Cloudflare WAF vs Akamai
A detailed comparison to help you choose between Cloudflare WAF and Akamai.
Quick Verdict
4.2/5
Cloudflare WAF
0 reviews
4.1/5
Akamai
0 reviews
Cloudflare WAF is rated higher (4.2 vs 4.1). Cloudflare's Web Application Firewall protects against OWASP Top 10, zero-day vulnerabilities, and DDoS. 300+ global PoPs absorb attacks. Free plan blocks basic threats; Pro adds OWASP managed rules. Akamai invented the CDN industry in 1998. 340,000+ servers in 130+ countries. Enterprise CDN, edge security, and media delivery at massive scale. Acquired Linode for cloud compute.
Cloudflare WAF Web Application Firewall protecting millions of sites |  Akamai The original CDN — 4,400+ edge PoPs across 130+ countries | |
|---|---|---|
| Overview | ||
| Rating | 4.2 (0 reviews)✓ | 4.1 (0 reviews) |
| Pricing model | freemium | paid |
| Starting price | Free tier available | Free tier available |
| Best for | Any website behind Cloudflare that wants a maintained application firewall and DDoS absorption as a baseline — from hobby projects on the free tier to compliance-bound businesses on Business or Enterprise. | Global media and streaming platforms, gaming backends, and attack-prone enterprises that need the largest edge footprint and top-tier DDoS scrubbing under enterprise contracts |
| Features | ||
| IPv6 | ||
| DDoS protection | ||
| Automated backups | ||
| Snapshots | ||
| Managed option | ||
| Bare metal | ||
| GPU available | ||
| S3-compatible | ||
| Hourly billing | ||
| Free tier | ✓ | |
| Tags | ||
| Tags | free tierddos protectionapi accesseu datacenterus datacenterapac datacenter | ddos protectioneu datacenterus datacenterapac datacenter |
| Visit Cloudflare WAF → | Visit Akamai → | |
Cloudflare WAF
Pros
- + WAF engine and managed ruleset included on every plan, including Free
- + Unmetered DDoS absorption at the edge on all tiers
- + Central rules maintenance — no appliances, agents or rule deployments to manage
- + Attack-score and bot-management layers available as needs grow
- + Flat plan pricing; no per-request or per-rule metering
Cons
- - Advanced rate limiting, attack-score rules and full log export are plan-gated
- - Managed rules can block legitimate traffic; tuning requires a logging-first workflow
- - Free plan limits request body inspection to 1 MB
- - Only applies to proxied records — DNS-only traffic is not filtered
- - A compensating control, not a substitute for fixing application vulnerabilities
Akamai
Pros
- + Unmatched edge reach: 4,400+ PoPs across 130+ countries and 1,200+ networks
- + Prolexic DDoS scrubbing is the industry reference: 20+ Tbps dedicated capacity, zero-second mitigation, 100% platform availability SLA
- + Two decades-plus of delivery track record at the largest media and event scale
- + Aggressive egress pricing on the Akamai Cloud compute side, inherited from the Linode acquisition
- + Edge compute (EdgeWorkers, Functions) plus core and distributed compute regions under one network
Cons
- - No public pricing — quote-based enterprise procurement with real sales-cycle overhead
- - Not an option for individuals, small businesses, or anyone who wants self-serve onboarding
- - Dense, modular product catalog that is easy to over-buy or misconfigure
- - Volume commitments can make traffic overruns expensive
- - Compute breadth is thin compared with AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud
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