# Progress Kemp LoadMaster vs Cloudflare Load Balancing: which do AI models recommend for load balancers, October 2026

IT AI Recommendation Index, October 2026 Edition, Load balancers. Five of fourteen models named Progress Kemp LoadMaster first on the direct prompt; two named Cloudflare Load Balancing. Page: https://it-ai-index.com/network/load-balancers/progress-kemp-loadmaster-vs-cloudflare-load-balancing/

| | First-choice share | Rank | Negative rate | Labels | Models naming it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Progress Kemp LoadMaster | 27% | #2 of 13 | 0% | 20 | 10 of 14 |
| Cloudflare Load Balancing | 4% | #5 of 13 | 0% | 25 | 12 of 14 |

## The direct prompt, model by model

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: progress kemp loadmaster first (first choices: Progress Kemp LoadMaster) (alternatives: AWS Application Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX)
- Kimi K2: progress kemp loadmaster first (first choices: HAProxy, Progress Kemp LoadMaster) (alternatives: F5 NGINX)
- GLM 4.7 FlashX: progress kemp loadmaster first (first choices: NGINX, Progress Kemp LoadMaster) (alternatives: F5 BIG-IP, HAProxy)
- MiniMax M2.5: progress kemp loadmaster first (first choices: Progress Kemp LoadMaster) (alternatives: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancing, GCP Cloud Load Balancing, NGINX)
- Muse Glimmer 30B: progress kemp loadmaster first (first choices: Progress Kemp LoadMaster) (alternatives: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy, NGINX)
- Gemini 3.5 Flash: cloudflare load balancing first (first choices: Cloudflare Load Balancing) (alternatives: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Application Gateway, HAProxy, NGINX, Progress Kemp LoadMaster)
- Mistral Small: cloudflare load balancing first (first choices: Cloudflare Load Balancing) (alternatives: HAProxy, Progress Kemp LoadMaster, VMware Avi Load Balancer)
- Grok 4.1 Fast: neither first, one named (first choices: HAProxy, NGINX) (alternatives: AWS ALB, Azure Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancing, GCP Cloud Load Balancing, Progress Kemp LoadMaster)
- Qwen 3.7 Flash: neither first, one named (first choices: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Application Gateway, NGINX) (alternatives: Cloudflare Load Balancing, HAProxy)
- GPT-6 Luna: neither first, one named (first choices: AWS Application Load Balancer) (alternatives: Azure Application Gateway, Azure Load Balancer, Cloudflare Load Balancing, Google Cloud Application Load Balancer, Google Cloud Network Load Balancer)
- Claude Haiku 4.5: neither named (first choices: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Load Balancer, NGINX) (alternatives: Citrix ADC, F5, HAProxy)
- GPT-5.4 mini: neither named (first choices: Application Load Balancer) (alternatives: Azure Load Balancer, Google Cloud's Application Load Balancer, Network Load Balancer)
- Perplexity Sonar: neither named (first choices: HAProxy) (alternatives: AWS Elastic Load Balancing, Azure Application Gateway)
- Llama 4 Maverick: neither named

## What the models said about Progress Kemp LoadMaster

- "Best All-Rounder (Hybrid/Virtual/On-Premises): Progress Kemp LoadMaster ... is widely considered the gold standard for the mid-market." (Gemini 3.5 Flash, paraphrase prompt, first choice)
- "I'd recommend Progress Kemp LoadMaster as the best application delivery controller for a mid-sized B2B company" (GLM 4.7 FlashX, paraphrase prompt, first choice)
- "Progress Kemp LoadMaster (now part of Progress) is the one I would suggest as the default starting point." (MiniMax M2.5, paraphrase prompt, first choice)

## What the models said about Cloudflare Load Balancing

- "Ideal for companies needing global traffic steering, failover, and strong DDoS protection... making it a good fit for B2B companies with a global customer base" (Mistral Small, direct prompt, first choice)
- "Best For: B2B SaaS companies, multi-cloud setups, and security-first organizations... Combines global routing with top-tier security at the edge" (Gemini 3.5 Flash, direct prompt, first choice)
- "Best if you want managed service simplicity: Cloudflare Load Balancing ... though managed services can become expensive as usage grows" (Perplexity Sonar, budget prompt, alternative)

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. Comparisons are drawn for the top eight products in each category. Published under CC BY 4.0; the output is the models' output, and nothing here is a recommendation by the index.