F5 BIG-IP vs. NetScaler ADC

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
BIG-IP
Score 8.8 out of 10
N/A
F5 BIG-IP software from Seattle-based F5 Networks is a load balancing and application protection solution suite available on cloud or via virtual editions, on a subscription or perpetual licensing basis. The BIG-IP suite of products supports a wide range of security and application performance needs. The suite includes BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager (LTM) traffic management and optimization, BIG-IP DNS, BIG-IP Access Policy Manager (APM) identity and password protection, BIG-IP Application…N/A
NetScaler ADC
Score 8.0 out of 10
N/A
NetScaler ADC is an application delivery controller.N/A
Pricing
F5 BIG-IPNetScaler ADC
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
BIG-IPNetScaler ADC
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details——
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
F5 BIG-IPNetScaler ADC
Considered Both Products
BIG-IP
Chose F5 BIG-IP
F5 BIG-IP is Much better than NetScaler ADC. Flexibility of iRules and great user base make it customizable and easy to configure
Chose F5 BIG-IP
F5 interface is better and more user friendly and the technology is just better. F5 WAF is better and easier to integrate than Imperva WAF which I have seen introduce latency.
Chose F5 BIG-IP
F5 BIG-IP's iRules are way superior and robust
Chose F5 BIG-IP
F5 BIG-IP is hands down better, easier to use, configure etc. It is easy to pick up and learn.
Chose F5 BIG-IP
A10 was great because it was all inclusive, but F5 BIG-IP was more familiar.
Chose F5 BIG-IP
As a partner we had a better commercial undestading and a better experience with the product that the competitor, but, sill customer service have the improve.
Chose F5 BIG-IP
SSLVPN on F5 works much better than IPSec on ASA. From the user's side, no configuration is required - the user can just install the VPN client, input the URL, and the F5 client does the rest. For ASA, profile installation or configuration is required, so the user must go to …
Chose F5 BIG-IP
Netscaler and F5 Big-IP are very similar. I liked the Netscaler GUI a little better, but they both basically serve the same purpose quite well. Both are more advanced than the cheap/free software-based alternatives out there. Both can be clustered to avoid having a single point …
Chose F5 BIG-IP
We use a significant number of the virtual edition F5s, and a few physicals. We also have netscalers in a few places, but the netscalers we use are pretty much only used for Citrix Traffic where the F5s give us a ton of flexibility and can handle pretty much anything we throw …
Chose F5 BIG-IP
We decided to go with F5 BIG-IP over the competitors because F5 BIG-IP has the features we need at an acceptable price point for our organization. The ease of use, administration, set up, and quality of support was better than the competition. Also, the ability to link several …
Chose F5 BIG-IP
In the application delivery controller space, there are a lot of players - established players like F5, Barracuda and Citrix all the way to new kids on the block such as A10.

Any of these companies can sell you a load balancer / application firewall device. Any of these will …
NetScaler ADC
Chose NetScaler ADC
Netscaler has more features than F5 BIG-IP APM product and easier to manage with friendlier user interface for network admins. It was more cost efficient as well and if you have a Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop environment, it is more compatible with those products as well. Our …
Chose NetScaler ADC
Our organization replaced 5 BIG-IP appliances with Citrix ADC, both are comparable products. The largest advantage for our organization switching to Citrix ADC is the shared code base and reduction of the number of vendors in an implemented solution chain from end to end.
Chose NetScaler ADC
We chose Citrix ADC over Kemp and F5 due to additional integrations with various products such as Citrix/Horizon/Monitoring tools. We additionally chose ADC due to better ease of use and ability to have the appliances be virtual or physical, with the configuration being a …
Chose NetScaler ADC
Our company uses both Citrix ADC and F5 BigIP. This is mostly due to team preference. F5 seems to require the use of separate types of devices to do multi-site load balancing while Citrix ADC functionality is the same software on all devices you implement.
Chose NetScaler ADC
The Citrix NetScaler is the competitor to the f5 BigIP LTM/GTM. I've used both products extensively and the both have pros and cons against each other. F5 has better support and better documentation, and is purpose built for load balancing applications. The NetScaler has a more …
Chose NetScaler ADC
Citrix NetScaler seems to be a beast right away. Once you start testing and getting used to the logic that is in place, it becomes the obvious choice for selecting such appliance to be used in an enterprise setting.
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
F5 BIG-IPNetScaler ADC
Virtual Private Network
Comparison of Virtual Private Network features of Product A and Product B
F5 BIG-IP
7.1
10 Ratings
3% below category average
NetScaler ADC
-
Ratings
AES 256-bit Encryption7.77 Ratings00 Ratings
Kill Switch6.44 Ratings00 Ratings
Multi-Platform Support6.55 Ratings00 Ratings
Split Tunneling6.84 Ratings00 Ratings
IP Address Masking7.76 Ratings00 Ratings
No-Logs Policy7.35 Ratings00 Ratings
Multiple Server Locations7.55 Ratings00 Ratings
Automatic Wi-Fi Protection5.83 Ratings00 Ratings
Simultaneous Connections7.68 Ratings00 Ratings
Customer Support Services8.08 Ratings00 Ratings
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F5 BIG-IPNetScaler ADC
Small Businesses
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Score 8.3 out of 10
Cloudflare
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Score 8.9 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Check Point Quantum Security Gateway
Check Point Quantum Security Gateway
Score 9.1 out of 10
Cloudflare
Cloudflare
Score 8.9 out of 10
Enterprises
Check Point Quantum Security Gateway
Check Point Quantum Security Gateway
Score 9.1 out of 10
NGINX
NGINX
Score 9.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
F5 BIG-IPNetScaler ADC
Likelihood to Recommend
8.9
(116 ratings)
8.6
(21 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.6
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.1
(2 ratings)
8.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
6.3
(6 ratings)
7.3
(4 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.1
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
F5 BIG-IPNetScaler ADC
Likelihood to Recommend
F5
I really do think it's well suited for any placement on the edge, especially with the WAF portion. APM is a whole different module unto itself that allows for VPN Connect connectivity, web top access. So it really is for these modules anyway, an edge appliance for us and not really usable in the interior of the network.
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NetScaler
Citrix Netscaler can be a powerful network appliance for environments that are fully committed and open to utilizing a network appliance that isn't made by a traditional network vendor. Administrator user experience has improved over the years and will continue to improve with the flexibility of virtual and physical appliances available for medium and large enterprises.
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Pros
F5
  • Easy connection: you can connect to your corporate network with two clicks.
  • IP restriction: F5 has a list of possible insecure IP numbers, if someone tries to connect using one of these numbers, F5 BIG-IP won't connect.
  • Always on feature: Very handy feature, if you install always on, you won't need to click connect.
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NetScaler
  • Flexibility. NetScaler assumes its admins know a bit about networking and in-depth details surrounding the applications they are configuring access for/to. This being so, the range of configuration options is very broad allowing various versions' combinations of protocol patterns, expressions, rules etc., all to the benefit of the admin.
  • Granularity. Having such a broad range of configuration options available, while still allowing simple options to be configured simply. The GUI is well-stylized and navigation has a good flow.
  • Ease of control. For load-balancing of simple services right out of the box, NetScaler makes it pretty easy, compared to the range of options available in the surrounding GUI and under the hood.
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Cons
F5
  • I think the policy configuration that had some improvements on the ASM word things, improvements may be on the signatures that would be good because it's a little bit confusing on the ASL, how they are updated and deployed, and this staging. So that's something that could be.
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NetScaler
  • The documentation could use an overhaul with specific examples related to the command line as well as GUI. Explanations in the documentation would also be helpful.
  • Being able to have more than just one routing table would allow the ability to leverage security.
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Likelihood to Renew
F5
Only way to to this type of tasks
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NetScaler
No answers on this topic
Usability
F5
Great customization and easy to use help reference menus
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NetScaler
Improve on the specifics I mentioned previously and could be a 10/10 product. It is also a confusingly branded product that I have supported in two large enterprises where IT departments are unsure if the product belongs to the Citrix remote access support team or the Network infrastructure support team (it should be the later) and typically under utilized.
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Support Rating
F5
On the occasions when we've had to engage f5 support, they have been great. They have always resolved our issues quickly and been easy to work with and professional. The reason I give them a 10 out of 10, however, is because when we've had issues that have crossed over between the f5 BIG-IP, our Cisco switches, and our Microsoft IIS server the f5 support representatives have been extremely knowledgeable about every product and device involved and have been able to troubleshoot end-to-end without having to engage other vendors.
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NetScaler
Overall, our organization's experience with Citrix support is that support can be hit or miss. Oftentimes it takes multiple attempts and much longer than desirable to obtain a viable solution for issues experienced with their products. It would be great to see Citrix invest time, effort, and almighty dollars into improving their support and bug fix process across the board.
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Implementation Rating
F5
implementation is fine
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NetScaler
No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered
F5
F5 BIG-IP is my first F5 product that I have stared to work, and it brings me more experience doing a lot of migration upgrades from old code version to new code. The way F5 has all configuration help us to develop scrips to improve our process.
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NetScaler
We chose Citrix ADC over Kemp and F5 due to additional integrations with various products such as Citrix/Horizon/Monitoring tools. We additionally chose ADC due to better ease of use and ability to have the appliances be virtual or physical, with the configuration being a simple migration of code which provided flexibility to be able to do a hybrid environment with ease.
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Return on Investment
F5
  • Having a load balancer of F5 helps to address large traffic limit on organisation's application
  • This means that organisation gets a lot of revenue due to the usage of their application
  • Hence provide a very positive impact onthe inverment or ROl of the organisation
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NetScaler
  • It has saved a tremendous amount of money and manpower by allowing for broad support without the need for a VPN.
  • The security functions within Netscaler enabled our business to pass additional IT-based audits.
  • Having a full Citrix stack from front to back makes our business look more professional both to our users and outsiders.
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ScreenShots