Dell VPLEX vs NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP comparison

The compared Dell Technologies and NetApp solutions aren't in the same category. Dell Technologies is ranked #4 in SM , with an average rating of 7.0, and holds a 6.6% mindshare in the category. NetApp is ranked #2 in CSDS , with an average rating of 9.3, and holds a 23.2% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of Dell Technologies users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of NetApp users who would recommend it.

Dell VPLEX

Read 19 Dell VPLEX reviews

1,413 Views
1,159 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

Read 64 NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP reviews

7,290 Views
437 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

Dell VPLEX

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Dell VPLEX and NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about NetApp, Dell Technologies, IBM and others in Storage Management.

To learn more, read our detailed Storage Management Report (Updated: May 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Storage Management

May 2026

Download the complete report

Helped 896,510 peers since 2012

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 VPLEX

Average Rating

8.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Storage Management (4th)

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Migration (2nd), Cloud Storage (5th), Cloud Backup (31st), Public Cloud Storage Services (12th), Cloud Software Defined Storage (2nd)

Mindshare comparison

While both are Storage Management and Software solutions, they serve different purposes. Dell VPLEX is designed for Storage Management and holds a mindshare of 6.6%, down 7.4% compared to last year.
NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP, on the other hand, focuses on Cloud Software Defined Storage, holds 23.2% mindshare, down 28.1% since last year.

Storage Management Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Dell VPLEX	6.6%
NetApp OnCommand Insight	7.9%
SolarWinds Storage Resource Monitor	6.7%
Other	78.8%

Storage Management

Cloud Software Defined Storage Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP	23.2%
IBM Spectrum Scale	26.4%
Portworx Enterprise	19.6%
Other	30.80000000000001%

Cloud Software Defined Storage

Featured Reviews

Shailendra Choudhary

Solution Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

Has supported enterprise projects consistently but pricing remains a challenge for broader adoption

We are system integrators and resell the HCI solution. We have worked with Dell VPLEX for approximately two to three years. We have been in several RFCs, and Dell VPLEX is implemented in the enterprise segment only. The solution is expensive and requires more budget, so people in the SMB segment do not prefer it. We typically recommend Dell VPLEX for customers who already work with other Dell products.

Read full review

Punit Waghela

Technical Specialist at Softcell Technologies Limited

Offers advanced features with notable emphasis on innovation

The best features of NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP include deduplication, compaction, and autonomous ransomware technology that native cloud storage solutions in AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud do not support. Moreover, NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP allows the use of multiple protocols including NFS, CIFS, and iSCSI, whereas native options may only support NFS and iSCSI. Customers already using on-premises NetApp storage such as FAS, AFF, or ASA can experience the same functionality on the cloud with NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP, which adds significant value. For data protection, customers can take advantage of the Snapshot technology available with NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP. This technology facilitates data recovery by allowing snapshots to be stored either on the same storage or on a disaster recovery (DR) storage. NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP helps us to take snapshots and store them on the same storage, with options for migration or replication of those snapshots to different storage, including on-premises DR storage or other cloud storage, providing excellent disaster recovery capabilities.

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

"Its mirroring capabilities allow for data to be mirrored across two different data centers, so if one center were to crash or fail, the other center could take over and keep everything running smoothly."

"The capacity to migrate machines onto VPLEX is great — it's very clean. We can migrate machines and add arrays easily."

"Storage virtualization and geographic resilience for Metro Sans, plus a great performance improvement."

"With VPLEX, we are able to automate this process where failovers between sites now occur automatically."

"The best part of the solution is the virtualization layer due to the fact that, for all our pain points during migration, we use the virtualization with VPLEX."

"Dell's technical support is awesome. We received instant support from EMC as long as we had an active contract."

"The business continuity is sorted, as the data is in two data centers, i.e., readable and writable, and if one side goes down, there is no downtime and the other side continues non-disruptively."

"VPLEX/VE is an amazing feat of engineering."

More Dell VPLEX pros

"The solution’s Snapshot copies and thin clones in terms of operational recovery are the best thing since sliced bread."

"The tool's most valuable features are the SnapLock and SnapMirror features. If something goes wrong with the data, we can restore it. This isn't a mirror; we store data in different locations. If there's an issue on the primary site, we can retrieve data from the secondary site."

"It gives us a way to optimize resource usage in the public cloud, without overpaying or wasting resources, while providing unified storage no matter what data you have and ensuring we have control of the data and know what it's being used for."

"Unified Manager, System Manager, and Cloud Manager are all GUI-based. It's easy for somebody who has not been exposed to this for years to pick it up and work with it."

"Los resultados son sorprendentes en términos de funcionalidad y defensa contra terceros."

"Snapshots are one valuable feature within ONTAP, but CVO's appeal is that it acts just like the on-prem solution. It's the same OS, but in the cloud. We can continue to use ONTAP as we did on-premise."

"NetApp CVO allows us to continue to provide service customers with access to their data, even if a physical site is going to be down for a long period of time."

"Stability, availability, performance, all these kinds of things, mean we're eventually getting more customers and more satisfied customers."

More NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP pros

Cons

"It needs to improve the thin reclaim on certain arrays."

"Dell VPLEX should improve its integration and user interface and be easier to configure."

"VPLEX hardware migration to spare equipment in case of major disruption."

"Due to the bug with Broadcom, we have had a massive crisis on VPLEX. This little bug has caused roughly one thousand machines to go down."

"The price is a problem with EMC due to the fact that it's more expensive than the other vendors."

"The licensing model for enterprise storage (EMC VMAX) and integrating the solution into the actual storage frames instead of a separate product."

"Cost. This is really expensive."

"Maybe setup a one-to-many cluster, instead of just a 1-to-1."

More Dell VPLEX cons

"I would like to see more information about Cloud Volumes ONTAP using Google Cloud Platform on NetApp's website."

"Something we would like to see is the ability to better manage the setup and tie it to our configuration management database. We manage our whole IT infrastructure out of that database."

"I would want more visibility and data analytics where we can see anomalies within the shares within the GUI."

"The support is good in general but the initial, frontline support could be improved."

"In the next release, I would like to see more options on the dashboard."

"In terms of improvement, I would like to see the Azure NetApp Files have the capability of doing SnapMirrors. Azure NetApp Files is, as we know, is an AFF system and it's not used in any of the Microsoft resources. It's basically NetApp hardware, so the best performance you can achieve, but the only reason we can't use that right now is because of the region that it's available in. The second was the SnapMirror capability that we didn't have that we heavily rely on right now."

"We've just been dealing with general pre-requisite infrastructure configuration challenges. Once those are out of the way, it is easy."

"The only issue we had lately was that outside our VPC we could not reach the virtual IP, the floating IP. I heard that they have fixed that..."

More NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"VPLEX is a little bit expensive in my personal opinion."

"We struck a great deal with Dell EMC, so for us, VPLEX was not very expensive."

"The pricing could be improved. It is a good product, but it is very expensive for me."

"Our licensing is based on a yearly subscription. That is an additional cost, but because of the storage efficiencies that the NetApp gives, even with the additional cost of the NetApp license, you still end up saving money versus straight Azure native for storage. It's definitely worth it."

"It is expensive. There are no costs in addition to their standard licensing fees."

"They give us a good price for CVO licenses. It is one of the reasons that we went with the product."

"Cloud is cloud. It's still expensive. Any good solution comes with a price tag. That's where we are looking to see how well we can manage our data in the cloud by trying to optimize the costs."

"Compared to other storage vendors, NetApp, is not always able to compete with their pricing. Yet, we acknowledge the ease of use ONTAP brings with the AWS integration."

"The pricing of this solution is definitely higher than what the typical Azure Files and AWS solutions charge, but given the features and the stability NetApp has provided, we are okay with it. We are not complaining about the pricing."

"The solution's pricing is reasonable."

More NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Storage Management solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

896,510 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Construction Company

10%

Healthcare Company

10%

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Construction Company

10%

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	3
Large Enterprise	12

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	8
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	53

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Dell VPLEX?

Some of the products are very easy to implement, while others are more difficult, and our team seeks support help when required. Regarding the integration part, the delivery team handles all integr...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Dell VPLEX?

We are implementing Cohesity, Hitachi, Dell, and Nutanix, VMware, vSAN; multiple products. We have recently started working with Cohesity because there was not much presence in India for Cohesity, ...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Dell VPLEX?

Hitachi Systems Microclinic has been renamed to Hitachi Systems India Private Limited. The email address has been changed to shailendra.chaudhry.hd at hitachi-systems.com from shailendra_singh.chau...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP?

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP is actually quite reasonable in price compared to other native cloud storage options. For example, a customer using 100 TB of AWS storage would not benefit from deduplica...

See all answers

What needs improvement with NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP?

It would be nice to see technology supporting the Elastic Fabric Adapter on Amazon AWS, therefore getting RDMA technology for more low-latency connections.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP?

I use NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP mostly in customer companies.

See all answers

Comparisons

SolarWinds Storage Resource Monitor vs Dell VPLEX

Compared 13% of the time

IBM SAN Volume Control vs Dell VPLEX

Compared 12% of the time

Huawei OceanStor DJ vs Dell VPLEX

Compared 10% of the time

IBM Spectrum Virtualize vs Dell VPLEX

Compared 9% of the time

NetApp BlueXP vs Dell VPLEX

Compared 9% of the time

More Dell VPLEX Competitors

Amazon S3 vs NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

Compared 8% of the time

Azure NetApp Files vs NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

Compared 5% of the time

Amazon FSx vs NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

Compared 5% of the time

NetApp Cloud Volumes Service for Google Cloud vs NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

Compared 4% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

Compared 4% of the time

More NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Dell VPLEX

May 2026

Download Dell VPLEX product report

Buyer's Guide

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP

May 2026

Download NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP product report

Also Known As

No data available

ONTAP Cloud, CVO, NetApp CVO

Overview

Dell VPLEX enhances storage management by offering virtualization, seamless data migration, and data center mirroring, making it ideal for enterprise applications needing high availability and data security.

Dell VPLEX stands out with its ability to integrate with multiple storage back-end systems, providing transparent data movement and deduplication. Its metro and geo-clustering capabilities ensure high availability, making it suitable for enterprise applications requiring maximum uptime. Supporting online migrations without disruptions, it offers high RPO and RTO for replication. However, it faces challenges in storage tiering, administration ease, and reducing costs, with users seeking better replication capabilities, cloud integration, and a web-based interface. Its licensing model and hardware dependencies can raise expenses, and configurations may be complex due to outdated technologies.

What are Dell VPLEX's Key Features?

Storage Virtualization: Abstracts physical storage into virtual resources.
Seamless Data Migration: Supports online migrations without disruptions.
Mirroring: Offers data mirroring across multiple data centers.
High Availability: Features metro and geo-clustering capabilities.
Integration: Works with diverse storage back-end systems.

What Benefits and ROI Can Users Expect?

Enhanced Data Security: Provides high RPO and RTO for replication.
Operational Efficiency: Reduces downtime with transparent data movement.
Geographical Resilience: Supports multi-data center redundancy management.
Cost Management: Potential for reduced costs with efficient data management.

In industries like finance and healthcare, Dell VPLEX is crucial for centralized storage in VMware environments and databases, helping manage redundancy and virtualization. They implement it as a front-end appliance, enabling connectivity between servers and storage appliances, facilitating seamless multi-vendor environment operations.

Dell Technologies

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP is an efficient storage management solution for managing and storing data in the cloud. It offers seamless integration with cloud providers, advanced data replication capabilities, and high data protection. With reliable performance, it is ideal for industries like healthcare and finance.

NetApp

Sample Customers

Kindred Healthcare, Regis Aged Care, WeBank SpA, Panduit, Munson Healthcare

1. Accenture 2. Acer 3. Adidas 4. Aetna 5. AIG 6. Apple 7. Bank of America 8. Barclays 9. Bayer 10. Berkshire Hathaway 11. BNP Paribas 12. Cisco 13. Coca-Cola 14. Comcast 15.ConocoPhillips 16. CVS Health 17. Dell 18. Deutsche Bank 19. eBay 20. Eli Lilly 21. FedEx 22. Ford 23. Freescale Semiconductor 24. General Electric 25. Google 26. Honeywell 27. IBM 28. Intel 29. Intuit 30. JPMorgan Chase 31. Kellogg's 32. KeyCorp 33. Liberty Mutual 34. L'Oréal 35. Mastercard

Find out what your peers are saying about NetApp, Dell Technologies, IBM and others in Storage Management. Updated: May 2026.

DOWNLOAD NOW

896,510 professionals have used our research since 2012.

We monitor all Storage Management reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.