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Veritas Backup Exec vs Veritas NetBackup comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 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

Veritas Backup Exec
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
18th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Veritas NetBackup
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
116
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Veritas Backup Exec is 1.7%, down from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Veritas NetBackup is 3.4%, down from 5.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Q&A Highlights

MP
Jan 23, 2020
 

Featured Reviews

Pawel Augustyn - PeerSpot reviewer
Simplified interface with good performance but needs monitoring
I need to use PowerStore and Veritas Backup Exec. It is a direct backup to types, and it is supported by my backup. It offers good performance and stability, and it works properly. I am happy with this program. It is still working on aligning with security requirements and data encryption for Amazon or ATAC. It has a lot of functions and security measures, which ensure our backups are secure.
Wesam Qashou - PeerSpot reviewer
A mature backup solution, with many features, and great support
Veritas NetBackup is the first line of defense when disaster strikes. Before performing disaster recovery, we must have a good backup of our image that is also protected from ransomware. This way, we have a golden image that is resilient to ransomware attacks. We saw the benefits of Veritas NetBackup within the first three months.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The ease-of-use in general is great."
"Veritas helps me manage business-critical backups effectively and has been pretty useful in keeping the functions comfortable."
"The one thing for the last 12 months which has been very good for Veritas was the instance-based license. This means that you're able to license per instance, not only per physical server."
"Veritas is good for small environments."
"I have found the overall features of the solution very good and there is the option to backup to the cloud."
"One nice feature with Backup Exec is mainly that disaster can happen to any server and the disk image can be destroyed very easily. It's also easy to fully email the backup image and restore the server."
"It's quite stable, and so far, we have had no technical issues with Veritas Backup Exec."
"The interface, dashboard, and pricing are all perfect."
"Its most valuable features are flexibility and reliability."
"I have found it to be the simplest solution to the market. It gives us a complete end to end solution. We are using this solution, Veritas Appliance and another one for access archiving. It is convenient to have all the support from one vendor."
"The simulation engine is highly valuable as it allows us to simulate what a failure would be like and generate reports."
"Veritas released a new feature in version 8 of NetBackup called VRP. It's kind of like replication management from VMware. The great thing about this feature is that Veritas gave it to us for free."
"The tool provides recovery. The support for their legacy software is very good."
"This is the best solution that I know of."
"The VM portal and the CloudCatalyst are two of the solution's most valuable features."
"What I like most is it is a professional product. It supports all kinds of technologies, and I consider it one of the best backup products available."
 

Cons

"The solution is too heavy and complex with 1,000 menus and options that make it messy rather than lightweight."
"The solution lacked local support, which became an issue for us and our customers. They needed to have more presence on the ground."
"One area for improvement is Veritas's pricing."
"The licensing packet is confusing. If Veritas could do a better job of clarifying it, that would be helpful."
"Initial setup is a bit complex and needs some expertise for troubleshooting when something goes wrong."
"Expanding is difficult because if I want to add, for example, a terabyte of data, then I have to buy a disk shelf and it will cost me a lot."
"The scalability could be improved even though the solution is targeted to small customers."
"The overall product rating is five out of ten."
"Licensing costs are quite high."
"I would advise not to use this tool. I think between the licensing issues and the older solution mentality it is not a great solution."
"The solution costs too much."
"I have been involved in upgrades. They have not been straightforward. Some of them have required us to make changes to our architecture and production environment."
"When the customer is using SaaS applications like Office 365, the integration falls short and needs to be improved."
"It's not a user-friendly solution. It's a little bit complicated. The UI is not very friendly."
"The SQL Server backup features are not up to date."
"NetBackup is expensive and should be cheaper. That is why we are moving on to another solution."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I rate the product's pricing a six out of ten."
"The solution could be more cost-effective."
"It is affordable, but I hope that the price will come down a lot because of other competitors. It is a good price for the customer, but sometimes, the competition provides a much lower price. There are two ways to license it. You can license it per instance or per terabytes of data that we are mocking up. It is enough because it is not so complex. It is good when you're working with customers."
"Its price is a bit high. There is only the standard fee. There is no additional fee."
"The pricing of Veritas Backup's license is comparable to Veeam."
"I think it's sold at the right price. It's not expensive. The license is usually for a year."
"It is cheap compared to the other backup technologies. It all depends on the requirements."
"The pricing is good."
"I rate the product's pricing a seven out of ten."
"In terms of cost, it's not very good."
"The price is okay."
"The solution is expensive compared to other products."
"It is slightly more expensive than Commvault, but it is pretty much the same. It is an enterprise solution, so it scales quite well. It has a lot of features. So, you pay for what you get. It is not cheap, but it is fit for the purpose."
"The licensing model is cost-prohibitive as you scale out."
"The pricing, of course, can always be better."
"The solution is expensive."
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Answers from the Community

MP
Jan 23, 2020
Jan 23, 2020
Both solutions are perfect and great names in data protection. If you have a small or medium setup then go with Backup Exec and if you have a big setup with the latest workload then go with Net Backup. You can get a TB license for all servers which you want to protect.
2 out of 9 answers
it_user762030 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 20, 2020
We have just recently migrated our backups off of Netbackup due to the cost. I do not remember the licensing, but the whole product was getting too expensive for not only the product but for the management of the product. We had 6 different pieces in the environment due to some configuration designs. So we have moved to a product that we pay so much for the hardware and then a license for the amount of data we ingest through that product. It is one environment management that can handle a large amount of Data Protection.
Bckupdataad67 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 20, 2020
The proper question is not Backupexec or Netbackup but what kind of protection you want to have? We had backup exec for more than 4 years and I can assure you, as a backup administrator, that I had some really hard days related to the proper coverage of servers, applications, and data. Netbackup is the proper choice if you want a serious protection infrastructure but you have to consider the following key facts: -What type of environment do you want to protect? Netbackup works perfectly with VMWare and with mixed environments. I'm not saying that it will not work with other providers but the integration with VMware is one of the greatest pros of this product. -Is the backup time window enough to cover all your resources? With Backupexec I was struggling to have all backup jobs complete in a time frame of 13 hours. With Netbackup and especially in conjunction with their Appliances I was able to add more and more jobs for the very same time frame. -What is your frontend volume? With Netbackup the best solution is to have a Frontend Capacity license. With this license type, there's no need to buy extra licenses for SQL, SharePoint, Exchange, Oracle, etc. It's an all-inclusive license. Furthermore, with the new version 8.2 you don't even have to install agents on servers! The prices may vary but I guess for i.e 20TB capacity the price will be somewhere between 80000 to 100000 euros (1-year maintenance included and assuming a feasible discount). You don't have to pay for an appliance but if you afford it it's highly recommended in order to achieve the best performance and other technologies (i.e AIR, deduplication ratio, etc). I don't really know what is the current status of Backupexec in terms of version, prices, features etc. As a product it's absolutely not comparable to Netbackup On the other hand we have left it behind for good.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How do the backup solutions of Veeam and Veritas compare?
Technically, Veeam is best for hyper-v & VMWare replications, snapshots, HA failover, also support for file system backups inside VMs., support for tape library & FC too. But Veritas Netbac...
What do you like most about Veritas Backup Exec?
The most important feature is the variety of backup applications it supports, including ERP systems and most other programs, such as Microsoft.
What is the best next generation backup tool?
Assuming you have an onprem ecosystem which runs the VMware, physical systems on Win, Linux and Unix and run both traditional DB's and nosql DB's like mongo, then Netbackup (NBU) will be the right ...
What do you like most about Veritas NetBackup?
The most valuable feature of cloud integration is the ability to send data outside of your location. This can be achieved by integrating cloud tier options or other object storage solutions.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Veritas NetBackup?
The product is cost-effective, and I would rate its pricing as an eight out of ten. The pricing model is based on the amount of data transferred, making it manageable for us.
 

Also Known As

Backup Exec, Symantec Backup Exec
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Beta Offshore
Beta Offshore
Find out what your peers are saying about Veritas Backup Exec vs. Veritas NetBackup and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,524 professionals have used our research since 2012.