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F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) vs Zscaler Internet Access comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 4, 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

iboss
Sponsored
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
7th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
Internet Security (3rd), Web Content Filtering (1st), Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASB) (7th), ZTNA as a Service (8th), Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (8th)
F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Man...
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
15th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
Network Access Control (NAC) (7th), SSL VPN (5th), Remote Access (10th), Access Management (10th)
Zscaler Internet Access
Ranking in Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
4th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
56
Ranking in other categories
Internet Security (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Secure Web Gateways (SWG) category, the mindshare of iboss is 2.1%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) is 1.4%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zscaler Internet Access is 14.5%, down from 17.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Secure Web Gateways (SWG)
 

Featured Reviews

Matt Crockford - PeerSpot reviewer
It's easy to roll out, and their understanding of our business made it seamless
One aspect we value about iboss is its simplicity. Their customer service is brilliant, and they are super responsive and knowledgeable. It's easy to roll out, and their understanding of our business made it seamless. We were impressed by the solution's mental health function, which can detect if someone needs help. It scans what users are browsing and flags warning signs so we can check to see if they are okay. We've had to use it a couple of times. The user interface is highly intuitive. Our IT team picked it up with minimal training. It's arranged so that it's easy to find where things are. Another advantage is the single pane of glass console, which gives you visibility into what's happening. We're not fully there yet because we haven't implemented zero trust, but we're excited about the possibilities from the demos we've seen. We launched a POC of iboss' ChatGPT Risk Protection feature two weeks ago. AI is a great tool, but you need to be careful what you put into it. My biggest fear is employees inputting sensitive corporate information or customer PII data into one of these chatbots. I was impressed by our trial of the feature. It's exactly what we wanted. Now, when a user goes to ChatGPT, there's a banner warning them not to share information, and we can block conversations containing customer data like bank details and email addresses. I don't want to stop people from using it, but we need visibility. We've only tried it on a test group of 15 people. You can configure it to look for specific keywords or integrate it with your DLP policy if you have that configured
Ashish Kumar Rai - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers remote access control, good GUI and easy to configure
I'd suggest improved documentation integration directly within the GUI. Right now, finding comprehensive documentation often requires going to external websites like the community portal. In the APM interface itself, they could add direct hyperlinks to relevant online documentation. This would provide easy access to admin guides and other resources when working within the GUI.
AshwaniTyagi - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers good reliability and availability to users
Sometimes, cost is one component that customers complain about, especially if they compare it with some of its competitors. Zscaler's pricing seems to be a bit on the higher side. I think the pricing model is also something that the tool can probably look into to optimize or improve for the customer so that it can be a competitive tool commercially. The solution's technical support needs to be improved, especially by offering a better support structure for different geographical areas.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Its initial setup was straightforward."
"The console is cloud-based, which is something I really appreciate."
"iboss is easy to use despite its complexity. Multiple engineers manage it, but it's significantly more straightforward to administer than traditional VPNs and web proxies."
"iboss is among the few products providing inline filtering where no application is needed on the device. It operates on the network side and is not device-based. This feature was one of the main reasons why we stayed with them for so long."
"iboss has significantly lowered the number of security incidents. It is crazy how much it blocks and how much it is aware of the outside danger."
"I would rate the technical support of iboss a solid 10 without a shadow of a doubt."
"Valuable features: Within the filter: Controls (Web categories, applications, and Allow/Block list) and Network (local Subnets). Within the reporter: Logs (Event Log) and Reports."
"The security aspect of the solution, particularly the malware behind it, is excellent. That's something that really helped us out. It's not just a simple proxy that just blocks the insights of potential threats that come on behind it. They do malware detection and that helps us a lot."
"I recommend F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) to others due to its reliability, and it is perceived as critical to security infrastructure."
"The solution is stable and reliable."
"The portal access was very good."
"The product allows us to create customized portals for your users."
"On a scale from one to ten for stability, I would rate F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) a ten."
"The performance of the solution is valuable."
"A lot of features are useful to me, including mostly the authentication, SAML, or SSO, with no sign-on."
"The most valuable feature is the virtual IP creation. It's our most frequently used feature."
"Zscaler offers a centralized DLP solution for web, endpoint, and email."
"We enjoy all of the proxy capabilities and the capability to integrate into the SIEM/SOC solution."
"The most valuable feature is bandwidth control."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a nine and a half out of ten...The setup phase was easy."
"The solution’s customer service is good."
"One on the main benefits is protection all time from anywhere."
"One feature that is valuable to me from an implementation point of view is that it's very easy to implement."
"For our needs, the cloud-native proxy architecture is a very good solution. We are moving away from on-prem appliances and moving more toward cloud-based solutions. Zscaler is a good fit for our strategy. This architecture helps with cyber threats because we inspect most of the traffic and we can see that a lot of threats are stopped directly in the secure web gateway."
 

Cons

"Our iboss subscription access should be more secure with an OTP or VPN etc. It is easy to gain access if, for example, hackers obtain my username and password."
"If they could implement an extra security layer preventing access to iboss from the open internet, it would be great."
"Fold that in with the risk intelligence they're getting from all of the different subscriptions they are a part of. Now, these security companies subscribe to things like emerging threats, databases, etc. You can fold all this intelligence to decide what's happening on an endpoint. I would love to see them start moving into that space. That would compete directly with Microsoft. Maybe that's why they haven't. Having that ability native within the solution would be great. The other area in which I would love to see improvement is more detailed descriptions of why they block websites."
"I'd like to see them accelerate development on the security side, particularly around data loss prevention."
"The reporting feature needs improvement. It doesn't give you the expected results. It is quite difficult to get the specific reports needed, and it is not as intuitive as the rest of the platform."
"For zero trust implementation, we encountered complexity issues, especially with a large infrastructure company ExxonMobil."
"I am currently doing a PoC of the zero trust aspect of it. Compared to other similar solutions, it is hard to get around each feature. It takes a while to get used to it."
"To scale up, a new iboss Node Blade Chassis must be purchased."
"We do not have knowledgeable support teams locally."
"The operational deployment is not great."
"If I could copy and paste objects instead of picking and configuring them from scratch each time, it would be great."
"The solution’s GUI looks very old."
"In my opinion, the GUI side needs some improvement based on my usage. Sometimes, it doesn't work as efficiently as the CLI side."
"The initial setup was complex."
"I'd suggest improved documentation integration directly within the GUI. Right now, finding comprehensive documentation often requires going to external websites like the community portal."
"The solution is quite costly."
"Zscaler Internet Access could improve by adding a VPN feature."
"I would like to see more training and video documentation."
"The reporting functionality could be a bit easier to use. There is a reporting function, but it's quite hard to do any good reporting, from a user-management perspective. For example, if a department manager wants to know how his department is using the web, there is a way to get the data, but it's quite cumbersome to get it and show it well. And that's true for comparing between departments."
"We'd like for them to include some sort of antivirus tool."
"Zscaler should continue to make the user interface better. They should also improve the backup network and continue to expand it so that it can handle larger numbers of customers."
"The performance needs improvement. Some areas create performance issues and, depending on the use cases, require reconfiguration to perform again."
"The deployment process of Zscaler Cloud Connector needs to be more user-friendly."
"There are many functionalities in Zscaler Internet Access that need improvements, such as an advanced firewall and logging capabilities to track calls."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have not priced the solution recently, but they were competitive with other vendors in the past."
"The overall pricing for iboss is very competitive and transparent."
"It is not expensive, and it is also not cheap. iboss is priced right in the sweet spot for the number of features it offers."
"It is expensive compared to one of its competitors."
"It is probably in line with other solutions, but I do not deal with the financial side."
"We had the cost of purchasing a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs. However, the following year, the cost of just licensing was similar to what was paid the previous year for a new appliance along with the implementation and licensing costs."
"The tool is a little bit expensive."
"The product is very expensive."
"I rate the tool's pricing an eight out of ten."
"Recently, they have simplified the licensing"
"It is quite expensive. It does its job, but it is quite expensive for what we need."
"It is costlier than other solutions."
"Because it's a cloud solution, we pay on a yearly basis. It is affordable and includes tech support and all features."
"The pricing is an issue. It is expensive compared to other firewalls on the market."
"We pay around 6,500 INR per user per year, which is very expensive. I would rate Zscaler's pricing one out of five."
"The tool is moderately priced."
"We have found the solution to be expensive."
"The pricing for Zscaler Internet Access could be made cheaper."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Government
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Healthcare Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with iboss?
For zero trust implementation, we encountered complexity issues, especially with a large infrastructure company Exxon...
What is your primary use case for iboss?
Previously when I used iboss, we did the POC for iboss for ExxonMobil. Four or five people wanted to move from our ol...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for iboss?
Regarding pricing, setup costs, and licensing, iboss is not cheap, and that's my only concern. There are cheaper alte...
What do you like most about F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)?
In my opinion, the GUI is perfect with the configuration options provided. F5 BIG-IP has given customization options ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)?
F5 products are more expensive than other solutions but are valued for their quality and reliability, akin to purchas...
What needs improvement with F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM)?
F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM ( /categories/application-performance-monitoring-apm-and-observability )) does n...
Which is the better security solution - Cisco Umbrella or Zscaler?
Cisco Umbrella and Zscaler Internet Access are two broad-spectrum Internet security solutions that I have tried. Zs...
Which is better, Zscaler internet access or Netsckope CASB?
We researched Netskope but ultimately chose Zscaler. Netskope is a cloud access security broker that helps identify ...
 

Also Known As

iBoss Cloud Platform
F5 Access Policy Manager
ZIA
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

More than 4,000 global enterprises trust the iboss Cloud Platform to support their modern workforces, including a large number of Fortune 50 companies.
City Bank, Ricacorp Properties, Miele, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office
Ulster-Greene ARC, BanRegio, HDFC, Ralcorp Holdings Inc., British American Tobacco, Med America Billing Services Inc., Lanco Group, Aquafil, Telefonica, Swisscom, Brigade Group
Find out what your peers are saying about F5 BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) vs. Zscaler Internet Access and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.