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CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform vs Panzura CloudFS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 12, 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

CTERA Enterprise File Servi...
Ranking in File System Software
3rd
Ranking in NAS
9th
Ranking in Cloud Storage
10th
Ranking in Cloud Storage Gateways
2nd
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Migration (7th), Cloud Backup (13th), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (9th), Content Collaboration Platforms (12th)
Panzura CloudFS
Ranking in File System Software
4th
Ranking in NAS
12th
Ranking in Cloud Storage
13th
Ranking in Cloud Storage Gateways
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the File System Software category, the mindshare of CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform is 7.6%, up from 4.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Panzura CloudFS is 13.1%, up from 10.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
File System Software
 

Featured Reviews

Igal Muginstein - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers flexibility, fast performance, and ransomware protection
The platform is releasing new features at a fast pace, which sometimes leads to version updates every three to six months. Although updates are generally not complex, it is challenging to stop the production environment during these updates, even if the downtime is just a few minutes. This is a common challenge across all NAS providers. From my perspective, the most important area for improvement is developing a method to perform updates without affecting customer production environments. Additionally, there are some cache size limitations that might become problematic for future use cases, though they don’t impact current applications. Collaboration for NFS and SMB protocols could also be enhanced. Although this issue isn't specific to CTERA, it is something we are working on together to improve. The quality of the versions has improved, but occasional issues still arise. All solutions face this challenge, but we hope to see a continued reduction in the number of bugs. That said, we haven't had any major production problems in the last four years, and we appreciate how responsive CTERA is to our issues. We engage in brainstorming sessions together, and we value this relationship.
Andy Knauf - PeerSpot reviewer
Reliable file management and disaster recovery with minimal overwrites
For me, it is the stability aspect. It is a lot more stable now than it ever has been, but just keeping that stability is important. Previously, a new update would come out, and there might be something wrong with it, or it may not sync up as well as it should, or it may cause something to lose access to the server. We have had some problems in the past, but in the last couple of years, we have not had any issues like we had early on. There could be a slightly better dashboard or a better pane of glass. When something goes wrong somewhere, there should be a little bit better alerting with issues before they become a big problem.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"CTERA stood out due to its ease of use and superior security features."
"It is a three-in-one solution for us. It is a file-sharing platform, an archiving solution, and also a backup solution."
"I like that the glass is always half full with CTERA file services. It keeps the data hot for users on location and then tiers off older data. If you need it, the stub is still there. You can click on it, and it's back on the device."
"The solution provides data eviction, where unused data is evicted from the local file, freeing up space. It also allows data to be rehydrated from the cloud when needed."
"Our main reason for going for this solution was the uncontrollable growth of file data. It was unsustainable on our previous platform or technology. We needed something scalable like CTERA, so it was the scalability that we required."
"CTERA has out-of-the-box data protection capabilities."
"CTERA's instantaneous and redundant file replication, available across multiple geographical locations, ensures easy and user-friendly recovery."
"The best feature is the migration tool within CTERA."
"Panzura is a hundred percent better than what we had before."
"The core function of Panzura CloudFS, with its synchronizing of files across multiple servers, provides us with a much more efficient workflow for our production staff."
"The main thing in Panzura is that there are three key components: PanFS, NAS, and collaboration. These are strong features, and a big benefit is that you can access everything from anywhere."
"Panzura has not increased its data storage costs."
"Its most valuable features are the collaboration, the file snapshots, and the data protection the solution provides."
"It is a very solid product. We keep all of our older files on their system. It is easy to restore if a file gets deleted. We have good disaster recovery. It is very reliable and very quick, and we do not have files that get overwritten because it locks the file."
 

Cons

"The web portal that our users access to view data and backups could be optimized. CTERA could apply some of the improvements made to their administrative interface on the user side. The administrators are a much smaller group of people than the users, so it would be helpful if they targeted user experience resources to them."
"They fixed all the requirements that we had in the beginning. The beginning was a little bit rough, but we tuned it nicely. However, in some cases, they could improve performance."
"I am looking for a process where version upgrades do not impact the customers. There is no downtime."
"It would help to have a global single-pane-of-glass view of all my CTERA devices. We have different regions, and we must log in to each portal to see what's happening with those. It would be nice to have a single portal to see the health of the devices, versions, and firmware upgrades. Sometimes, we want to dive into something more complex, like investigating why CTERA storage usage grew from 2 terabytes to 4 terabytes in a week. That's a little challenging. It's something we would like to see on the road map."
"However, in some cases, they could improve performance."
"The new Edge filer that they have comes with a lot more features than what we purchased. It would be better if we are able to add those extra features without having to swap out the hardware. A clear upgrade path for legacy customers would be beneficial."
"It has a learning curve."
"One suggested improvement for the CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform is the ability to distribute data across multiple active backend storage nodes rather than the current limitation of a single active node."
"Master Snapshot feature is the only exceptional feature, but the rest of the features are similar to other storage solutions."
"There are a few file types that do not work well with Panzura CloudFS."
"It should be easy for people not on the network to connect and access their files."
"There are a few file types that do not work well with Panzura CloudFS. Specifically, the GIS data formats, such as a geo database, have been found better kept outside of Panzura CloudFS."
"Previously, a new update would come out, and there might be something wrong with it, or it may not sync up as well as it should, or it may cause something to lose access to the server."
"There could be a slightly better dashboard or a better pane of glass. When something goes wrong somewhere, there should be a little bit better alerting with issues before they become a big problem."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is hard to compare the costs if we want to retain the same model of a separate high-performance storage or certain things, but it is one of the cheapest solutions available in Israel."
"CTERA's pricing seems to be on par with some of the other players, such as Nasuni and Azure. They all have benefits, but CTERA is competitive for its features."
"It is fairly priced. I am not too involved in the pricing of what we used to pay, but it would have reduced the cost of ownership. I cannot give a figure, but the EMC solution was very expensive compared to CTERA."
"I find the pricing reasonable. They offered us deals that helped us. Especially with the upgrade to a bigger unit last year, they were helpful with the deal."
"I am not directly involved in the pricing aspects, but I understand that CTERA's pricing is competitive and within industry standards."
"So far, pricing seems to be fine."
"CTERA's pricing model is competitive compared to other companies that achieve the same thing. Their closest rival is Nasuni, and CTERA is significantly more affordable than Nasuni."
"It is not bad. It is like everything else. Pricing has gone up quite over the last couple of years, but everybody's pricing has gone up. For what they deliver, it is right in line with what everybody else has."
"The solution's pricing is on the expensive side."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
70%
Financial Services Firm
5%
Educational Organization
3%
University
3%
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?
I am not directly involved in the pricing aspects, but I understand that CTERA's pricing is competitive and within industry standards.
What needs improvement with CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?
One area for improvement is the migration tool, which at times does not work as designed, necessitating the use of alternative solutions like Robocopy. AI and automation features could enhance the ...
What is your primary use case for CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?
We use it as a hosted cloud solution. We had initially tried Azure File Sync, but that did not work. Due to certain security concerns, I was tasked with researching alternatives. I evaluated severa...
What are the products that Panzura provides?
Panzura offers four main products: CloudFS, data services, smart apps, and global services. They call this "all-in-one solution" and it's for end-to-end cloud data management. Why is it called that...
What kind of industries does Panzura serve?
Hello, I think businesses from all industries that have their data on a cloud can benefit from Panzura. Especially if you have offices in various locations or your employees are working from home a...
Why was Panzura acquired? Is the acquisition going to cause a change?
I think Panzura may change in a positive direction now that it's been bought by Profile Capital. That's a very big investment company for technology businesses and I think it's an opportunity for ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Panzura Freedom
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

McDonald's, WPP, US Navy, Gore, Festo, Stryker, Bezeq, PERI
Petrofac, Komatsu, HCA Healthcare, Vanguard, Disney, Pokemon, US Department of Justice, Gensler, Fluor, AFRY, Milwaukee Tool, Navy Federal Credit Union, TechTarget
Find out what your peers are saying about CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform vs. Panzura CloudFS and other solutions. Updated: February 2025.
842,194 professionals have used our research since 2012.