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Dell VMAX All Flash vs NetApp AFF comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

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

Everpure FlashArray X NVMe
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
18th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
36
Ranking in other categories
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (6th)
Dell VMAX All Flash
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
29th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp AFF
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
3rd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
314
Ranking in other categories
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Everpure FlashArray X NVMe is 1.6%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell VMAX All Flash is 0.7%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp AFF is 8.7%, down from 9.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
NetApp AFF8.7%
Pure FlashArray X NVMe1.6%
Dell VMAX All Flash0.7%
Other89.0%
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Jaehoon Oh - PeerSpot reviewer
Chief Technology Officer at Lambda256
Supports efficient storage management through volume snapshots and offers reliable non-disruptive upgrades
I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could be enhanced. I can see the performance statistics in the Pure Storage console, but it does not show the performance by 4K byte unit. It displays IOPS and bandwidth, but IOPS is about real use, and I want to know how many IOPS are currently running in 4K byte units. I cannot see that IOPS because most storage systems report their performance by 4K byte unit. I want to see Pure Storage performance by 4K byte unit to compare with other storage or other internal NVMe SSD.
AS
Solution Architect at a agriculture with 10,001+ employees
Performance and interface improve data processing speeds but require complex configuration
The most valuable features of VMAX are its performance and GUI interface. We have seen significant improvements in technology over the last four to five years. The snap feature, along with deduplication, has notably enhanced our data processing speeds. We haven't experienced any outages or core-level issues in the last ten years, making us comfortable with the storage solution.
KennethEtsula - PeerSpot reviewer
Presales Manager at Spartec
Offers seamless installation and efficient data handling with robust support
NetApp AFF provides an all-flash storage solution for unified SAN solutions, supporting both SAN and NAS functionalities. Data reduction capabilities such as deduplication, compression, and compaction are standard features included with the license in NetApp AFF. With the storage efficiency from a NetApp AFF installation, users can manage substantial data running on all-flash. The features such as compaction and compression provide storage efficiency guarantees in an all-flash environment.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Technical support has been helpful and responsive."
"It has benefited my organization because it has reduced time to insights."
"Everything works well, and it is very fast."
"The best features of Pure FlashArray X NVMe include the volume snapshot capabilities, which allow us to save most of the storage space by volume snapshots periodically."
"Overall stability is very good."
"One of the best features is the support, which is excellent."
"One of the best features is the support, which is excellent."
"Pure Storage has signature security technology, which cannot be deleted, even if you are an administrator."
"The most valuable features of VMAX are its performance and GUI interface."
"The product's initial setup phase was good."
"The ransomware protection feature is housed in a separate unit, specifically addressing the top twenty most critical threats."
"The snapshot feature has been precious for our testing processes, application development, and managing testing environments due to its efficiency and ease of use."
"We haven't experienced any outages or core-level issues in the last ten years, making us comfortable with the storage solution."
"It works very well."
"This solution's stability is good, and we have not had any issues."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the deduplication and the ability to move data to different clouds."
"Switching to AFF has improved the performance of a lot of our virtual machines in a VMware environment, and the number of support tickets that we receive has fallen to almost zero because of this, so it's been a real help for our virtual server support team."
"The benefits of being on AFF are the phenomenal speed at which we're able to ingest data and index it, and the IOPS."
"When I select a vendor such as NetApp to work with, I don’t look just at the performance; I look at reliability, scalability, replication, disaster recovery; to be able to do this all efficiently, plus their SnapMirroring and snapshotting capability."
"NetApp AFF's flash technology offers great performance. This feature has been my go-to for managing data and ensuring speed and reliability."
"Performance is excellent. In fact, it's so fast that we're not really even taxing it all that much."
"Easier to manage with the clustered system and everything with the newest ONTAP 9."
 

Cons

"Maybe the price can be reduced since the solution is very expensive."
"There is room for improvement in catering to midrange storage needs, especially for customers seeking Enterprise-class features."
"Efficiency improvements would always be welcome, but I'm not sure if they could get more efficient."
"In the future, I would like to see integration with enterprise backup systems."
"I want to see Pure Storage not only be for fast storage, but I want to see it be for the entire data center."
"I want to see Pure Storage not only be for fast storage, but I want to see it be for the entire data center."
"It feels more suitable for small and medium-sized businesses rather than enterprises."
"Many options to check performance, like read, writes, random writes, and random reads, are missing in Pure FlashArray X NVMe."
"Improvements are needed in both partition recovery and scalability."
"The scalability of VMAX is somewhat limited, especially in terms of cache scalability. We've had to procure additional engines to address this limitation."
"There is room for improvement in the centralized administration."
"We encountered some challenges during large data migrations that could be addressed for smoother transitions."
"The scalability of VMAX is somewhat limited, especially in terms of cache scalability."
"The configuration part of the product is an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
"To be more competitive in the industry, they can develop deduplication, compression, and smarter features in the same array instead of all-flash."
"The product still uses the concept of decoupling hardware with multiple HA pairs where system resources like CPU/memory is bound to a single controller."
"That's what we run into a lot. Our datacenters have a need for more flexible cabling and NetApp has very strict guidelines on what kind of cables you use."
"In terms of what needs improvement, I would like to see more consistency with the UI. It seems to change every few versions. The menus can be in a completely different place."
"Technical support could use some improvement."
"The bad part about having scalability is the expense. It is currently extremely expensive, to be able to scale so fast on flash."
"I would like to see NetApp improve more of its offline tools and utilities."
"The total cost of ownership has increased a little."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pure FlashArray X NVMe’s pricing is cheaper than other products."
"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."
"The licensing is on a yearly basis."
"They can tout the functionality and cutting edge technology that they have, but that's where the price tag comes in. The cost is high, but I think as they grow their business and get more customers that it will probably go down a little bit."
"Our licensing fees are $500,000+ USD."
"The support cost per array is about $20,000 a year for 24/7 support."
"As far as the licensing costs, everything is included in the license."
"Pretty much everything that you need is licensed when you buy the product. Licensing to me is different than the maintenance cost, but they can bleed into one another. We buy the product, and we expect three years of support bundled into what we negotiate on our storage arrays. I would start to see maintenance costs going into the fourth year, but we're not there yet."
"It is not a cheap product."
"The price falls within the mid-range, neither inexpensive nor high-priced."
"The total cost, the pricing of it, has gone up quite a bit."
"ATTO bridges add to the total cost of the system."
"You need to be careful with the licensing since it can become expensive."
"If you go for Replication, Vault, and NAS, please ensure that the license has been ordered at the very beginning. However, licenses can been added or modified without rebooting the system at any time."
"We benefited from implementing all-flash by reducing our data center footprint. We took it from 30 racks to just over five. This is one of the biggest savings for us."
"I looked at other vendors for other potential projects and thought NetApp's pricing was very competitive."
"The price of the upgrading of the solution is high. I could buy a whole unit of All Flash FAS 300 with a shelf for around $285,000. Yet if I want to add one additional shelf, it'll cost me $275,000. So they want you to upgrade by replacing it. It's cheaper to buy a whole new unit than to just scale out. The upside is they last. AFF lasts us three or four years. So that's a good investment."
"It can get a little expensive if you need to add more disks. The cost is a pain point for us, especially in terms of expansion."
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Comparison Review

it_user186357 - PeerSpot reviewer
Solutions Architect with 51-200 employees
Jan 28, 2015
NetApp vs. XtremIO
Is there another storage platform as feature rich as NetApp FAS? I think it is fair to say that NetApp FAS running Clustered Data ONTAP is a very feature rich platform – the move to the clustered version of ONTAP has brought many next-generation features including Scale-out and Non-disruptive…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
16%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Construction Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business15
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise12
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business45
Midsize Enterprise47
Large Enterprise242
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
The price of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is very expensive, though I do not know the actual price because I am using the E...
What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could ...
What needs improvement with Dell EMC VMax?
The scalability of VMAX is somewhat limited, especially in terms of cache scalability. We've had to procure additiona...
What is your primary use case for Dell EMC VMax?
We use the solution for SAP ERP applications. We utilize both VMAX and PowerMax for different aspects of our operations.
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
Well, Is one thing NetApp Storage has vs other brand is the mix of protocol CIFS with NFS booth working together in t...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
This question is very dependent on your requirements. Both are among the best in the field. Of course, the intended c...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
The answer depends on your needs and budget. If you want high performance (who doesn't) or let's say the latency matt...
 

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X, Pure FlashArray X NVMe
No data available
NetApp All Flash FAS, NetApp AFF, NetApp Flash FAS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
Information Not Available
DreamWorks Animation, FICO, Yahoo! Japan
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell VMAX All Flash vs. NetApp AFF and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
885,880 professionals have used our research since 2012.