Load balancers for small business buyers
Asked as “load balancer”, and as “application delivery controller”, on behalf of a small B2B company. 58 first choices recorded across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, fourteen models each. Added to the November 2026 Edition.
Standing · first-choice share
19%
Contested · AWS Elastic Load Balancing 14%
19HAProxy14AWS Elastic Load Balancing12NGINX55others
19% of first choices, contested.
Since October 2026▼−1Since October 2026: 20% → 19%, −1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.HAProxy held the lead, −1 point on 20%, inside the 11-point floor.
By buyer segment
The same question asked on behalf of a different buyer. Each standing is computed within its segment; they sit side by side and are never added together.
Small business
HAProxy19%Contested▼−1Since October 2026: 20% → 19%, −1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.This pageMid-marketHAProxy32%Contested▲+3Since October 2026: 29% → 32%, +3 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.Standing →EnterpriseF5 BIG-IP23%Contested▼−17Since October 2026: 40% → 23%, −17 points. Past the 11-point floor: movement.Standing →
HAProxy19%Contested▼−1Since October 2026: 20% → 19%, −1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.This pageMid-marketHAProxy32%Contested▲+3Since October 2026: 29% → 32%, +3 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.Standing →EnterpriseF5 BIG-IP23%Contested▼−17Since October 2026: 40% → 23%, −17 points. Past the 11-point floor: movement.Standing →The standing
Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, over all fourteen models, for a small B2B company. Ordered by share.
ProductFirst-choice shareNegative rateLabelsQuadrantSince October 2026
01HAProxy19%18%67accepted challenger▼−1Since October 2026: 20% → 19%, −1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.20% → 19%
HAProxy19%18%67accepted challenger▼−1Since October 2026: 20% → 19%, −1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.20% → 19%02AWS Elastic Load Balancing14%11%37accepted challenger▲+4Since October 2026: 10% → 14%, +4 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.10% → 14%
03
NGINX12%15%67accepted challenger▼−2Since October 2026: 14% → 12%, −2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.14% → 12%
NGINX12%15%67accepted challenger▼−2Since October 2026: 14% → 12%, −2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.14% → 12%04
Cloudflare Load Balancing9%0%36accepted challenger▼−2Since October 2026: 11% → 9%, −2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.11% → 9%
Cloudflare Load Balancing9%0%36accepted challenger▼−2Since October 2026: 11% → 9%, −2 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.11% → 9%05AWS Application Load Balancer7%17%23accepted challenger▲+4Since October 2026: 3% → 7%, +4 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.3% → 7%
06Google Cloud Load Balancing Lab in the set3%14%22accepted challenger=heldSince October 2026: 3% → 3%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.3% → 3%
07Azure Load Balancer3%16%19accepted challenger▼−3Since October 2026: 6% → 3%, −3 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.6% → 3%
08
Kemp LoadMaster3%20%20accepted challenger▼−7Since October 2026: 10% → 3%, −7 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.10% → 3%
Kemp LoadMaster3%20%20accepted challenger▼−7Since October 2026: 10% → 3%, −7 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.10% → 3%09
Azure Application Gateway3%20%10accepted challenger▲+3Since October 2026: 0% → 3%, +3 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.0% → 3%
Azure Application Gateway3%20%10accepted challenger▲+3Since October 2026: 0% → 3%, +3 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.0% → 3%10
Traefik2%3%37accepted challenger▲+1Since October 2026: 1% → 2%, +1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.1% → 2%
Traefik2%3%37accepted challenger▲+1Since October 2026: 1% → 2%, +1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.1% → 2%11
DigitalOcean Load Balancers2%0%11accepted challenger▼−1Since October 2026: 3% → 2%, −1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.3% → 2%
DigitalOcean Load Balancers2%0%11accepted challenger▼−1Since October 2026: 3% → 2%, −1 point. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.3% → 2%Show the three products at 0%, ordered by negative rate
14F5 BIG-IP0%87%23criticized challenger=heldSince October 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.0% → 0%
13Citrix ADC0%79%19criticized challenger=heldSince October 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.0% → 0%
12Caddy0%0%13accepted challenger=heldSince October 2026: 0% → 0%, ±0 points. Inside the 11-point floor: within noise.0% → 0%
The floor is 11 points of share, measured: how far the models move a leader on their own when the same questions are asked twice with nothing changed. A larger change is movement; a smaller one can't be told apart from repeat variation, and both are shown. Each index measures its own floor from its own repeat, over its own categories, so the floor differs from one index to the next. Both editions asked the same fourteen models. How the floor is measured
Bars are the share of first choices, 0 to 100Every product with at least 10 labels here. Every product name links to its product page.
Google Cloud Load Balancing is made by Google, whose model Gemini 3.5 Flash is in the set. On the four share prompts that model made it the first choice zero times of 4; the other thirteen models two times of 52. Lab treatment is defined on the method page; the row is marked, not excluded.
Head to headHead-to-head pages are published for mid-market buyers, so these open on mid-market figures, not small business.
All twenty-eight head-to-head pages: the top eight products, each against each
HAProxy vs AWS Elastic Load BalancingHAProxy vs A10 Thunder ADCHAProxy vs AWS Application Load BalancerHAProxy vs Cloudflare Load BalancingNGINX vs Kemp LoadMasterNGINX vs Progress Kemp LoadMasterNGINX vs AWS Elastic Load BalancingNGINX vs A10 Thunder ADCNGINX vs AWS Application Load BalancerNGINX vs Cloudflare Load BalancingKemp LoadMaster vs Progress Kemp LoadMasterKemp LoadMaster vs AWS Elastic Load BalancingKemp LoadMaster vs A10 Thunder ADCKemp LoadMaster vs AWS Application Load BalancerKemp LoadMaster vs Cloudflare Load BalancingProgress Kemp LoadMaster vs AWS Elastic Load BalancingProgress Kemp LoadMaster vs A10 Thunder ADCProgress Kemp LoadMaster vs AWS Application Load BalancerProgress Kemp LoadMaster vs Cloudflare Load BalancingAWS Elastic Load Balancing vs A10 Thunder ADCAWS Elastic Load Balancing vs AWS Application Load BalancerAWS Elastic Load Balancing vs Cloudflare Load BalancingA10 Thunder ADC vs AWS Application Load BalancerA10 Thunder ADC vs Cloudflare Load BalancingAWS Application Load Balancer vs Cloudflare Load Balancing
Recommended versus criticized
Every product with at least 10 labels here, on both axes. The 30% line names a quadrant, not the verdict above: that one needs more than 40%.
Criticized challengerCriticized default
Negative label rate →
01A02
0304A05
G06
A07
08091011C12
C13
F14
Accepted challengerEndorsed leader
0%First-choice share → · lines at 30% share and 25% negative30%
Key
01HAProxy19%
HAProxy19%02AWS Elastic Load Balancing14%
03NGINX12%
NGINX12%04Cloudflare Load Balancing9%
Cloudflare Load Balancing9%05AWS Application Load Balancer7%
06Google Cloud Load Balancing3%
07Azure Load Balancer3%
08Kemp LoadMaster3%
Kemp LoadMaster3%09Azure Application Gateway3%
Azure Application Gateway3%10Traefik2%
Traefik2%11DigitalOcean Load Balancers2%
DigitalOcean Load Balancers2%12Caddy0%
13Citrix ADC0%
14F5 BIG-IP0%
What they warned about
One of fourteen models held their first choice under the paraphrase. Claude Haiku 4.5, GPT-5.4 mini, Perplexity Sonar, Grok 4.20, Mistral Small, DeepSeek V4 Flash, Llama 4 Maverick, Qwen 3.7 Flash, Kimi K2, GLM 4.7 FlashX, MiniMax M2.5, GPT-6 Luna and Muse Glimmer 30B changed. A high negative share on a product with few labels is a warning. A low share on a product with many labels is salience, not sentiment.
F5 BIG-IP
87%
20 of 23 labels negative · 10 of 14 models · 12 hard negative
“Avoid enterprise-heavy ones like F5 BIG-IP or Citrix unless you need advanced security (they're overkill and expensive for small teams).” Grok 4.20, comparative prompt
Citrix ADC
79%
15 of 19 labels negative · 9 of 14 models · 10 hard negative
“For a small shop that is not already a Citrix customer, the licensing model and support/maintenance overhead is usually overkill.” Muse Glimmer 30B, negative prompt
HAProxy18%
12 of 67 labels negative · 8 of 14 models · 3 hard negative
“No vendor support ... just don't treat the free version as "set it and forget it."” DeepSeek V4 Flash, negative prompt
NGINX15%
10 of 67 labels negative · 6 of 14 models · 2 hard negative
“don't self-host HAProxy or NGINX unless you have a specific requirement” GPT-6 Luna, direct prompt
What they cite
Fourteen of the fourteen models returned a source list in this edition: five return the pages they cited and nine the search results they consulted.
Sites the answers cite
59 of 84 answers in this category came back with a source list, from 13 of 14 models: citations where the model returns them, or the search results it consulted. 651 links across 184 sites, every framing counted. Ranked by the number of answers carrying the site or page. The other 1 model searched through a gateway that returned no source list on this edition. 54 of the 252 answers across every segment cited this index's own page for the category; the method page measures whether that reading tilts an answer.
28 answers · 31 citations · 10 models
publisher (Gane)25 answers · 26 citations · 10 models
vendor site · Loadbalancer.org19 answers · 22 citations · 10 models
vendor site · G217 answers · 22 citations · 8 models
16 answers · 25 citations · 8 models
vendor site · Amazon16 answers · 23 citations · 8 models
14 answers · 14 citations · 8 models
12 answers · 12 citations · 8 models
vendor site · Kemp Technologies11 answers · 25 citations · 9 models
11 answers · 13 citations · 5 models
11 answers · 11 citations · 6 models
10 answers · 23 citations · 6 models
Pages the answers cite
The ten pages named in the most answers, by full address. A page here is one the models returned with a recommendation, not one the index endorses.
25 answers · 10 models
25 answers · 10 models
12 answers · 7 models
12 answers · 8 models
12 answers · 7 models
11 answers · 6 models
10 answers · 5 models
8 answers · 5 models
8 answers · 6 models
7 answers · 6 models
Search against answers
Each company's standing in the answers beside its site's footprint in Google search, one row a site: the products the models named on it with their shares, and the share they add up to; monthly searches on Google, and DataForSEO's estimate of AI search demand (modeled from search signals, directional, not a count of queries to any assistant), for the most-searched of the company's and its products' names (the name is in each row's hover text); estimated monthly organic visits to the site; and its best position in Google's top ten for “best load balancer”, “load balancer”, “load balancers”. US estimates from DataForSEO and Google's Ads Transparency Center. A small company's site, or a mid-sized company's site for its flagship, is marked company; a product on a large parent's site (Google, Microsoft) has no site figures. A column with no figures for this category is left out, and an empty cell means none were seen, not none exist. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.
| Company and products | Share | Own site cited | Name searches, Google | AI search demand, est. | Organic visits | Paid search a month, est. | Google ads, last 30 days | Best Google position |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| HAProxy haproxy.com HAProxy 19%, HAProxy Community Edition 3% | 22% | 142 | 4,400 | 424 | 18,410 | 4 | ||
| AWS parent site AWS Elastic Load Balancing 14%, AWS Application Load Balancer 7% | 21% | 83 | 368,000 | 114,001 | ||||
| NGINX nginx.org NGINX 12%, NGINX Open Source 2% | 14% | 152 | 33,100 | 4,362 | 38,473 | |||
| Cloudflare parent site Cloudflare Load Balancing 9% | 9% | 69 | 550,000 | 10,897 | ||||
| Progress Kemp LoadMaster | 9% | 50 | 2 | |||||
| Azure parent site Azure Load Balancer 3%, Azure Application Gateway 3% | 7% | 54 | 301,000 | 47,904 | ||||
| Google Cloud parent site Google Cloud Load Balancing 3% | 3% | 35 | 165,000 | 7,596 | ||||
| Kemp LoadMaster kemptechnologies.com | 3% | 46 | 210 | 9 | 35,090 | $127 | 23 | 3 |
| Traefik traefik.io | 2% | 45 | 6,600 | 593 | 6,095 | 90 | ||
| DigitalOcean parent site DigitalOcean Load Balancers 2% | 2% | 5 | 74,000 | 942 |
Google's top ten for the three searches hold 22 sites; 4 of them are among the sites the models cited here (aws.amazon.com, g2.com, kemptechnologies.com, loadbalancer.org). The first result for “best load balancer” is g2.com.
How they answered
Six framings of the same buying question, each sent to every model in a fresh session with search on. One row per model, so a row shows whether it held its answer under rewording, what it named when cost was the constraint, and what it argued against. Computed from the raw judge labels.ShowHide
How they answered
Six framings of the same buying question, each sent to every model in a fresh session with search on. One row per model, so a row shows whether it held its answer under rewording, what it named when cost was the constraint, and what it argued against. Computed from the raw judge labels.
ShowHideModelDirect“What is the best load balancer for a small B2B company?”Paraphrase“Which application delivery controller would you recommend to a small business that sells to other businesses?”Comparative“What are the top load balancers for a small team and how do they differ?”Budget-constrained“What is the best load balancer for a small company with a tight budget?”Scale-constrained“We are a 30 person company evaluating a load balancer. What should we look at?”Negative“Which load balancers should a small business avoid or be cautious about?”
Claude Haiku 4.5AWS Elastic Load Balancingno first choiceChangedagainst: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IPHAProxy, NodeBalancerNGINXno first choiceagainst: HAProxy
Six alternatives
Azure Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancing, Google Cloud Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikTwo alternatives
HAProxy, NGINXThree alternatives
NGINX, Peplink Balance, TraefikSix alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, DigitalOcean Load Balancers, Google Cloud Load Balancer, HAProxy, Network Load Balancer, TraefikGPT-5.4 miniElastic Load BalancingProgress Kemp LoadMasterChangedCloudflare Load Balancingagainst: EnvoyHAProxyagainst: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer, Google Cloud Load Balancingno first choiceagainst: Azure Basic Load Balancer, Classic Load Balancer
Four alternatives
Azure Load Balancer/Application Gateway, Cloud Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINXTwo alternatives
F5 BIG-IP, FortiADCFour alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikOne alternative
NGINXGemini 3.5 FlashCloudflare Load BalancingCloudflare Load BalancingHeldagainst: F5 BIG-IPAWS Elastic Load Balancing, DigitalOcean Load BalancersDigitalOcean Load Balancers, Hetzner Cloud Load BalancersCloudflare Load Balancingagainst: A10 Thunder ADC, AWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Application Gateway, Cisco ACE, Citrix ADC, Consul, Envoy, F5 BIG-IP, Google Cloud Load Balancing, HAProxy, Istio, Linkerd, NGINX
Four alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikFive alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Application Gateway, HAProxy, NGINX, Progress Kemp LoadMasterFive alternatives
Caddy, Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikSix alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, Caddy, Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikFour alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikPerplexity SonarAWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Application Gateway, Google Cloud Load Balancingagainst: F5 BIG-IPProgress Kemp LoadMasterChangedagainst: F5 BIG-IP, NetScaler ADCAWS Elastic Load Balancing, HAProxyHAProxy Community Editionagainst: AWS Application Load Balancer, F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager, HAProxy, NGINXno first choiceagainst: AWS, Azure, Barracuda ADC, Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, Google Cloud, HAProxy, Kemp LoadMaster, NGINX
Four alternatives
Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX, Progress Kemp LoadMasterThree alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, HAProxy, Loadbalancer.org Enterprise ADCFour alternatives
Caddy, Cloudflare Load Balancing, NGINX, TraefikTwo alternatives
Cloudflare Load Balancing, DigitalOcean Load BalancersTwo alternatives
HAProxy, NGINXGrok 4.20NGINXagainst: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IPKemp LoadMaster, NGINX ADCChangedagainst: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IPNGINX, Traefikagainst: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IPNGINXagainst: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager, NGINXAWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balanceragainst: A10 Networks Thunder, AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Application Load Balancer, Azure Load Balancer, Barracuda Load Balancer ADC, Cisco, Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, Google Cloud Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX Open Source, NetScaler ADC, Traefik
Six alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Application Load Balancer, HAProxy, Keepalived, Loadbalancer.org Enterprise ADC, TraefikThree alternatives
A10 Thunder ADC, Azure Application Gateway, Barracuda Load Balancer ADCTwo alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, HAProxyThree alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxyTwo alternatives
HAProxy, NGINXMistral SmallAWS Elastic Load Balancingno first choiceChangedCloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy One, NGINXAWS Elastic Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX Open Sourceno first choiceagainst: F5 BIG-IPagainst: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer, Kemp LoadMaster, Radware Alteon Application Delivery and Security
Three alternatives
Kemp LoadMaster, Loadbalancer.org Enterprise ADC, NGINXTwo alternatives
Kemp LoadMaster, NodeBalancerOne alternative
Kemp LoadMasterThree alternatives
HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikDeepSeek V4 FlashHAProxyProgress Kemp LoadMasterChangedagainst: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, NetScaler ADC, Radware AlteonCaddy, HAProxy, NGINXagainst: EnvoyNGINXHAProxyagainst: A10, F5 BIG-IPagainst: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, HAProxy
Four alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Cloudflare Load Balancing, Kemp LoadMaster, NGINXTwo alternatives
Barracuda Load Balancer ADC, HAProxyThree alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Cloudflare Load Balancing, TraefikThree alternatives
Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, TraefikFive alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer, GCP Cloud Load Balancing, Kemp LoadMaster, NGINXLlama 4 MaverickAWS Elastic Load Balancingno first choiceChangedno first choiceAWS Elastic Load Balancingno first choicenothing named
Three alternatives
F5 BIG-IP, Kemp LoadMaster, NGINXTwo alternatives
Loadbalancer.org Enterprise ADC, NGINXQwen 3.7 FlashHAProxyCloudflare Load BalancingChangedagainst: Cisco, F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic ManagerCaddyNGINXTraefikagainst: HAProxy, NGINXagainst: F5 BIG-IP iSeries, HAProxy, NGINX
Five alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Load Balancer, Google Cloud Load Balancing, NGINX, TraefikFive alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Load Balancer / Front Door, Google Cloud Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINXFour alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikFour alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancer, HAProxy, TraefikFour alternatives
AWS Network Load Balancer, Azure Front Door, Cloudflare Load Balancing, Google Cloud Load BalancingKimi K2NGINXProgress Kemp LoadMasterChangedagainst: F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager, F5 BIG-IP VENGINX, Traefikagainst: AWS Application Load BalancerHAProxyagainst: Citrix ADCAWS Application Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancingagainst: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Application Gateway, Azure Front Door, Citrix ADC, Cloudflare Load Balancer, Consul Connect, DNS Round-Robin, F5 BIG-IP, HAProxy, Istio, Legacy Microsoft NLB, Linkerd, NGINX Open Source, Route 53 simple routing
Three alternatives
Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, Progress Free LoadMasterThree alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Application Gateway, SKUDONET/Relianoid Community EditionThree alternatives
Caddy, Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxyTwo alternatives
NGINX, Progress Kemp Free Load BalancerTwo alternatives
Kemp LoadMaster, TraefikGLM 4.7 FlashXAWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Load Balancer, HAProxy, NGINXagainst: F5 BIG-IP LTMKemp LoadMasterChangedagainst: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, NGINXCloudflare Load Balancingagainst: F5 BIG-IP LTMHAProxyHAProxyagainst: F5 BIG-IPagainst: F5 BIG‑IP LTM
One alternative
Barracuda Load Balancer ADCFour alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikEight alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, Caddy, DigitalOcean Load Balancers, Google Cloud Load Balancing, Microsoft NLB, NGINX, Round-Robin DNS, TraefikFour alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Application Gateway, Kemp LoadMaster, NGINXMiniMax M2.5no first choiceAWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Application Gateway, Google Cloud Load BalancingChangedagainst: Citrix ADC, Zen Load BalancerHAProxy, NGINXHAProxyno first choiceagainst: AWS Application Load Balancer, F5 BIG-IP, Kemp LoadMaster
Six alternatives
Cloudflare Load Balancing, Fortinet FortiADC, Kemp LoadMaster, NGINX, Traefik, ZevenetFive alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancer, Google Cloud Load Balancing, TraefikThree alternatives
NGINX Open Source, Progress Kemp LoadMaster, TraefikGPT-6 LunaAWS Application Load Balanceragainst: HAProxy, NGINXAWS Application Load Balancer, Application Gateway v2 with WAFChangedCaddyagainst: HAProxyHAProxy Community Editionno first choiceagainst: NGINXagainst: Azure Basic Load Balancer, Classic Load Balancer, HAProxy, NGINX
Three alternatives
Azure Application Gateway, Azure Front Door, Google Cloud External Application Load BalancerFive alternatives
AWS Application Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancing, DigitalOcean Load Balancers, NGINX, TraefikTwo alternatives
AWS, NGINXMuse Glimmer 30BHAProxyProgress Kemp LoadMasterChangedagainst: F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager, NetScaler ADCno first choiceHAProxy Communityagainst: F5 BIG-IP, F5 NGINXno first choiceagainst: A10 Thunder, ALB, Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, Kemp LoadMaster, Radware Alteon
Three alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing – ALB/NLB, Cloudflare Load Balancing, NGINXOne alternative
HAProxySeven alternatives
AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer / Front Door, Caddy, GCP HTTP(S)/Network LB, HAProxy, NGINX, TraefikTwo alternatives
Progress Free Load Balancer, TraefikBold is the first choiceAlternatives are counted; the count opens them.What the answer argued against
The record
One row per call: the version string exactly as returned, whether the model searched, sources cited, and latency.
Eighty-four rows: every prompt, every model, every answer.
| Prompt | Model | Version string | Time (UTC) | Searched | Sources | Latency |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Direct recommendation | Claude Haiku 4.5 | claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 | 2026-11-01 14:12 | no | 0 | 5 s |
| Direct recommendation | GPT-5.4 mini | gpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-17 | 2026-11-01 12:43 | no | 0 | 2 s |
| Direct recommendation | Gemini 3.5 Flash | gemini-3.6-flash (asked for gemini-3.5-flash; the API answered as this version) | 2026-11-01 13:16 | no | 0 | 12 s |
| Direct recommendation | Perplexity Sonar | sonar | 2026-11-01 11:13 | yes | 10 | 3 s |
| Direct recommendation | Grok 4.20 | spacexai/grok-4.20-non-reasoning via xai | 2026-11-01 15:09 | yes | 5 | 15 s |
| Direct recommendation | Mistral Small | mistral/mistral-small via mistral | 2026-11-01 16:31 | yes | 5 | 4 s |
| Direct recommendation | DeepSeek V4 Flash | deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra | 2026-11-01 12:06 | yes | 15 | 19 s |
| Direct recommendation | Llama 4 Maverick | meta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock | 2026-11-01 12:01 | yes | 5 | 2 s |
| Direct recommendation | Qwen 3.7 Flash | alibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba | 2026-11-01 14:42 | no | 0 | 24 s |
| Direct recommendation | Kimi K2 | moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita | 2026-11-01 17:53 | yes | 10 | 44 s |
| Direct recommendation | GLM 4.7 FlashX | zai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai | 2026-11-01 18:14 | yes | 10 | 39 s |
| Direct recommendation | MiniMax M2.5 | minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax | 2026-11-01 10:57 | no | 0 | 73 s |
| Direct recommendation | GPT-6 Luna | gpt-6-luna | 2026-11-01 10:18 | yes | 3 | 9 s |
| Direct recommendation | Muse Glimmer 30B | meta/muse-glimmer-30b via togetherai | 2026-11-01 11:43 | yes | 15 | 17 s |
| Paraphrase | Claude Haiku 4.5 | claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 | 2026-11-01 17:16 | no | 0 | 4 s |
| Paraphrase | GPT-5.4 mini | gpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-17 | 2026-11-01 10:18 | yes | 4 | 5 s |
| Paraphrase | Gemini 3.5 Flash | gemini-3.6-flash (asked for gemini-3.5-flash; the API answered as this version) | 2026-11-01 15:44 | no | 0 | 15 s |
| Paraphrase | Perplexity Sonar | sonar | 2026-11-01 16:43 | yes | 10 | 3 s |
| Paraphrase | Grok 4.20 | spacexai/grok-4.20-non-reasoning via xai | 2026-11-01 14:54 | yes | 5 | 11 s |
| Paraphrase | Mistral Small | mistral/mistral-small via mistral | 2026-11-01 10:32 | no | 0 | 5 s |
| Paraphrase | DeepSeek V4 Flash | deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra | 2026-11-01 19:39 | yes | 24 | 37 s |
| Paraphrase | Llama 4 Maverick | meta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock | 2026-11-01 18:16 | yes | 5 | 3 s |
| Paraphrase | Qwen 3.7 Flash | alibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba | 2026-11-01 16:33 | no | 0 | 31 s |
| Paraphrase | Kimi K2 | moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita | 2026-11-01 16:58 | yes | 25 | 58 s |
| Paraphrase | GLM 4.7 FlashX | zai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai | 2026-11-01 11:27 | yes | 10 | 62 s |
| Paraphrase | MiniMax M2.5 | minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax | 2026-11-01 12:13 | no | 0 | 79 s |
| Paraphrase | GPT-6 Luna | gpt-6-luna | 2026-11-01 19:09 | yes | 2 | 9 s |
| Paraphrase | Muse Glimmer 30B | meta/muse-glimmer-30b via togetherai | 2026-11-01 09:10 | yes | 25 | 20 s |
| Comparative | Claude Haiku 4.5 | claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 | 2026-11-01 12:12 | yes | 10 | 8 s |
| Comparative | GPT-5.4 mini | gpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-17 | 2026-11-01 18:21 | yes | 5 | 7 s |
| Comparative | Gemini 3.5 Flash | gemini-3.6-flash (asked for gemini-3.5-flash; the API answered as this version) | 2026-11-01 13:38 | no | 0 | 16 s |
| Comparative | Perplexity Sonar | sonar | 2026-11-01 08:43 | yes | 10 | 5 s |
| Comparative | Grok 4.20 | spacexai/grok-4.20-non-reasoning via xai | 2026-11-01 18:04 | yes | 9 | 15 s |
| Comparative | Mistral Small | mistral/mistral-small via mistral | 2026-11-01 15:24 | yes | 10 | 9 s |
| Comparative | DeepSeek V4 Flash | deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra | 2026-11-01 15:57 | yes | 25 | 47 s |
| Comparative | Llama 4 Maverick | meta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock | 2026-11-01 14:18 | yes | 5 | 4 s |
| Comparative | Qwen 3.7 Flash | alibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba | 2026-11-01 14:39 | no | 0 | 32 s |
| Comparative | Kimi K2 | moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita | 2026-11-01 19:04 | yes | 19 | 65 s |
| Comparative | GLM 4.7 FlashX | zai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai | 2026-11-01 12:57 | yes | 20 | 285 s |
| Comparative | MiniMax M2.5 | minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax | 2026-11-01 11:39 | no | 0 | 14 s |
| Comparative | GPT-6 Luna | gpt-6-luna | 2026-11-01 14:03 | yes | 6 | 17 s |
| Comparative | Muse Glimmer 30B | meta/muse-glimmer-30b via togetherai | 2026-11-01 14:38 | yes | 15 | 29 s |
| Budget constrained | Claude Haiku 4.5 | claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 | 2026-11-01 11:37 | no | 0 | 5 s |
| Budget constrained | GPT-5.4 mini | gpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-17 | 2026-11-01 16:13 | no | 0 | 3 s |
| Budget constrained | Gemini 3.5 Flash | gemini-3.6-flash (asked for gemini-3.5-flash; the API answered as this version) | 2026-11-01 09:08 | no | 0 | 15 s |
| Budget constrained | Perplexity Sonar | sonar | 2026-11-01 16:57 | yes | 10 | 3 s |
| Budget constrained | Grok 4.20 | spacexai/grok-4.20-non-reasoning via xai | 2026-11-01 17:35 | yes | 5 | 10 s |
| Budget constrained | Mistral Small | mistral/mistral-small via mistral | 2026-11-01 08:37 | yes | 5 | 4 s |
| Budget constrained | DeepSeek V4 Flash | deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra | 2026-11-01 12:20 | yes | 25 | 25 s |
| Budget constrained | Llama 4 Maverick | meta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock | 2026-11-01 09:45 | yes | 5 | 2 s |
| Budget constrained | Qwen 3.7 Flash | alibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba | 2026-11-01 14:31 | no | 0 | 26 s |
| Budget constrained | Kimi K2 | moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita | 2026-11-01 15:49 | yes | 10 | 18 s |
| Budget constrained | GLM 4.7 FlashX | zai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai | 2026-11-01 16:21 | yes | 10 | 27 s |
| Budget constrained | MiniMax M2.5 | minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax | 2026-11-01 12:46 | yes | 5 | 51 s |
| Budget constrained | GPT-6 Luna | gpt-6-luna | 2026-11-01 14:17 | yes | 3 | 8 s |
| Budget constrained | Muse Glimmer 30B | meta/muse-glimmer-30b via togetherai | 2026-11-01 09:23 | yes | 15 | 19 s |
| Scale constrained | Claude Haiku 4.5 | claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 | 2026-11-01 10:07 | no | 0 | 6 s |
| Scale constrained | GPT-5.4 mini | gpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-17 | 2026-11-01 12:56 | no | 0 | 4 s |
| Scale constrained | Gemini 3.5 Flash | gemini-3.6-flash (asked for gemini-3.5-flash; the API answered as this version) | 2026-11-01 16:07 | no | 0 | 16 s |
| Scale constrained | Perplexity Sonar | sonar | 2026-11-01 13:42 | yes | 10 | 5 s |
| Scale constrained | Grok 4.20 | spacexai/grok-4.20-non-reasoning via xai | 2026-11-01 14:46 | yes | 5 | 14 s |
| Scale constrained | Mistral Small | mistral/mistral-small via mistral | 2026-11-01 15:32 | no | 0 | 5 s |
| Scale constrained | DeepSeek V4 Flash | deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra | 2026-11-01 09:42 | yes | 20 | 27 s |
| Scale constrained | Llama 4 Maverick | meta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock | 2026-11-01 14:22 | yes | 5 | 3 s |
| Scale constrained | Qwen 3.7 Flash | alibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba | 2026-11-01 10:33 | no | 0 | 34 s |
| Scale constrained | Kimi K2 | moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita | 2026-11-01 18:07 | yes | 24 | 35 s |
| Scale constrained | GLM 4.7 FlashX | zai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai | 2026-11-01 12:50 | yes | 15 | 29 s |
| Scale constrained | MiniMax M2.5 | minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax | 2026-11-01 09:26 | yes | 5 | 69 s |
| Scale constrained | GPT-6 Luna | gpt-6-luna | 2026-11-01 09:59 | yes | 3 | 11 s |
| Scale constrained | Muse Glimmer 30B | meta/muse-glimmer-30b via togetherai | 2026-11-01 13:14 | no | 0 | 4 s |
| Negative framing | Claude Haiku 4.5 | claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 | 2026-11-01 11:28 | yes | 19 | 10 s |
| Negative framing | GPT-5.4 mini | gpt-5.4-mini-2026-03-17 | 2026-11-01 14:31 | yes | 4 | 6 s |
| Negative framing | Gemini 3.5 Flash | gemini-3.6-flash (asked for gemini-3.5-flash; the API answered as this version) | 2026-11-01 12:41 | no | 0 | 16 s |
| Negative framing | Perplexity Sonar | sonar | 2026-11-01 18:55 | yes | 10 | 4 s |
| Negative framing | Grok 4.20 | spacexai/grok-4.20-non-reasoning via xai | 2026-11-01 16:32 | yes | 10 | 15 s |
| Negative framing | Mistral Small | mistral/mistral-small via mistral | 2026-11-01 15:49 | yes | 5 | 4 s |
| Negative framing | DeepSeek V4 Flash | deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash via deepinfra | 2026-11-01 17:19 | yes | 24 | 36 s |
| Negative framing | Llama 4 Maverick | meta/llama-4-maverick via bedrock | 2026-11-01 10:47 | yes | 5 | 2 s |
| Negative framing | Qwen 3.7 Flash | alibaba/qwen3.7-flash via alibaba | 2026-11-01 16:46 | yes | 9 | 34 s |
| Negative framing | Kimi K2 | moonshotai/kimi-k2 via novita | 2026-11-01 12:49 | no | 0 | 68 s |
| Negative framing | GLM 4.7 FlashX | zai/glm-4.7-flashx via zai | 2026-11-01 11:29 | yes | 19 | 49 s |
| Negative framing | MiniMax M2.5 | minimax/minimax-m2.5 via minimax | 2026-11-01 19:44 | yes | 17 | 54 s |
| Negative framing | GPT-6 Luna | gpt-6-luna | 2026-11-01 10:00 | yes | 3 | 14 s |
| Negative framing | Muse Glimmer 30B | meta/muse-glimmer-30b via togetherai | 2026-11-01 17:23 | yes | 24 | 31 s |
Normalization in this category
Every judgment call made between the raw labels and the numbers above, listed so it is visible and reversible.
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Category-scoped readings
A10 Networks (Thunder ADC) read as A10 Thunder ADC
AWS ALB/ELB read as AWS Elastic Load Balancing
AWS ALB/NLB read as AWS Elastic Load Balancing
AWS ELB read as AWS Elastic Load Balancing
AWS ELB/ALB read as AWS Elastic Load Balancing
AWS Elastic Load Balancer (ELB) read as AWS Elastic Load Balancing
Akamai read as Akamai Connected Cloud
Azure LB read as Azure Load Balancer
Barracuda read as Barracuda Load Balancer ADC
Citrix read as Citrix ADC
Citrix NetScaler read as Citrix ADC
Citrix NetScaler (ADC) read as Citrix ADC
Cloudflare read as Cloudflare Load Balancing
DigitalOcean Load Balancer read as DigitalOcean Load Balancers
F5 read as F5 BIG-IP Local Traffic Manager
GCP LB read as GCP Cloud Load Balancing
GCP Load Balancing read as GCP Cloud Load Balancing
Google Cloud LB read as Google Cloud Load Balancing
Kemp read as Kemp LoadMaster
Loadbalancer.org read as Loadbalancer.org Enterprise ADC
NetScaler read as NetScaler ADC
Radware read as Radware Alteon
Unresolved, counted raw
AWS Elastic Load Balancing – ALB/NLB
Application Gateway v2 with WAF
Barracuda ADC
Consul
DNS Round-Robin
F5 BIG-IP iSeries
F5 BIG‑IP LTM
GCP HTTP(S)/Network LB
Google Cloud External Application Load Balancer
HAProxy Community
Hetzner Cloud Load Balancers
Hetzner Load Balancers
Legacy Microsoft NLB (Network Load Balancing)
Linux Virtual Server (LVS)
Microsoft NLB
NGINX ADC
NGINX Proxy Manager
NginxaaS
Progress Free LoadMaster
Progress Kemp Free Load Balancer
Route 53 simple routing
SKUDONET/Relianoid Community Edition
Zen Load Balancer
Zevenet (formerly Loadbalancer.org)
Discontinued, still offered
No shut-down product was recommended here.