Cloudflare WAF vs ModSecurity
Thirteen of fourteen models named Cloudflare WAF first on the direct prompt; zero named ModSecurity. Cloudflare WAF was named by fourteen of the fourteen models and ModSecurity by ten and Cloudflare WAF carries 70 labels and ModSecurity 20, so the shares are not directly comparable.
Named in two categories this edition.
Named in one category this edition.
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 web application firewalls page.
By framing
Cloudflare WAFFirst choices, of fourteen modelsModSecurity
Across every category in the November 2026 Edition, Cloudflare WAF and ModSecurity were named in the same answer forty-one times, of the 219 answers naming Cloudflare WAF and the 48 naming ModSecurity. In those answers ModSecurity took the first choice one time and Cloudflare WAF twenty-seven.
Every model, every framing
| Model | Direct | Paraphrase | Comparative | Budget-constrained | Scale-constrained | Negative |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Haiku 4.5 | | | | | ||
| GPT-5.4 mini | | | | | ||
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | | | | | | |
| 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 | | | | | | |
| Muse Glimmer 30B | | | | | |
Cloudflare WAF ModSecurity first choice named as an alternative argued againstblank: not namedEach cell is one answer, Cloudflare WAF on the left and ModSecurity on the right.The direct prompt
Cloudflare WAF first, ModSecurity not the choice
13 of 14 modelsModSecurity was named in the answer but not as the choice, or not at all.Neither was the first choice, one was named
1 of 14 modelsThe answer put something else first and named one of the two as an alternative.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
Cloudflare WAF94%#1 of 9ModSecurity0%#6 of 9Cloudflare WAF85%#1 of 12ModSecurity2%#6 of 12Cloudflare WAF60%#1 of 9ModSecurity0%#– of 9What the models said about Cloudflare WAF
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Six of eight in this category shown.
“Popular and low-latency, but criticized for outdated ModSecurity rules, support delays (e.g., 48+ hours), latency in some cases, false negatives, and bypasses” Grok 4.20 · negative prompt · soft negative
“A significant 2024 vulnerability (discovered by Zafran) revealed a pervasive misconfiguration bug affecting these major WAF providers” Kimi K2 · negative prompt · soft negative
“These avoid high licensing costs (often $5K–$50K+/year for commercial tools like Cloudflare Enterprise, AWS WAF, or Imperva)” Grok 4.20 · budget prompt · soft negative
“For most mid‑market B2B companies the Cloudflare WAF is the easiest, most cost‑effective way to get enterprise‑grade protection today.” MiniMax M2.5 · direct prompt · first choice
“Cloudflare WAF with Bot Manager is the best overall choice due to its strong security, ease of deployment, and cost-effective pricing” Mistral Small · paraphrase prompt · first choice
“For most small‑to‑midsize companies on a tight budget, Cloudflare’s free or low‑cost WAF tier is the best starting point.” GLM 4.7 FlashX · budget prompt · first choice
What the models said about ModSecurity
Every negative label with a quote, up to three, then the highest-weighted positives, up to three. Six of eight in this category shown.
“Do not install this unless you are prepared to spend weeks maintaining the OWASP Core Rule Set (CRS). An unpatched open-source WAF is often less secure” Qwen 3.7 Flash · negative prompt · hard negative
“Deploying legacy self-hosted open-source WAF engines (like unmaintained ModSecurity v2/v3 builds) without active maintenance or rule updates.” Gemini 3.5 Flash · negative prompt · hard negative
“Avoid purely open-source options like ModSecurity unless you have dedicated security staff” Grok 4.20 · paraphrase prompt · hard negative
“Top Recommendation: ModSecurity (with OWASP Core Rule Set)” Grok 4.20 · budget prompt · first choice
“don't reject ModSecurity simply because it's older: its project says it is now under OWASP stewardship and actively maintained” GPT-6 Luna · negative prompt · alternative
“ModSecurity or Coraza offer powerful, free protection with complete customization” Kimi K2 · budget prompt · alternative
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.