

Find out in this report how the two Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Protection solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.
Operational efficiency has improved; we no longer have staff consistently monitoring backend servers during deployment or scaling events, as HAProxy's health checks and hitless reloads allow us to push changes with minimal manual intervention.
This resulted in a drastic decrease in costs and, at the same time, the accuracy of the hits coming on HAProxy was almost around 100% or 99.99%.
I estimate seeing a return on investment with HAProxy, as it significantly reduced staff requirements and enhanced scaling capabilities, particularly when transitioning from NGINX, which faced issues.
There is no need to have redundant people when we have a system like Link11 set up in the background.
Since we are utilizing the open-source edition, community forums, mailing lists, and GitHub have been invaluable, with typically someone having encountered the same problems we faced.
My interactions with HAProxy's customer support were limited, but the feedback from my team indicated satisfactory service.
We manage an automatic load balancing feature where we add HAProxy servers dynamically behind the application load balancer to handle more traffic.
HAProxy's scalability is excellent; as our traffic expands, it handles load increases effortlessly.
For scalability, HAProxy meets my needs, supporting our initial horizontal scaling and then adapting to vertical scaling in a VMware environment.
This reliability serves as a key reason for our choice, providing us with confidence even when faced with heavy traffic.
The hot reload feature of HAProxy also really helped us so that we never had to shut it down to reload it.
We have reduced a lot of servers, replacing them with one or two HAProxy servers which deliver better performance, accuracy, and an almost 100% success rate with requests.
The configuration syntax is powerful yet can become overwhelming for newcomers; a more beginner-friendly interface or a native GUI without relying on third-party tools would ease the onboarding process.
An easier desktop interface to connect to a remote server and make changes on my PC would be beneficial.
The reloading functionality is effective as it allows soft reloads without interrupting traffic patterns.
The dashboard is somewhat clunky, which is the primary area I would want Link11 to improve.
Since we use the open-source edition, there are no licensing fees, with the main cost being the infrastructure running on EC2 instances in AWS, which helps maintain low expenses.
Setting up HAProxy didn't cost anything for me.
The pricing remains competitive compared to other vendors.
By moving all SSL termination to the load balancer, I now manage certificates in a single place, and I can also utilize Let's Encrypt with HAProxy's built-in ACME support, making renewal automatic.
HAProxy positively impacted our organization by exceeding scalability expectations, initially projected at 200k requests but ultimately handling over 15 million transactions per second without any issues.
As a production engineer at that time, I definitely wanted to ensure that the system could handle massive connections, especially since we operated an e-commerce platform where we could not lose any customer calls.
The automated responses have helped my team and my workflow by reacting to threats in real time and helping mitigate attacks within moments instead of relying on manual alerts and manual response processes.
| Product | Mindshare (%) |
|---|---|
| HAProxy | 1.5% |
| Link11 | 3.0% |
| Other | 95.5% |


| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 18 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 15 |
| Large Enterprise | 16 |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 5 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 4 |
| Large Enterprise | 2 |
HAProxy delivers reliability, high performance, and efficient load balancing solutions. Its open-source model ensures cost-effectiveness and scalability, ideal for managing extensive infrastructure demands with minimal latency while offering seamless integration with modern platforms.
HAProxy is renowned for its robust performance in load balancing across TCP and HTTP protocols, featuring multiple algorithms such as round-robin. Users appreciate its customizable configuration and seamless SSL termination, which make it an excellent choice for managing complex infrastructures. The platform's open-source nature supports scalability, reducing costs while providing flexible proxy operations. HAProxy efficiently handles high concurrency, enabling smooth traffic management and ensuring stability within diverse systems.
What key features does HAProxy offer?HAProxy is extensively used in load balancing implementations across various sectors. Companies deploy it for managing high traffic, Layer 4 and Layer 7 applications, and SQL databases. It supports microservices architecture, performs SSL offloading, and manages email services like SMTP. As a reverse proxy, HAProxy delivers high availability for systems like Redis, RabbitMQ, and Apache while integrating with Docker and Kubernetes. Its features enhance web application firewall capabilities and traffic routing, making it suitable for industries demanding reliable and efficient network management.
Link11, headquartered in Germany, offers cloud-based IT security services designed to prevent business disruptions, enhancing cyber resilience for IT networks and critical applications globally. Their services benefit industries across Europe, North America, and Asia with comprehensive protection.
Link11 provides a range of security and performance solutions, including Network Security, Web Application & API Protection, and Application Performance solutions. Their offerings encompass Network DDoS protection and an all-in-one WAAP solution, featuring Web Application Firewall, Web DDoS Protection, Bot Management, API Protection, and Secure CDN & DNS. A high-performance global network, monitored 24/7 by the Link11 Security Operations Center, ensures robust defense mechanisms.
What are the key features of Link11?
What benefits and ROI can users expect?
Link11 is suited for industries wanting to protect web applications against Layer 7 DDoS attacks, cross-site scripting, SQL injection, and phishing attempts. Deployed on cloud models, Link11 integrates as a fundamental security layer, offering effective bot management and securing websites with multiple technologies.
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