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Dell PowerProtect Data Manager vs HPE Zerto Software comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 11, 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

Dell PowerProtect Data Manager
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
11th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Deduplication Software (7th)
HPE Zerto Software
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
2nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
340
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Migration (2nd), Cloud Backup (3rd), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Dell PowerProtect Data Manager is 4.4%, up from 4.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE Zerto Software is 3.1%, down from 3.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

MinaMagdy1 - PeerSpot reviewer
Comprehensive integration and user-friendly dashboard enhance data protection workflows
PowerProtect Data Manager lacks the tape-out functionality, which is important for organizations relying on it for offsite backup. While PowerProtect Data Manager offers a workaround, it's not always accepted, notably by sectors like banking. Additionally, I would like PowerProtect Data Manager to provide microservices and container backup for modern applications.
Sachin Vinay - PeerSpot reviewer
Leverage disaster recovery with reliable support and cost-effective future-proof features
Zerto is straightforward to implement because it only requires the installation of an agent on the VMs designated for migration. A service, typically a VM, must also be deployed at the disaster recovery location. This entire process is simple and can be completed within three days. Zerto's near-synchronous replication occurs every minute, allowing for highly granular recovery points. This means that even if interruptions or malware disruptions occur within that minute, Zerto can restore to the last known good state, effectively recovering the entire setup to the latest backup. This capability ensures high data security and minimizes potential data loss. One of the main benefits of implementing Zerto is its data compression, which significantly reduces the load on our IPsec VPN. Zerto compresses data by 80 percent before transmitting it across the VPN, minimizing the data transferred between geographically dispersed locations. This compression and subsequent decompression at the destination alleviate the strain on the VPN, preventing overload and ensuring efficient data synchronization. Zerto simplifies malware protection by integrating it into its disaster recovery and synchronization features. This comprehensive approach eliminates the need for separate antivirus setups in virtual machines and applications. It streamlines our security measures and removes the need for additional software or solutions, resulting in an excellent return on investment. Zerto's single-click recovery solution offers exceptional recovery speed. Through the user interface, a single click allows for a complete restoration from the most recent backup within two to three minutes, enabling rapid recovery and minimal downtime. Zerto's Recovery Time Objective is excellent. In the past, if a virtual machine crashed, we would recover it from a snapshot, which could take one to two hours. With Zerto, the recovery process takes only five minutes, and users are typically unaware of any disruption. This allows us to restore everything quickly and efficiently. Zerto has significantly reduced our downtime. When malware affects our data, Zerto immediately notifies us and helps us protect other applications, even those not yet implemented with Zerto. By monitoring these applications, we can quickly identify and address any potential malware spread, minimizing downtime across our systems. Zerto significantly reduces downtime and associated costs during disruptions. Our services are unified, so in the event of a disruption without Zerto, even a half-day disruption would necessitate offline procedures. This would lead to increased manpower, service delays, and substantial financial losses due to interrupted admissions and other critical processes. By unifying service processes, Zerto minimizes the impact of outages. Zerto streamlines our disaster recovery testing across multiple locations by enabling efficient failover testing without disrupting live services. Traditionally, DR testing required downtime of critical systems, but Zerto's replication and failover capabilities allow us to test in parallel with live operations. This non-disruptive approach ensures continuous service availability while validating our DR plan, even in scenarios like malware attacks, by creating a separate testing environment that mirrors the live setup. This comprehensive testing provides confidence in our ability to handle real-world incidents effectively. This saves us over 60 percent of the time. Zerto streamlines system administration tasks by automating many processes, thereby reducing the workload for multiple administrators. This allows them to focus on other university services that require attention and effectively reallocate support resources from automated tasks to those requiring more dedicated management. Zerto is used exclusively for our critical services, providing up to a 70 percent improvement in our IT resilience.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It satisfies my customers' scalability needs and provides interactive features, allowing efficient integration."
"Dell EMC PowerProtect Data Manager is user-friendly and easy to use. it does what it needs to do."
"Dell PowerProtect Data Manager is a comprehensive backup software that integrates with Dell backup storage to enhance data protection."
"The solution adequately handles data storage."
"Dell PowerProtect Data Manager helps to reduce the amount of data being transferred and stored."
"The solution's initial setup is straightforward."
"I love that it has an interactive GUI, and it is not complicated to use."
"The product's initial setup phase was easy."
"I love the product and their support."
"I would rate Zerto a nine out of ten."
"The replication being log-based is awesome."
"The feature of the HPE Zerto Software I appreciate the most is the ease of use of single file restores, which is something we use frequently."
"The most valuable for us and for my company is that we are replicating most of our production customers to the DR site, and we can do testing whenever we want."
"We use the solution to move servers and VMs between data centers."
"The solution's most valuable aspect is allowing a failover from our remote sites to our data center. Our remote sites have failed several times, and on each occasion, we were able to bring a plant back online within 30 minutes, even though the hardware repair took many days."
"One of the most valuable features of Zerto is its straightforward cost model."
 

Cons

"You need to use additional software to back up entire environments. It will be good if they could support entire tape libraries."
"The interface is too complex."
"As a new product, there are some things that still need to improve a bit as it matures."
"Management is difficult and it is hard to determine when things aren't working properly."
"They should include a feature similar to S3 bucket."
"The marketing strategy is lagging behind competitors such as CommVault. Dell needs to improve its market presence and communication with customers and solution providers."
"The solution should enhance its user interface and make it more flexible."
"The tool's scalability has certain shortcomings, making it an area where improvements are required."
"There needs to be more flexibility in the licensing."
"When we do failover and failback, it doesn't maintain some of the settings that it should and I don't really understand why that happens."
"The overall management plan could improve. If something happens with the VM on the vSphere side, the error codes are pretty weak. If there was a way to click on something within the UI that takes us to a support page or article, that would be very beneficial."
"It would be advantageous if Zerto had plugins for Infoblox, Cisco, or load balancers, as this would enable us to better manage those records."
"The performance was generally good, but occasional lag disrupted the flow, leaving room for improvement."
"The setup of the system, although simple to get working, is a little more tricky to get right. This aspect could have benefitted from a bit more explanation."
"It would be good if we could store a snapshot of the images coming through so that we can always go back and have a vision history."
"I am a little bit worried about how Zerto will work with large volumes of data, such as replication for big data and very large files."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is offered at a very competitive price in the market."
"The licensing costs and pricing model are based on capacity and the license is easy to upgrade."
"The solution is not less expensive than competitors but pricing deals are available."
"The solution is more affordable than other vendors."
"The price of Dell EMC PowerProtect Data Manager is reasonable."
"Dell PowerProtect Data Manager is not an expensive solution."
"We offer monthly or yearly subscriptions. The price could be cheaper."
"It is not the cheapest product; it is not the most expensive product, but it works. It is a mid-range product, and it is justified in terms of being pretty quick and easy."
"Zerto is not cheap but is an invaluable asset."
"It was pretty appropriate. It was not too cheap, not too expensive. It was just about right."
"The pricing is fair."
"It is cost-efficient because we have perpetual licenses. We are a small to medium-sized business, so cost is a pretty big important factor."
"The cost is not dirt cheap but also is not terrible."
"Zerto's pricing is competitive, given the benefits and ease of setting it up. It may seem more expensive upfront, but you're going to save that over the long term by spending less engineering time configuring, reconfiguring, etc."
"While conducting our proof of concept, I compared prices with just one other vendor. At the time, the price for Zerto was more favorable."
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Comparison Review

it_user159711 - PeerSpot reviewer
Nov 9, 2014
VMware SRM vs. Veeam vs. Zerto
Disaster recovery planning is something that seems challenging for all businesses. Virtualization in addition to its operational flexibility, and cost reduction benefits, has helped companies improve their DR posture. Virtualization has made it easier to move machines from production to…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Healthcare Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Dell PowerProtect Data Manager?
One notable feature is its robust backup support for Kubernetes and container environments. Additionally, PPDM stands out for its ease of deployment and management compared to other backup solution...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell PowerProtect Data Manager?
Overall, pricing does not significantly impact our decision. The main concern is the solution itself, presales activities, and positioning it in the right place. Commercial aspects are secondary to...
What needs improvement with Dell PowerProtect Data Manager?
The marketing strategy is lagging behind competitors such as CommVault. Dell needs to improve its market presence and communication with customers and solution providers.
What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Data Guard?
Ik fluister:VM Host Oracle en DataGuard hebben we per toeval vervangen door Zerto :-) tijdens de Zerto implementatie en VPG werden de Host Data in write-ack Block-Level gerepliceerd. Qua licentie 1...
What do you like most about Zerto?
Its ability to roll back if the VM or the server that you are recovering does not come up right is also valuable. You have the ability to roll back a few seconds or a few minutes. The rollback feat...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zerto?
I ballpark Zerto's pricing at about $1,000 per VM, which I find fair for what it does, but the cost of entry was tough initially due to the minimum number needed to start. I really needed to prove ...
 

Also Known As

PowerProtect, Dell EMC PowerProtect
Zerto Virtual Replication
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

National Bank of Greece, USC Australia, PCS Publishing, Dell Digital IT, Rushmore Electric, Melanson Health, Arrow Electronics
United Airlines, HCA, XPO Logistics, TaxSlayer, McKesson, Insight Global, American Airlines, Tencate, Aaron’s, Grey’s County, Kingston Technologies
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell PowerProtect Data Manager vs. HPE Zerto Software and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,524 professionals have used our research since 2012.