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4-star reviews ( Show all reviews )

    reviewer1469877

Application delivery has unified public access and delivers secure, persistent web sessions

  • February 01, 2026
  • Review from a verified AWS customer

What is our primary use case?

My main use case for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is mostly for application hosting, load balancing, and reverse proxy.

A specific example of how I use F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition for application hosting, load balancing, or as a reverse proxy is that we had limited sets of IP addresses for the public and multiple applications—around more than 100. We didn't have 100 public IPs for each application, so using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we used only one virtual server, and behind that, we were able to take all the 100 applications. Basically, using one public IP, we are hosting all of our 100 applications, which is a lot of cost saving and also less overhead on the administration side. This was one of the use cases for which we have used F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

I have a few other use cases for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition where there was a requirement for a persistent session to be implemented to have the proper load balancing and maintain the session with the back-end server, and we have a few applications that use this persistence feature. Apart from that, we are also using the WAF on top of our virtual edition of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition as a part of the security enhancement and application security requirements.

What is most valuable?

The best features that F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition offers are all of them because we are using almost all of the features like load balancing, SSL offloading, and even the WAF, as I mentioned earlier. The most important thing is that whatever services or features we are using, it is very good in terms of performance, and it is a very stable platform for these applications without any issues. Overall, I am happy with its performance and stability across all the features that we are using.

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has impacted my organization positively with cost savings, as I mentioned earlier, by saving public IP addresses, and its performance and stability, which give almost 100% uptime for the application because we have high availability. The security part is also helping us achieve that using the WAF module. Overall, the application stability and performance are all at par.

What needs improvement?

I feel that F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition could be improved because overall, it is a pretty good product, but the licensing is rather costly. It would be great if the team can do something for their existing customers regarding the costing and the licensing because each module needs a separate license on top of the base LTM model, and that is one thing that I feel they should address for their customers.

While licensing is a main area for me, I think there is also a need to improve the iRule functionalities within F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. Currently, with iRules, the customer or administrator needs to investigate and write them, and there is no kind of base support for writing them. It would be an advantage if F5 creates a user interface or dashboard within F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, so there would be ready, available iRules, or any support could be given on the platform itself instead of searching for it on outside websites.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition since my first job, so for around 10 years, I have been working on the different platforms and virtual editions of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The uptime improvements with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition are almost close to 100%, as it only goes down if a failover happens. We do the failover on the weekends during off-business hours or during upgrades when required. Mostly, only in these scenarios could we see a bit of fluctuation or a glitch for the application. Apart from that, I do not see any issues. We have not had any issues, and it rarely happens that if there is an issue, it might cause a problem for some of the applications, but apart from that, I do not see any major issues happening in my past experience with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. It was pretty much stable.

I can confidently say that F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Overall, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is a scalable product, and with the licensing for the additional modules, whenever we need, we can add it on top of the existing licensing without any major impact. It is pretty much scalable and advanced. We can even have multiple units in high availability based on the requirement, and based on that, we can have active-active or active-passive configurations.

How are customer service and support?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has pretty good customer support, and they also have pretty good documentation available on their community platform. Support is overall good.

How would you rate customer service and support?

What was our ROI?

I have seen a return on investment with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, and the most important metrics are the money and time saved because, as I mentioned earlier, there was less use of public IPs for each application, as well as less application overhead for the administrator to manage from the network point of view.

What other advice do I have?

My advice for others looking into using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is that if you have any application or application delivery requirement where you need to host the application on the internet, and you need to fulfill different kinds of application requirements such as load balancing, persistence, security, SSL offloading, or WAF security for OWASP Top 10 signature attack mitigation, you should definitely explore F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. It is one of the best products that comes with a different feature set, and its performance is very good. Also, it is a pretty stable product on the platform. You should definitely explore this product for your use cases, and it is definitely going to fulfill your use cases.

Overall, I find F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition pretty good, and I always enjoy exploring it because it gives a variety of customizations that we can do as an administrator. I always look for new approaches or customizations for our use cases, and I enjoy experimenting with it. I would rate this product a 9 out of 10.


    reviewer2800392

Cloud deployment has simplified traffic distribution and now supports flexible multi-zone DR

  • January 31, 2026
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

My main use case for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is to load balance the incoming traffic in our environment. When users want to access our internal infrastructure or web applications located in our internal infrastructure or DMZ environment, their traffic is load balanced into the internal environment. Users arrive from the internet and either land into our DMZ web application, from which we redirect the same application via F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition to our internal environment. We are using the LTM edition in our environment for this purpose.

Apart from that, we are also using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition as BIG-IP DNS, which was previously known as GTM. We use F5 products for DNS traffic as well. We have two data centers, one on the west side and one on the east side in the Azure environment. BIG-IP DNS edition load balances the traffic into different data centers. In some cases, for disaster recovery scenarios, we use this virtual IP DNS capability. Additionally, we are also using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition with ASM tools and WAF, which provides Web Application Layer 7 firewall capabilities.

What is most valuable?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition offers several best features. It is very easy to deploy within fifteen to twenty minutes. We can deploy F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition anywhere, either in an on-premises environment or in the Azure environment. If we want to discard a virtual IP, we can do that easily. We can span as many virtual IPs in a very fast time. If an F5 virtual edition becomes corrupted, we can easily redeploy the same snapshot of that virtual machine into the environment very quickly. It is very scalable and easy to use compared to hardware applications. In comparison with hardware applications, if a failure happens with hardware, we need to replace the hardware, which takes considerable time. However, with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we can redeploy very quickly, within ten minutes.

Scalability with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is excellent in terms of current usage where we have one thousand to two thousand users landing into the DMZ zone who want to access DMZ applications. Sometimes on weekends, holidays, or during peak seasons, if ten thousand, fifty thousand, or even a million people want to access the application simultaneously, we have configured auto-scalability. Automatically, additional F5 virtual machines will deploy, and the increased virtual load will be served by F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. This auto-scalability feature is very useful. If we want to use F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition for other purposes, such as internal deployment, we can also redeploy the same F5 instance internally.

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has positively impacted my organization with an excellent dashboard that has been very much revamped. The features are refreshed compared to earlier versions, such as version thirteen. Version sixteen has a very clean and easy-to-use dashboard that is very fast compared to our physical F5. The ordering and registration processes are very easy to navigate. We can choose the F5 version very easily. Another very scalable and user-friendly feature is that we can add as many interfaces as needed. In physical F5 systems, the hardcoded interfaces are typically eight or sixteen, and we cannot increase those interfaces. However, with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we can span as many virtual interfaces as required. As per the use case, if it increases, we can increase the interfaces very easily. These capabilities are very useful for our company.

What needs improvement?

Regarding F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's improvement areas, the current dashboard is very useful, but I believe the registration process should be simplified in the virtual edition. Especially in the Azure environment, many features are not currently aligned and working with Azure. We need to make efforts to ensure it is well integrated with Azure. Currently, if we want to integrate route tables with the virtual F5 edition, we need to deploy scripting inside the virtual F5 instances, and then that script performs the virtual IP route table changes in the Azure environment. This feature should be auto-configured, and efforts are needed to ensure the virtual edition is very much aligned with the Azure environment. I am expecting this improvement in the next edition.

The failover capability is also not as good as it should be. We have tested the failover functionality, and sometimes we have observed that failover fails. F5 does not successfully fail over to other instances perfectly, so that also needs to be improved. Security should also be enhanced, as in the past I have seen some security loopholes. Tightening of security should be included in the new software. These improvements should be present in near future editions.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition specifically for five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is very much stable. The stability rating is one hundred percent.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The scalability of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is excellent. Within ten minutes of time, we can scale and boot as many virtual machines as needed in the environment. It is very fast.

How are customer service and support?

The customer support for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is very fast. Within logging the ticket, we get the invitation link within fifteen minutes, and support personnel are in the room to help us. The service is very fast and very useful.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Negative

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I did not previously use any other load balancing solution. The only thing is that earlier we were using physical F5, but currently we are using the virtual edition. I can also remember that earlier we were using NetScaler. Currently, we are not using it because it is not as much improved.

What was our ROI?

Compared to our physical environment, with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition we have saved approximately one hundred thousand dollars. In terms of employees, earlier we were using ten applications, so we had a team of five people. Currently, we are only a team of two people. We also saved expenses in this area. Overall, I can say the ROI includes a twenty-five to thirty percent cost reduction, with some areas achieving forty percent cost reduction in our expenses.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is that the setup cost is not very high, but licensing is very substantial. The licensing is very heavy, and prices are very costly for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. I have observed that the real pricing is not fully visible to me because it is handled by my sales team, but the pricing is very high for licensing.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

Before choosing F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we evaluated F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition with NetScaler and Azure's native solution.

What other advice do I have?

With F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, I find it easy to configure interfaces and span multiple interfaces, which has saved our time. It also reduces cost because in the physical environment, we need to spend considerable money for sixteen interfaces even if we are using only four interfaces and need to pay the price for all sixteen interfaces. However, with the virtual solution, if we want to use interfaces, we can span four interfaces and need only a very small amount of money. It is time-saving because configuring interfaces requires human interaction. The user experience has also improved as we can configure as many virtual environments as needed, such as DMZ environment, internal environment, and other environments per our use case.

On a scale of one to ten, I would rate F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition a nine out of ten. I cannot give a ten out of ten because there should always be improvements needed in the software domain. I cannot rate it as ten out of ten because improvements are always necessary in the software and IT domains. I reduced the number by one for this reason, as there are no other reasons for this rating.

I can advise other organizations or colleagues that if they want to use any scalable, faster, or better stable solution, I usually recommend F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. It is cost-effective compared to other solutions, such as Azure native solutions. Compared to those alternatives, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is a very cost-effective solution, and they can easily redeploy and deploy with significant cost savings. The easy-to-use dashboard and all features make it an excellent choice.


    reviewer2800377

Centralized load balancing and VPN management have improved efficiency and reduced errors

  • January 30, 2026
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

My main use case for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition at the State of Oregon involved migrating from Cisco ACS to F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, specifically using their LTM module. Day to day, I handled a lot of services, including load balancing and certificate management. I onboarded customers looking to balance loads between servers using their LTM module, and I also worked extensively with the AFM module, which is a firewall, and the APM module, which is their VPN.

What is most valuable?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is especially useful for its load balancing capabilities. They excel in round-robin load balancing methods and offer persistence methods that can be beneficial for hosting websites where customers navigate multiple times to fill out forms. For instance, in an application hosted on a server, I could implement a persistence method to maintain session continuity, combined with round-robin methods that optimize performance on the application side.

I also utilized F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition for their APM module, which provides a solid VPN solution. They have a user-friendly flow where, for example, I could add a one-time password easily. The remote access VPN capabilities are notable, and I appreciate their AFM module for firewall functionalities. The GUI is very user-friendly, allowing me to create rules and NAT policies with ease.

The best features F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition offers, in my experience, include their flow method and APM module. I have used Palo Alto and Cisco products, but I find F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's APM module exceptional for its visual representation of authentication processes. Additionally, I appreciate how clearly F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition handles certificate management, all accessible from one dashboard for easy renewal or creation.

The flow method in F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition stands out for its GUI, as I can visually compare different customers without digging into details the way I would have to do in Cisco or Palo Alto. For example, if I want to see differences between customers, in F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, I can visualize it all in a flow diagram while seeing the features associated with each customer, which simplifies the comparison process significantly.

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has positively impacted my organization at the State of Oregon by streamlining operations. The load balancing module, in particular, was very effective, as it simplified the user experience compared to Cisco's extensive tab system, which made it hard to correlate user authentication. F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's customer-centric approach allows me to see individual client configurations without confusion.

I have noticed specific positive outcomes with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, such as significant time savings and a reduction in errors. I have a clearer overview of which features each customer has, which minimizes mistakes during operations and enhances our overall efficiency.

What needs improvement?

In terms of improvements for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, I encountered issues with load management when multiple modules such as AFM, APM, LTM, and GTM are handled together. If one customer has all modules in use, I found that F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition struggles with load capacity, leading to problems, particularly with high traffic volumes.

The primary concern I noted regarding F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is its scalability during high-load situations. While their iRules and LTM modules perform well, handling large traffic volumes remains a challenge, necessitating improvements in their load handling capabilities.

For how long have I used the solution?

I am not currently using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition in my role, but I used to work for the State of Oregon, and I migrated to F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, which is how I know about this product, having worked on it for approximately five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has proven to be stable, although it faced challenges handling high traffic volumes. At times, we experienced difficulties that required close monitoring, especially with traffic loads, but the load balancing module still performed admirably.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The scalability of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition was quite impressive, as it allowed us to onboard many customers efficiently. I particularly appreciated the APM and LTM modules, which facilitated an easier onboarding process for additional customers. However, the primary concern I noted regarding F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is its scalability during high-load situations.

How are customer service and support?

Customer support for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has been excellent. We received quality assistance for our inquiries, and I appreciated their forums, which provided comprehensive answers to many questions and architectural queries.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Before adopting F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we were using Cisco solutions. We transitioned to F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition after reviewing budgetary concerns and architectural advantages, prompting our move to incorporate load balancing, VPN, and AFM modules into our infrastructure.

What was our ROI?

We have seen a return on investment with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. By using multiple integrated modules such as AFM, APM, and LTM in one platform, we avoided the need for separate components, which saved considerable money and space.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has been very favorable, especially compared to competitors, as F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's pricing structure was significantly more advantageous and aligned with our budgetary considerations.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

In our evaluation process, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition really stood out among competitors. Although we considered other options, we ultimately decided to pursue F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. For firewall solutions, however, we also looked at Palo Alto for potential improvements.

What other advice do I have?

My advice for others considering F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is to focus on the LTM and APM modules. As for the AFM module, I would recommend checking if there have been significant improvements over the last five years since I last worked with it. I believe I have provided all the insights and feedback regarding F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition that I can. I have rated this product an eight out of ten.


    reviewer2800341

Cloud traffic management has become unified and application security has improved for OWASP risks

  • January 30, 2026
  • Review from a verified AWS customer

What is our primary use case?

In F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we are using the LTM and ASM module. We use F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition for L7 load balancing and SSL offloading.

In our case, we are totally working on a cloud environment, and we are using different cloud-native solutions across AWS, GCP, and Azure. Behind that, we are using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's LTM and ASM module, so any traffic that lands on our cloud-native will first load balance from our cloud-native load balancers. Apart from this, we are using firewalls as well. Layer 4 traffic inspection is done on that. Post that, for Layer 7 traffic inspection and application-level load balancing, we are using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's LTM and ASM module. LTM is especially used to load balance the application traffic to the real-time application servers or application load balancers. We have applied some profiles, policies, pools, and nodes. Apart from that, we are also applying an ASM policy on that virtual server so that Layer 7, which means OWASP Top 10 inspection, could be done for that application.

With the help of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we can deploy that virtual edition in any kind of virtual machine. We can use cloud-native virtual VMs, or we can also deploy that on VMs. Those are the main use cases of that.

What is most valuable?

For load balancing, we are using ASM solutions, which protects our applications from the OWASP Top 10, which is very critical for any applications. Our applications are protected against that, and there is no unwanted or unauthorized entry for any application due to the enforcement of ASM policy. This is also providing some learning suggestions, and many things are available. They can also provide signature-based detection. We can also do things including URL-based blocking or URL-based allowing, URI-based, or parameter-based filtering. There are multiple things on ASM policy. It is a huge combination of many policies.

It is always helpful because it always helps us in every case. Since we work in network security, it always helps with our monitoring and applying policies for our application security from a load balancing and application point of view.

What needs improvement?

As per my understanding, there is a need to improve support. Sometimes it is very critical to get support for that. Apart from that, the licensing part needs to be considered as well. If support is increased more than this, that will be more useful for the user.

If we could have a more stable subscription model and a smoother V-licensing workflow, especially in a cloud environment, that should be more flexible. Sometimes we face issues, and as I mentioned earlier, we need more support. If support is increased for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, that will be more helpful for us because it is very critical sometimes to call support.

In my experience, especially the last three times, I get less support on weekends, and that is very critical for us because we have to perform critical activities on weekends only. They need to increase support on weekends.

For how long have I used the solution?

It has been around three years that I have been using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is stable. It is a very stable solution.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The scalability of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is very good. It is the most scalable and reliable system. Its accuracy is also very high. From a scalability point of view, it is very good.

How are customer service and support?

F5 support is knowledgeable and helpful for complex LTM and ASM issues. Resolution time can vary based on case-to-case and is dependent on priority.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Negative

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have never used any dedicated solution for OWASP Top 10 or load balancing. I was using native AWS, not a dedicated solution.

How was the initial setup?

With the help of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, whenever we want to deploy a new machine or if we have any new application or any new environment, it is very easy for us to deploy those things. That will save our time as well as resources because it will not take time. It is very easy to deploy a virtual edition in any virtual environment.

What about the implementation team?

Not yet, because when I onboarded here, it was already in place. We expanded its use and are working with it.

What was our ROI?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is stable. It is a very stable solution.

There is no doubt that F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition saves resources. It also saves money, but in very few cases. Whenever, if we want to scale up or scale down our VMs per requirements, this will save our money because if we purchase hardware, it will cost every time, but due to F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we are saving money. It also saves our resources because with fewer resources, we can do many things.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

To be honest, the cost of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is not low, but since it provides enterprise-level security and everything, it should have that price.

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is very easy for our team because sometimes we know that there is peak traffic, such as when any festival comes and many users come to visit the site. At that time, as we are using the virtual edition, we have the feasibility to scale up. It is automatically scaled up with the help of our cloud-native solutions. That is the best practice, and we can scale up or scale down as per our requirement. I very much appreciate that virtual edition because we have this feasibility that we can scale up or scale down as per our requirement.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

I have never used any dedicated solution for OWASP Top 10 or load balancing. I was using native AWS, not a dedicated solution.

What other advice do I have?

Organizations, if you are using or if you want an enterprise-level solution, you definitely have to go with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. It is a little costly, but it is value for money. As I am working with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition with LTM and ASM, it is well-suited for enterprises that require advanced traffic management and strong web application security in a multi-cloud environment.

Overall, it is a good experience with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition because I never worked with hardware, so it is very good for me. My rating for this solution reflects my satisfaction with the product and its capabilities.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Amazon Web Services (AWS)


    Abdul Rehman Manzoor

Centralized traffic management has improved security monitoring and simplified service publishing

  • January 19, 2026
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

My main use case for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is that we are in the process of publishing services, observing the traffic of the published services publicly, and any backend servers. We assign the virtual IPs and then check the traffic and bypass the traffic which is blocked according to the requirements of the customer.

A specific example of how I have used F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is a recent troubleshooting scenario where we had to whitelist one of the API calls that was passing through the WAF of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. We went onto the physical servers, checked the log traffic, added the text file, and whitelisted the text file and applied the configuration. This is how the traffic was exempted from passing through the WAF.

What is most valuable?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition offers extensive documentation available for any help required and the capability for multiple licenses within a single platform.

The documentation has helped me significantly by allowing me to avoid having to install new hardware or separate appliances for WAF, BIG-IP, load balancers, and different ADCs, as I can manage everything in one big box and purchase the licenses. The ease of use of the documentation makes it straightforward for many users here, so it is easy to find use cases on the internet.

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has positively impacted my organization by providing separate candidates for managing F5 traffic, leading to more effective publishing of services publicly, assigning public IP addresses, and then assigning the virtual IPs, nodes, pools, pool members, and all of that. It definitely provides a granular approach to the device.

I truly appreciate the power of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition compared to any other vendor we have used, and we have seen more use cases coming in, proving it to be better than other products.

What needs improvement?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition could be improved by enhancing the GUI, as I think it should be more user-friendly.

Aside from the GUI improvements, I find that with other products, everything appears more organized. For instance, with FortiWeb, we have a dashboard where I can check the policy status with just one click, and everything is easily accessible. In F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, it tends to require navigating through menus and sub-menus.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition in different roles, specifically in banking, where I used BIG-IP LTM in one infrastructure. Currently, I am working in an environment where we are using the ASM module as a WAF.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is very stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

When my organization needs to handle more traffic or add more applications, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition scales up easily without running into any issues, and it is very smooth.

How are customer service and support?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition provides very good customer support. I would rate the customer support on a scale of one to ten as a perfect ten based on all of the experience I have had so far.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Before F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we were using a different solution, specifically FortiADC for Application Delivery Controller and FortiWeb for ASM.

How was the initial setup?

It was relatively easy to deploy F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition initially due to my team receiving support from F5. We were there for them, and it was pretty much taken care of by the F5 support team.

I would describe the learning curve for my team adopting F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition as definitely present. We learned a lot from it, especially from the provided documentation and many use cases available over the internet.

What about the implementation team?

Integration with other solutions or platforms in my environment through F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has not posed any challenges. It is pretty straightforward with the appliances that we currently have.

What was our ROI?

I have seen a return on investment with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition as compared to other appliances we have used. With F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we have not faced any RMAs, which has made a positive operational impact.

What other advice do I have?

My advice to others looking into using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition would emphasize its scalability, the power of the appliance, and its reliability, which are big pluses for the product.

I have a positive response on F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. However, I strongly feel that the GUI needs to be a bit more user-friendly, as I find FortiWeb's GUI more accessible, even though the product is not as powerful as F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. My overall rating for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is eight out of ten.


    Abdul Azim

Centralized policies have strengthened application security and streamline load balancing

  • January 16, 2026
  • Review from a verified AWS customer

What is our primary use case?

My main use case for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is application delivery and security, primarily for load balancing and Layer 7 (application-layer) protection of web applications.

We use it to distribute traffic across multiple backend servers to ensure high availability, performance optimization, and zero single point of failure. On the security side, we use it to protect applications from common web threats such as SQL Injection, Cross-Site Scripting (XSS), CSRF, brute-force and credential-stuffing attacks, bot traffic, malicious scanners, and Layer 7 DDoS floods.

Additionally, we leverage BIG-IP VE for:

  • SSL/TLS offloading and inspection to reduce server load

  • Persistence/session management (cookie / source IP) for stable user sessions

  • Health monitoring to automatically detect failures and route traffic to healthy nodes

  • Traffic visibility and logging for troubleshooting, compliance, and faster incident response

Overall, it has been a reliable solution for improving application uptime, security posture, and user experience in production environments.

How has it helped my organization?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has had a very positive impact on our organization by improving application delivery, availability, and overall service stability. It has helped us ensure high uptime by distributing traffic across multiple servers and automatically routing users to healthy backend resources through effective health monitoring.

It also enhanced application performance through optimized load balancing and SSL offloading, which reduced server load and improved response times for end users. From an operational perspective, it has saved significant time for our team by providing better traffic visibility, faster troubleshooting, and centralized control, which reduced downtime and improved incident response.

Overall, BIG-IP VE has strengthened our application environment by delivering reliable performance, better availability, and faster service delivery with improved efficiency.

What is most valuable?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition’s best features are load balancing, high availability, and Layer 7 security. It keeps applications running smoothly by distributing traffic, provides failover to avoid downtime, and protects web apps from attacks like SQL injection, XSS, bots, and brute-force attempts. On top of that, the monitoring and visibility are very helpful. It makes troubleshooting faster and saves a lot of time for the operations team. Overall, it’s a reliable solution that improves performance, security, and availability at the same time.

What needs improvement?

I believe F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition could be improved in terms of pricing and licensing transparency.

However, customers who purchase through authorized partners may receive better pricing and licensing options, as it largely depends on the partner’s capability and commercial offering.

From a pricing perspective, F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is somewhat high compared to others, and the licensing is provided as annual-based licenses rather than perpetual licenses.

There are some issue we are faced we are getting clear kb article 


For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working in my current field for the last 3.5 years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Yes, it is very stable solution you can as so far on your own requirement

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is highly scalable. You can scale it by increasing CPU/RAM resources, adding more backend pool members, and deploying additional VE instances in HA or clustered designs. It works well for growing traffic demands as long as proper sizing and licensing are planned.

How are customer service and support?

yes we are supporting customer in deployment and providing technical services to all our customers

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Before using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, we were using Citrix NetScaler.

How was the initial setup?

it's less complex from others

What about the implementation team?

Yes, we used a local reseller and system integrator for the deployment, and the overall experience was very good. They supported us with licensing, sizing recommendations, and end-to-end implementation, and ensured a smooth rollout with proper configuration and post-deployment support.

What was our ROI?

Yes, we have seen a positive ROI with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. It improved application uptime and availability through load balancing and health monitoring, which reduced service outages. It also saved operational time by enabling faster troubleshooting and centralized traffic control, and reduced backend server load through SSL offloading, resulting in better performance with fewer escalations and less downtime.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Pricing and licensing for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition are generally on the higher side compared to other ADC solutions. Setup cost mainly depends on the required modules and sizing. Licensing is mostly subscription-based (annual/term), and if the evaluation license expires, some LTM features can be disabled, so license monitoring is important.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We evaluated Citrix ADC (NetScaler) before choosing F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. Both are strong ADC solutions for load balancing and application delivery, but we found some key differences.

F5 BIG-IP VE vs Citrix ADC (NetScaler) – Pros & Cons

F5 BIG-IP VE – Pros

  • Very strong LTM load balancing and traffic management

  • Mature Layer 7 security and policy control (especially with iRules and security profiles)

  • Excellent stability and performance in enterprise environments

  • Strong monitoring, logging, and troubleshooting visibility

  • Better flexibility for advanced customization and complex use cases

❌ F5 BIG-IP VE – Cons

  • Licensing and pricing can be higher compared to alternatives

  • Requires skilled resources for advanced configurations (iRules, policies, security tuning)

✅ Citrix ADC – Pros

  • Good load balancing and application optimization

  • Often seen as cost-effective depending on licensing and bundles

  • Works well in environments heavily based on Citrix virtualization / VDI

  • Strong GUI-based configuration for standard use cases

❌ Citrix ADC – Cons

  • Advanced customization and troubleshooting can be less flexible compared to F5

  • Some enterprises find F5 more stable for high-complexity deployments

  • Security/policy tuning may require more effort depending on the environment

Summary

Overall, we selected F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition because it provided better application availability, stronger traffic control, and more reliable performance for our production requirements.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition 9/10 overall.

Advice: Plan the sizing and licensing properly, deploy it in HA (Active/Standby) for high availability, and monitor license validity (especially EV licenses) to avoid any service impact. If configured correctly, it delivers excellent load balancing, application availability, and Layer 7 security.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Private Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?


    reviewer2716224

Focuses on securing application access with dependable integration

  • June 05, 2025
  • Review from a verified AWS customer

What is our primary use case?

My main use cases for using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition are mainly WAF. That's the main purpose.

We use F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition mostly for the login functionality with our Salesforce and for security login purposes.

What is most valuable?

The features I appreciate the most about F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition are the WAF capabilities.

The advanced web application firewall protection and SSL offloading capabilities of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition have been utilized in my organization. These features are contributing to our application security and compliance posture.

What needs improvement?

I find it too complex to assess the impact of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's automated deployment and integration with container orchestration platforms, such as Kubernetes and OpenShift, on my applications delivery speed and reliability.

I don't use F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's automated deployment and integration with container orchestration platforms such as Kubernetes and OpenShift.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition for about five to six years, possibly longer.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is stable and reliable. I have not experienced any stability or reliability issues with the solution.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition scales with us as we are continuously expanding the deals of the product.

The solution is performing well and keeping up with our needs as we continue to increase our usage.

How are customer service and support?

I do not use customer service and technical support directly with F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. We have an integrator called Spider. They are satisfactory and whenever they encounter issues, they open a case with F5 and assist us.

I would rate the customer success and technical support for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition an eight out of ten.

What was our ROI?

I have no idea about the ROI from using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. We use the technology on the technical side, not on the financial aspects.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I don't have information about the pricing, setup costs, or licensing for F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

What other advice do I have?

I do not use the load balancing and traffic management features of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

I use other container orchestration platforms, but they are not relevant to F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

I have utilized F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition's ability to integrate with cloud platforms including AWS, Azure, GCP, and Salesforce.

I have no idea how this integration has helped my organization manage hybrid or multi-cloud environments.

The seamless integration of F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition with existing F5 technologies is not important to me as I do not use other technologies from F5.

Financially, we require F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition because we need the product. We don't have anything else that performs the same functions, so we use it without trying alternatives.

I just use and manage F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition, though I didn't handle its deployment.

I would recommend F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition as a solution to others.

I would rate F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition an eight out of ten overall.


    Kodanda Ramji C.S

Offers easy-to-use integration capabilities

  • April 15, 2024
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

I use the solution in my company to meet the virtualization needs of our customers. In the case of a payment gateway, according to the application, every VirtualBox gets segregated. Every VirtualBox will have multiple banks connected to one particular vCMP for a specific application.

What is most valuable?

The solution's most valuable feature is its good virtualization concepts. My company is very happy with all the basic features of the product.

What needs improvement?

On-the-go upgrades are an option that the tool currently lacks, making it an area where improvements are required. If you have an instance where you have a specific configuration of CPU memory when you want to increase it, you have to parallelly create a new instance, and you have to export and import the configurations. On the go, if you could give any option to shut down VirtualBox, increase CPUs, and start it again, that would be a good option.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition for more than four to five years.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is a scalable solution.

In F5 BIG-IP i5800, if you have assigned a single CPU and memory for a virtual instance and if it increases, you can just add a CPU and memory to the existing vCMP. What you have to do is spin one more virtual instance with the two CPUs and double the memory, like eight GB memory, for example. You can't just increase the existing VirtualBox. You have to create another VirtualBox parallel, download the configurations, and import it.

My company provides one banking application to around ten customers. My company has around seven virtual instances and seven applications, each application having around 70 customers running on one F5 BIG-IP i5800. My company has created seven VirtualBox.

How are customer service and support?

The solution's technical support was good. Whenever my company reached out to the product's support team, we got solutions to our issue. In case an issue doesn't get solved, then it gets escalated, and the product's support team provides our company with an engineer to deal with the problem.

How was the initial setup?

The product's initial setup phase is straightforward.

The solution is deployed on an on-premises model and the cloud model. For the on-premises version, my company deployed it on something like F5 BIG-IP i5800, and for the cloud deployment, we have installed the virtualizations on Cisco CSP kind of tools. My company ensures that VirtualBox is deployed on CSP. In both the aforementioned scenarios, we have tested the tool, after which we started to use the product in the past two to three years.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

My company's customers need to make payments for the licensing charges attached to the product. It is an expensive product. As per the requirements of our company's customers, we opt for it if it is the only hosting option available. My company also needs to see which box from F5 matches the requirements of our customers.

What other advice do I have?

Speaking about the impact of the tool on the application delivery process, I can say that static routes are limited. For every vCMP, there are some limitations of VLAN IDs and static routes, like the number of routes that can be added. There are some limitations in the product that are likely to impact our company's applications.

In terms of performance and scalability features, according to the application limit, my company can add a single CPU per vCMP or two CPUs per vCMP, which is dependent on the load requirements that we plan. The company also needs to plan according to the application requirements. My company didn't face any issues following the aforementioned process.

My company provisions vCMPs based on the concurrent session support and SSL support criteria. Based on the data sheets, my company checks the total concurrent connections, SSL connections, and throughput limit. Even when my company plans to do segregations, we plan to do them according to the specifications described in the data sheets.

You need ten pieces of the tool for load balancing. If my company's customers' requirements only consist of a product that offers five features, then they can adopt a basic OEM tool. If some customers need more features in a product, my company recommends F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition. Mostly our company's customers do accept our suggestions and choose F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

I recommend the product to others who plan to use it since it is a user-friendly and not-so-complex tool.

The integration capabilities of the product are easy to use, and there is no complexity involved in it.

I rate the tool an eight out of ten.


    Nikolay Dimitrov

Used for for web application firewalls and it has DoS layer 7 protection

  • February 20, 2024
  • Review from a verified AWS customer

What is our primary use case?

We use the solution for web application firewalls and VPNs. It could be your VPN concentrator, intelligent DNS, and load balancing.

What is most valuable?

For public clouds like AWS in Azure, the solution can use AutoDiscovery to discover the members of the virtual machines in AWS and Azure based on their tagging mechanism. This way, when you add a new virtual machine, it will automatically be added to the Virtual Edition's post.

It has a web application firewall (WAF) module. It has to get web application security. It has DoS layer 7 protection, which not many vendors have. The solution also automatically builds the thresholds for DoS attacks so that you don't have to configure the DoS manually. You enable it with basic settings, and it's using machine learning to learn the baseline and detect DoS attacks.

What needs improvement?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is a heavy system that needs a lot of CPU, memory, and hard disk. Also, the solution's center management is not very well managed.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the solution for seven to eight years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution has been much more stable over the last few years because it's an old product, and its bugs were fixed.

How are customer service and support?

The technical support is good for a complex product like F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

How was the initial setup?

The solution's initial setup is easy because most bugs are fixed.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is an expensive solution, but it's worth the price.

What other advice do I have?

We have deployed the solution on VMware, private cloud, and public cloud. F5 is going to release a new product, BIG-IP Next, which will be a new implementation of BIG-IP with many more features. BIG-IP Next is going to be more cloud-friendly because it's going to be based on containers.

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition has a scripting module. If something is not in the default functionality, you could always make a script that will solve your issue. Even if it's something that would take a week, you'll still be able to write a script to solve your custom use case. Most vendors don't have such scripting functionality.

F5 BIG-IP Virtual Edition is worth it, but it's a complex solution that has many functions. Users may have to do some learning instead of using it straight away. The learning material is publicly available to learn, but it will take time.

The solution's integration is straightforward because it integrates well with others like Splunk. The solution's security functionality is one of the best for the on-premises device. Nowadays, the solution has integration with shared security.

Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.


    Sushil Gaund

Handles traffic spikes effectively and allows configuration of policy profiles across multiple layers for enhanced security

  • February 15, 2024
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

We use it for two applications.

I've also used the Virtual Edition in the network core alongside the hardware appliances. I don't think there's any issue with either. Both seem to be working well simultaneously.

How has it helped my organization?

It's easy to integrate with others. I've integrated it with McAfee Solutions, Aruba NAC, and the EMS tool from Micro Focus.

It's easily manageable with various solutions.

What is most valuable?

I like the virtualization aspect, similar to what you get with cloud services or VMware.

What needs improvement?

I have a specific issue with the network interface connector, the NIC.

We're limited to a maximum of two NICs in a virtualized environment. It's a limitation of the tool.

So, Network Interface Connectors (NICs) need to be improved. More NICs would be helpful.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using it for three months. I use the latest version.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I would rate the stability a seven out of ten.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

No issues with scalability. Virtual Edition handles traffic spikes.

The main difference between the Virtual Edition and the hardware is that you run the F5 image on VMware or any other cloud platform. In my experience, I haven't faced any issues with scalability or manageability due to virtualization. It's been good.

In our IT department, no one uses the Virtual Edition for F5. However, our customers use the Virtual Edition.

I would rate the scalability an eight out of ten.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were using the hardware initially because it was too expensive for our client. That's why they wanted to go with the BIG-IP Virtual Edition.

How was the initial setup?

There weren't any major issues with the deployment, but it wasn't completely seamless.

Virtual Edition required some additional work compared to hardware, like provisioning and sizing tasks.

However, once configured, it's easy to scale by increasing the VM size.

VM size adjustments weren't difficult, but it's not as straightforward as hardware deployment.

The deployment time depends on the configuration. It might take one day or one hour, depending on the number of applications that need to be configured.

What about the implementation team?

My company is a system integrator.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

It is a yearly-based license. I would rate the pricing a three out of ten, with ten being expensive.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We had Redware and Palo Alto.

We had limitations in Redware with the number of virtual servers and tools. F5 doesn't have those limitations.

Plus, for security, we can configure policy profiles across layers 3, 4, 7, and even 2. F5 also has persistence and separate mechanisms for things like server acceleration.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend using this solution. Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten.