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Actifio vs Zerto comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Actifio
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
50th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
Test Data Management (7th)
Zerto
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
2nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
304
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Migration (3rd), Cloud Backup (2nd), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Actifio is 0.3%, down from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zerto is 3.0%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

Anil-Sinha - PeerSpot reviewer
Actifio enables quick and efficient data refreshes
The product is scalable. However, to ensure optimal scalability, you need to work on the underlying hardware and resources. For example, if your network has limited bandwidth, you need to identify and address the bottlenecks by increasing resources. The product is designed to be scalable, but it requires attention to the underlying resources to ensure sufficient capacity. For example, they have the appliance on a given server. And that server would work till a certain stage. Then if you see that the resources are low or have reached the capacity, you have to next level of the VM, like, in terms of if there is a memory or CPU or from the appliance to wherever you are hosting, wherever you are presenting that virtual disk, that network traffic, if you see that network traffic is reaching capacity, then you have to add additional. So it's scalable from the design perspective, but you have to work on the underlying resources to make sure they also have that capacity.
Sachin Vinay - PeerSpot reviewer
Leverage disaster recovery with reliable support and cost-effective future-proof features
Zerto is straightforward to implement because it only requires the installation of an agent on the VMs designated for migration. A service, typically a VM, must also be deployed at the disaster recovery location. This entire process is simple and can be completed within three days. Zerto's near-synchronous replication occurs every minute, allowing for highly granular recovery points. This means that even if interruptions or malware disruptions occur within that minute, Zerto can restore to the last known good state, effectively recovering the entire setup to the latest backup. This capability ensures high data security and minimizes potential data loss. One of the main benefits of implementing Zerto is its data compression, which significantly reduces the load on our IPsec VPN. Zerto compresses data by 80 percent before transmitting it across the VPN, minimizing the data transferred between geographically dispersed locations. This compression and subsequent decompression at the destination alleviate the strain on the VPN, preventing overload and ensuring efficient data synchronization. Zerto simplifies malware protection by integrating it into its disaster recovery and synchronization features. This comprehensive approach eliminates the need for separate antivirus setups in virtual machines and applications. It streamlines our security measures and removes the need for additional software or solutions, resulting in an excellent return on investment. Zerto's single-click recovery solution offers exceptional recovery speed. Through the user interface, a single click allows for a complete restoration from the most recent backup within two to three minutes, enabling rapid recovery and minimal downtime. Zerto's Recovery Time Objective is excellent. In the past, if a virtual machine crashed, we would recover it from a snapshot, which could take one to two hours. With Zerto, the recovery process takes only five minutes, and users are typically unaware of any disruption. This allows us to restore everything quickly and efficiently. Zerto has significantly reduced our downtime. When malware affects our data, Zerto immediately notifies us and helps us protect other applications, even those not yet implemented with Zerto. By monitoring these applications, we can quickly identify and address any potential malware spread, minimizing downtime across our systems. Zerto significantly reduces downtime and associated costs during disruptions. Our services are unified, so in the event of a disruption without Zerto, even a half-day disruption would necessitate offline procedures. This would lead to increased manpower, service delays, and substantial financial losses due to interrupted admissions and other critical processes. By unifying service processes, Zerto minimizes the impact of outages. Zerto streamlines our disaster recovery testing across multiple locations by enabling efficient failover testing without disrupting live services. Traditionally, DR testing required downtime of critical systems, but Zerto's replication and failover capabilities allow us to test in parallel with live operations. This non-disruptive approach ensures continuous service availability while validating our DR plan, even in scenarios like malware attacks, by creating a separate testing environment that mirrors the live setup. This comprehensive testing provides confidence in our ability to handle real-world incidents effectively. This saves us over 60 percent of the time. Zerto streamlines system administration tasks by automating many processes, thereby reducing the workload for multiple administrators. This allows them to focus on other university services that require attention and effectively reallocate support resources from automated tasks to those requiring more dedicated management. Zerto is used exclusively for our critical services, providing up to a 70 percent improvement in our IT resilience.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Very user-friendly and the QSA is very good."
"They will assist me in achieving whatever budget issue the client may be having."
"Actifio was very stable. Whenever they identified bugs, they would promptly provide us with patches."
"Very user-friendly and the QSA is very good."
"The solution helps reduce costs."
"This product has unique capabilities that lead the product category in test data management, cloning and recovery."
"The portal is a valuable feature. I am here in Baton Rouge, and I can get into the Vegas data center and see real-time replication on the portal."
"There wasn't anything in place that compares to what we're getting from Zerto. Before Zerto, we didn't have a proper disaster recovery program or application in place. We had a simple backup solution where we could back up our data every 24 hours. So we went from that to being able to recover full systems within a matter of minutes. With Zerto, if we do have an event or disaster, we know that we can recover from that much quicker than we were able to before."
"The software has been awesome."
"What I like most about Zerto is that it just works at the end of the day. It is almost a set-it-and-forget-it solution in relation to its capability of keeping the DR environment in sync."
"Zerto is an excellent solution for cloud-based environments, but for DIY clients who have another site to recover their systems it also works well."
"The most important features are the simplicity of recovery and the wider capabilities and feature sets than VMware SRM has."
"The continuous replication with a low recovery point objective (RPO) is crucial for us."
"In terms of the most valuable features, having the failover tests where you can see where your actual RTO and RPO would be is really nice, especially for the management level. I really liked the ease of when I need to do a file or folder restore off the cuff. Usually, it takes me less than five minutes to do it, including the mounting of the actual image. That was one thing with Unitrends, it was a similar process but if that backup had aged off of the system, then you had to go to the archive and you find the right disks, load them in, and then actually mount the image."
 

Cons

"Areas that need improvement would be the support for recovery in the physical environment."
"The solution doesn't support AIX software or in-cloud, and we have a lot of servers running on AIX and Oracle."
"While the product does support various databases, the company needs to make more of an effort to support N-minus-one compatibility."
"The initial setup is complex."
"Lacks the option to price backup costs within the solution itself."
"Google has stopped supporting the on-premise version of the tool."
"Even though Zerto is for disaster recovery, it would be nice if it can also make backups."
"Zerto is too reliant on VMware's vCenter. It's tough to upgrade, move, or do anything related to virtual servers with vCenter."
"Zerto should continue adding new features. When I used it at the other bank, it wasn't good with replicating VDIs and automation."
"I would like for them to support additional hypervisor options. They support VMware but if they supported Hyper-V or Nutanix, it would be beneficial."
"The backup end of this solution could be improved. We tried using it as a full backup solution and it took way too long to complete at least one backup."
"From the technical side, there can be a little bit more PowerShell integration. I know it leverages APIs, but people still use PowerShell. Some people would rather use PowerShell if that is an option."
"I would like to have an overall orchestration capability that would enable you to do multiple VPGs in some sort of order, with delays in between."
"Zerto's solution could benefit from additional security features, such as malware scanning tools at the recovery site."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Support is very good. They send out a VM link and help you fix any issues."
"Actifio is cheaper than other tools."
"Pricing is on a case by case basis."
"Compared to other options like SRM, Zerto is a more expensive solution, making it primarily suitable for larger organizations."
"There is a one-time cost for maintenance and support. We have a three-year contract that we will have to renew when those three years come up. There is also licensing on top of that for whatever product you are using it for."
"If you are an IT person and you think that DR is too expensive then the cloud option from Zerto is good because anyone can afford to use it, as far as getting one or two of their criticals protected."
"It is economical as compared to other brands."
"When we purchased Zerto, we felt it was worth the cost as it would protect us from any potential problems and give us peace of mind knowing that any critical items could be recovered quickly."
"The last time I looked at pricing, it was very good. It's much cheaper by far than VMware."
"I know it is per server, but I am not fully aware of the price model. I know for our VDI environment, they are looking at something that is on the lower end and that they can use just for migrations and not so much a disaster recovery."
"Pricing is one area where there could be some improvement. We would like to see a consumption model that would charge in a DR scenario, where you're failing over and consuming those resources, instead of a per-protected-node model. Or it could be a model based on the amount of storage space you're protecting."
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Comparison Review

it_user159711 - PeerSpot reviewer
Nov 9, 2014
VMware SRM vs. Veeam vs. Zerto
Disaster recovery planning is something that seems challenging for all businesses. Virtualization in addition to its operational flexibility, and cost reduction benefits, has helped companies improve their DR posture. Virtualization has made it easier to move machines from production to…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
22%
Computer Software Company
20%
Retailer
8%
Government
5%
Computer Software Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Healthcare Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Actifio?
Actifio is cheaper than other tools. I rate the pricing an eight out of ten.
What needs improvement with Actifio?
The product must provide AI features. Google has stopped supporting the on-premise version of the tool.
What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Data Guard?
Ik fluister:VM Host Oracle en DataGuard hebben we per toeval vervangen door Zerto :-) tijdens de Zerto implementatie en VPG werden de Host Data in write-ack Block-Level gerepliceerd. Qua licentie 1...
What do you like most about Zerto?
Its ability to roll back if the VM or the server that you are recovering does not come up right is also valuable. You have the ability to roll back a few seconds or a few minutes. The rollback feat...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zerto?
The setup is somewhat expensive. I'd rate the pricing seven out of ten.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Zerto Virtual Replication
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

IBM, Waste Industries, Nasdaq, Verizon, Sharp, Rosetta Stone, Dakine, JBS Australia, Texas Wesleyan University, Cintra, People's Choice Credit Union, Lotto NZ, Electric Insurance, Tyler Technologies, Intility, Corporate One Federal Credit Union, Bryant University, pc/nametag, Isagenix, Sungard Availability Services, Databank, Electrocraft, Lifescript, Westfleisch, Interstate National Corporation, RestorePoint, Net3, Access Community Health Network, Newmarket International, Rezolve Group Inc., Piri Reis University, MC Assembly, Grass-Merkur, dbMotion, Christian Broadcasting Network, Bezeq, Abilene Christian University, CNW Group, Softcat, Migliori, City of South Portland, NaviSite, News-Press & Gazette, Comtec, Equity Insurance, Admirals Bank, Assistra, Dassault, Henry Davis York Lawyers, SAI Global, Audax Group, DSM, Triad Retail Media, Euronet Worldwide, Palm Beach County School District, iGate, Emerald Queen Casino
United Airlines, HCA, XPO Logistics, TaxSlayer, McKesson, Insight Global, American Airlines, Tencate, Aaron’s, Grey’s County, Kingston Technologies
Find out what your peers are saying about Actifio vs. Zerto and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,716 professionals have used our research since 2012.