore, SSL Offloading has dramatically improved our server performance. Since the encryption and decryption of secure traffic is a very resource-intensive task, the LoadMaster takes on this burden completely. This frees up valuable CPU and memory resources on our backend application servers, allowing them to focus on delivering our services more efficiently and resulting in a much faster and smoother experience for our users.

The product could be improved with a more intuitive interface for complex configurations and more advanced analytics. Additionally, enhanced security features, like a more robust Web Application Firewall, and stronger APIs for better automation would be beneficial. Overall, the main areas for improvement are in strengthening the advanced features to better meet the demands of large-scale enterprise environments.

key features for the next release should focus on three areas. First, an enhanced, next-generation security suite with a more powerful Web Application Firewall (WAF) and integrated bot protection. Second, more advanced and customizable analytics dashboards to provide deeper insights into application performance. Finally, greater support for modern, cloud-native environments, including better APIs for automation and seamless hybrid-cloud traffic management

I first implemented and used this load balancer two years ago when I was a resident engineer at the production data center, and it is still in use.

The stability of this solution is very high. It seems stability is one of the core reasons.

The High Availability (HA) capabilities are the foundation of its stability. By constantly monitoring your servers and instantly rerouting traffic in case of a failure, the solution ensures continuous service and eliminates a single point of failure in your environment.

Furthermore, its intelligent traffic distribution is key to maintaining stability under load. 

Based on your experiences my impression of the scalability of this solution is very positive. The Kemp LoadMaster is designed to handle growth in a flexible and cost-effective way, so it's a good long-term investment.

Based on our experience, our interactions with customer service and support have been minimal, which we consider a positive reflection of the solution's stability and our team's in-house expertise.

When we did require assistance, we primarily leveraged the vendor's online knowledge base and technical documentation. These resources were highly effective for troubleshooting and answering our technical questions, allowing us to resolve most issues without needing to contact direct support. The quality of these self-service options contributed to a smooth and efficient operational workflow.

Positive

We did not use a different solution previously. We selected the Kemp LoadMaster at the time we initialized the data center's establishment because its features were considered the best fit for our requirements. We have continued to use this solution, as it has fully met our needs and fulfilled all our requirements since its initial deployment.

The initial setup was straightforward and intuitive.

The core installation and basic configuration of the solution were user-friendly, allowing us to get the system up and running quickly after our data center was established. The interface and wizards made it easy to configure essential functions like High Availability (HA) and SSL Offloading, which were our primary requirements.

While the initial setup was simple, we found that configuring more complex, custom rules or advanced traffic policies required a deeper understanding. However, the overall process was considered efficient and we were able to deploy the solution to meet our needs without significant delays.

As the resident engineer was at the production data center, I was responsible for the full deployment and configuration. The straightforward nature of the solution’s initial setup and its intuitive interface made it possible for our in-house team to handle the entire implementation ourselves. While we sometimes leveraged vendor knowledge base articles for technical support, the hands-on expertise for the deployment was kept in-house.

The ROI is positive because the solution improved performance, ensured high availability to avoid downtime, and reduced operational costs through simplified management

My primary advice is to carefully analyze your total cost of ownership (TCO) rather than just the initial purchase price. Kemp LoadMaster is highly competitive on price and often provides a much better value compared to more expensive, traditional hardware-based solutions, which can have significant long-term maintenance costs.

Yes, we did evaluate other options before choosing Kemp LoadMaster. We conducted a thorough review of various solutions, including open-source options and other hardware and software appliances on the market. We determined that these alternatives were either too expensive, lacked the flexibility we needed, or were simply not a good fit for our specific production environment. Ultimately, we found that Kemp offered the best combination of essential features, cost-effectiveness, and ease of use.

Kemp LoadMaster has been a highly effective and reliable solution for our organization. We selected it when our data center was first established, and it has consistently fulfilled all of our requirements since then.

The solution's primary use case is to load-balance inbound traffic—specifically HTTPS and DNS—to our Synergy Blade servers. Its High Availability (HA) and intelligent traffic distribution capabilities have been crucial for ensuring continuous service and preventing server bottlenecks. The SSL Offloading feature was also a major factor, as it significantly improved server performance by handling resource-intensive encryption tasks.

Based on my experience, I advise others to take full advantage of Kemp's flexible licensing models—perpetual, subscription, and pay-as-you-go—to match their specific financial and operational needs.

I use Kemp LoadMaster for the application delivery controller. I have a couple of applications hosted behind the load balancer.

If I have an application behind the load balancer, the distribution of traffic helps me.

Security is considered the most effective feature in Kemp LoadMaster. In terms of performance, it improves work performance, especially in the distribution of traffic behind the load balancer.

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 capabilities like DDoS mitigation and others available in other load balancers. Virtual chassis is another capability that should be added.

I have been using Kemp LoadMaster for the last two or three years.

It's rated seven out of ten for stability. The support team should resolve issues faster.

Kemp LoadMaster is scalable, however, there are many features that need to be added. There are challenges, and I'm not using virtual chassis in Kemp cloud Bharat.

The support team takes a lot of time to provide resolutions.

Positive

I am currently using F5 due to the range of capabilities they offer compared to Kemp LoadMaster.

I evaluated F5, which offers more capabilities.

Kemp LoadMaster is easy to use, especially for smaller organizations or infrastructures. The biggest benefit is that it's easy to use and configure.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

I use Kemp LoadMaster in my company as a replacement for Microsoft Forefront Threat Management Gateway and as a load balancer for Microsoft Exchange services in an on-premises environment. Nowadays, I use Kemp LoadMaster as an application load balancer for SQL Server, DNS servers, and different applications where load balancing is possible.

The most valuable feature of the solution is the Edge Security Pack (ESP). With Edge Security Pack (ESP), you can have your internet connections checked against the authorizations, functionalities, and the pre-authorization that happens when you access resources from the internet that are hosted internally so that no one can access these services without authentication.

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.

I have been using Kemp LoadMaster for ten years. My company has a partnership with Microsoft and Kemp, and we implement Kemp LoadMaster for our customers. My company doesn't use Kemp LoadMaster since it is not required in our infrastructure.

With Kemp LoadMaster, my company has never faced any functionality issues in the IT environment of our customers. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

I recommend Kemp LoadMaster to businesses of all sizes. Even small companies require the same functionalities of Kemp LoadMaster as large companies.

I have never seen a vendor offer such great support to users, to be honest. I rate the technical support a ten out of ten. When you write to Kemp LoadMaster asking for technical support, you won't have to wait for longer than two hours. Kemp LoadMaster offers you a technician who works remotely regardless of the areas of issues in the product, which is really awesome.

Positive

The initial setup of Kemp LoadMaster is very simple.

The solution is deployed on an on-premises model. We often use Siebel Server Load Balancing for cloud-based services and not Kemp LoadMaster since it is a tool that is included with services provided by Microsoft, making it easier for us to use. Typically, we use Kemp LoadMaster on-premises.

Currently, I cannot compare Kemp LoadMaster with similar solutions in the market since I see that my company has to do a lot of work with those customers who use Citrix NetScaler. With Citrix NetScaler, the configuration part is handled by the customer or by one of the partners of Citrix NetScaler. Neither I nor my company have ever taken part in the configuration part of Citrix NetScaler.

I rate the overall solution a ten out of ten.

We use LoadMaster for application load balancing.

LoadMaster is easy to deploy and understand. 

I want to have the ability to pull a particular server. The DevOps portion was challenging for me, like if I needed to redirect from one IP to another URL. I needed to look that up, and the knowledge base is not well organized. When I look for information about Kemp on the Internet, I don't find many articles or anything like that.

I have used LoadMaster for about four years.

LoadMaster is highly stable.

LoadMaster is suitable for enterprise businesses. 

I rate Kemp support nine out of 10. Kemp support is good, but LoadMaster is highly stable, so we don't have many issues. We contacted them only once. 

Positive

The deployment doesn't take much time. It's easier if you have a VM. The hardware takes some time to connect. It hardly takes an hour to deploy if you have everything configured. Kemp is easier to maintain compared to Cisco. 

LoadMaster is cheaper than some other solutions. It has a perpetual license, so it's a one-time cost.

I rate Kemp LoadMaster nine out of 10. 

For one major customer, we installed the Kemp Loadmaster as before this I was in security and firewall. But it was requested by Microsoft that there needs to be a Load Balancer in front of the exchange platform. So Kemp is used as a Load Balancer.

From my personal experience, many firewalls provide Load Balancing functionalities, but Kemp Loadmaster has a lot of features and functionalities like what you can configure. So there are a lot of features but we use only five percent of it. 

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 have been using the solution since 2015. 

It is a stable solution. We do not have many users using the solution only one customer is left who uses virtual Loadmasters and the solution is working stable. 

The technical support team is good. I rate them nine out of ten.

Positive

The initial setup is straightforward as they have good documentation.

The price of the solution is cheap. 

My advice is on what they are already using. For example, if it's in a Data Center customer and he already has some security devices and servers. And I would ask him what kind of functionality you want if this can already be set up in a firewall because I'm working very much with FortiGate Firewalls, which also provide load-balancing functionalities. But only up to a specific level, and if it's simple load balancing, round drop into two servers, then you can do it with the firewall. So you don't need an extra device like a dedicated load balancer. But when it comes to load balancing for an exchange platform or another. For the same customer, we replaced the Microsoft TMG with Kemp LoadMaster. Then you have to deal with things and features. For this, you need then this dedicated load to balance the device. So it depends on the functionalities that one requires. 

I rate the overall solution a nine out of ten.

My primary use case of this solution is as a web application firewall.

Kemp mitigated our cross-scripting vulnerabilities, cookie-related issues, and content security policy issues. Instead of working on each application, we can do everything with Kemp. In addition, using Kemp has raised our site score from average to fully-secured.

The most valuable feature is that Kemp can be integrated with our active directory, so then we can use ESP. Then SSL certificates can be hosted or deployed from Kemp rather than going through the application.

The UI is very basic and not very attractive, so this could be an area for improvement. In the next release, I would like to see global load balancing and the ability to connect to networks not physically attached to the individual device (VPNs or point-to-point connections, for example).

I have been using this solution for three years.

Kemp is very reliable.

I had some difficulty getting the correct load balances, but it's very reliable otherwise.

I have had no issues at all with their support team.

I previously used an open-source version of this solution, but it was very hard to maintain and suffered frequent crashes, so we switched to Kemp for better reliability. I also used Citrix, but the use case for it is completely different than for Kemp.

The initial setup was very straightforward, requiring only around an hour of configuration.

A team wasn't required because the product is straightforward.

Our aim in implementing Kemp was to improve our security posture and increase our security ratings because we were losing business due to our rating being a bit low. Once we implemented Kemp and shared our new security scorecard, our projects got extended, so I believe that Kemp has helped to bring us more business.

We pay around $10,000 a year for licensing. There are no additional costs.

I evaluated the on-premises version of Citrix but found Kemp to be more helpful, while Citrix was more expensive and not very user-friendly.

Each and every organization that hosts applications should have this solution. I would rate this solution as nine out of ten.

My primary use case for this solution is load balancing and application load balancing.

The feature I find most valuable is load balancing with different algorithms.

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. I am not sure if this is due to poor configuration or not, but I think that the stability could be improved.

I have been using this solution since 2019.

I would rate the scalability of this solution a nine, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

When it comes to the maintenance and support of this solution, we have one person dedicated to solving these issues from Kemp Resources that knows our environment and setup.

We used NLP, which is not in the same leak. That's a Microsoft inbuilt network load balancer, but it's not in the same leak. It doesn't do the application-level low balancing.

My impression is that the initial setup process is quite straightforward and decent. The only part that was tricky was the global server load balancing.

Our model of deployment is on-premises.

The deployment was done with assistance from Kemp resources based in our country.

Regarding the pricing of this solution, I would say it's somewhere in the middle because at the bottom you have free solutions and at the top the most expensive ones.

I would rate this solution as a whole a nine, on a scale from one to 10, with one being the worst and 10 being the best.

I would advise other people trying to use this solution to go ahead and try to use it as some use cases are quite complex. Our use case is straightforward.

We use an on-premises Skype for Business Server VoIP service that utilizes the Kemp LoadMaster LM-2400 for service resiliency. This allows our three front-end servers to seamlessly support our service. We never miss a call and our chat service is always ready as a result.

Kemp has a pre-made virtual service profile that perfectly fits our use case so the initial setup is quite easy. We also have expanded the use of the LoadMaster to accommodate a number of ancillary services that also require resilience.

The Kemp LoadMaster is easy to set up, well documented, and very easy to maintain. It has done a flawless job supporting our Microsoft Skype for Business Server VoIP services, as well as expanding to cover a number of other services that require load balancing.

The LoadMaster has helped to keep our Voice over IP services in-house, which has produced tremendous savings versus hosting our services in the cloud. This has allowed us to devote our resources to other projects, increasing our overall effectiveness.

The load balancing features of the LoadMaster are the best we have used.

Failover is seamless and our services are rock solid. Kemp maintains a library of templates pre-configured for a number of services, including Microsoft Skype for Business Server. This makes configuring the virtual services very easy. It also makes it very easy to add additional virtual services as you find new use cases. The convenience of being able to download new or updated templates from Kemp's support site cannot be understated.

If I had to pick an area for improvement, I think it would be direct integration with the template library. At present, you need to download the templates from the Kemp support portal and then upload them onto the LoadMaster. 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.

We first implemented our Kemp LoadMaster eight years ago when we launched a new VoIP project that required load balancing for enhanced reliability.

The stability is rock solid. We have only experienced one issue in eight years. Kemp support was all over it and got us back online in no time.

For our organization, the LM-2400 is perfectly sized. I'm sure it has an upper limit but we have not gotten anywhere near it yet.

Kemp tech support has been absolutely fantastic. 

We have had one hardware issue, which over a span of eight years isn't bad at all, and one setup question. Both of these issues were handled quickly and to our satisfaction.

Previously, we had been using a Barracuda load balancer. It was nice but the management was not as easy to use and it was not quite as reliable as we would have liked.

The initial setup was very straightforward. The virtual service templates provided by Kemp make setup a snap!

We used a vendor team but our assigned technician was not familiar with networking or load balancing. I ended up taking over the setup and it couldn't have been easier.

The Kemp LoadMaster is a tremendous value. It works well and is easy to set up and to maintain.

Barracuda and F5 were evaluated as well. The performance and value were found to be much better with the Kemp LoadMaster.

The Kemp LoadMaster just works. It is extraordinarily difficult to suggest any changes that might improve its feature set. Go with Kemp, you won't regret it!

We use the Kemp Loadmaster to load-balance enterprise-wide applications that require high-availability. We also wanted to make sure the performance and throughput meet the needs of the usage of our applications.

These applications include Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS), Microsoft SharePoint (2010, 2013), file sharing servers, multiple public-facing websites, multiple internal websites, on-premise IT Service Management applications, and others.

The LoadMaster handles both production and development environments for these applications.

The Kemp LoadMaster was very easy to deploy and we initially deployed without needing much tech support help. The management is very intuitive and can easily be used by techs without needing extensive training to use.

The LoadMaster met all of the features and performance we were looking for at a very affordable price. We were also looking to lessen the real estate rack space in our data centers and really wanted a virtual solution that will work with our Hyper-V environment.

Having a Hyper-V image that we easily deployed to multiple Hyper-V clusters allowed us to achieve high availability with the LoadMaster.

The templates provided by Kemp for well-known applications like Exchange and SharePoint make these applications very easy to deploy. When the templates are used, there is not much left to configure and they just work!

I have used and evaluated templates from other load balancing vendors, but still required extra help from a technician just to make the application work correctly. This is a little frustrating sometimes since you would think that the template should just work.

I have not had any issues with any of the LoadMaster templates at all.

Out of the box, the LoadMaster provides real-time statistics regarding connections to the real servers, as well as to the virtual services. We see the number of connections in the last 5/30/60 minutes, and current active connections as well. However, it would be nice if we were able to drill in further to see the actual IP addresses that made up these connections, whether they were coming from the internet or internal, and possibly the option to disconnect certain active connections.

The historical graphs showing CPU metrics and the network is useful, as well. It would be nice if the historical metrics were easily exportable from the interface.

We have been using Kemp LoadMaster for the past nine years. This was eight years using the hardware-based LoadMaster, and less than a year on the virtual LoadMaster platform.

We like the stability of the LoadMaster setup on high-availability, running two separate Hyper-V clusters. We have tested HA failover of the virtual devices a few times now and failover worked perfectly each time.

Since we are using virtual LoadMasters, we are certain that we can easily scale when needed without needing extra hardware.

Kemp customer service is excellent. When I had submitted a ticket for questions I had, the response was almost immediate and they made sure to always follow up with me just to check that everything was to our satisfaction.

We switched from a prior solution since the LoadMaster provided the features, performance and throughput that we required for a more affordable price point.

The initial setup is very easy since we were provided an image for our hypervisor. Technical documentation was provided and it was very easy to follow and initially configure without needing extra technical help.

We implemented in-house.

Our ROI on the Kemp LoadMaster is very positive.

It is well-priced and licensing is very flexible.

We looked at Radware and F5.

The LoadMaster is very easy to set up, configure, and manage. We have been using it for almost 10 years and are still very happy with this solution.

We use our devices as virtual load balancers for Exchange 2016, primarily.

We have two sites with two LMs at each site in clusters. We also use the devices as global DNS services and reverse proxy/authentication servers for our external users.

Our services are primarily Microsoft products being served. These include Exchange, SharePoint, CRM Dynamics, Skype, and ADFS. We are also looking at implementing websites in the future as required.

SSL offloading is enabled. Our devices are set up in the network as well as the DMZ.

With Kemp, I have been able to implement a global DNS load balancer between two sites for internal and external users with our existing Exchange DAG setup. This has made DR and BCP much easier to manage.

Our previous setup used Microsoft's TMG solution, and when that went end of life we needed to figure out a replacement. Being able to use load balancing, SSL offloading, and Edge Security Packages, all in one service, made my life much easier to manage from a day to day and single pane of glass perspective.

ESP gives us peace of mind because it has taken over from Microsoft's Threat Management Gateway (reverse proxy) solution. It also alerts us if there are attempted security breaches so that we can be sure we are safe.

The DNS Load Balancer makes it so that I don't have to worry about site failures. As it manages both our external DNS and internal DNS queries, we can failover to the individual sites as required. This is true for site failures as well as planned maintenance. 

We also use the Kemp 360 Vision, which monitors our services from an external perspective and alerts us via SMS and email, so I know if things go down. 

We experienced a brief period of instability.

We have been using Kemp LoadMaster for six years.

I have only had an issue with the solution once in terms of stability. The issue was not an end user-visible issue, and upgrading the O/S fixed the issue right away.

I beleive it's scalable because I can always upgrade my licensing to a unit that handles more requests. 

Service is great, easy to work with, and always responsive.

Prior to Kemp LoadMaster, we used end-of-life products from Microsoft.

The initial setup is straightforward, due to Kemp's support services and available templates and documentation.

We completed the setup in-house.

I believe it is high due to the many services that the solution has been able to provide.

From a cost perspective, Kemp is very competitive and is not hard to justify by any means.

We looked at Citrix Netscaler as well as a solution by A10 Networks.

My advice is to use Kemp's support to help with the initial setup. It is included in the initial cost and it makes sure that best practices are used. Keep up with the support because it's worth it.

I am currently happy with everything.