Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks are rapidly evolving. The bits per second increased by 20x between 2013 and 2024. This explosive growth reflects not just brute-force volumetric attacks, but also the widespread use of sophisticated amplification techniques. They’re moving beyond simple traffic overload to become precision-guided, adaptive threats. The result is business chaos. The average website downtime costs enterprises upwards of $2 million and $427 per minute for smaller businesses.
Consequently, organizations can no longer afford a reactive posture; they must implement preemptive and resilient defense mechanisms. DDoS protection is no longer optional. Below, we’ll discuss 7 of the best DDoS protection software options on the market in 2025.
What Are DDoS Attacks?
DDoS are a specific type of cyberattack where malicious actors overwhelm a server, website, or network with a flood of illegitimate internet traffic, preventing legitimate users from accessing the service by disrupting its availability. Interestingly, data points to attackers focusing more on financial services and tech. Tech now overtakes gaming as the most targeted sector. The shift toward targeting technology firms is driven by the high value of intellectual property and the critical infrastructure they control. These attacks are often orchestrated for various motives, including extortion through ransom demands, ideological protest (hacktivism), or simply to gain a competitive advantage by disrupting a rival’s operations.
And in 2025, they continue to break records for the number of attacks recorded. Cloudflare, which records a quarterly Cloudflare DDoS Threat Report, stated that during Q2 2025, their system ‘automatically blocked the largest ever reported DDoS attacks, peaking at 7.3 terabits per second (Tbps) and 4.8 billion packets per second (Bpps).’These record-breaking attacks were largely attributed to the exploitation of zero-day vulnerabilities, such as the HTTP/2 Rapid Reset method. As of the latest year-on-year data, the DDoS volume is up 358% (Deepstrike).
There are statistics we could keep feeding you that highlight the growing threat of DDoS attacks. And it’s not just the growing numbers; it’s the style of attacks. Reports indicate that they are becoming longer in duration and more harmful (Yahoo Finance). Furthermore, the prevalence of multi-vector attacks—simultaneously hitting multiple layers (3, 4, and 7)—demands more comprehensive, layered defense strategies.
DataDome DDoS Protect
DataDome DDoS Protection Solution is one of the best on the market. It’s also the industry’s only dedicated Layer 7 DDoS protection solution. It’s specifically designed to stop the most sophisticated application-layer attacks that traditional network defenses fail to do. Using an AI-powered approach, it consistently analyzes more than 5 trillion daily signals that detect and block the most advanced DDoS threats. This focus on behavioral analysis minimizes false positives and ensures legitimate traffic is never blocked. The accuracy is like no other provider.
With DataDome’s DDoS Protect, you can expect:
- Almost instant layer 7 detection, with responses under 2 milliseconds.
- A false positive rate below 0.01%
- Instant protection deployment without the need to change your infrastructure.
- A global analysis and protection of threats
- Integrated Bot Management provides significant operational efficiencies and time savings. DataDome is highly effective at securing critical endpoints, including APIs, against high-volume botnet-driven attacks.
- Block sophisticated account fraud, such as ATO and fake accounts.
- Find and fix blind spots, securing your entire attack surface against fraud.
Cloudflare DDoS Protection Solution
Cloudflare is one of the biggest names in DDoS protection. Protection kicks in automatically, and it scales from stopping a few thousand bad requests to multi-terabit floods. Cloudflare’s visibility and reporting also make it a favorite for businesses that want both raw defense and clear insight into what’s happening during an attack. Cloudflare maintains a strict zero-tolerance policy against ransom DDoS attacks (RDoS), refusing to negotiate with attackers.
Key features ofCloudflare include:
- Always-on protection across Layers 3, 4, and 7 with no manual intervention.
- Network capacity exceeding 200 Tbps
- Real-time analytics and dashboards showing attack type, origin, and mitigation actions.
- Tight integration with Cloudflare’s CDN, WAF, and Bot Management.
- Automatic detection and mitigation measured in seconds. All protection is enforced at the edge, globally, ensuring minimal latency impact.
Also Read: The Future of Cloud Security is Autonomous: Is CNAPP the Foundation?
AWS Shield
AWS Shield is Amazon’s native, always-on DDoS protection for workloads on AWS. The standard version is free and automatic. Shield Advanced adds heavier-duty controls, expert humans on call, and bill-shock “cost protection” when an attack forces resources to scale. Shield Advanced offers dedicated, deep packet inspection capabilities that are not available in the Standard tier. This native integration is a significant advantage for businesses already embedded in the AWS ecosystem, as it simplifies deployment and management complexities.
Key features of the AWS Shield include:
- Always-on detection for L3/L4. Also includes automatic L7 mitigations via AWS WAF integrations.
- 24/7 access to the AWS DDoS Response Team (DRT) with attack diagnostics and hands-on assistance. The DRT offers proactive engagement during an active attack to apply custom, immediate mitigation strategies.
- DDoS cost protection credits to offset scaling and data-transfer spikes on protected resources.
- Global edge footprint through CloudFront and Route 53 for absorption and scrubbing at scale.
Project Shield
Google’s Project Shield is free and built for at-risk publishers, newsrooms, human rights groups, and nonprofits. You route traffic through Google’s reverse proxy, filtering the junk before it reaches you.
Key features include:
- No-cost protection for eligible organizations. It’s designed to defend against volumetric and L7 web floods.
- Reverse-proxy model to scrub traffic on Google’s edge and keep origin IPs off the battlefield. This service leverages Google’s massive global network and infrastructure to absorb even the largest attacks.
- Proven at scale against record-setting attacks.
- Expanded eligibility to more nonprofits and marginalized groups.
Microsoft Azure
Azure’s managed DDoS has two tiers—IP Protection for small footprints and Network Protection for larger estates. Both have automatic tuning per resource and rapid-response support. We like that the tight integration with Azure networking keeps setup simple.
Key features of the Microsoft Azure package include:
- Always-on monitoring and automatic mitigation tuned to your public IP resources.
- Two tiers: IP Protection (cost-effective for <15 IPs) and Network Protection (extras + scale).
- DDoS Rapid Response (DRR) and cost-protection guarantees on Network Protection.
- The platform uses adaptive throttling techniques based on machine learning to distinguish between genuine resource spikes and attack traffic.
Google Cloud Armor
Cloud Armor is Google Cloud’s DDoS/WAF shield for apps on GCP. It also goes beyond via external HTTP(S) load balancing. Its standout is Adaptive Protection—ML that detects anomalies, proposes a blocking rule, and lets you push it live fast. It’s also strong at L7, with global edge capacity and sane rule management.
With Google’s Cloud Armor, you can expect:
- ML-driven anomaly detection is adaptive and auto-generates custom WAF signatures.
- Global edge mitigation across Google’s network with tight load balancer and CDN integration.
- Managed protection tiers and evolving feature sets for large, noisy environments.
- Real-time alerts and recommended rules before attacks increase to full volume. Integration with reCAPTCHA Enterprise provides robust defense against automated bot traffic at the application layer.
AppTrana DDoS Mitigation
Indusface’s AppTrana is a fully managed web application and API protection model with built-in DDoS defense.
Behavioral profiling feeds rate limits and policies per URI, host, geo, and IP. You can block volume and shape hostile behavior without targeting legitimate traffic.
Key features of AppTrana include:
- Managed DDoS across L3–L7 with behavioral analysis and granular rate-limiting.
- 24/7, fully managed WAF, bot mitigation, and API security in one software package.
- A zero false positives policy. AppTrana backs its mitigation efficacy with a comprehensive Service Level Agreement (SLA).
- Strong practitioner reviews (Gartner peer insights) for support quality and efficacy.
Ideally, you want to look for DDoS protection software that combines real-time threat detection with the modern technologies capable of preventing the sheer scale of DDoS attacks we’re seeing in 2025. The key is to match a provider’s strengths—be it Layer 7 specialization, massive network capacity, or seamless cloud integration—with your organization’s specific risk profile and technical environment.
