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HAProxy vs HashiCorp Consul comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 9, 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

HAProxy
Ranking in Service Mesh
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
Application Delivery Controllers (ADC) (3rd)
HashiCorp Consul
Ranking in Service Mesh
8th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Service Mesh category, the mindshare of HAProxy is 13.6%, up from 7.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HashiCorp Consul is 5.4%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Service Mesh
 

Featured Reviews

Mehdi El Filahi - PeerSpot reviewer
Useful for for small and quick load-balancing tasks
What I like best about the product is its simplicity and speed. When you need to set up a load balancer quickly, HAProxy offers options like sticky sessions and round-robin. It's also fast to configure, including adding SSL for security. While it may have fewer options than other solutions like F5, HAProxy gets the job done for basic load-balancing tasks. The reliability features of HAProxy were particularly useful in a scenario where I needed to test load balancing between two Tomcats. Since these domains were inaccessible, I set up a third Docker with HAProxy, which had access to the Tomcat domains. I then configured HAProxy to handle the load balancing. This setup allowed the client to interact with HAProxy. The solution's integration with other elements is easy.
Phanindra Sangers - PeerSpot reviewer
Has an efficient key vault feature, but its integration capabilities need enhancement
I recommend HashiCorp Consul for beginners. It is a stable tool. The key-vault storage feature has significantly enhanced our configuration management process. We have maintained the secret software applications in the vault and retrieved the information from Kv. I rate the product a seven out of ten. It is good open-source software to be managed within the production.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I am also able to make configuration changes during the day, in production, with no worries of problems and/or downtime occurring."
"​​Reliability. HAProxy is the most reliable product I have ever used."
"The support for all major Linux distros makes running and testing a breeze."
"It reduced the load on our main load balancers."
"Having the right load balancing solution – which is what HAProxy is – and protection in place gives organizations peace of mind."
"The most valuable thing for me is TCP/IP Layer 4 stuff you can do with HAProxy. You can go down to the protocol level and make decisions on something."
"Scalable and inexpensive."
"​It has allowed us to evenly distribute the load across a number of servers, and check their health and automatically react to errors."
"The product's most valuable features are support for Service Mesh TLS and canary deployment."
"HashiCorp Consul's most valuable feature is the automation of many processes, which limits the errors from user interaction."
"The documentation is good."
 

Cons

"The solution's dashboards and reports could be improved."
"While troubleshooting, we are having some difficulties. There are no issues when it is running; it is stable and very good; however, if there is a troubleshooting issue or an incident occurs, we will have issues because this is open-source."
"Dynamic update API. More things should be possible to be configured during runtime."
"Sometimes it's challenging to get through the log, and you need a log to understand what is going on. It isn't easy to map the logging with the documentation, and every time I read the log, I have to pull out the documentation to understand what I'm reading."
"Pricing, monitoring, and reports can be improved."
"We've changed solutions as it doesn't fit with our current needs."
"HAProxy could do with some good combination integrations."
"We need to handle new connections by dropping, or queuing them while the HAProxy restarts, and because HAProxy does not handle split config files."
"They could improve issues related to triggering generic deployments for the platform."
"The command line of HashiCorp Consul could be more intuitive to make it easier to use."
"Health check outputs are delayed sometimes."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Test/lab virtual machines can be installed without a licence. They can't be used for performance testing but otherwise behave like production nodes."
"I think that the pricing is very fair, I would definitely recommend buying the Enterprise license."
"The product is open source."
"The tool is open-source."
"We are using HAProxy as an open-source."
"HAProxy is free in the initial offer. However, pricing can be improved."
"It is free of cost."
"If you don't have expertise then go with the licensed version. Otherwise, open-source is the best solution."
"In case of budget constraints, we opt for the product's business support licenses and use an open-source version"
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
29%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Do you recommend HAProxy?
I do recommend HAProxy for more simple applications or for companies with a low budget, since HAProxy is a free, open-source product. HAProxy is also a good choice for someone looking for a stable ...
What do you like most about HAProxy?
The solution is effective in managing our traffic.
What do you like most about HashiCorp Consul?
The product's most valuable features are support for Service Mesh TLS and canary deployment.
What needs improvement with HashiCorp Consul?
They could improve issues related to triggering generic deployments for the platform. We have raised multiple support cases. They could enhance the integration approach with Service Mesh tools. Add...
What advice do you have for others considering HashiCorp Consul?
I recommend HashiCorp Consul for beginners. It is a stable tool. The key-vault storage feature has significantly enhanced our configuration management process. We have maintained the secret softwar...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

HAProxy Community Edition, HAProxy Enterprise Edition, HAPEE
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Booking.com, GitHub, Reddit, StackOverflow, Tumblr, Vimeo, Yelp
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about HAProxy vs. HashiCorp Consul and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.