No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

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

Why PeerSpot?
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 5, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
6.4
F5 BIG-IP AFM offers cost-effective returns with F5 bundles, though standalone returns are moderate, providing practical daily value.
Sentiment score
6.0
Fastly boosts return on investment with improved performance, reduced latency, and cuts infrastructure costs by 40-60%.
Reducing infrastructure costs by 40 to 60% because Edge Caching minimizes backend traffic, resulting in lower computing costs.
Senior software engineer at Simplify vms
I have seen a return on investment, particularly in time savings, especially regarding the changes.
Cloud architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.8
F5 BIG-IP AFM support is responsive and praised, though expertise varies; customer service is excellent, communication needs improvement.
Sentiment score
6.3
Fastly's customer care is efficient with multi-channel support, but has inconsistencies in response times and transparency across time zones.
The responses are generally fast and effective.
System Advisor at a tech services company with 5,001-10,000 employees
I rate the technical support by F5 a ten from one to ten.
Information Security Engineer at BigFish Enterprise Ltd.
The customer service is excellent, and I rate it ten out of ten.
Network Security Engineer at IIPL
demonstrating the team's technical expertise in CDN and Edge architecture
Senior software engineer at Simplify vms
We have SLAs defined because we opted for enterprise support pricing.
Staff Engineer at a retailer with 1,001-5,000 employees
I would describe Fastly's customer support as fast and efficient when I have had to use it.
Cloud architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.0
F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager is scalable and flexible, supporting diverse environments and thousands of users daily.
Sentiment score
6.4
Fastly is praised for scalability, ease of growth support, cloud flexibility, excellent support, and successful global integrations.
The solution is highly scalable, allowing me to add or remove nodes and manage traffic without interruption, which is essential for meeting application demands.
System Advisor at a tech services company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Seamlessly handling massive traffic without requiring backend changes due to its globally distributed Edge network and stateless API-driven design.
Senior software engineer at Simplify vms
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.4
F5 BIG-IP AFM is highly rated for stability, reliability, and efficient logging, with no major bugs or issues reported.
Sentiment score
7.3
Fastly is stable and reliable with high uptime, no technical issues, and strong performance in enterprise applications.
Highly reliable for enterprise-scale applications with high uptime guarantees.
Senior software engineer at Simplify vms
 

Room For Improvement

F5 BIG-IP AFM needs better GUI, cloud integration, pricing, support, reporting, and zero-day prevention to enhance user experience.
Fastly requires improvements in China presence, configuration complexity, pricing, customer support, security features, documentation, and bot detection.
I would assess the importance of F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)'s integration with cloud services as significant.
Information Security Engineer at BigFish Enterprise Ltd.
The appliance and features could be enhanced further, especially in terms of security.
System Advisor at a tech services company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Having advanced technology similar to other vendors like Palo Alto for zero-day attack prevention would be valuable.
Network Security Engineer at IIPL
I chose 8 out of 10 because it has excellent performance and low latency delivery, making it suitable for larger applications, with strong Edge Caching and instant purging capabilities.
Senior software engineer at Simplify vms
Fastly could improve by improving the documentation and having some code examples.
Cloud architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Fastly should provide features similar to Cloudflare regarding a block list.
Technical support engineer at Adobe
 

Setup Cost

F5 BIG-IP AFM is costly yet valued for its stability, functionality, and perceived value for money despite high pricing.
Fastly is competitively priced with usage-based costs and customizable options, but some find it expensive with a learning curve.
The standard license is reasonably priced, but additional features like the WAF can be more expensive.
System Advisor at a tech services company with 5,001-10,000 employees
If considering a one-stop solution that provides load balancing, DNS security, AAA authentication, and firewalling on the same hardware, the cost is reasonable.
Network Security Engineer at IIPL
Setup costs are low since no infrastructure needs provisioning, mainly focusing on DNS configurations, cache rules, and origin integration.
Senior software engineer at Simplify vms
In terms of price, I find it good.
Cloud architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Valuable Features

F5 BIG-IP AFM provides robust security and performance with features like DDoS protection and AI-driven traffic analysis.
Fastly CDNs integrate with Signal Sciences WAF for efficient content delivery, enhancing performance with global edge locations and code management.
The solution provides behavioral analysis via AI to detect malicious traffic.
Network Security Engineer at IIPL
The scalability feature also allows me to manage and allocate resources dynamically without disrupting production traffic.
System Advisor at a tech services company with 5,001-10,000 employees
I think the DDoS features are valuable in F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM), and I recommend it usually for certain types of companies.
Information Security Engineer at BigFish Enterprise Ltd.
Fastly has a wide number of configuration features that can be performed, and I emphasize that they can be done from code, which makes it much more traceable.
Cloud architect at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
We observed a 30 to 50% reduction in response time and a significant reduction in backend load of 40 to 60%, improving visibility through a real-time dashboard for monitoring traffic, errors, and performance.
Senior software engineer at Simplify vms
In this project, it is working as a reverse proxy for CDN and WAF, web application firewall, additionally image optimization.
Technical support engineer at Adobe
 

Categories and Ranking

F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall...
Ranking in Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection
12th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Fastly
Ranking in Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection
11th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
CDN (7th), Web Application Firewall (WAF) (25th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection category, the mindshare of F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) is 2.0%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Fastly is 3.7%, up from 2.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Fastly3.7%
F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)2.0%
Other94.3%
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection
 

Featured Reviews

Nawapol Boonlerd - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Security Engineer at BigFish Enterprise Ltd.
Comprehensive network protection has mitigated DDoS risks and supports secure on-prem operations
Currently, there are no weaknesses or disadvantages in F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) that I have identified. It is a little bit expensive, and I think about additional features they could have in the future to make it even better. For example, I have thoughts about the price. Currently, it does not integrate, and I would assess the importance of F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)'s integration with cloud services as significant. Currently, I use only one site, and I cannot tell you about F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) centralized security policies. I have not used F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM)'s Threat Intelligence capabilities. I have not used their dynamic traffic shaping feature. So far, the only thing that could be improved is the pricing of F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM).
Pranay Jain - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior software engineer at Simplify vms
Edge caching has transformed response times and delivers faster candidate data globally
Fastly can be improved in certain areas such as VCL, which is powerful but has a steep learning curve for normal users. A more user-friendly, UI-based configuration could simplify the experience, alongside better templates for common use cases and dashboard improvements, as the current dashboard feels complex for beginners, and pricing can be hard to predict for smaller companies. I chose 8 out of 10 because it has excellent performance and low latency delivery, making it suitable for larger applications, with strong Edge Caching and instant purging capabilities. However, VCL complexity and pricing predictability, especially for smaller companies, along with a user-friendly dashboard are areas impacting my score.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection solutions are best for your needs.
913,683 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
11%
Engineering Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

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...
What needs improvement with F5 Advanced Firewall Manager?
Currently, there are no weaknesses or disadvantages in F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) that I have identified. It is a little bit expensive, and I think about additional features they cou...
What is your primary use case for F5 Advanced Firewall Manager?
I am starting to learn and working with F5 team to conduct a proof of concept, and I do have experience with F5 Rules for AWS WAF. I have experience with BIG-IP, not BIG-IQ, and I may have experien...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fastly?
In terms of price, I find it good, and as I mentioned, the implementation cost had some difficulty at the beginning due to the learning curve.
What needs improvement with Fastly?
I think Fastly could improve by improving the documentation and having some code examples so that it is easier for developers, since at the beginning it becomes a bit complicated.
What is your primary use case for Fastly?
My primary use case for Fastly is using it as a CDN to speed up my customers' access to the applications. A specific example of how Fastly has helped improve my customers' access to the application...
 

Also Known As

F5 AFM, F5 Advanced Firewall Manager
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

City Bank, Ricacorp Properties, Miele, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office
Twitter, Airbnb, Alaska Airlines, Pinterest, Vimeo, The Guardian, The New York Times, Ticketmaster, The Drupal Association, Opera, about.com, imgur, Etsy, Foursquare, GitHub, New Relic, shopify, Shazam, Firebase
Find out what your peers are saying about F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM) vs. Fastly and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
913,683 professionals have used our research since 2012.