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Bacula Enterprise vs Veritas NetBackup 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

Bacula Enterprise
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
27th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Backup (13th)
Veritas NetBackup
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
119
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Bacula Enterprise is 1.0%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Veritas NetBackup is 1.9%, down from 4.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Veritas NetBackup1.9%
Bacula Enterprise1.0%
Other97.1%
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

GiovanniRamirez - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior IT Consultant at Xerif
Solid backup tool with good scalability
The last scenario in which I used Bacula was for a customer who needed some open-source tool which could support encryption at that time. We managed to convince the customer to use Bacula to deploy it in their environment It was a very good project. The Bacula concept, topology, and networking…
SunilPanigrahi - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager at a logistics company with 10,001+ employees
Unified backups have protected virtual machines and applications and optimize storage efficiency
Regarding automated disaster recovery, we have not used Veritas NetBackup automated disaster recovery because according to the RFP terms and conditions, we are not supposed to have automated failover or failback, as we are a government entity and cannot violate the rules of the RFP. My feedback about granular recovery in Veritas NetBackup is that we have been doing verifications of the backed-up data to restore from point to point and time to time, focusing on file level or database level. When it comes to integration with cloud services, we have not started because we are a government entity and are not allowed to store any data in the cloud at this time. From security concerns regarding what I would improve about Veritas NetBackup, I think you need to look into this because we found only one encryption option available, which is not that very strong. When I initiate a backup from my laptop or server to the appliance or the tape media using Veritas NetBackup, the encryption channels are not strong, and there are not many options available. Whatever is there is by default and not changeable. We cannot modify any encryption facilities, and security is a big concern nowadays, so you need to look into that. Regarding the functionality part of Veritas NetBackup, I think this encryption feature should be stronger and integrated from point to point, not just at specific levels. When I initiate a backup, all the communication channels involved should be encrypted until it reaches the endpoint, meaning from client to server, server to client, and client device.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is easy to scale Bacula Enterprise even if your system is growing tremendously in data and servers."
"The most valuable features are the special plugins such as SAP HANA databases, Microsoft SQL, and various types of virtualization."
"The solution has extensive documentation and a very active community."
"Bacula is pretty stable."
"Bacula is very solid, very stable, and very scalable."
"It works great and it provides you with several standard tools to restore your backup, even after a big failure."
"It can be used in virtually any environment we have onsite."
"It brought many advantages - such as the learning curve being very light."
"Deduplication is the most valuable feature as it reduces the backup time and provides backup of a single copy of data"
"The solution is stable."
"This is the best solution that I know of."
"The tool provides recovery. The support for their legacy software is very good."
"The most valuable feature is that you don't need any special connectivity - you just need to give your seller name, and then it automatically discovers all your virtual machines, which is a great benefit, especially in a bigger environment."
"It provides us with the versatility to back up everything we require which eliminates the need for a secondary backup solution."
"The solution is easy to scale."
"Veritas NetBackup provides good backup performance, and I can mount the snapshot without an installer."
 

Cons

"Many features have been converted to commercial licensing, which restricts their availability."
"A more user-friendly interface (GUI) can be developed."
"We would like to see an improvement in the functionality of the GUI."
"The initial setup could be a bit easier."
"We are looking for a unique interface that can rule both enterprise and open source editions. Such a thing does not yet exist."
"Easier setup and configuration, perhaps including a GUI, would be an improvement."
"It could improve its interface or offer a specific screen for the manager of the company."
"Bacula needs a graphical user interface because, for administrators, the command-line interface is okay, but for the average user it is not very easy."
"Veritas NetBackup is an expensive solution, and its pricing could be improved."
"The product must enable data migration from on-premise to the cloud."
"The product could improve the user-friendliness and comfort of its environment, especially for those unfamiliar with it."
"We had some issues with the hardware backup appliance."
"The licensing costs could be more affordable."
"The pricing could be improved, and the interface could be more intuitive."
"The database integration could be better."
"System administrators would be more efficient in NetBackup if the number of tools and command lines was reduced."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This is an open-source solution."
"We have a perpetual license."
"There is a license required for this solution and it is priced based upon the data used."
"It was on a yearly basis. During the annual review, when we asked them about our licensing, they couldn't explain it. For example, we had reduced by a factor of 40%, but our license only dropped by 5%. We would then ask Veritas people if we've reduced this much and shut down these servers, why has our license changed so less? They were never able to give us a straight answer. They weren't able to say, "Well, you're using this, and this is more expensive." In many cases, as we reduced our capacity and what we were using with Veritas NetBackup, our licensing actually went up, and they were often unable to explain why."
"My licensing model is based on capacity so as we grow, the price we pay increases and it becomes too expensive."
"It is slightly more expensive than Commvault, but it is pretty much the same. It is an enterprise solution, so it scales quite well. It has a lot of features. So, you pay for what you get. It is not cheap, but it is fit for the purpose."
"Veritas NetBackup's pricing is a bit steep when compared to other tools. It is very costly, but service-wise and overall, the Veritas NetBackup is a good product."
"When we consider the quality and value of Veritas NetBackup, it is worth the cost."
"It is very expensive. The licensing cost for this solution is on a yearly basis. It is approximately 50k. We will continue using it at least for the next year, but we are currently doing an analysis to switch to some other solution."
"I rate the product's pricing a seven out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
University
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business33
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise66
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Bacula Enterprise?
Bacula is more expensive than various other solutions. It’s almost completely commercial now. Products like Veeam software are much more expensive.
What needs improvement with Bacula Enterprise?
Many features have been converted to commercial licensing, which restricts their availability.
What is your primary use case for Bacula Enterprise?
The last scenario in which I used Bacula was for a customer who needed some open-source tool which could support encryption at that time. We managed to convince the customer to use Bacula to deploy...
What is the best next generation backup tool?
Assuming you have an onprem ecosystem which runs the VMware, physical systems on Win, Linux and Unix and run both traditional DB's and nosql DB's like mongo, then Netbackup (NBU) will be the right ...
What do you like most about Veritas NetBackup?
The most valuable feature of cloud integration is the ability to send data outside of your location. This can be achieved by integrating cloud tier options or other object storage solutions.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Veritas NetBackup?
Veritas NetBackup is quite expensive, and sometimes vendors do not suggest it and always recommend different other options, especially after certain points, which is a concern. As far as our core o...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NASA, SwissCom, Navisite, Turner Studios, Bank Austria, Caixa Bank, SdV Plurimedia, Leibniz University Hannover, Zeta Global, Tricore, NetLog, Siemens, LocaWeb, wbsGo, itesys, Queens School of Computing, Escrypt.
Beta Offshore
Find out what your peers are saying about Bacula Enterprise vs. Veritas NetBackup and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,768 professionals have used our research since 2012.