Cisco DNA Center vs Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform comparison

Cisco and Red Hat are both solutions in the Network Automation category. Cisco is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.0, while Red Hat is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.7. Cisco holds a 15.0% mindshare in NA, compared to Red Hat’s 21.2% mindshare. Additionally, 89% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 97% of Red Hat users who would recommend it.

Cisco DNA Center

Read 41 Cisco DNA Center reviews

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1,706 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

Red Hat Ansible Automation ...

Read 68 Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform reviews

3,165 Views
2,144 Comparison Views

97% willing to recommend

Cisco DNA Center

Red Hat Ansible Automation ...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 6, 2025

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform and Cisco DNA Center both compete in the automation and network management sector. Cisco DNA Center is favored for its robust network management capabilities, especially in integrated Cisco environments, whereas Ansible stands out with its simplicity and ease of use.

Features: Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is known for its agentless architecture, utilizing simple YAML syntax for configuration management. It provides flexible, role-based access control and a comprehensive documentation suite. Cisco DNA Center excels in providing centralized control and advanced AI-driven network insights, with seamless integration with other Cisco devices ensuring enhanced network security.

Room for Improvement: Ansible's main challenges revolve around scalability issues due to SSH, along with its GUI and documentation needing improvement. Cisco DNA Center could be more competitively priced and offer better integration with non-Cisco products, with room for improvement in configuration management complexities.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Ansible is deployable in hybrid, on-premises, and multi-cloud environments, with strong community support, though some find the official support lacking. Cisco DNA Center's primary on-premises deployment can be complex, but integration within the Cisco ecosystem is beneficial, and while customer support is generally good, ease-of-use could enhance the setup experience.

Pricing and ROI: Ansible’s open-source basis offers cost benefits, but enterprise features necessitate additional expenditure, providing significant ROI through operational efficiency. Meanwhile, Cisco DNA Center, though more expensive with substantial licensing fees, justifies its cost through comprehensive network management capabilities, potentially limiting adoption in smaller networks due to its pricing structure.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco DNA Center vs. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Report (Updated: January 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco DNA Center vs. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

January 2025

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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

6.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Management Applications (1st), Network Monitoring Software (15th)

Red Hat Ansible Automation ...

Ranking in Network Automation

1st

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Release Automation (3rd), Configuration Management (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Network Automation category, the mindshare of Cisco DNA Center is 15.0%, down from 19.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is 21.2%, down from 22.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Network Automation

Featured Reviews

AvrahamSonenthal

Senior Network Engineer at Inside Global

Efficiently manages our wireless network and provides valuable monitoring features

The platform's biggest benefit has been in managing our wireless network. Having a single pane of glass to control all wireless controllers and access points and to monitor activity has been a significant advantage. We're a small federal agency with around 300 network devices, so automation is a minor focus. It's more relevant for larger networks. The main benefits we've seen are in inventory management and the potential for configuration automation. However, I recommend using the DNA Centre only for larger networks with over a thousand devices; otherwise, it may not be cost-effective. Before proceeding, ensure that your devices are compatible with DNA Center, as not all Cisco devices are supported. Also, investing in proper training is different from plug-and-play. I rate it an eight.

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Surya Chapagain

Senior System Administrator at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

Easy to manage and simple to learn

We use Red Hat a lot. I open tickets for the Red Hat cases, however, with Ansible, I haven't opened any cases. My manager worked with them a bit. If we have a problem with some file and we need to get Red Hat to analyze the issue and the file is 100GBs, we'll have an issue since we need to provide a log file for them to analyze. If it is around 12GB or 13GB, we can easily upload it to the Red Hat portal. With more than 100GBs, it will fail. I heard it should cover up to 250GB for an upload, however, I find it fails. Therefore, Red Hat needs to provide a way to handle this.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Automation is another key highlight. With automation, you can automate everything through a single port."

"The product gives a consolidated view."

"The most valuable features of the solution are all of its security features...It is a highly scalable solution."

"It enables monitoring of various components such as access points, switch cards, and other elements within the company's solutions."

"The product's most valuable feature is the visual representation of the switch's front panel."

"Cisco DNA Center provides operational support, compliance support, security vulnerability detection, and automatic scheduling."

"The solution helps in user microsegmentation."

"Cisco is a leading network company."

More Cisco DNA Center pros

"It has improved our organization through provisioning and security hardening. When we do get a new VM, we have been able to bring on a provisioned machine in less than a day. This morning alone, I provisioned two machines within an hour. I am talking about hardening, installing antivirus software on it, and creating user accounts because the Playbooks were predesigned. From the time we got the servers to the actual hand-off, it takes less than an hour. We are talking about having the servers actually authenticate Red Hat Satellites and run the yum updates. All of that can be done within an hour."

"It is quick to production. It has an API in the back which allows for integrations."

"The initial setup is straightforward."

"The most valuable features of Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform are the agentless platform and writing the code is simple using the Yaml computer language."

"The solution is very simple to use."

"The reason I like Ansible is, first, the coding of it is very straightforward, it's very human-readable. I'm also on a contract, and I can clearly iterate and bring people up to speed very quickly on writing a Playbook compared with writing up a Puppet manifest or a Salt script."

"There are so many models that I don't have to create one."

"The capacity to install products on the operating system is very valuable."

More Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform pros

Cons

"They should include UTM features in the product."

"The solution's technical support is an area with which my company's clients have a problem. Cisco doesn't provide good technical support unless a user has a big account that Cisco wants to retain."

"The task failure reporting or provisioning failure reporting could be a little bit better in the UI, with more information given to the user."

"The cost is very high."

"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."

"I would like is to have a small information pointer available. It could be a plus feature that I want to implement. When I hover my mouse over the user interface, it should provide a brief explanation. It would be helpful to have it incorporated into the UI."

"From the recent DNA point of view, there are some stability challenges with Cisco, but very minor."

"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."

More Cisco DNA Center cons

"Performance has been an issue on larger environments, but it has gotten a lot better over the past two years."

"The web GUI can be a little bit better. There should be a couple of more features."

"On the Dashboard, when you view a template run, it shows all the output. There is a search filter, but it would be nice to able to select one server in that run and then see all that output from just that one server, instead of having to do the search on that one server and find the results."

"What we need is model-driven, declarative software infrastructure management. However, things tend to break with new versions, requiring a lot of work to fix…The focus should be on improving the support for Ansible in the area of AI coding."

"Networking needs to be improved."

"Ansible can face scalability issues, such as limitations when trying to scale up infrastructure. It might struggle with connection dropping or spawning additional VMs under certain conditions."

"What I'm trying to figure out, personally, is, when doing mass updates, how I can parallelize that a little bit better. It seems right now - and maybe, it's a shortcoming on my end - that I run through one set of servers, and then another set of servers, ad then another set of servers, but it seems like I could throw a lot of these checks out. Different types of servers, like web servers and DB servers, if I could parallelize that a little bit to make everything run a little bit more efficiently, that would help."

"For Ansible Tower, there are three tiers with ten nodes. I would like them to expand those ten nodes to 20, because ten nodes is not enough to test on."

More Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Cisco DNA Center is too expensive."

"Cisco DNA Center is a licensed product with multiple levels of licensing available such as basic, advanced, and essential. I don't have the exact figure, but Cisco DNA Center is costly. For example, the box has information about the essential license and costs a considerable amount of money. You need to pay extra to use advanced features in Cisco DNA Center. My company sees Cisco DNA Center as a solution that's worth the money, which is why it invested in the solution. If you want centralized management for your network, especially when upgrading it, Cisco DNA Center is perfect, but it's more suitable for a large-scale rather than a small-scale network."

"The partnership price is notably high, but it ultimately depends on the chosen business model."

"Cisco DNA Center is expensive."

"The solution is a little bit expensive but depends a lot on the customer's usage. If you use it in the right place, you can easily pay for it."

"Our licensing agreement is for three years."

"We get a yearly license at the time we buy the product."

"I would rate the pricing a six out of ten, with ten being expensive."

More Cisco DNA Center pricing and cost advice

"The solution is inexpensive compared to other products."

"We use the open-source version of the solution."

"Users have to pay a per-node cost of around $ 100 per node."

"Everything is generally fair. No one ever likes to pay a lot of money, but we are getting the value. We also get support with it. It has been fair and worthwhile."

"Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is an affordable solution."

"Ansible is a lot more competitive than any of the others. Its setup was also straightforward. In fact, we just implemented Ansible on OpenShift, so that is how we are running the Ansible Automation Platform now."

"Red Hat's open source approach was a factor when choosing Ansible, since the solution is free as of right now."

"If you only need to use Ansible, it's free for any end-user, but when you require Ansible Tower, you need to pay per Ansible Tower server."

More Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

19%

Government

10%

Manufacturing Company

University

Educational Organization

32%

Financial Services Firm

14%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco DNA Center?

The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it gives some kind of ease in operations, especially since our company is moving from CLI to GUI-based configuration.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco DNA Center?

The cost is very high.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco DNA Center?

The system is working fine for me currently.

See all answers

What is the difference between Red Hat Satellite and Ansible?

Red Hat Satellite has proven to be a worthwhile investment for me. Both its patch management and license management have been outstanding. If you have a large environment, patching systems is much ...

See all answers

How does Ansible compare to Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (SCCM)?

Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager takes knowledge and research to properly configure. The length of time that the set up will take depends on the kind of technical architecture that your org...

See all answers

What do you like most about Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform?

The most valuable features of the solution are automation and patching.

See all answers

Comparisons

Juniper Mist Wired Assurance vs Cisco DNA Center

Compared 8% of the time

Meraki Dashboard vs Cisco DNA Center

Compared 7% of the time

SolarWinds Network Configuration Manager vs Cisco DNA Center

Compared 7% of the time

Fortinet FortiManager vs Cisco DNA Center

Compared 6% of the time

Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE) vs Cisco DNA Center

Compared 4% of the time

More Cisco DNA Center Competitors

Microsoft Configuration Manager vs Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

Compared 14% of the time

VMware Aria Automation vs Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

Compared 10% of the time

Red Hat Satellite vs Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

Compared 9% of the time

Microsoft Intune vs Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

Compared 6% of the time

IBM Workload Automation vs Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

Compared 2% of the time

More Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco DNA Center

February 2025

Download Cisco DNA Center product report

Buyer's Guide

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

January 2025

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform report

Download Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform product report

Also Known As

DNA Center

Ansible

Overview

Cisco DNA Center offers a comprehensive platform for network automation and management, providing detailed analytics, enhanced security, and streamlined operations for both wired and wireless networks.

Cisco DNA Center integrates with Cisco infrastructure to deliver efficient network automation and management, helping organizations improve network visibility, security, and control. It supports AI-driven analytics and automated workflows to enhance operational efficiency and reduce errors. Challenges include compatibility with third-party systems, steep learning curve, and complex deployment. Its interface facilitates centralized control, vital for troubleshooting, policy management, and configuration management, with support for zero-touch provisioning and SD-Access.

What are the key features of Cisco DNA Center?

Robust Analytics: Provides detailed insights into network health with AI-driven analytics.
Centralized Security: Integrates with ISE for comprehensive security management.
Automated Device Management: Simplifies device provisioning and configuration transfers.
Wi-Fi Analytics: Offers deep insights into wireless network performance.
Zero-Touch Provisioning: Streamlines new device deployments with minimal human intervention.
Scalable Segmentation: Efficiently segments network traffic ensuring security and performance.

What benefits should users consider?

Operational Efficiency: Automation reduces potential errors and streamlines workflow.
Enhanced Security: Integration with Cisco ISE bolsters security capabilities.
Network Visibility: Comprehensive dashboards and analysis tools enhance monitoring.
Troubleshooting: Real-time monitoring aids in identifying and resolving issues swiftly.

In sectors such as healthcare, finance, and retail, Cisco DNA Center is utilized for its ability to enhance security and compliance, manage large-scale networks, and provide detailed analytics for better operational decision-making. Its support for location tracking and policy automation ensures efficient network management across diverse environments.

Cisco

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is a powerful network automation solution that allows organizations to handle every aspect of their application launch process within a single product. It enables users to share their automations so that teams within an organization can collaborate on various projects with ease. Ansible Automation Platform is designed to be used by all employees involved in the network automation process.

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Benefits

Some of the ways that organizations can benefit by choosing to deploy Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform include:

Maximum benefit for reduced overhead. Ansible Automation Platform is an all-in-one solution that can enable users to do the jobs of multiple products with one. Users do not need to purchase multiple products to handle their network automation and application development needs. It is equipped with prefabricated content from more than one hundred companies that are partnered with it.

Scalable. Ansible Automation Platform is a highly scalable solution. It can easily be scaled up so that automations can be extended across the various devices that make up an organization’s network.

Flexibility. Ansible Automation Platform is highly flexible. It enables users to tackle any and all automation-related tasks.

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Features

Automation analytics. Ansible Automation Platform comes equipped with an automation analytics feature. This feature enables organizations to measure the effects of their automations and plan how they are going to implement automations moving forward. It makes it easy for administrators to spot anomalies in their automations and resolve them before they can escalate and become major issues.

Integration suite. Ansible Automation Platform gives organizations access to a wide variety of integrations that enable them to connect to Ansible’s partners. Now users can augment their capabilities without needing to purchase additional solutions that will enable them to run features that are not normally a part of Ansible’s array of tools. The Ansible environment is built to handle the wide variety of integrations that their partners offer. In order to accomplish this it includes the APIs that users need in order to fully benefit from the integrations.

Centralized interface. Ansible Automation Platform comes with a centralized GUI interface that enables users to manage all of their network automation and application creation activities from a single location. Businesses can guarantee that their operations are going to be handled efficiently and according to a single standard. The management process is greatly simplified. All of the tools that users need are located in one place.

Reviews from Real Users

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is a highly effective solution that stands out when compared to many of its competitors. Two major advantages it offers are its automation manager and its comprehensive centralized GUI-based management interface.

MD J., a solution architect at STBL, says, “The automation manager is very good and makes things easier for customers with multi-cloud platforms.”

Aankit G., a Consultant at Pi DATACENTERS, writes, “We like the GUI-based interface for the tower. Before, we only had a command-line interface to run all the Ansible tasks. Now, the Ansible tower provides the complete GUI functionality to run, manage, and create the templates and the Ansible jobs. This includes the code and YAML file we can create. The GUI interface is the added advantage of this solution, including some integration with the different plugins.”

Red Hat

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

HootSuite Media, Inc., Cloud Physics, Narrative, BinckBank

Buyer's Guide

Cisco DNA Center vs. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

January 2025

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