DATA SHEET

BIG-IP DNS

WHAT'S INSIDE Hyperscale and Protect Your DNS While

2 Unmatched DNS Performance Optimizing Global App Delivery
2 DNS Caching and Resolving Scaling and securing every environment helps protect your business from site outages and
3 Secure Applications improves DNS and application performance. Securing DNS infrastructures from the latest
distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and protecting DNS query responses from cache-
7 Globally Available Applications
poisoning redirects will help keep your business online and viable. To fully achieve these
9 Simple Management goals, you need efficient ways to monitor DNS infrastructure and application health, and to
scale on-demand.
13 Network Integration

15 Architecture F5® BIG-IP® DNS distributes DNS and user application requests based on business policies,
data center and cloud service conditions, user location, and application performance. The
15 BIG-IP Platforms
BIG-IP platform delivers F5’s high-performance DNS services with visibility, reporting, and
16 F5 Cloud Services analysis; hyperscales and secures DNS responses geographically to survive DDoS attacks;
delivers a real-time DNSSEC solution; and ensures high availability of global applications in
16 DNS On-Demand Scaling
all cloud environments.
17 DNS Query RPS Maximum
Performance
KEY BENEFITS
18 Simplified Licensing
Hyperscale DNS up to 100 million RPS with a Improve global application performance
18 F5 Global Services
fully loaded chassis Send app users to the cloud or on-premises site
18 DevCentral BIG-IP DNS hyperscales authoritative DNS up to with the best performance based on application,
100 million query responses per second (RPS) geolocation, business, and network conditions.
and controls DNS traffic. It ensures that users are
connected to the best site and delivers on-demand Deploy flexibly, scale as you grow, and
scaling for DNS and global apps. manage efficiently
BIG-IP DNS delivers flexible global application
Protect against DNS attacks and ensure management in virtual and multi-cloud
availability environments. The web-based UI provides
Ensure DNS and application availability and easy DNS configuration with centralized menus;
protection during DNS DDoS attacks or volume advanced logging, statistics, and reporting along
spikes. Mitigate DNS threats by blocking access with export to 3rd party analytics.
to malicious IP domains.
U N M AT C H E D D N S P E R F O R M A N C E

BIG-IP DNS delivers hyperscale performance that can handle even the busiest apps and
websites. When apps have a volume spike in DNS queries due to legitimate requests or DDoS
attacks, BIG-IP DNS manages requests with multicore processing and F5 DNS Express™,
dramatically increasing authoritative DNS performance up to 50 million RPS to quickly
respond to all queries.

This scalability helps your organization provide the best quality of service (QoS) for your users
while eliminating poor application performance. DNS Express improves standard DNS server
functions by offloading DNS responses as an authoritative DNS server. BIG-IP DNS accepts
zone transfers of DNS records from the primary DNS server and answers DNS queries
authoritatively.

Benefits and features of multicore processing and DNS Express include:

• High-speed response and DDoS attack protection with in-memory DNS

• Authoritative DNS replication in multiple BIG-IP or DNS service deployments for

faster responses

• Authoritative DNS and DNSSEC in multi-clouds for disaster recovery and fast,
secure responses

• Scalable DNS performance for quality of app and service experience

• The ability to consolidate DNS servers and increase ROI

In cases of very high volumes for apps and services or a DNS DDoS attack, BIG-IP DNS with
DNS Express enabled plus in Rapid Response Mode (RRM) hyperscales up to 100 million RPS.
It extends availability with unmatched performance and security—absorbing and responding
to queries up to 200 percent of the normal limits. See page 17 for performance metrics
and details.

D N S C A C H I N G A N D R E S O LV I N G

DNS latency can be reduced by enabling a DNS cache on BIG-IP DNS and having it respond
immediately to client requests. BIG-IP DNS can consolidate the cache and increase the
cache hit rate. This reduces DNS latency up to 80 percent, with F5 DNS Caching reducing
the number of DNS queries for the same site. When used in hardware on the F5 VIPRION®
platform, DNS caching hyperscales for ultimate query response performance and delivers
linear scalability across multi-bladed chassis. In addition to caching, BIG-IP DNS allows the
device to do its own DNS resolving without requiring the use of an upstream DNS resolver.

BIG-IP DNS 2
 Caching profiles available to select for multiple caches include:

• Transparent cache

• BIG-IP DNS site between client and DNS internal/external

• Hot cache

• Caching resolver

• No cache response - BIG-IP DNS sends out requests with responses returned for
resolving and caching

• Validating caching resolver

DATA CENTER 1

INTERNAL CLIENTS DATA CENTER 2

300ms

Figure 1: BIG-IP DNS supports all BIG-IP

DNS
common DNS deployments that
are either authoritative or locally 15ms
resolved DNS. Specific zone requests
not cached are forwarded to name
servers for faster DNS resolving, BIG-IP Platform
allowing users to receive expedient 300ms
responses.
Private/Public
Cloud

BIG-IP DNS reduces the average DNS response time and latency for mobile and desktop
devices from an average of 300 milliseconds (ms) and 100 ms respectively to as little as 15
ms, depending on workloads.

S E C U R E A P P L I C AT I O N S

DNS denial-of-service attacks, cache poisoning, and DNS hijacking threaten the availability
and security of your applications. BIG-IP DNS protects against DNS attacks and enables you
to create polices that provide an added layer of protection for your applications and data.

DNS attack protection features include:

• Hardened device—BIG-IP DNS is ICSA Labs Certified as a network firewall, and resists
common teardrop, ICMP, and daemon attacks.

• DNS attack protection—BIG-IP DNS offers built-in protocol validation in software to

automatically drop high-volume UDP, DNS query, NXDOMAIN floods, and malformed
packets. You can use BIG-IP DNS in hardware to mitigate these high-volume attacks.

BIG-IP DNS 3
 • DNS load balancing—The BIG-IP platform can be used to front-end static DNS servers.
If the DNS request is for a name controlled by the BIG-IP platform, F5 DNS services will
answer the request.

• Security control—F5 iRules® for DNS can help you create policies that block requests
from rogue sites.

• Packet filtering—BIG-IP DNS uses packet filtering to limit or deny websites’ access
based on source, destination, or port.

DNS firewall
DNS DDoS, cache poisoning of LDNS, and other unwanted DNS attacks and volume spikes
can cause DNS outage and lost productivity. These attacks and traffic spikes increase volume
dramatically and can take down DNS servers.

BIG-IP DNS, with security, scale, performance, and control functionality, provides DNS firewall
benefits. It shields DNS from attacks such as reflection or amplification DDoS attacks and
other undesired DNS queries and responses that reduce DNS performance.

Figure 2: Visualize DNS DDoS

attacks, the top 25 attack URLs,
Queries Per Second (QPS) and by
country as available, and other DNS
traffic such as Reponses Per Second
(RPS) by record types for a full
picture of your DNS performance and
unwanted attacks.

BIG-IP DNS 4
F5 DNS SERVICES INCLUDE: In addition, you can mitigate complex DNS security threats by blocking access to malicious IP
domains with Response Policy Zones. With BIG-IP DNS, you can install a third-party domain
• Protocol inspection and validation
filtering service such as SURBL or Spamhaus and prevent client infection or intercept infected
• DNS record type ACL* responses to known sources of malware and viruses. F5 DNS firewall services reduce the

• High-performance authoritative
costs of infection resolution and increase user productivity.
DNS, which scales responses
exponentially IMPORTED DATABASE SERVICE

• Authoritative DNS hyperscaling Response Policy Zone

Domain Reputation
up to 200% to absorb DDoS Live Updates

attacks Service A Service B

USERS
• Reducing latency and
hyperscaling DNS caching
BIG-IP
• DNS load balancing DNS

• Stateful inspection (never

accepts unsolicited responses) BIG-IP Platform

• ICSA Labs certification (can be

deployed in the DMZ)
Figure 3: Lower your risk of malware and virus communication and mitigate DNS threats by
• The ability to scale across blocking access to malicious IP domains with a domain reputation service such as SURBL
devices using IP Anycast or Spamhaus.

• Secure responses (DNSSEC)

CLIENTS DMZ DATA CENTER

• DNSSEC response rate limits

BIG-IP
• DNS over HTTPS support DNS

resolves queries and mitigates Servers

attacks
Internet
LDNS
BIG-IP Platform
• Complete DNS control using
DNS iRules Web
Applications

• DDoS threshold alerting*

• Threat mitigation by blocking

BIG-IP
access to malicious IP domains DNS

BIG-IP BIG-IP
• DNS logging and reporting DNS DNS

BIG-IP Platform
• Hardened F5 DNS code
(not BIND protocol)
BIG-IP VE BIG-IP VE
*Requires provisioning BIG-IP® Advanced Firewall
Manager™ to access functionality.

Figure 4: BIG-IP DNS keeps apps available with firewall services protecting DNS infrastructure
from high-volume attacks and malformed packets.

BIG-IP DNS 5
Complete DNSSEC signing
With BIG-IP DNSSEC support, you can digitally sign and encrypt your DNS query responses.
This enables the resolver to determine the authenticity of the response, preventing DNS
hijacking and cache poisoning. In addition, receive all the benefits of global server load
balancing while also securing your DNS query responses. Alternatively, if a zone has already
been signed, BIG-IP DNS manages static DNSSEC responses for higher performance.

Centralized DNSSEC key management

Many IT organizations have or want to standardize on FIPS-compliant devices and secure
DNSSEC keys. You can use BIG-IP DNS with FIPS cards that provide 140-2 support for
securing your keys. In addition, BIG-IP DNS integrates and uses hardware security modules
(HSMs) from Thales for implementation, centralized management, and secure handling of
DNSSEC keys, reducing OpEx and delivering consolidation and FIPS compliance.

Top-level domain support for DNSSEC

For DNS administrators who want to delegate to other secure sub-domains, BIG-IP DNS
allows easy management of DNSSEC as a top-level domain, becoming a parent zone.

DNSSEC validation
In most networks, DNS resolvers offload DNSSEC record requests and crypto calculations
to validate that the DNS response being received is correctly signed. DNSSEC responses
coming into the network require high CPU loads on DNS resolving servers.

DNS over HTTPS

DNS over HTTPS (DOH) is encrypted DNS using SSL for full protection. It is fully enabled by
popular web browsers and can create delays and security issues for service providers and
enterprises who are not able to terminate and respond to these DNS inquires. F5 BIG-IP DNS
allows your network to unencrypt and resolve DNS queries over HTTPS without impacting
responses-per-second (RPS). In addition, DoH support removes HTTPS as a DNS Spoofing
vector for malicious amplification attacks and protects the last mile with DNS message
encapsulation.

BIG-IP DNS 6
Advanced global load balancing
BIG-IP DNS includes the industry’s most advanced traffic distribution capabilities to match the
needs of any organization or globally deployed application.

• Round robin • Round trip time

• Global availability • Hops

• LDNS persistence • Packet completion rate

• Application availability • User-defined QoS

• Geography • Dynamic ratio

• Virtual server capacity • LDNS

• Least connections • Ratio

• Packets per second • Kilobytes per second

With BIG-IP DNSSEC validation, administrators can easily offload and validate DNSSEC on the
client side using BIG-IP DNS for resolving. This results in superior DNS performance and a
dramatic increase in the site response to users.

G L O B A L LY AVA I L A B L E A P P L I C AT I O N S

BIG-IP DNS offers global application availability and sophisticated health monitoring that
support a wide variety of application types, giving organizations the flexibility to adapt quickly
and stay competitive.

These global availability and health monitoring features include:

• Global load balancing—BIG-IP DNS provides comprehensive, high-performance

application management for hybrid environments.

• Dynamic ratio load balancing—BIG-IP DNS routes users to the best resource based on
site and network metrics (for example, based on the number of hops between the client
and the local DNS).

• Wide area persistence—To ensure user connections persist across apps and data
centers, BIG-IP DNS synchronizes data, propagates local DNS, and maintains
session integrity.

• Geographic load balancing—BIG-IP DNS includes an IP database identifying location at

the continent, country, and state/province level to connect users to the closest app or
service for the best performance.

BIG-IP DNS 7
 • Custom topology mapping—With BIG-IP DNS, organizations can set up custom
topology maps. By defining and saving custom region groupings, you can configure
topology based on intranet app traffic policies that match your internal infrastructure.

• Infrastructure monitoring—BIG-IP DNS checks entire infrastructure health, eliminating

single points of failure and routing app traffic away from poorly performing sites.

SITE 2 – NEW YORK

Figure 5: BIG-IP DNS ensures users

BIG-IP BIG-IP
are always connected to the best site. DNS LTM
1 User queries local DNS to resolve
USER – SEATTLE
domain, and local DNS queries
BIG-IP DNS. 2 BIG-IP DNS uses
4 BIG-IP Platform BIG-IP Platform
metrics collected for each site and
identifies the best server. 3 BIG-IP
DNS responds to local DNS with IP
address. 4 User is connected to best
site on premises or in multi-cloud. 1
Corporate Servers

SITE 1 – SAN FRANCISCO

BIG-IP BIG-IP 2
DNS LTM

BIG-IP Platform BIG-IP Platform

BIG-IP BIG-IP
DNS LTM

3
Cloud Apps

Corporate Servers

Application health monitoring

BIG-IP DNS improves the application experience by intelligently monitoring the availability of
resources. It expands application resilience by flexibly selecting and using the best available
BIG-IP solutions for health monitoring. BIG-IP DNS reduces application downtime and enables
easy availability with multiple settings in application monitoring.

Today’s sophisticated applications require intelligent health checks to determine availability.

Instead of relying on a single health check, BIG-IP DNS aggregates multiple monitors so that
you can check the application state at multiple levels. This results in the highest availability,
improves reliability, and eliminates false positives to reduce management overhead.

BIG-IP DNS provides pre-defined, out-of-the-box health monitoring support for more than 18
different applications, including SAP, Oracle, LDAP, and mySQL. BIG-IP DNS performs targeted
monitoring of these applications to accurately determine their health, reduce downtime, and
improve the user experience.

BIG-IP DNS 8
 Disaster recovery/business continuity planning
In addition to performing comprehensive site availability checks, you can define the
conditions for shifting all traffic to a backup data center, failing over an entire site, or
controlling only the affected applications.

SIMPLE MANAGEMENT

Managing a distributed, multiple-site network from a single point is an enormous challenge.

BIG-IP DNS provides tools that give you a global view of your infrastructure with the means
to manage the network and add polices to ensure the highest availability for your business-
critical applications. Manage global infrastructure from a centralized UI with features
including:

• Web-based user interface.

• Streamlined and centralized DNS and GSLB menus for fast configuration.

• Efficient list and object management for complete visibility of global resources.

• Unique naming of objects to reduce administration and build business policies.

• Enhanced management of distributed applications as part of one collective group.

• Context-sensitive help for information on objects, commands, and configuration

examples.

Figure 6: Reduce DNS delivery

deployment time with centralized
and easy-to-find configuration and
management sequences.

BIG-IP DNS 9
 • Powerful command-line interface—The TMSH command-line interface delivers
integrated search, context-sensitive help, and batch-mode transactions.

• Automated setup and synchronization—Autosync automates and secures multiple

BIG-IP DNS devices, eliminating difficult hierarchical management common to DNS.

• Improves scale and analysis with unlimited N+1 devices—In a failover situation, when
BIG-IP DNS services are part of a Device Service Cluster (DSC) group, the BIG-IP
solution performs at its peak capacity—across all appliances or virtual editions synced
with DNS and GSLB services. BIG-IP DNS provides highly scalable apps and services,
performing smart analysis on all incoming traffic to better understand patterns and
anomalies.

• Scalable and optimized GSLB configurations—Incremental Sync delivers high

performance for large deployments. With more devices synced, configuration changes
transpire rapidly. For large deployments with GSLB configurations and rapid user
changes, you can protect changes by manually saving when most convenient.

• Configuration retrieval—AutoDiscovery enables retrieved configurations from

distributed BIG-IP instances, removing repeat configurations across devices.

• Data center and sync groups—Create logical groups of network equipment to ensure
efficient use of monitoring and metrics collection for intelligently sharing with members
in the logical group.

• Distributed application management—You can define dependencies between

application services and manage them as a group, building scalable traffic distribution
policies and improving efficiency with granular control of objects.

• iRules—Use the F5 iRules scripting language to customize the distribution of global

traffic. BIG-IP DNS looks deep inside DNS traffic to customize app traffic to the desired
data center, pool, or virtual server. This reduces latency, increases attack protection,
and improves performance.

• Customize traffic with QoS—Design traffic decisions and easily develop custom load
balancing algorithms using quality of service metrics in iRules, such as round-trip time,
hops, hit ratio, packet rate, topology, and more.

• DNS iRules—Manage DNS queries, responses, and actions for a fast, customized
DNS infrastructure. For instance, configure DNS iRules with filtering for protection
and reporting.

• F5 ZoneRunner™ —ZoneRunner is an integrated DNS zone file management tool that

simplifies and reduces the risk of misconfiguration. Built on the latest version of BIND,
ZoneRunner provides:

• Auto population of commonly used protocols.

• Validation/error checking for zone file entries.

BIG-IP DNS 10
 • Zone importation from an external server or a file.

• Automatic reverse lookups.

• Easy creation, editing, and searching of all records.

• Easy management of NAPTR records for LTE and 4G requirements.

Load balancing across container environments

When migrating to public cloud and containers, engineers and architects need a robust
solution for load balancing between clusters (global load balancing) across multi-cloud
deployments. F5 BIG-IP DNS targets applications in container clusters for scale, routing,
and security services by enabling Server Name Indication (SNI) support when using
HTTPS monitor.

DNS health monitor

The DNS health monitor available in BIG-IP DNS and BIG-IP® Local Traffic Manager™ (LTM)
monitors DNS server health and helps configure DNS based on reporting. The DNS health
monitor detects whether the servers are operating at peak performance and helps in
reconfiguring for optimal responses.

High-speed logging
You can easily manage DNS and global app logging for fast network visibility and planning.
High-speed logging of DNS queries and responses, syslog, and global server load balancing
decision logs improve information on data to enable fast network recognition with quick,
deep search and display.

Figure 7: Understand your DNS health

from seconds to years comparing the
top source IPs, Domain and wide IP
names and the TPS for reporting.

BIG-IP DNS 11
 Enhanced DNS detailed statistics
BIG-IP DNS delivers advanced DNS statistics for administrators, with enhanced detailed data
for profiles such as query type counts (A, CNAME, NS, RRSIG, AAAA, SRV, and “other” types)
with requests, responses, and percentage counts. Stats are per profile and per device global
count for fast visibility and capacity planning of DNS delivery infrastructure. DNS detail stats
are viewable in DNS profile or in analytics reporting.

Advanced DNS reporting and analytics

F5 Analytics provides advanced DNS reporting and analysis of applications, virtual
servers, query names, query types, client IPs, top requested names, and more for business
intelligence, capacity planning, ROI reporting, troubleshooting, performance metrics, and
tuning, enabling maximum optimization of the DNS and global app infrastructure.

Figure 8: Administrators can easily

manage DNS using analytics with
advanced reporting and analysis
of actions for fast visibility of DNS
delivery and infrastructure.

BIG-IP DNS 12
ADVANTAGES OF DNS BIG-IQ Centralized Management
VISIBILITY F5® BIG-IQ® Centralized Management provides a central point of control for F5 physical

• View and manage configuration

and virtual devices and for the solutions that run on them. It simplifies management, helps
and policies on DNS devices. ensure compliance, and gives you the tools you need to deliver your applications securely
and effectively. BIG-IQ manages BIG-IP DNS licenses, policies, SSL certificates, images, and
• Add BIG-IP DNS and BIG-IP LTM
devices to existing sync groups.
configurations.

• Analyze F5 iQuery® connection BIG-IQ offers BIG-IP DNS centralized management including the ability to create, retrieve,
information to help identify DNS update, and delete all global server load balancing (GSLB) objects; tools to deploy and
sync-group issues.
rollback GSLB policies; and the ability to manage DNS listener and profile configurations.
• View high-level statistics across
your DNS infrastructure showing
status of DNS sync groups and
devices.

• View both real-time and historical

DNS statistics.

Figure 9: BIG-IQ integration showcases advanced DNS visibility with requests, responses, and
unhandled query insights for in-depth analytics.

N E T W O R K I N T E G R AT I O N

BIG-IP DNS is designed to fit into your current network and into your plans for the future.
Integration features include:

• SNMP management application support—BIG-IP DNS integrates its MIBs and an

SNMP agent with DNS. This enables SNMP management applications to read statistical
data about BIG-IP DNS performance.

BIG-IP DNS 13
 • Third-party integration—BIG-IP DNS communicates and integrates with a broad array
of network devices. This includes support for various types of remote hosts, such as
SNMP agents, third-party caches, servers, routers, and load balancers to diagnose the
health of network endpoints.

• IPv6/IPv4 support—Ease the transition to IPv6 by providing DNS gateway and

translation services for hybrid IPv6 and IPv4 solutions and managing IPv6 and IPv4
DNS servers. BIG-IP LTM configured with NAT64 transforms IPv6 to IPv4 for those IPv4-
only environments.

• IP Anycast integration—DNS query volumes directed to one IP address, whether

legitimate or during a DoS attack, are easily managed by distributing the load among
multiple geographic BIG-IP DNS devices. Network managers realize these benefits:

• Improved user performance and reliability

• Reduced network latency for DNS transactions

• Ability to scale DNS infrastructure to manage DNS request load to one IP address

• Lower rates of dropped query packets, reducing DNS timeouts/retries

• Increased revenue because more users are serviced and brand equity is protected

Figure 10: BIG-IP DNS and IP Anycast

integration distributes the DNS
request load by directing single IP
requests to multiple local devices.
BIG-IP
DNS

BIG-IP BIG-IP
DNS DNS

BIG-IP Platform

BIG-IP VE BIG-IP VE

• Global server load balancing in virtual and cloud environments—Easily spin up

virtual instances of BIG-IP DNS. Provide flexible DNS delivery and global application
availability by routing users to applications in physical, virtual, and cloud environments.

BIG-IP DNS 14
ARCHITECTURE

The advanced architecture of BIG-IP DNS gives you total flexibility to control application
delivery without creating traffic bottlenecks.

The BIG-IP DNS architecture includes:

• TMOS® —The F5 operating system, TMOS, provides a unified system for optimal DNS
and application delivery, giving you total visibility, flexibility, and control across all BIG-
IP services.

• Query and response performance and scalability—Linearly scale on larger platforms

and multi-bladed chassis for increased performance by integrating functions in TMOS.
BIG-IP DNS is can be provisioned for platforms that support F5 Virtual Clustered
Multiprocessing ™ (vCMP®).

B I G - I P P L AT F O R M S

Only F5’s next-generation, cloud-ready ADC platform provides DevOps-like agility with
the scale, security depth, and investment protection needed for both established and
emerging apps. The new BIG-IP® iSeries appliances deliver quick and easy programmability,
ecosystem-friendly orchestration, and record-breaking, software-defined hardware
performance. Customers can now accelerate private clouds and secure critical data at scale
while lowering TCO and future-proofing their application infrastructures. F5 solutions can
be rapidly deployed via integrations with open source configuration management tools and
orchestration systems.

In addition to the iSeries, F5 offers VIPRION modular chassis and blade systems designed
specifically for performance and for true on-demand, linear scalability without business
disruption. The new VELOS platform is the next generation of F5’s industry-leading chassis-
based systems, which delivers unprecedented performance, scalability, and customization
in a single ADC system. BIG-IP® virtual edition (VE) software runs on commodity servers and
supports the broadest range of hypervisors and performance requirements. VEs provide
agility, mobility, and fast deployment of app services in software-defined data centers and
cloud environments.

See the BIG-IP System Hardware, VIPRION, VELOS, and Virtual Edition data sheets for
details. For information about specific module support for each platform, see the latest
release notes on AskF5. For the full list of supported hypervisors, refer to the VE Supported
Hypervisors Matrix.

BIG-IP DNS 15
In addition, F5 offers BIG-IQ® Centralized Management for single-pane-of-glass management
of all F5 devices for enabling orchestration of F5 application delivery policies.

BIG-IP iSeries Appliances VIPRION Chassis

BIG-IP Virtual Editions VELOS Chassis

F5 CLOUD SERVICES

Now you can easily provision and configure the services your apps need in minutes. Built in
a pay-as-you-go model, F5 Cloud Services offer predictable pricing, flexibility and the ability
to auto-scale to meet changing demand. Have your on-premises DNS services and zone
transferred to F5 Cloud Services:

• DNS Cloud Service—Easily provision and configure DNS services with a few clicks;
begin responding to queries within minutes of activation.

• DNS Load Balancer Cloud Service—Ensure high availability and application

performance with the simple, intelligent F5 DNS Load Balancer Cloud Service.

DNS ON-DEMAND SCALING

Administrators have the option to add DNS and GSLB on-demand scaling with rate limit and
object limit capacity as desired to BIG-IP DNS or BIG-IP LTM appliances. This option supports
requirements for exact traffic performance, resulting in lower CapEx and OpEx. On-demand
scaling includes the following services: DNS, GSLB, and DNSSEC. User interface statistics
show rated capacity of instances, such as query RPS and object limits, which deliver fast
traffic detail for easy capacity planning. Contact your regional F5 sales representative or
reseller for more information.

BIG-IP DNS 16
DNS QUERY RPS MAXIMUM PERFORMANCE

BIG-IP DNS services deliver query response per second (RPS) with high performance
scalability. The table below lists many BIG-IP platforms with DNS Express enabled for
authoritative DNS query response with the maximum capabilities per platform.

Platform Max Query RPS

Virtual Edition 250,000*
i2600 240,000
i2800 500,000
i4600 480,000
i4800 880,000
i5600 1,000,000
i5800, i5820 FIPS 1,500,000
i7600 1,500,000
i7800, i7820 FIPS 2,300,000
10150s NEBS 990,000
10350v FIPS, NEBS 1,800,000
i10600 2,000,000
i10800 2,900,000
i11400-DS 1,200,000
i11600 (DS) 1,800,000
i11800 (DS) 4,500,000
i15600 4,100,000
i15800 8,100,000
VELOS CX410 Full Chassis (8 blades)
VELOS BX110 Blade 2,500,000
VIPRION 2200 Full Chassis (2 blades)
VIPRION 2400 Full Chassis (4 blades)
VIPRION B2250 Blade 2,100,000
VIPRION 4480 Full Chassis (4 blades)
VIPRION 4800 Full Chassis (8 blades)
VIPRION B4450 Blade 6,400,000

*BIG-IP DNS Virtual Edition is available in increments of 250,000 RPS. For 5050s and above, Rapid Response Mode (RRM—see page 2) delivers up to 200
percent of normal max query RPS when turned on. See F5 Sales or reseller for details.

BIG-IP DNS 17
SIMPLIFIED LICENSING

Meeting your applications’ needs in a dynamic environment has never been easier. F5’s
provides you with the flexibility to provision advanced modules on-demand, at the best value.

• Decide what solutions are right for your application’s environment with F5’s solutions.

• Specify the subscriptions you need across hybrid-cloud environments.

• Provision the modules needed to run your applications with F5’s Good, Better, Best
offerings.

• Spin up or down any solution needed with Enterprise Licensing Agreements.

• Implement complete application flexibility with the ability to deploy your modules on a
virtual or physical platform.

F5 GLOBAL SERVICES

F5 Global Services offers world-class support, training, and consulting to help you get the
most from your F5 investment. Whether it’s providing fast answers to questions, training
internal teams, or handling entire implementations from design to deployment, F5 Global
Services can help ensure your applications are always secure, fast, and available. For more
information about F5 Global Services, contact [email protected] or visit F5 Professional
Services.

DEVCENTRAL

The F5 DevCentral™ technical community is an active and engaged source for the best
technical, how-to articles, discussion forums, shared code, media, and more related to DNS
delivery and global app networking.

BIG-IP DNS 18
 M O R E I N F O R M AT I O N

To learn more about BIG-IP DNS, search on f5.com to find these and other resources.

Web pages
DNS Delivery
Global Server Load Balancing
DevCentral

Data sheet
BIG-IP System Hardware Data sheet

Articles and videos

Intro to DNS services and global server load balancing (video)
DNS is key to connected customers
Addressing Cloud-based DNS—It’s time to move
Encrypted DNS - Mitigating the Impact of DoT and DoH for Service Providers
What Is a DNS Amplification Attack?

Case studies
Bank improves user experience with always available, fast, and secure access to banking services using F5
SaaS provider ensures high uptime and resiliency for critical customer apps with F5
Everbridge manages traffic and security across global cloud providers and local data center
Shawbrook Bank enlists F5 to accelerate and scale digital transformation

©2021 F5 Networks, Inc. All rights reserved. F5, F5 Networks, and the F5 logo are trademarks of F5 Networks, Inc. in the U.S. and in certain other countries. Other F5 trademarks are identified at f5.com.
Any other products, services, or company names referenced herein may be trademarks of their respective owners with no endorsement or affiliation, expressed or implied, claimed by F5.
DC0621 | DS-CORE-705086980