Load balancers · November 2026 Edition
A10 Thunder ADC vs AWS Application Load Balancer
Zero of fourteen models named A10 Thunder ADC first on the direct prompt; two named AWS Application Load Balancer. A10 Thunder ADC was named by ten of the fourteen models and AWS Application Load Balancer by ten and A10 Thunder ADC carries 10 labels and AWS Application Load Balancer 14, so the shares are not directly comparable.
Named in one category this edition.
AWS Application Load Balancer
accepted challengerNamed in one category this edition.
First-choice share4%4%Of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts, 0 to 100.
Negative rate0%14%Negative labels as a share of the product's labels, 0 to 100.
Rank in category#6#7A position in a field of 16; printed, not drawn.
Labels1014A count; the two differ.
The two percentage rows are drawn on one 0 to 100 track, A10 Thunder ADC reading right to left. Rank and label count are printed, not drawn.NGINX was named alongside these two in eleven of the fourteen direct answers. HAProxy vs A10 Thunder ADC · HAProxy vs AWS Application Load Balancer · NGINX vs A10 Thunder ADC
Share is the count of first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts over all fourteen models, for a mid-market B2B company; rank is within the category; every quote names the model and the prompt it came from. Both figures come from the load balancers page.
By framing
How many of the fourteen models made each the first choice, per way of asking, and how many argued against it.
A10 Thunder ADCFirst choices, of fourteen modelsAWS Application Load BalancerDirect02
Paraphrase20
Comparative00
Budget-constrained00
Scale-constrained00
Negative002 against AWS Application Load Balancer
Bars are first choices, 0 to 14 each sideModels that argued againstA model can name both, so the two sides of a row do not sum to fourteen.
Every model, every framing
The eighty-four answers behind the chart above, one cell each: where A10 Thunder ADC and AWS Application Load Balancer stood in it.
| Model | DirectAA | ParaphraseAA | ComparativeAA | Budget-constrainedAA | Scale-constrainedAA | NegativeAA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Haiku 4.5 | AA | |||||
| GPT-5.4 mini | AA | | ||||
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | AA | | ||||
| Perplexity Sonar | AA | |||||
| Grok 4.20 | | |||||
| Mistral Small | | |||||
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | | |||||
| Llama 4 Maverick | ||||||
| Qwen 3.7 Flash | | AA | ||||
| Kimi K2 | ||||||
| GLM 4.7 FlashX | AA | |||||
| MiniMax M2.5 | AA | AA | ||||
| GPT-6 Luna | AA | |||||
| Muse Glimmer 30B | AA |
A10 Thunder ADCAA AWS Application Load Balancer first choice named as an alternative argued againstblank: not namedEach cell is one answer, A10 Thunder ADC on the left and AWS Application Load Balancer on the right.The direct prompt
The plain question, one answer per model, grouped by where A10 Thunder ADC and AWS Application Load Balancer stood in it.
AWS Application Load Balancer first, A10 Thunder ADC not the choice
2 of 14 modelsA10 Thunder ADC was named in the answer but not as the choice, or not at all.Claude Haiku 4.5AWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Load Balancer, Network Load Balancer alternatives: Google Cloud Load Balancing, NGINX
GPT-5.4 miniAWS Application Load Balancer alternatives: AWS Network Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancing, Google Cloud Application Load Balancer
Neither was the first choice, one was named
2 of 14 modelsThe answer put something else first and named one of the two as an alternative.Gemini 3.5 FlashCloudflare Load Balancing alternatives: AWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Application Gateway, GCP Cloud Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX, Progress Kemp LoadMaster
MiniMax M2.5no first choice alternatives: AWS Application Load Balancer, Azure Load Balancer, Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, Google Cloud Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX
Neither was named
10 of 14 modelsThe answer made no first choice from these two in this category.Perplexity SonarProgress Kemp LoadMaster alternatives: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX
Grok 4.20HAProxy alternatives: AWS Elastic Load Balancing (ELB) – ALB/NLB, Cloudflare Load Balancing, Loadbalancer.org Enterprise ADC, NGINX, Progress Kemp LoadMaster
Mistral SmallNGINX alternatives: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, HAProxy, Kemp LoadMaster, Loadbalancer.org Enterprise ADC
DeepSeek V4 FlashHAProxy, Progress Kemp LoadMaster alternatives: NGINX
Llama 4 MaverickNGINX alternatives: Citrix ADC, F5 BIG-IP, HAProxy, Kemp LoadMaster
Qwen 3.7 FlashNGINX alternatives: Application Load Balancer, HAProxy
Kimi K2Kemp LoadMaster alternatives: HAProxy
GLM 4.7 FlashXProgress Kemp LoadMaster alternatives: Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX
GPT-6 LunaApplication Load Balancer alternatives: Application Gateway, External Application Load Balancer, Front Door, Network Load Balancer
Muse Glimmer 30BHAProxy alternatives: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer, NGINX, Progress Kemp LoadMaster
Bold names in an answer are the products the judge labeled a first choice; a model naming several gives each of them that label. The full answer text for every row is in the record.
By buyer segment
The same question asked on behalf of a different buyer. Each standing is computed within its segment and they are never added together. The figures above are the mid-market standing, which is the one the category orders by.
Small business
AWS Application Load Balancer leads by seven points.
AWS Application Load Balancer7%#5 of 14
A10 Thunder ADC0%#– of 14Mid-marketThe figures above
Level: the same share of first choices.
A10 Thunder ADC4%#6 of 16AWS Application Load Balancer4%#7 of 16
The full mid-market standing →Enterprise
AWS Application Load Balancer leads by two points.
AWS Application Load Balancer2%#12 of 16
A10 Thunder ADC0%#14 of 16What the models said about A10 Thunder ADC
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Three of four in this category shown.
“F5 BIG-IP LTM or A10 Thunder ADC are top choices if you need enterprise-grade features and scalability.” Mistral Small · paraphrase prompt · first choice
“Top Recommendation: A10 Networks Thunder ADC” Qwen 3.7 Flash · paraphrase prompt · first choice
“Strong performance, but generally more complex and positioned slightly upmarket” DeepSeek V4 Flash · paraphrase prompt · alternative
What the models said about AWS Application Load Balancer
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Five of six in this category shown.
“AWS ALB is unsuitable for workloads requiring L4 forwarding, ultra-low-latency pass-through, or non-HTTP protocols; use NLB or the appropriate L4 service instead.” Perplexity Sonar · negative prompt · soft negative
“ALB is not the right choice when the workload is non-HTTP (use NLB)” Muse Glimmer 30B · negative prompt · soft negative
“I'd recommend starting with AWS ALB or Azure Load Balancer (depending on your cloud provider)” Claude Haiku 4.5 · direct prompt · first choice
“AWS-centric company: AWS Application Load Balancer for web apps” GPT-5.4 mini · direct prompt · first choice
“Cloud-first, mostly HTTP(S) APIs, limited ops staff | AWS ALB, Azure Application Gateway, Google Cloud Load Balancing” MiniMax M2.5 · direct prompt · alternative
Also compared
HAProxy vs A10 Thunder ADCHAProxy vs AWS Application Load BalancerNGINX vs A10 Thunder ADCNGINX vs AWS Application Load BalancerKemp LoadMaster vs A10 Thunder ADCKemp LoadMaster vs AWS Application Load BalancerProgress Kemp LoadMaster vs A10 Thunder ADCProgress Kemp LoadMaster vs AWS Application Load BalancerAWS Elastic Load Balancing vs A10 Thunder ADCAWS Elastic Load Balancing vs AWS Application Load BalancerA10 Thunder ADC vs Cloudflare Load BalancingAWS Application Load Balancer vs Cloudflare Load BalancingAll twenty-eight head-to-head pages and the full load balancers standing
Comparisons are drawn for the top eight products in each category, each against each. The output is the models' output; nothing here is a recommendation by the index.