Thinking about moving from HAProxy to a proprietary load balancer?

If you're using HAProxy, you're in good company. It's one of the most flexible and powerful open source load balancers available.

However, if you feel like sometimes you need something more, you might be wondering whether or not to invest in a commercial load balancer instead...

Bottom line — Don't!

HAProxy is without a doubt the most versatile and capable open source load balancer. It's a veritable Swiss Army knife of functionality, with a HUGE developer and support community — much larger than a single organization.

As many of you will know, I’ve already taken a rather passionate stand on HAProxy vs NGINX. Which is exactly why we chose HAProxy as one of the major building blocks of our commercial load balancer.

Shocked? Don't be! Unlike other vendors, we’re very open about what we use in our appliance and why.

And when we implement new functionality, we always give it back to the open source community, for example:

• Integrating a 'server side' feedback agent into the main branch of HAProxy
• Releasing an open source SNMP MIB and agent for HAProxy
• Integration of an external health check into the main branch of HAProxy

Simply put, more eyes means on the code means open source tools are stronger, better, faster and more secure. Which is fundamentally why we believe open source is better than proprietary. And we're not alone. Thousands of people use open source to attain more flexible technology solutions and faster innovation.

So why pay more to be locked in to a commercial product?

It's a good question, and many commercial vendors try and debunk open source HAProxy as a solution — by playing on your fears:

• Fear that you are on your own
• Fear that you’ve configured it wrong
• Fear that you won't be able to fix it
• Fear that its not as good as commercial
• Fear that you will be hacked
• Fear that you will be blamed

Don’t cave in to your fears — You should stick with HAProxy.

I truly mean that. Thousands of people already do and they're very happy.

In fact, most commercial load balancers have very similar functionality to HAProxy. They are just easier to use in certain situations, and may have lots of nice extras like reporting and graphing. SNAPT was a great example of how to sell a nice frontend to HAProxy.

In fact, as I’ve discussed several times before, commercial load balancers are all very similar to each other, which by definition makes them a commodity.

However, if you've decided you might need something more, then where do you turn? You could do worse than speak to us to get advice on your options and how to solve any shortcomings.

Hopefully you are no longer scared of using HAProxy.

But if you decide you might need something more, then speak to us to get advice on your options and how to get exactly what you need.

We genuinely care about your outcomes and never knowingly mis-sell a product just to make a quick buck. Because if it doesn’t solve your problem, what's the point?

Your freedom to choose the best solution is important to us. And if we don’t think we can help you — then we’ll be honest about it.

Our sole purpose is to understand what you need to be successful, and help you deliver that by:

• Listening and understanding where you want to end up on your journey
• Giving you confidence with security, performance and stability
• Offering advice and consultancy that goes beyond just load balancing

And because we already use and love HAProxy for true flexibility, not only can you seamlessly migrate to us, but in the unlikely event that you try our products but later change your mind, you can simply take your existing config and go back to the free version of HAProxy.

How’s that for a get out of jail free card?

P.S. We mean what we say about helping you make the right choice for you. HAProxy Enterprise is nothing to do with us — but we are friends and you should check them out as well. Tell them we sent you!

P.P.S. Talking of friends, we're very sad to hear what's happened to SNAPT Aira. That was another great commercial alternative to HAProxy.

But don't forget to talk to us first ; )