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F5 Shape Security vs Imperva Application Security Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 22, 2026

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

F5 Shape Security
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Fraud Detection and Prevention (21st)
Imperva Application Securit...
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
147
Ranking in other categories
CDN (2nd), Web Application Firewall (WAF) (1st), Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (4th), Bot Management (1st), API Security (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Security Software solutions, they serve different purposes. F5 Shape Security is designed for Fraud Detection and Prevention and holds a mindshare of 1.6%, down 2.1% compared to last year.
Imperva Application Security Platform, on the other hand, focuses on Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection, holds 8.1% mindshare, up 7.4% since last year.
Fraud Detection and Prevention Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
F5 Shape Security1.6%
ThreatMetrix4.9%
Riskified3.4%
Other90.1%
Fraud Detection and Prevention
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Imperva Application Security Platform8.1%
Cloudflare13.2%
Radware DDoS6.8%
Other71.9%
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection
 

Featured Reviews

Nikolay Dimitrov - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber Security Engineer at Paysafe / IBM
Easy to configure and blocks bot attacks for web users
The solution is deployed on the F5 cloud. The solution's real-time analytics help you see what has been blocked. It helps to see whether the attack category was an automation attack or a fake browser. F5 Shape Security has a normal dashboard. We are doing F5 Shape Security migrations for 30 customers. F5 Shape Security uses Javascript. For a lot of competitors, the Javascript can be reverse-engineered by attackers to bypass the protection. F5 Shape Security has machine learning authentication of the Java script. If you had hacked it, the encryption would have been changed. It's really hard for attackers to reverse engineer the F5 Shape Security JavaScript. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.
reviewer2818155 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Associate at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Application protection has improved and reporting and dashboards still need refinement
I believe Imperva Application Security Platform should have a more interactive wizard. While the dashboard is good, it could be more eye-catching. Based on my perspective, I recommend modifying the dashboards, especially the main dashboard where I can see the traffic hit count, alerts, and other latest information. In terms of reporting, I find it challenging to create reports; in my earlier days, it was difficult. Over time, I have learned how to create reports, but it should be easier to do so. I have used other tools such as firewalls or SolarWinds, where creating a report is straightforward and does not take much time, unlike in Imperva, where I have to add many elements. Modifications in the integration aspects would also be beneficial.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of the solution is the ease of configuration."
"F5 Shape Security's most valuable feature is performance."
"Setup was straightforward, very simple. I only entered the domain and Incapsula returned the DNS data that I needed to change for the protection to be configured."
"On the real time, you can see live traffic, which is flowing into our website."
"There are a number of features that are valuable such as the account takeover and various antivirus features."
"Scalability is pretty easy on the base platform. You just add another, and you're ready to go."
"Imperva solutions are the best in terms of stability."
"The solution is very affordable; it's based on the average traffic utilization, not the DDoS traffic, so if you're being DDoSed, you don't pay extra for the absorption of the DDoS traffic."
"The valuable features of Imperva WAF include its effective security breach prevention through automatically updating rules."
"The most valuable aspect of it is that it blocks all types of attacks."
 

Cons

"I want the solution's custom exclusion rules to be more granular."
"The tool's price is high."
"In the past, I have had bugs on the WAF."
"This is a very limited tool if you're looking to customize."
"If I had the opportunity to recommend an enhancement to Imperva it would be to have more POP (Point of Presence) in East and West Africa, and in Central Africa as well."
"The rules surrounding the making of web applications could be improved."
"The solution needs to improve Integration with third parties for their on-prem deployment models. The integration is not that good yet."
"There’s nothing that’s missing in terms of features."
"The support for the on-premises version needs improvement."
"The solution should integrate with something that looks at continuous security management."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is moderately priced."
"​Although the pricing can be a little high, it is worth the protection and security that it offers.​"
"Varies depending on the needs of the customer."
"Everybody complains about the price of this solution."
"The cost is somewhere around $10,000 a site. For every site, you pay individually. For every DNS entry, you have you pay."
"There is a license for this solution and we purchase the license annually with no additional fees."
"It's an excellent product, but it can be very costly."
"It is very costly, but the return on investment is very high. Its cost was around $70,000, and we got it back in just six months."
"The license is on a yearly basis."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
28%
Healthcare Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Retailer
5%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business88
Midsize Enterprise25
Large Enterprise70
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
Which Web Application Firewall (WAF) would you recommend? R&S or Imperva?
Imperva is a strong choice, given their security focus and ongoing R&D into the product in areas such as bot management.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Imperva DDoS?
The pricing, setup costs, and licensing of Imperva DDoS are reasonable for the amount of technical capabilities provided. I would rate the pricing of Imperva DDoS as five, where one is very cheap a...
What needs improvement with Imperva DDoS?
I would like to see improvements in the pooling of threats and attacks, possibly to enlarge the scale of indicators of compromise. For example, the initiation of an attack on the endpoint level cou...
 

Also Known As

Shape Security
Imperva Bot Management, Imperva Web Application Firewall, Imperva API Security
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Wells Fargo, Loblaw, JetBlue, Zoosk
Hitachi, BNZ, Bitstamp, Moz, InnoGames, BTCChina, Wix, LivePerson, Zillow and more.
Find out what your peers are saying about NICE, BioCatch, ThreatMetrix and others in Fraud Detection and Prevention. Updated: June 2026.
900,644 professionals have used our research since 2012.