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HPE Zerto Software vs OpenText Data Protector comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 21, 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

HPE Zerto Software
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
2nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
346
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Migration (1st), Cloud Backup (2nd), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (1st)
OpenText Data Protector
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
22nd
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.8
Number of Reviews
102
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of HPE Zerto Software is 2.0%, down from 3.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenText Data Protector is 1.0%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
HPE Zerto Software2.0%
OpenText Data Protector1.0%
Other97.0%
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

PP
Tech Lead, Storage and Data Protection at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees
Helps simulate a DR failover commit and perform DR tests much faster
Near-synchronous replication has some trade-offs. With near-synchronous replication, we get almost all the information up to date at the destination site, but the trade-off is that sometimes that could take a lot of CPU cycles, network bandwidth, and troubleshooting. A few versions back with Zerto, there were some bugs in the software that were causing constant replication back and forth that was driving a lot of network bandwidth utilization over the network, and we did not know why until we found out it was a bug. It depends on what your business or application really requires. If it requires near-synchronous, you have to enable that. However, if Zerto can make it easier or have a smaller footprint by sending larger payloads or having network compression, it will be a little bit easier. On wide area networks and local area networks, that would definitely be preferred. We have had some issues running Linux virtual machines on the new version. There were some issues with virtual replication adapters on Cisco UCS hosts running VMware vCenter 8. There were several things we had to do with installation and getting the replication adapters to work. Integration with Keycloak for Active Directory authentication using new Linux VMs was challenging, but it is now functioning well.
Ahmad-Hassan - PeerSpot reviewer
Project Manager And Technical Consultant at EEMC
Provides effective backup for physical servers and needs improvements for cloud compatibility
We use OpenText Data Protector for Oracle database backup and some applications that run for database security OpenText Data Protector is good for physical backup, specifically for physical servers. It is effective for direct backups to EMC library or storage without using a repository. However,…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Most of the time, this is at least a two person job. We used to have three people doing it. Previously, when we had a disaster recovery drill, the way it worked was 12 of us would show up in the office on a Friday night and work overnight from 12:00 AM on Friday night to 8:00 AM in the morning on Saturday. Then, three of us would be working for four hours out of those eight or nine hours just getting applications up and running in Arizona. Now, for the disaster recovery drill, I just stay onsite to help and assist anybody else as they need during that time frame and my work is done in about a 30-minute time frame. This is compared to the four or five hours it used to take for the three of us to do it."
"Orchestration is much better."
"VMware VM replication over narrow WAN bandwidth."
"It reduced the time for DR tests from the infrastructure side. Being able to get our work done in a matter of a couple of minutes so the app teams can get to work and can do their testing has been significant."
"The granularity enables us to failover specific workloads instead of an all-or-nothing type of scenario, where you have to move your entire IP block and your data center, or you have to move large chunks of VMs. Those situations also make it prohibitive to test effectively."
"What I appreciate about Zerto is that it's set and forget. You set it, and it just works."
"The most valuable tool is the dashboard, which allows us to immediately check the DLP status, replication data, and all other data needed to have cleaner and immediate control of the situation."
"If we lost our data center and had to recover it, Zerto would save us a great deal of time. In our testing, we have found that recovering the entire data center would be completed within a day."
"The initial setup is very easy."
"The dashboards in Micro Focus Data Protector are very good. They are similar to the dashboards in Veeam Backup & Replication."
"The stability of the product seems to be quite good."
"I like that it supports HPE UNIX servers since many backup solutions do not - this is the main reason why we chose this solution."
"Ability to automatically detect and secure new data sources without requiring manual configuration intervention."
"Backup of SAP/Oracle -- they are more robust than the competition."
"OpenText Data Protector is good for physical backup, specifically for physical servers."
"The reliability of HP Data Protector is the most valuable feature for us."
 

Cons

"Zerto's connectivity with automation platforms could be improved. For example, vCenter can use a VMware-developed tool called Site Recovery Manager. That can be integrated with automation platforms such as Terraform, Ansible, Chef, or Puppet, to perform automated, self-sufficient recoveries to essentially avoid any downtime. To my knowledge, Zerto does not have integration with those platforms."
"We would like the LTR function to be able to retain the past 12 months."
"The only thing I could suggest for HPE Zerto Software would be better support for detached drives in a clustered environment, as it's currently not supported very well unless everything's running on a virtualized VMDK file."
"The main issue with Zerto is its user interface, which lacks flexibility and presents a steep learning curve."
"Pricing is kind of expensive, but for what we get, it is probably worth it. I know they just had a huge price increase due to the VMware stuff getting expensive, which added about a thousand dollars a month to our bill."
"Zerto generates many false positive alerts, which is annoying. I still have thousands of alerts in my inbox, and those are false alerts. When I check there's actually no problem."
"The reporting could be improved in terms of the reports that you can show to auditors to prove that you have done the testing. I provide the reports that it generates now but, it would be great if, at the end of a DR test, it would generate a report of everything that Zerto did."
"It would be nice if Zerto offered OVFs, which are custom-built VMs that you can install on your virtualized environment. At the moment, I have the Zerto sitting on two custom-built Windows servers, which creates a lot of overhead. I'm waiting for them to create an OVF file, which is a built and hardened version of their Zerto server that I can just install wherever with a couple of mouse clicks."
"It's very expensive compared to Veeam and other similar solutions."
"The downside of the flexibility on offer is if you over-configure it, it may fail to function as some configurations may not match."
"Virtualization."
"We faced some certification issues after we upgraded to version 10.2."
"In general, you can say that Micro Focus Data Protector is behind in capabilities when compared with other backup solutions, such as Commvault, Symantec, NetBackup, but it is very strong for certain use cases such as array integration. We are using it in production even now. There should be some kind of cloud integration and archiving solutions. I think this is the area they need to focus on."
"The scheduler setup could be better. We are facing some issues scheduling the job based on our requirements."
"If you compare the solution with the same specific features and enhancements on another solution, Data Protector is expensive. This is especially true when compared to, for example, Veeam."
"The product can be developed by including functionalities like DR, CDP, and SureBackup, which are currently unavailable in the solution."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is very reasonable."
"Zerto’s licensing model has changed a bit over the last year and they are in alignment with others. It is pretty simple and more economical."
"Zerto is very cost-effective. We get really great value for the cost of the service."
"Zerto is pretty reasonable. I haven't checked to see how much Rubrik is going to quote us for their solution. At least for us, the price doesn't play a big factor in the decision-making because it is a pretty small deployment for our use case."
"At the time I had purchased the product, the pricing was fair and reasonable. Over the years, costs have certainly gone up, which makes it hard for healthcare companies to use the solution."
"It's not the cheapest tool, it's expensive. But it's doing a good job."
"You need to figure out how many critical servers and applications you have in your environment so you will know how many Zerto licenses to buy."
"Zerto's pricing model is cost-prohibitive for small—to medium-sized businesses."
"We have many competitors who are pricing better, and we believe that our pricing is higher."
"The licensing cost was not annual. We didn't pay any license. We paid when we deployed and we didn't pay for anything after that. There were no additional fees after the initial payment."
"Avoid using many LTO drives; when using fewer drives, the price will be extremely good."
"The pricing is neither too expensive nor very cheap."
"Data Protector's pricing is very competitive and we have no issues in this regard. I would give it an eight out of ten in terms of pricing."
"The licensing cost is too high."
"The product is cheaper than Commvault."
"Pricing for Micro Focus Data Protector is reasonable."
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Comparison Review

it_user159711 - PeerSpot reviewer
Architect at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
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
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
8%
Marketing Services Firm
13%
Performing Arts
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business90
Midsize Enterprise89
Large Enterprise198
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business28
Midsize Enterprise22
Large Enterprise61
 

Questions from the Community

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?
From a pricing standpoint, HPE Zerto Software was reasonably priced initially compared to SRM, but now it is almost on par, if not better.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Micro Focus Data Protector?
The solution is expensive as it requires purchasing all features without the option to negotiate based on client numbers, unlike Veeam which offers flexibility in pricing.
What needs improvement with Micro Focus Data Protector?
OpenText Data Protector is not user-friendly, especially for cloud backup. It lacks functions and facilities compared to Veeam, which offers more user-friendliness for virtual machine backups. Ther...
What is your primary use case for Micro Focus Data Protector?
We use OpenText Data Protector ( /products/opentext-data-protector-reviews ) for Oracle database backup and some applications that run for database security.
 

Also Known As

Zerto Virtual Replication
Micro Focus Data Protector, Data Protector, OmniBack, HPE Data Protector
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

United Airlines, HCA, XPO Logistics, TaxSlayer, McKesson, Insight Global, American Airlines, Tencate, Aaron’s, Grey’s County, Kingston Technologies
GSK Vaccines, Repsol, Vodafone Group, Siemens AG, Medium Enterprise Transportation Services Company
Find out what your peers are saying about HPE Zerto Software vs. OpenText Data Protector and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
883,712 professionals have used our research since 2012.