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Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN vs Juniper Session Smart Router comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 1, 2025

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

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
92
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (5th), WAN Edge (2nd)
Juniper Session Smart Router
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
12th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
Routers (7th)
 

Featured Reviews

Igor Van Den Ouden - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables secure and flexible branch connectivity with application-aware routing
The valuable features of Cisco SD-WAN include its security policies and zone-based firewall that are applied to every site, as well as application-aware routing. Security is standard compliant, eliminating config drift that was prevalent before manual configurations. Application-aware routing offers flexibility in using different lines for traffic, depending on the policy implemented.
Sascha Bülow - PeerSpot reviewer
Tunnel-free and secure vector routing technology is its major USP, and as a partner, we get good support from them
The UI of the SSR conductor is the main part where improvements can be done. Today, for every configuration step, you have to do a series of clicks. What we are missing there are wizards. For example, I have two applications, and I want one application to be prioritized against the other. In such a case, a wizard for assigning policies to a service without configuring each step by hand would be very helpful. There should be an overhaul of the GUI of the conductor. The functionality they have got in the Mist portal should be baked into the conductor itself. It would be really great, but as we all know, that won't happen. Besides that, there are so many things we are discussing with the engineers and the product management of 128T or Juniper. I'm pretty sure that every feature that will come in the next half-year or three-quarters of a year would be influenced directly by us.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution provides good consolidation, centralization, and manageability for edge routers."
"You get security, all of the service you need, and it's easy to deploy."
"Using SD-WAN to combine services can result in better up time, higher speeds, and much lower costs."
"The deployment is quite simple and straightforward."
"The segmented traffic it provides is the best in the industry right now."
"I have found the solution's main features are its ability to be customized, network traffic classification, and has a wide range of features that can be set."
"Cisco SD-WAN is a stable solution."
"The solution has great scalability."
"As compared to the other major vendors in the SD-WAN market, such as VeloCloud, Cisco, and others, the tunnel-free and secure vector routing technology is its major USP, which gives plenty of room to discuss with the customer why IPSec from 1998 is a bit outdated."
"The solution is especially Session's smart, application-aware, AI-based."
"They provided us with a customized product according to our requirements."
"The most valuable feature of Juniper Session Smart Router is its unique SDR channel."
"Customer service is very prompt."
 

Cons

"We don't have any issues with this solution other than the price."
"The bandwidth limitations would be good to remove, but it is a policy and license situation for Cisco because the cost is very high. It would be good to have OTP implemented with VRF. It can have support for EIGRP Over the Top (OTP) VRF. I saw some limitations in regards to the VRF protocol and the advertisement between VRF configuration. EIGRP Over the Top basically was quite limited with the VRF configuration. If you wanted to do rollback in VRF by using the EIGRP OTP protocol, the formation was not populated across. Cisco got back and confirmed that it is a configuration that I need to wait for until the next release, which is going to happen in one year. Cisco documentation is not the way it used to be before. It just gives an easy way to configure, but it doesn't go into the details of the configuration. The information that you need is there, but sometimes you want to go further and get more information, but the information is quite limited. It would be good to cover a few business cases or configuration cases. They used to be there in the past."
"Cisco's router and voice gateway has not been available since the launch of SD-WAN."
"Better pricing and greater security would be nice to see."
"This solution should include a fully functional firewall at no extra charge."
"The solution could have a better web interface to simplify changing configurations."
"The solution is very costly."
"Its license model needs to be improved. They always make the license model too complex. There are too many license models and too many options. They should have a flexible license model. They can improve a lot of things in terms of scalability, templates, and automation, mainly automation for onboarding a number of sites. If you want some new features, it can take quite a long time. If you want a feature and it is not yet developed, you need to have the support of the business units to have the feature developed. If the feature is not on their roadmap, it can take quite some time before you get the feature."
"The UI of the SSR conductor is the main part where improvements can be done. Today, for every configuration step, you have to do a series of clicks. What we are missing there are wizards. For example, I have two applications, and I want one application to be prioritized against the other. In such a case, a wizard for assigning policies to a service without configuring each step by hand would be very helpful. There should be an overhaul of the GUI of the conductor. The functionality they have got in the Mist portal should be baked into the conductor itself. It would be really great, but as we all know, that won't happen."
"Juniper Session Smart Router can improve the integration for Wi-Fi devices and add additional Sassy deployments."
"Juniper Session Smart Router could be better in terms of software performance."
"Regarding improvement, we still need to see what it can do."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is going to be on a yearly basis. There are no additional costs."
"The costs are a bit on the high side."
"For 600 links, the license for Cisco SD-WAN costs us US$250k a year."
"The price is high."
"The solution is quite expensive so it is important to enhance its cost efficiency."
"You have to pay between 3000 and 10,000 euros, or something in that range. The core switches Nexus cost me between 10,000 and 20,000 euros."
"It is much cheaper than other solutions. Most of our clients are the top 500 companies, and they all have a corporate contract."
"80 percent reduction in WAN costs. There are no MPLS or P2P circuits left in the organization."
"It is a simple bandwidth-based license and the orchestration comes bundled with the solution by default."
"We are currently renegotiating the offer for the licenses and the license bundle model. The license for an ISP has to be different from the license for an end customer. This is something we are currently renegotiating with Juniper, but, of course, the pricing for the licensing is always an issue when you want to get more customers."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
46%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Computer Software Company
21%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco SD-WAN?
When considering the most valuable features of Cisco SD-WAN, the decoupling of self-monitoring stands out significantly.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco SD-WAN?
The pricing for Cisco SD-WAN is rated eight out of ten, with some variability depending on the reseller discounts and the size of the enterprise. It is also relatively cost-effective for smaller bu...
What needs improvement with Cisco SD-WAN?
The main area for improvement in Cisco SD-WAN is the lack of documentation, which often lags behind the software releases. This is especially notable since Cisco acquired the solution and is still ...
What do you like most about Juniper Session Smart Router?
The most valuable feature of Juniper Session Smart Router is its unique SDR channel.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Juniper Session Smart Router?
Juniper Session Smart Router is not significantly cheaper than, for example, Cisco.
What needs improvement with Juniper Session Smart Router?
I did not find any problem with Juniper. Regarding improvement, we still need to see what it can do.
 

Also Known As

Cisco SD-WAN
128T Networking Platform, 128 Technology SD-WAN, Juniper SSR Series
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Doyle Research, Ashton Metzler & Associates
Revation Systems
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN vs. Juniper Session Smart Router and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.