AWS Shield vs F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and F5 are both solutions in the Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #5 with an average rating of 8.7, while F5 is ranked #13 with an average rating of 8.3. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 4.9% mindshare in DDOS, compared to F5’s 1.2% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of F5 users who would recommend it.

AWS Shield

Read 11 AWS Shield reviews

1,995 Views
1,995 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall...

Read 25 F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) reviews

1,062 Views
1,062 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

AWS Shield

F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall...

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

F5 BIG-IP AFM and AWS Shield are competing in network security, specifically in DDoS protection solutions. F5 BIG-IP AFM has a competitive edge in pricing and customer service, while AWS Shield is noted for its robust feature set and integration with AWS services.

Features: F5 BIG-IP AFM offers advanced traffic management, full-proxy security, and iRules for custom configuration. AWS Shield provides seamless integration with AWS services, automatic detection and mitigation of DDoS attacks, and real-time protection against server attacks.

Room for Improvement: F5 BIG-IP AFM could benefit from improved ease of deployment, enhanced integration capabilities, and a more intuitive user interface. AWS Shield could optimize its feature set for non-AWS environments, provide more detailed analytics, and offer more flexible pricing options.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: AWS Shield is easily deployable within AWS, offering automated setup and robust integration. F5 BIG-IP AFM requires more setup time but provides reliable customer support, enhancing user experience for those prioritizing personalized assistance.

Pricing and ROI: F5 BIG-IP AFM attracts users with its competitive pricing and strong ROI for businesses with existing infrastructure. AWS Shield justifies its higher initial cost with significant long-term ROI through seamless AWS integration and reduced management overhead.

To learn more, read our detailed AWS Shield vs. F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

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

December 2025

Download the complete report

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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

AWS Shield

Ranking in Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection

5th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall...

Ranking in Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection

13th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection category, the mindshare of AWS Shield is 4.9%, down from 6.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) is 1.2%, down from 1.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
AWS Shield	4.9%
F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)	1.2%
Other	93.9%

Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection

Featured Reviews

PranavTelang

Lead Architect at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees

Has enabled multi-layered threat mitigation but still lacks deeper visibility for advanced application attacks

AWS Shield has limited coverage as it only protects against common and high-volume network and transport layer attacks, such as SYN floods. It does not provide inherent protection against more sophisticated layer 7 attacks such as HTTP floods. In such cases, integration with WAF is necessary, which results in additional costs for customers. To protect layer 7, layer 4, and layer 3, customers must implement both solutions. The service also has difficulties with static detection thresholds, which may not be sensitive enough to detect smaller application-specific attacks. While AWS Shield is a key security service, AWS should enhance their expert support with 24/7 response for complex attacks, which is currently limited.

Read full review

Pawel Augustyn

System Advisor at CRIF SpA

Provides outstanding resource management and application security across multiple geographies

The most valuable features for me are stability, availability, and security, along with the ability to manage multiple features to secure my applications. The solution also monitors and blocks unconventional requests and maintains security efficiently. The scalability feature also allows me to manage and allocate resources dynamically without disrupting production traffic.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I am impressed with the product's multiple features like security."

"The solution's ease of use is the most valuable feature."

"It is quite scalable, and we have not faced any issues with its scalability."

"The product has a good mechanism to analyze trends and trigger events."

"AWS Shield is aligned with the web application firewall (WAF), and they work seamlessly together, primarily working with Elastic Load Balancer, CloudFront, and Route 53 for CDN and DNS services protection."

"We have integrated the tool with Active Directory. The most important feature is that it's transparent and doesn't degrade the performance of our solution. Additionally, it's easy to configure, which is crucial for us. It's easy to use and set up and stops attacks on our servers. We haven't encountered any attack problems because the solution stops them in real-time. AWS Shield specifically focuses on defending against denial-of-service attacks, making it a great solution for that type of threat."

"AWS Shield offers numerous protection features that are crucial at the application layer, safeguarding users from distributed denial of service attacks, man-in-the-middle assaults, and hacker orchestrations."

"It is integrated with AWS. So, it gives you a good first step."

More AWS Shield pros

"The most valuable features of F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) are the web gateway, load balancing, services, and applications available."

"The solution provides behavioral analysis via AI to detect malicious traffic."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is that the blocking of IP's."

"This product excells in every aspect from installation and the interface to providing superior network security."

"It excels in preventing downtime and maintaining application performance, which is crucial for our clients' security and operational continuity."

"Its performance and ease of use are valuable."

"We use three main features. The first one is access control. The second feature we use is called IP intelligence. Finally, we have a DDoS safety feature."

"I find the signature base is very helpful to see traffic"

More F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) pros

Cons

"The product needs to improve its logs and reports to make it read better."

"We end up having to pay extra for features that AWS adds that we don't need."

"The product is expensive."

"The management of it is a bit hard. If you don't engineer it on the front side, it is hard to go back in and change it. It could be improved in terms of architecture requirements and then ongoing support requirements as a secondary component to it. People tend to set up things like this, and they just expect it to work without the care and feeding that needs to go back into it either from an application team or a network environment team."

"The time taken to detect anomalies must be reduced."

"AWS Shield has limited coverage as it only protects against common and high-volume network and transport layer attacks, such as SYN floods."

"Perhaps the time required to detect anomalies can be reduced. Presently, it takes some time to determine whether a situation is normal or abnormal."

"The product should give users more flexibility to customize their security policies according to their requirements."

More AWS Shield cons

"Apart from the price, I feel no other areas need improvement."

"The solution doesn't really meet our requirements for an edge firewall."

"The solution's UI could be improved."

"There is room for improvement in Advanced Firewall Manager's dashboard statistics, especially during attacks."

"There should be simplified and better integration with BIG-IQ."

"F5 BIG-IP AFM can improve the reporting interface in relation to advanced troubleshooting depending on CLI. They should have enhanced troubleshooting with the use of GUI."

"The initial setup of F5 BIG-IP AFM in a complex environment was simple. However, the full deployment took us approximately one year."

"The solution’s initial setup is not easy."

More F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost depends on traffic each month, so on average, it costs us between US$200 and US$300 per month."

"It depends on your subscription level and the volume that you're spending with AWS. So, it is very relative to the consumption alignment in your subscription level. It is a well-constructed, scalable pricing option, but it is relative to how much you're spending on AWS. Because the more you spend, typically, the more you get off on services like this. I find it to be comparable to other solutions."

"The tool's pricing is good."

"The tool is cheap."

"We pay $3000 per month for the solution."

"The product is expensive."

"We need to pay a yearly licensing fee for the solution."

"The solution is slightly on the higher priced side."

"The price of F5 BIG-IP AFM is a little more expensive than other firewalls on the market."

"F5 BIG-IP AFM is an affordable solution. There were not any additional fees other than the standard licensing."

"As per pricing, I would not say cheap, but little higher than cheap, but not very expensive. So you can say kind of value for money solutions."

"F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) is an expensive solution. They are one of the best in the market, but the price could be cheaper."

"It is somewhat on the expensive side although it is worth the additional cost."

More F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Comms Service Provider

12%

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Insurance Company

Financial Services Firm

15%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Performing Arts

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	3
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	7

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	8
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	14

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about AWS Shield?

We have integrated the tool with Active Directory. The most important feature is that it's transparent and doesn't degrade the performance of our solution. Additionally, it's easy to configure, whi...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS Shield?

The pricing structure for AWS Shield is fair, yet it depends on the specific protections chosen. Enabling Shield Advanced on multiple services such as CloudFront, network load balancer, or Route 53...

See all answers

What needs improvement with AWS Shield?

Services always benefit from improvements, including AWS Shield. With respect to the Web Application Firewall, current rule-based setups may not be adequately defined or classified. Enhancement of ...

See all answers

What do you like most about F5 Advanced Firewall Manager?

CGNAT is one of its strong areas.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 Advanced Firewall Manager?

The standard license is reasonably priced, but additional features like the WAF can be more expensive. There are plenty of technical documents and a supportive community available, which helps mana...

See all answers

What needs improvement with F5 Advanced Firewall Manager?

The appliance and features could be enhanced further, especially in terms of security. Some features like the WAF ( /categories/web-application-firewall-waf ) firewall may seem expensive compared t...

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Comparisons

Cloudflare vs AWS Shield

Compared 24% of the time

Azure DDoS Protection vs AWS Shield

Compared 20% of the time

Cloudflare One vs AWS Shield

Compared 16% of the time

Radware DDoS vs AWS Shield

Compared 8% of the time

More AWS Shield Competitors

Arbor DDoS vs F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)

Compared 42% of the time

Radware DDoS vs F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)

Compared 23% of the time

A10 Thunder TPS vs F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)

Compared 17% of the time

Cloudflare One vs F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)

Compared 9% of the time

More F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

AWS Shield

January 2026

Download AWS Shield product report

Buyer's Guide

F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)

January 2026

F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) report

Download F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) product report

Also Known As

No data available

F5 AFM, F5 Advanced Firewall Manager

Overview

AWS Shield is a managed Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) protection service that safeguards applications running on AWS. AWS Shield provides always-on detection and automatic inline mitigations that minimize application downtime and latency, so there is no need to engage AWS Support to benefit from DDoS protection.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) is a high-performance, full-proxy network security solution designed to protect networks and data centers against incoming threats that enter the network. Built on F5’s industry-leading BIG-IP hardware and software platforms, BIG-IP AFM provides a scalable platform that delivers the flexible performance and control needed to mitigate aggressive distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) and protocol attacks before they overwhelm and degrade applications and infrastructure availability.

For service providers, BIG-IP AFM IPS does even more, protecting the network edge and performing traffic inspection and protocol adherence for prevalent service provider protocols such as SS7, Diameter, HTTP/2, GTP, SCTP and SIP traffic coming into the network over UDP, TCP, and SCTP.

Sample Customers

netflix, dow jones, mapbox, pearson, rovio, youview, moviestar planet, asurion, payplug, hour of code

City Bank, Ricacorp Properties, Miele, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office

Buyer's Guide

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

December 2025

Free Report: AWS Shield vs. F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)

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