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Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN vs VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 16, 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

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
2nd
Ranking in WAN Edge
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
92
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (6th)
VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
7th
Ranking in WAN Edge
7th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
52
Ranking in other categories
Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) (11th)
 

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.
Sami-Isoaho - PeerSpot reviewer
To fully utilize cloud vendors' hardware networking, Microsoft and VMware support everything
To improve the product, the company, alone or with a good partner, should manufacture their own hardware brand with boxes to make the product more shippable. Implementing VMware is much more difficult, time-consuming, and expensive than implementing Fortinet or Check Point. With Fortinet, you pay a couple of hundred dollars for hosting and a low-cost firewall, there's only one box to ship to each site, and it's much easier to manage. Moreover, it would be easy for the large telecom operators and system integrators to sell the solution. It would also be a good fit for customers with multiple small offices, who I currently advise to choose hardware-vendor SD-WAN solutions over VMware.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Overall, I rate Cisco SD-WAN as nine out of ten."
"The solution has great scalability."
"Cisco SD-WAN is a stable solution."
"The first part that we like is that we can reuse certain hardware, which is a valuable asset. You can use hardware SKUs that already exist in the network. The second part that we like is the integration with the cloud and the measurement of the cloud's quality. These are the two values that this solution gives as compared to other implementations that we have seen."
"The most valuable features, application awareness, and failover resilience, stand out as key considerations for users."
"The most valuable features of Cisco SD-WAN are reliability and scalability."
"SD-WAN is very stable - once it's deployed, you can just forget about it, it runs by itself."
"Any technical support we needed was great."
"VMware is the only SD-WAN solution that integrates with Azure Virtual WAN."
"One of the key use cases for VMware SD-WAN was assisting a customer in the industrial zone. They required virtualized servers and wanted to enable VMware SD-WAN to connect their sites in Japan or China. We assisted in building the system by integrating VMware servers and utilizing the Cisco suite."
"I love the solution because of its many features like cluster and cloud VPN."
"The product’s most valuable feature is DMPO."
"It can be used for load balancing and load sharing. It's easy to use and customizable."
"VMware SD-WAN is scalable."
"They make use of a combination of different internet lines, which improves quality."
"The most valuable feature of VMware SD-WAN is flexibility. It is more flexible than other vendors."
 

Cons

"It would be better if it provided more visibility. At present, we can't troubleshoot in real time."
"The platform needs to be updated to be more stable and simple."
"The user interface needs improvement. Users should be able to find various features faster without much tweaking."
"It's an expensive solution."
"We recently found some bugs."
"Cisco needs to improve the technical support for this solution."
"Since most user-data is going through the solution, we are concerned about security, as all the information is in the cloud and not on-premises. The user data authentification should be higher to better prevent malicious attacks."
"The initial setup was not very straightforward, but it gets easier the more deployments you complete."
"Better price model would be appreciated."
"VMware SD-WAN could improve if the hardware could integrate the interface using ICP. Additionally, if VMware SD-WAN is used with SSE providers that use tunnels there are some issues prioritizing traffic because it cannot decrypt."
"In an upcoming release, the solution can be more functional and have additional features."
"There is room for improvement in the pricing."
"They should provide us with the flexibility to scale up."
"It needs better security."
"The firewall can be more advanced."
"I would like for them to upgrade to 5G integration. Our customers have 4G now and the connectivity isn't good. It should be much faster."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The initial cost is quite significant, but the investment is worthwhile."
"Cost-wise, Cisco SD-WAN is comparatively high."
"The pricing for Cisco SD-WAN is more expensive than other brands or solutions, such as Fortinet and Palo Alto Networks, so it's one out of ten."
"This is not a cheap option but if you move from Capex to Opex, I expect you should have lower costs."
"I give the price a seven out of ten."
"Licensing is on a subscription basis."
"The solution is quite expensive so it is important to enhance its cost efficiency."
"The product's license is expensive."
"VeloCloud performs as well as the Cisco SD-WAN but it is cheaper in price."
"I would rate the product’s pricing a six out of ten since the license is costly."
"The solution's price combines the license and the bandwidth you used."
"The licensing model of VMware SD-WAN could be improved, it is not always that competitive. The biggest concern is to be competitive against other solutions. However, the way that the licensing model is designed is not corresponding to the real use cases of my customers."
"You need to pay for a license to use this product."
"The cost of VMware SD-WAN is high, but I think you can still get better pricing if your volume is high."
"The price of this solution should be lower."
"Price would be a challenge for customers, because it is expensive."
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Answers from the Community

SM
Aug 16, 2022
Aug 16, 2022
@Diyaspino,​ all three are overpriced. Depending on what are you looking for, you may look at Fortinet or even check the latest Sophos offering. There is a number of different postings on SD-WAN in the last few years. Once people learned that SD-WAN is an old VPN with a new user interface, they moved to a new buzzword.
See 2 answers
EB
Jul 25, 2022
Hi @Malith Chandrasekara, @TEDDY LLANO, @reviewer1657632, @Dániel Halmai, @Paul Woods, @Lipaz Hessel ​and @MohamedArshath, Can you please chime in and help @Diyaspino ​with this question? We appreciate your help.  ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ ​
DI
Aug 16, 2022
@Diyaspino,​ all three are overpriced.  Depending on what are you looking for, you may look at Fortinet or even check the latest Sophos offering.  There is a number of different postings on SD-WAN in the last few years. Once people learned that SD-WAN is an old VPN with a new user interface, they moved to a new buzzword. 
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
45%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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 are the biggest differences between Fortinet Fortigate and VMware SD-WAN?
One of our favorite things about Fortinet Fortigate is that you can deploy on the cloud or on premises. It is a very stable, reliable, and consistent solution. We like that we can manage the entire...
What do you like most about VMware SD-WAN?
One of the key use cases for VMware SD-WAN was assisting a customer in the industrial zone. They required virtualized servers and wanted to enable VMware SD-WAN to connect their sites in Japan or C...
 

Also Known As

Cisco SD-WAN
VMware SD-WAN, VeloCloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Doyle Research, Ashton Metzler & Associates
Redmond, Coca Cola, Roka Bioscience, MetTel, Deutsche Telekom, Rockford Construction,  The Bay Club, tru Independence, Triton Management Services, DevCon, AXPM
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN vs. VMware VeloCloud SD-WAN and other solutions. Updated: February 2025.
844,944 professionals have used our research since 2012.