Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

AWS WAF vs Barracuda Web Application Firewall comparison

Sponsored
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

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

Cloudflare
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
CDN (1st), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (1st), Managed DNS (1st), Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) (13th)
AWS WAF
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
59
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (2nd)
Barracuda Web Application F...
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Web Application Firewall (WAF) (17th)
 

Featured Reviews

Carlos Alam Hernandez Baruch - PeerSpot reviewer
Fast and secure deployments simplify operations for government and fintech clients
It is a fast and secure DNS. It is very easy to deploy, and my customers are happy with this tool. Additionally, the CDN performance in Mexico is excellent, providing fast service and tools. It offers reliability during high-traffic periods, ensuring no impact on the environment. It helps my clients avoid using on-premise boxes, simplifying operations as they only use the prices on Cloudflare.
Kavin Kalaiarasu - PeerSpot reviewer
AWS's cloud-native security simplifies rule enforcement but needs better DDoS integration
The dashboarding could be improved, and the default metrics provided by AWS WAF could be upgraded. The rate at which AWS updates their managed rule sets could be better. Features like bot protection or DDoS mitigation, available with other WAF vendors, do not come natively with AWS WAF. Instead, they are part of AWS Shield. Providing DDoS protection as part of their WAF solution would be beneficial.
Anne-Aimee Wollerich - PeerSpot reviewer
Managing bot traffic effectively enhances usability for non-technical users
Barracuda Web Application Firewall lacks some of the more specified and structured features offered by solutions like Tenable. Although Tenable is more expensive and less easily deployable, its features are more deepened and chiseled, particularly for IT personnel. For example, Tenable provides more comprehensive dark web scanning capabilities, which Barracuda could improve upon.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is stable, and the DNS servers are simple to use."
"Generally, I am satisfied with this product."
"The solution automatically detects and responds to certain types of traffic based on geolocation."
"I like Cloudflare's application gateway and DDoS protection."
"Cloudflare consolidates various capabilities into one product, streamlining processes."
"The most valuable features of the solution are performance and security."
"It's very user-friendly."
"Easier http to https redirect using page rules"
"The most valuable feature is that it is very easy to configure. It just takes a couple of minutes."
"AWS WAF has a lot of integrated features and services. For example, there are security services that can be integrated very well for our customers."
"The most valuable feature is the way it blocks threats to external applications."
"As a basic WAF, it's better than nothing. So if you need something simple out of the box with default features, AWS WAF is good."
"One common use case is using detection protection for enhancing security models in AWS. Another use case is implementing log analysis and response recovery procedures for email services."
"The most valuable feature is the security, making sure that files are protected, preventing unauthorized users from accessing the system."
"We do not have to maintain the solution."
"The simple configuration and the scalability have been most valuable. We are able to scale across all of our different AWS instances."
"The initial setup is easy."
"It significantly improved our overall web security posture, addressing intrusions and enhancing control over web URLs in our environment."
"The customer service and support from Barracuda have been excellent."
"The solution offers multiple security features. There are machine learning features and great URL encryption. It also offers multi-protocol support against DDoS attacks."
"Even when we were upgrading to a new OS, we didn't have any difficulties with the product. The stability is good."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the simplicity of configuration."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of use and the signature base."
"Our customers value the solution's simplicity."
 

Cons

"They lack a good way to manage DNS as a company, since everything is relegated to single account logins until you get to the higher levels. They have come out with a paid feature to remedy this, but I have not had a chance to fully review it yet to know if it fixes the access problem."
"The product support needs to be accessible from more places, a wider area of coverage."
"Cloudflare doesn't have a reverse lookup. We can only do a DNS lookup to get the IP address from the hostname. It doesn't work if you want to look up the hostname from an IPA address."
"Technical support is lacking."
"An integrated SSO feature would be useful for Cloudflare DNS."
"DNS Management."
"If they improve on the placement of their data centers, it would be better. I'm living in a remote area. I would like to connect to them without any kind of lag."
"Support response time could be improved."
"Compatibility and integration functionalities, especially with services like Kafka for event-driven messaging, could be better."
"The solution is cloud-based, and therefore the billing model that comes with it could be more intuitive, in my opinion. It's very easy to not fully understand how you tag things for billing and then you can quite easily run up a high bill without realizing it. The solution needs to be more intuitive around the tagging system, which enables the billing. Right now, I have a cloud architect that does that on our behalf and it isn't something that a business user could use because it still requires quite a lot of technical knowledge to do effectively."
"The serverless product from AWS WAF could be improved. For example, they have only one serverless series, Lambda, but they should extend and improve it. Additionally, the firewall rules are not very easy to configure."
"The solution should identify why it blocks particular websites."
"On the UI side, I would like it if they could bring back the geolocation view on the corner."
"AWS WAF should provide better protection to its users, and the security features need to improve."
"They should make the implementation process faster."
"The product could be improved by expanding the weightage units of rules."
"If you know nothing about networks, then you can't set it up."
"Barracuda Web Application Firewall lacks some of the more specified and structured features offered by solutions like Tenable."
"There are false positives that I am receiving when compared to other WAFs."
"I think the main area for improvement in this product is learning it, as can be seen when comparing it to the F5 web application firewall. F5 has a very powerful learning phase when you start using your web application firewall against your site. Barracuda has something like this, but not with the same functionality from my point of view."
"The usability of the interface could be improved."
"We get false positives about phishing emails."
"The solution could use more reports."
"I would like to see a native multi-cloud cover."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing for the service is reasonable, neither excessively cheap nor prohibitively expensive. It aligns well with the value of their solution."
"The pricing depends on the usage, but the cheapest would be around 5,000 USD a month."
"So far I use free tier and happy with it. You can subscribe to business package if needed."
"The product's pricing is cheap."
"In terms of licensing costs, we don't pay for licensing for Cloudflare. We only establish communication, then for peering, Cloudflare takes care of the cross-connection in different data centers."
"That is one of the great features. I was able to access the majority of the features and services for free."
"We are using the free tier of the solution."
"It's a premium model. You can start at zero and work your way up to the enterprise model, which has a very high pricing level."
"The price is average."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a seven or eight out of ten."
"I rate the product price a five on a scale of one to ten, where one is high price, and ten is low price"
"The price of AWS WAF is expensive if you do not know how to manage your software up or down. I price of the solution is average amongst the other competitors but it would be better if it was less expensive."
"It's quite affordable. It's in the middle."
"There are different scale options available for WAF."
"The solution's cost depends on the use cases."
"It's an annual subscription."
"Cost is a bit on the higher side. Big companies can afford it."
"While I would have to check on the price of the solution, I feel it to be okay and it matches the market price."
"The price of the solution is a little expensive. There is a license for this solution and it can be purchased every one, two, or five years."
"The solution is based on a licensing model and might be $360 for the hybrid version."
"In my opinion, the product is fairly priced."
"They have competitive pricing."
"The pricing is less compared to other web applications."
"The product is inexpensive."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Web Application Firewall (WAF) solutions are best for your needs.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
6%
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Educational Organization
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?
Cloudflare. We are moving from Akamai prolexic to Cloudflare. Cloudflare anycast network outperforms Akamai static GR...
Which would you choose - Cloudflare DNS or Quad9?
Cloudflare DNS is a very fast, very reliable public DNS resolver. It is an enterprise-grade authoritative DNS service...
What do you like most about Cloudflare?
Cloudflare offers CDN and DDoS protection. We have the front end, API, and database in how you structure applications.
What are the limitations of AWS WAF vs alternative WAFs?
Hi Varun, I have had experienced with several WAF deployments and deep technical assessments of the following: 1. Im...
How does AWS WAF compare to Microsoft Azure Application Gateway?
Our organization ran comparison tests to determine whether Amazon’s Web Service Web Application Firewall or Microsoft...
What do you like most about AWS WAF?
The most valuable feature of AWS WAF is its highly configurable rules system.
What do you like most about Barracuda Web Application Firewall?
It significantly improved our overall web security posture, addressing intrusions and enhancing control over web URLs...
What is your primary use case for Barracuda Web Application Firewall?
Our primary use case was to track the traffic on websites or webshops to identify potential malicious actors, such as...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Barracuda Web Application Firewall?
The pricing for Barracuda is quite high compared to other OEMs. Each transaction requires my purchase team to negotia...
 

Also Known As

Cloudflare DNS
AWS Web Application Firewall
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Trusted by over 9,000,000 Internet Applications and APIs, including Nasdaq, Zendesk, Crunchbase, Steve Madden, OkCupid, Cisco, Quizlet, Discord and more.
eVitamins, 9Splay, Senao International
Oracle, CBS, Pioneer, Hyundai, Publix, Barnes Noble, Calzedonia, Nordstrom, Samsung, Nascar
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS WAF vs. Barracuda Web Application Firewall and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.