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GoAnywhere MFT vs SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 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

GoAnywhere MFT
Ranking in Managed File Transfer (MFT)
2nd
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolarWinds Serv-U File Tran...
Ranking in Managed File Transfer (MFT)
19th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.1
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Managed File Transfer (MFT) category, the mindshare of GoAnywhere MFT is 8.6%, up from 5.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server is 0.7%, down from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Managed File Transfer (MFT)
 

Featured Reviews

Earl Diem - PeerSpot reviewer
Key to our workflow and our workload automation strategy, helping us trade and consume files
File monitors are one of the most valuable features. We have about 400 file monitors running in GoAnywhere. They monitor the NAS locations where files arrive, and they kick off workflows. When a file arrives, GoAnywhere will identify that the file is there, move it to a consumption zone, then reach out to our enterprise scheduler through a REST API call. The solution helps centralize the exchange of data between systems, employees, customers, and trading partners. It's very central and that's pretty important. We generally move about 3,000 files a day, between our partners and internal workflows. My team really likes the intuitiveness of GoAnywhere's user interface. For example, my automation team has a file coming in from a bank, a file that needs to be unzipped, reformatted, re-zipped up, and then put into another folder where another team is going to consume it. Because of all the progressive elaboration—the project started a year ago—the format of the file is not the same. We addressed it with GoAnywhere instead of having the producer of the file change the format. That's how flexible it is for us. And looking at the comprehensiveness of GoAnywhere's workflow features, we use it pretty extensively for working with files. Stonebranch is our enterprise automation platform, but we don't really do any file work with Stonebranch. We chose to use GoAnywhere, our MFT tool, to move and manipulate files. The solution also connects to popular ICAP servers and that's pretty important to our security guys when it comes to preventing malware and other malicious content from entering our organization. The connection to popular ICAP servers, so that content is inspected for sensitive information like credit cards, is pretty important. We're a financial institution and a lot of the data we work with has PAN data and card numbers in it, coming in from partners.
reviewer2292672 - PeerSpot reviewer
The solution can be used for internal file transfer, but its technical support and third-party integrations should be improved
I am comparing SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server, WS_FTP, and Wing FTP for my current company. We use the solution for multiple purposes, and it should be user-friendly when integrating something. We cannot always depend on the support team to come and fix the issues. Overall, I rate SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server a seven out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Another nice feature is that you can invoke a native program from GoAnywhere. That helps you because you don't have to get fancy with agents. If a native program runs on the server that GoAnywhere is running on, like sed or perl, you can use it,"
"It enabled us to allocate staff toward other work. All the time that we would have wasted worrying about this stuff and correcting problems is put into other parts of our job. That's one of the best things about it, is that we don't waste time on these projects. We just don't have to worry about them because it lets us know if there's a problem."
"All of it is valuable, but the most valuable would be the ability to release medical records without having a limitation for size and not having to deal with the fax machine."
"When users say, 'I'm building spreadsheets that I would like to be uploaded on a regular basis into the IBM i,' we are able to accommodate that request within a matter of hours rather than the days it would take to create programs to do that. That is very useful. It has eliminated several dozens of scripts for us."
"The SFTP and encryption functionality works well, and SFTP is the bulk of what we use."
"The most valuable features are the automatic processing of files and scheduled execution of the files."
"Its speed is the most valuable because every integration used to take months with old SOA tools, integration buses, and that type of stuff. Now, we do integrations in a matter of days. Security is another valuable thing because every step in the workflow has an audit trace, which is great. This also brings a lot of confidence in automating business process workflows through this type of solution."
"GoAnywhere stands out for its user-friendly project creation, intuitive testing and troubleshooting, and especially its notification system, which keeps me informed of any issues that need attention, a feature we lacked before."
"We use SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server for internal file transfer."
 

Cons

"The support could be enhanced a little bit... If the first echelon of support could say, 'Okay, you are trying to create a variable,' and could tell you what you have to do, that would be good."
"When we restart the agent on each server, it tries to go out to the internet and it takes about a 13-minute timeout before it can move forward. Why is there a 13-minute timeout value when trying to go to the internet? ...If they could limit that timeout or give us a way to modify it so we could have a faster timeout, that would help us at least knock out a half-hour's worth of outage."
"At present, HelpSystems GoAnywhere MFT integrates with an antivirus solution, but it's a bit kludgy."
"Its user interface can be improved. The current user interface is a little basic for some of the use cases. We have to use an external component to enhance it. When we need a more appealing user interface, we use an additional component, and that works okay."
"API functionality wasn't part of our initial unit testing because it wasn't necessary then. However, shortly after implementing GoAnywhere, two different vendors approached us to do API transactions. We checked to see if GoAnywhere could do this and found that it was supposed to have that capability, but it broke down."
"The reporting could be more customizable."
"The support desk has room for improvement. I keep opening tickets and they keep telling me that they're closed, but they're not resolved."
"The solution's built-in functions could be better; I want to see easier file transfers and management."
"The solution’s technical support should be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost of GoAnywhere versus the value it brings to our data transfer operations is reasonable... The cost is relatively expensive but, back to the car analogy, that's to be expected with a Ferrari."
"Its pricing is fair. It is not the most expensive, and it is not the cheapest. For what we get in our environment, the pricing model works pretty well."
"Compared to other tools it's less expensive."
"I find it to be very fair. It is very good."
"I get the invoices, and its price is fine and appropriate. It is well priced. Even if it was double the price, we'd use it. For us, it is indispensable. We're not going to go anywhere else. There are no additional costs. Its licensing is good. There is just one charge that we get. That's it."
"GoAnywhere was the most attractively priced product that met our needs. In our PoC it really came down to MOVEit and GoAnywhere, and GoAnywhere's pricing was about 30 percent less."
"Licensing can be expensive and it depends upon which features you want to buy."
"Pricing is based on a one-time license."
"The pricing of the solution is INR 3,00,000."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Computer Software Company
10%
Healthcare Company
9%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Energy/Utilities Company
13%
Media Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Fortra's GoAnywhere MFT?
GoDrive eliminates the need to use the exchange server for file sharing.
What needs improvement with Fortra's GoAnywhere MFT?
The technical support response time has room for improvement.
What do you like most about SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server?
We use SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server for internal file transfer.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server?
The pricing of the solution is INR 3,00,000. The pricing of the solution should come down.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server?
The solution’s technical support should be improved. The solution's initial setup and third-party integrations could be improved.
 

Also Known As

HelpSystems GoAnywhere MFT, GoAnywhere MFT, GoAnywhere Managed File Transfer,
Serv-U File Transfer Protocol Server, Serv-U FTP Server
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

McKesson City of Modesto, California Kwik Trip Northwestern University Charter Communications
Information Not Available
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