AWS WAF

AWS WAF delivers the same operational efficiency proposition for web application security that the rest of AWS delivers for infrastructure: zero deployment, pay-as-you-go pricing, and native integration with the services that AWS-hosted applications already use. The 97.526% true positive rate in independent testing confirms that the detection quality is competitive with dedicated WAF vendors. For organisations running applications on AWS that need a starting WAF without procurement complexity or upfront commitment, AWS WAF is the natural first step.

The scope is AWS-hosted resources only. Applications running on Azure, GCP, on-premises, or multi-cloud environments are not protected, and advanced bot management sophistication is less than Cloudflare or Imperva.

The verdict: AWS WAF is right for AWS-native organisations wanting built-in WAF with no deployment overhead and transparent pay-as-you-go pricing. Multi-cloud and on-premises environments should evaluate Cloudflare or Imperva.

Last reviewed: May 2026

Strongest: Performance & latency

Watch out for: Traffic & threat analytics

Best for

AWS-native applications wanting integrated WAF without a separate vendor — especially combined with CloudFront CDN.

Not suitable for: Multi-cloud or non-AWS environments — AWS WAF only protects AWS-hosted resources.