Dell NetWorker vs IBM Spectrum Protect comparison

Dell Technologies and IBM are both solutions in the Backup and Recovery category. Dell Technologies is ranked #12 with an average rating of 7.8, while IBM is ranked #14 with an average rating of 7.3. Dell Technologies holds a 2.9% mindshare in BRS, compared to IBM’s 2.2% mindshare. Additionally, 90% of Dell Technologies users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 86% of IBM users who would recommend it.

Dell NetWorker

Read 85 Dell NetWorker reviews

4,869 Views
4,382 Comparison Views

90% willing to recommend

IBM Spectrum Protect

Read 149 IBM Spectrum Protect reviews

3,978 Views
3,421 Comparison Views

86% willing to recommend

Dell NetWorker

IBM Spectrum Protect

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 2024

IBM Spectrum Protect and Dell NetWorker compete in the data protection solutions category. Users generally rate IBM Spectrum Protect higher for pricing and support, but Dell NetWorker's features often make it a preferred investment.

Features: IBM Spectrum Protect is praised for its scalability, extensive platform support, and cost-effectiveness. Dell NetWorker is noted for its advanced integration capabilities, comprehensive reporting, and user-friendliness.

Room for Improvement: IBM Spectrum Protect users suggest enhancements in speed, modernizing backend processes, and better user interface customization. Dell NetWorker users seek improvements in backup and recovery speeds, better documentation, and improved security features.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM Spectrum Protect is described as complex to deploy but has robust customer service. Dell NetWorker offers a simpler deployment process yet has mixed reviews regarding customer support.

Pricing and ROI: IBM Spectrum Protect is considered cost-effective with a good ROI. Dell NetWorker's higher setup costs are balanced by its robust features and perceived long-term value.

To learn more, read our detailed Dell NetWorker vs. IBM Spectrum Protect Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Dell NetWorker vs. IBM Spectrum Protect

July 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

Dell NetWorker

Ranking in Backup and Recovery

12th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

IBM Spectrum Protect

Ranking in Backup and Recovery

14th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

149

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Dell NetWorker is 2.9%, down from 3.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Spectrum Protect is 2.2%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Backup and Recovery

Featured Reviews

ErmiasGirma

System and Cloud Deployment Engineer at Safaricom Ethiopia plc

Offers seamless integration and cost-saving benefits with enhanced recovery capabilities

Currently, in my organization, I am using Dell NetWorker for open-source solutions like PostgreSQL and MySQL databases, and some large VM environments. It also supports the Dell library and is used for the library archiving system Dell NetWorker allows for extensive customization, supporting…

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Syed Habib

Head of Infrastructure Security (S.A.V.P) at EXIM Bank Ltd

Manageable and comprehensive and integrates robust backup features for core banking

It's adequate for my core banking, however, I am looking for another solution for all systems. It is not compatible with other operating systems like Windows or Linux, and lacks a consolidated dashboard from Browser Spectrum. This is why I am searching for another solution. The product also lacks any centralized graphical user interface (GUI), such as Jarek Pod, and I am limited to using a console-based text user interface, which my local partner handles completely.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The updated graphical interface is better than it used to be."

"The backup software has been much faster since we've deployed the solution."

"The full backup is a great feature. Restoration is also good and very quick."

"The possibility of recovering up-to-the-moment data is very useful."

"The solution is stable."

"The solution is very stable, especially if you are using a RAC environment."

"Technical support from Dell is excellent."

"The software’s best feature is data backup for any system."

More Dell NetWorker pros

"by backing up only the changed data, we average around 75TB per night. If we had to do full backups, even occasionally, we would not be able to complete the backup within 12 hours, or we would have to make a large investment to fit a full backup within the 12 hour window."

"With Spectrum Protect, you can use any type of disk to back-end the repositories. It gave us flexibility to use whatever storage we wanted at our secondary site."

"The product is very stable."

"The backup on real-time, especially for the virtual machine, archiving, and retrieving the reader from the backup repository and getting it online, getting it validated, then performing the data consistency check over the backup."

"One way they have improved our organization is through the stability of the solution and the availability of the product."

"The file-restoring feature is the most valuable."

"We've found the product to be quite stable and the performance is very good."

"The business value comes from the capability to overcome data losses."

More IBM Spectrum Protect pros

Cons

"Its console UI should be better. It should also have more out-of-the-box reporting functionalities. It should also have easier cloud integration. They have got cloud boost and things like that, but if you want to directly back up to the cloud, I'm not too sure whether you can do it. For example, you can easily send data from Commvault to AWS, Azure, or a container, but it seems to be not so easy in NetWorker."

"I would like to see better support for the container systems, and we would like to see more support for image backups instead of pure file backups."

"It could be more user-friendly."

"The graphical user interface (GUI) of NetWorker needs improvement."

"The solution could improve by having more integration."

"The management of Dell Networker is quite cumbersome."

"I am not very satisfied with the support."

"The web console could be a lot better."

More Dell NetWorker cons

"Our new leadership has pushed us to go more toward the cloud, so we are definitely going to leverage anything we can in that direction."

"The solution needs to work on disaster recovery integration. Basically, VMware applications to the cloud, for example. There needs to be integration with the storage, and integration with VMware."

"For Spectrum Protect Plus, I would like to see more enhanced reporting features and integration with Spectrum Protect."

"I need to have more than two instances working together. I need a worldwide grid able to have replication between three, four, or five instances."

"It can be improved for large file systems with many files. Spectrum Protect can restore large files very well, but if you're restoring millions of little files, it is not as great. At one point, we tried to implement the VMware module with it, and it was awful and terrible. I don't know if that has improved. If it hasn't, this would be one big improvement."

"When it comes to virtualization in IBM it's not perfect."

"We need everything cloud. Strong support for cloud services. S3 connectivity, which is mandatory for us in the future along with this integration of Spectrum Copy Data Management or Spectrum Protect services together with these Spectrum Protect Plus functionalities, e.g., hardware, snapshots, and Copy Data Management. They should come together in one solution."

"In terms of features, they've got it all covered. The features they have are quite good. The only downside to it is that it is for an enterprise or big organization. In my opinion, it is not for a small business."

More IBM Spectrum Protect cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is a relatively inexpensive product compared to one of its competitors."

"The price of the license could be cheaper and it would be a benefit if they came up with a new pricing model. The competitors here in Oman sell universal licensing where a number of virtual machines are hosted at the customer place which can be licensed, or you can license the CPU sockets in those servers. However, NetWorker offers only CPU sockets or overall storage capacity to backup, but there is no universal licensing where you can provide a number of VMs. They should offer more options to stay competitive with other solutions, such as Veeam."

"The pricing is okay."

"Earlier, users had to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs of the product. The licenses were expensive but users used to get the best device to use."

"There is a licensing fee."

"The pricing of this solution is very good."

"Dell EMC NetWorker is very expensive."

"We use a license without a time term. We just need to buy additional support when needed."

More Dell NetWorker pricing and cost advice

"Going to IBM Tech University Conference saved me from making a major purchase of the wrong thing, which was very helpful."

"You need to put it in a PoC and test it out if you can."

"We chose IBM Spectrum Protect, because they actually have something called MSP pricing, which means managed services provider pricing. The pricing was attractive, and it seems to be a platform that IBM is totally investing on in terms of new functions and new capabilities."

"We have been at our size for a few years. We are not really looking to battle the licensing costs, as this is our primary system."

"Customers need to pay for licensing in order to use IBM Spectrum Protect. The customers that have been using it for a long time are okay and happy with it. From a cost point of view, it's better for them to renew their licenses than to go through the difficult process of changing a backup product in their environment, and migrate from one product to another."

"IBM provides an open license policy, which is more like a gentlemen's agreement."

"We have capacity licensing. We use the front end. The capacity licensing is pretty okay on the licensing price. I used to use the old PVU-based licensing in the early environment, but now we use capacity-based licensing."

"It is expensive."

More IBM Spectrum Protect pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

16%

Computer Software Company

Government

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

12%

Government

Educational Organization

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What's the difference between Dell EMC Avamar and Dell EMC NetWorker?

From the very beginning, Dell EMC NetWorker considers users and those who might potentially become users. In terms of both pricing and setup, this product offers an experience that is significantly...

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What do you like most about Dell NetWorker?

The feature that offers the greatest benefits in ensuring data integrity is its backup capability.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell NetWorker?

The licensing cost is somewhat expensive. While we use a traditional license, there is a capacity-based license available, but our customer is not comfortable switching to it. A five to seven perce...

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What do you like most about IBM Spectrum Protect?

IBM Spectrum Protect is stable.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Protect?

It's expensive. I acknowledge the cost associated with it.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Protect?

One point for improvement for IBM Spectrum Protect is security, as IBM has not been investing as much as in the past. There is a need for additional layers of security to fill the gaps, which is wh...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerProtect Data Manager vs Dell NetWorker

Compared 30% of the time

Veeam Data Platform vs Dell NetWorker

Compared 14% of the time

Dell Avamar vs Dell NetWorker

Compared 9% of the time

Commvault Cloud vs Dell NetWorker

Compared 9% of the time

Azure Backup vs Dell NetWorker

Compared 2% of the time

More Dell NetWorker Competitors

Veeam Data Platform vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 16% of the time

IBM Spectrum Protect Plus vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 15% of the time

Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 12% of the time

Commvault Cloud vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 10% of the time

Azure Backup vs IBM Spectrum Protect

Compared 3% of the time

More IBM Spectrum Protect Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Dell NetWorker

July 2025

Download Dell NetWorker product report

Buyer's Guide

IBM Spectrum Protect

July 2025

Download IBM Spectrum Protect product report

Also Known As

NetWorker

IBM TSM, IBM Tivoli Storage Manager

Overview

Built on a reputation of efficiency and reliability, thousands of customers trust Dell NetWorker to protect their data and applications across multiple environments, from core to edge to cloud.

Inherently flexible, NetWorker helps you deploy and leverage the data protection that fits your needs. NetWorker protects both physical and virtual environments, including VMware and Microsoft Hyper-V, as well as cloud workloads on AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.

NetWorker is available as part of Dell Data Protection Suite, which offers comprehensive data protection software applications and tools. NetWorker is delivered as software and as a virtual edition.

Dell Technologies

IBM Spectrum Protect (Tivoli Storage Manager) is a data protection platform that gives enterprises a single point of control and administration for backup and recovery. It is the flagship product in the IBM Spectrum Protect (Tivoli Storage Manager) family. It enables reliable, cost effective backups and fast recovery for virtual, physical and cloud environments of all sizes.

IBM

Sample Customers

Republic Bank, Westgate Resorts, Macquire Cloud Services, Shriners, Panatonni, Qatar Islamic Bank, Eurosport

CERN, Einstein Healthcare, Nyherji, Allianz Australia, TZM, ABT Online, NCT, Kindred Healthcare Inc., Cobalt Iron, TransGrid, Baptist Health of Northeast Florida, Cash America, Piedmont Healthcare, RWGV, Arkansas Tech University, British Columbia Institute of Technology

Buyer's Guide

Dell NetWorker vs. IBM Spectrum Protect

July 2025

Free Report: Dell NetWorker vs. IBM Spectrum Protect

Find out what your peers are saying about Dell NetWorker vs. IBM Spectrum Protect and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.

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