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F5 Silverline Managed Services vs Imperva Web Application Firewall comparison

F5 and Imperva are both solutions in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category. F5 is ranked #22 with an average rating of 8.7, while Imperva is ranked #7 with an average rating of 8.8. F5 holds a 1.2% mindshare in WAF, compared to Imperva’s 5.6% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of F5 users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 97% of Imperva users who would recommend it.
F5 Silverline Managed Services
Read 16 F5 Silverline Managed Services reviews
  • 856 Views
  • 302 Comparison Views
100% willing to recommend
Imperva Web Application Fir...
Read 52 Imperva Web Application Firewall reviews
  • 4,495 Views
  • 2,154 Comparison Views
97% willing to recommend
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

Imperva Web Application Firewall and F5 Silverline Managed Services are competitors in the web application security market. F5 appears to have the advantage in real-time mitigation and cloud-native services, while Imperva is praised for deployment ease and integration.

Features: Imperva Web Application Firewall offers attack validation, threat intelligence, and data integration, making it a robust solution for web security. F5 Silverline Managed Services is recognized for its cloud-native functionality, high-level protection, and the benefits of managed services.

Room for Improvement: Imperva users mention policy management complexity and GUI limitations, with room for better traffic visibility and enhanced bot protection. F5 feedback includes the desire for better pricing, improved stability, and expanded AI features.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Imperva is noted for its flexibility in deployment options but faces critique for support inconsistencies. F5 provides reliable support despite challenges with navigation and deployment complexity due to backend controls.

Pricing and ROI: Both products are considered expensive. Imperva is valued for potential high ROI in critical sectors, while F5's premium features are seen as justifying its price, despite budget concerns from users.

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Buyer's Guide
F5 Silverline Managed Services vs. Imperva Web Application Firewall
June 2025
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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

F5 Silverline Managed Services
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
22nd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
16
Ranking in other categories
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection (13th)
Imperva Web Application Fir...
Ranking in Web Application Firewall (WAF)
7th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
52
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Web Application Firewall (WAF) category, the mindshare of F5 Silverline Managed Services is 1.2%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Imperva Web Application Firewall is 5.6%, down from 6.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Web Application Firewall (WAF)
 

Featured Reviews

Archana Heeralal - PeerSpot reviewer
A reasonably priced product with a good UI, but the navigation is difficult, and the support team takes a long time to respond
Since we use the solution’s cloud, the product has more control over the back end. The customer will not have control. It is part of the product’s feature. When we get more complex requirements or if we want to write more complex tools, the support team will have the visibility to write them because they have control. The navigation is difficult to use. The navigation should be improved. Other products are quite straightforward. If I try to implement a new application and do an onboarding, it is not very easy. We must go to one feature, inside which there will be more features. It should be simplified, and a menu should be provided.
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Mitesh D Patel - PeerSpot reviewer
Effectively defends against threats like cross-site scripting (XSS), SQL injection, and others
It does bring value. For example, consider a BFSI customer. Their application is critical and represents their brand. Without a WAF, an attack could take their application down, harming their reputation. It leads to hampering the customer's workflow. With an Imperva WAF, they protect against attacks like DDoS or SQL injection, ensuring their application remains available and customers are happy. That's the main benefit for both the customer and the organization. The impact depends on the customer's use case. If their business primarily operates online, a CDN is beneficial for traffic optimization. Moreover, the integration options depend on the specific use case of our customers. Generally, integration capabilities are good with SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) parts.
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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 F5 Silverline Managed Services is the benchmark performance."
"We have a lot of businesses that we put behind this solution, and it has really helped us in terms of monitoring the logs and incidents."
"The most valuable feature of F5 Silverline Managed Services is its cloud-native functionality and the high level of protection it provides."
"The most important feature is that they have seven firewall protection, to protect our web servers."
"The most valuable feature of F5 Silverline Managed Services is it becomes similar to a distributed architecture."
"The product’s UI is easy to understand."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"The initial setup is very straightforward."
More F5 Silverline Managed Services pros
"The most valuable features of the Imperva Web Application Firewall are performance and flexibility. We can extend or customize the box itself."
"The solution is stable."
"Imperva monitors all traffic, even customer access, to the web application. Then, Imperva uses features like signatures to identify attacks like cross-site scripting or SQL injection."
"It is easy to use and has good security."
"The dynamic profiling of websites is the solution's most valuable feature. The security is also good."
"The solution is very scalable. It is one of the most important features. You can also expand resources and features as well."
"Very intuitive and granular configuration - It does not require much time, or advanced knowledge, for configuration and maintenance."
"The features I have found most valuable with Imperva Web Application Firewall are account takeover protection, advanced bot protection, and API security."
More Imperva Web Application Firewall pros
 

Cons

"F5 Silverline Managed Services can improve by reducing the price."
"I just hope the price can be cheaper."
"Improvements could include the creation of highly optimized profiles, optimization deployments, and compression profiles for better performance."
"There is a lot of room for improvement with their tech support. I am not sure F5 Silverline Managed Services can be classified as having tech support."
"There is room for improvement in the stability of the solution."
"You need to have Linux knowledge in order to use the shell."
"We'd like more AI to be used. Right now, they don't use it enough."
"F5 Silverline Managed Services can improve by adding features that Palo Alto has."
More F5 Silverline Managed Services cons
"Sometimes our web application firewall will slow down."
"If they can bring in generative AI features, that would be useful."
"It would be useful if the solution used more intelligence in attack protection. For example, firewalls are to be dependent on the configuration, but if they could have some data science around it the solution would be even better. The profiling of the traffic, and making decisions surrounding that should be intelligence-based, instead of being based on the configuration of the firewall itself."
"I don't really use it and therefore can't speak to areas of improvement."
"The reporting is missing some features, such as: only two export formats, and the time period does not include the last day, week, year."
"There is nothing specific where the application firewall is falling short."
"Support is one thing I wish Imperva could improve."
"I would like the solution to improve its support response time."
More Imperva Web Application Firewall cons
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of F5 Silverline Managed Services could be better, they are not very flexible. The price of the solution is based on the requirements of the enterprise."
"The product’s pricing is reasonable."
"The price of F5 Silverline Managed Services could be reduced."
"F5 Silverline Web Application Firewall works based on your bandwidth. They look at the clean bandwidth and do the pricing. 20% of a total pipe would be a clean bandwidth. The list price or a non-negotiated price for F5 Silverline Web Application Firewall would be around $2,200 per application per year for everything that you need. When you get into an enterprise kind of a setup, they negotiate this to the last bit. I would easily take 20% on that, which would be the cost, but it should cover all your Advance WAF features, bot protection, tech campaign, etc. It is built as a package and gives you most of the capability. You don't get the mobile SDK, which is an additional license. Mobile SDK is required only if you're buying or if you have a mobile application, and you are going to instrument F5 or Imperva into your mobile appliance. This anyways would be an additional module. It doesn't come within the WAF, but it is a WAF feature."
"The tool is expensive."
"It is a very affordable solution."
"The cost of this solution depends on the platform."
"It's an excellent product, but it can be very costly."
"Imperva’s pricing is a bit higher in the market since it offers a full-blown WAF."
"The price of this solution is a little bit high compared to competitors."
"There are some licenses that you have to buy to use some features. Its price could be better. Price is always important because, at the end of the day, customers have a budget. If you can meet the budget, you can sell, and if you don't, you cannot sell."
"The solution's pricing is an issue."
More Imperva Web Application Firewall pricing and cost advice
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
19%
Computer Software Company
13%
Insurance Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Insurance Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Is Citrix ADC (formerly Netscaler) the best ADC to use and if not why?
For ADC, any ADC can do a good job. But in case if you want to add WAF functionality to the same ADC hardware you have to look for other ADC's like F5, Imperva, Radware, Fortinet, etc.
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What do you like most about F5 Silverline Managed Services?
The initial setup is straightforward.
See all answers
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for F5 Silverline Managed Services?
The solution is quite reasonably priced, with costs being lower in comparison to competitors. On a scale where ten is very expensive, I would rate the pricing as three. It offers cost savings and i...
See all answers
Which is the best DDoS protection solution for a big ISP for monitoring and mitigating?
My recommendation is Imperva.
See all answers
DDoS solutions: Any other solutions to consider aside from Radware DDoS Protection Service and F5 Silverline DDoS Protection?
You can have a look to Imperva Cloud WAF, the anti-DDoS mitigation is under 1s and works very well. I observed a lot of DDoS attacks that were well managed (even not seen by the customer) by Imperv...
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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.
See all answers
 

Comparisons

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Compared 9% of the time
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Compared 15% of the time
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Compared 12% of the time
Azure Front Door vs Imperva Web Application Firewall Logo
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Compared 9% of the time
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AWS WAF vs Imperva Web Application Firewall
Compared 8% of the time
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Compared 6% of the time
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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide
F5 Silverline Managed Services
June 2025
F5 Silverline Managed Services reportDownload F5 Silverline Managed Services product report
Buyer's Guide
Imperva Web Application Firewall
June 2025
Imperva Web Application Firewall reportDownload Imperva Web Application Firewall product report
 

Also Known As

F5 Silverline Web Application Firewall, F5 Silverline DDoS Protection
No data available
 

Overview

F5's Silverline Managed Services is a SaaS solution delivering DDoS protection, managed Web Application Firewall (WAF) services, and managed Shape Security Fraud and Anti-bot solutions.

Silverline services include 24x7 access to F5's Security Operations Center (SOC). F5's expert security professionals use F5 products with state-of-the-art security tools to ensure the best protection possible. As an add-on to Silverline DDoS or WAF services, Silverline Threat Intelligence integrates dynamic lists of threatening IP addresses to give context for policy decisions.

F5

Imperva Web Application Firewall is a versatile solution that protects web applications and databases from various attacks, including DDoS, cross-site scripting, and SQL injection attacks. It offers data security, availability, and access control and can be deployed on-premises or on the cloud. 

The solution has good security against web attacks and offers advanced bot protection, API security, and mitigation features. Imperva WAF is easy to configure and deploy; it has good customer service and an excellent user interface.

Imperva
 

Sample Customers

City Bank, Ricacorp Properties, Miele, American Systems, Bangladesh Post Office
BlueCross BlueShield, eHarmony, EMF Broadcasting, GE Healthcare, Metro Bank, The Motley Fool, Siemens
Buyer's Guide
F5 Silverline Managed Services vs. Imperva Web Application Firewall
June 2025
Free Report: F5 Silverline Managed Services vs. Imperva Web Application Firewall
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