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Cisco DNA Center vs NetBox.dev comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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 DNA Center
Ranking in Network Automation
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (1st), Network Monitoring Software (20th)
NetBox.dev
Ranking in Network Automation
8th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
IP Address Management (IPAM) Tools (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Network Automation category, the mindshare of Cisco DNA Center is 9.9%, down from 13.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetBox.dev is 3.3%, down from 5.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco DNA Center9.9%
NetBox.dev3.3%
Other86.8%
Network Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Mahir Öztürk - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Engineer at NGN Bilgi ve İletişim Hizmetleri
Client history has helped resolve past network issues more efficiently
I mostly use the client history feature of Cisco DNA Center. I didn't use the real-time monitoring capability of Cisco DNA Center because I primarily used it for client history regarding issues and problems. I don't use it for real-time monitoring. If there is a problem, I can inspect the situation and see what is happening, which is beneficial.
TM
Consulting Engineer at Racing Victoria Limited
Works as an IP asset management platform but improvement is needed in report automation
I recommend the tool to others. I would suggest ensuring that whoever is working on the deployment is fully dedicated during that time. It's important not to be distracted. In my experience, when someone's focus is split, we encounter a few issues. I rate the overall product a seven out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"My advice to others is if you are a large enough company to have the Cisco DNA Center technology, you must try it because for a large enterprise or multi-site organization it's impressive and it saves a lot of money and time."
"The automation features are significant, reducing configuration time. This means outstanding functionality. By deploying the controller automatically, the rest becomes automated"
"Technical support is excellent. We have pretty good technical support."
"Cisco is a leading network company."
"What I found valuable in Cisco DNA Center is the Software-Defined Access Network, so the entire LAN network can be centralized and managed from a single dashboard."
"It is very versatile in terms of analytics."
"Deployment is easier than it was five or six years ago."
"It is a stable solution."
"I find NetBox. dev's interaction and user-friendly GUI most valuable. It makes editing and removing items easy for users. Moving away from spreadsheets has been a benefit for our clients. It saves them a lot of time and makes everything accessible."
 

Cons

"It would be helpful if it could be integrated with a variety of solutions, such as Meraki."
"The tool's IoT integration should be better."
"In my opinion, the client history in Cisco DNA Center can be longer than 10 days, perhaps extending to 15 or 20 days."
"The network, data center, and SD-WAN are all being treated as different services, but I would like to have only one solution to manage all of them."
"The solution's setup process needs enhancement."
"The initial setup is straightforward except for the issue that this solution is incompatible with switches or access points from other vendors. That is very bad."
"An area for improvement in Cisco DNA Center is the latency in data correlation. For example, sometimes, when an issue happens, and I check the logs, I can't find the corresponding log. There's a delay in log replication, so this is what needs improvement in Cisco DNA Center. Reporting in Cisco DNA Center could also be improved because it only has a few templates, and you can't customize it based on your requirements. There aren't many options available in Cisco DNA Center regarding reporting, versus Cisco Prime, which has excellent features for different levels of detailed reports. I'd like to see real-time data replication in the next release of Cisco DNA Center, similar to what's done in Meraki. Data in Meraki is real-time with no delay, so data is immediately replicated in the cloud. Currently, there's a lag in Cisco DNA Center, and addressing that lag is the enhancement I'd like to see in Cisco DNA Center. The solution also needs to be more user-friendly."
"There are some software problems from version to version. It takes a long time for DNA Center to recognize the video and control access devices."
"The tool should improve report automation."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Affordability is a problem because it's created for large enterprises only. So, some customers, even if their engineers want the solution, might have problems with budget limitations."
"The product is very costly."
"Our licensing agreement is for three years."
"The solution is expensive."
"It is an expensive solution."
"The tool is medium-priced."
"The licensing cost for Cisco DNA Center is not more than that of other solutions."
"The price of the solution is expensive. The hardware is licensed on the device, but the hardware on the server is expensive."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
13%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Healthcare Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise24
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco DNA Center?
After evaluating other solutions, we will provide feedback.
What needs improvement with Cisco DNA Center?
The deployment of Cisco DNA Center was complex due to the fact that on the data center side, we have a Juniper infrastructure, which created some complexity, though not significant. The deployment ...
What is your primary use case for Cisco DNA Center?
In my organization, we currently have some Cisco devices such as access switches, and we also have infrastructure, but that is not part of our responsibility. We do not manage that infrastructure. ...
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Also Known As

DNA Center
No data available
 

Overview

Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat, Cisco, SolarWinds and others in Network Automation. Updated: August 2026.
909,725 professionals have used our research since 2012.