Huawei Ethernet Switches Reviews

Most of the Huawei routers we use are for alternative network connections. For example, we have our fiber internet, which is connected through Cisco. However, during downtime, we connect Huawei to the 4G network through their routers. They provide an alternative connection. They also provide Wi-Fi on the premises.

The basic features are great. We can connect to the internet through SIM cards, through the phone network, to 4G and 5G networks.

It provides Wi-Fi on the premise and basic switching and routing capabilities on facilities.

They're straightforward to set up. Even a non-technical user can just take a Huawei Switch with a few lines of documentation, and they're able to put them online. They have the ability to use them even a totally new or non-technical user. It's a bit easier to use.

It’s hard to get technical support.

I’ve been using the solution for two years.

They are less stable than Cisco, however. They are quite stable. They're acceptable.

The solution is scalable.

We have between 400 to 500 users, depending on the number of people in the office. On Fridays, when everybody has to come to the office, we have around 500 people.

The tech support is not very good. It's a bit hard to get tech support for Huawei products.

We use Cisco and Huawei.

The initial setup is very straightforward and very easy.

It takes minutes to set up Huawei products. It's very easy and straightforward, and the beauty with them is that they provide an automated setup. You only click next, next, and do so under very good guidance. Or if you have to put a password, there is an explanation there on how to put a password that may meet these security standards. It's self-explanatory. You can easily set it up.

We did not require outside help. For example, we did not require any external service at our site and even at our client site. Since we provide integrated services, it's so easy for us, even when we go to client sites.

From the experience that our clients have had, if we deliver Huawei products, they can set it up themselves without requiring an integrator.

Users pay once, and then they have the solution. You don’t need to constantly pay for licensing. They're also cheaper than competitor programs.

We’re using the latest version. I don't know the exact version that we have. They're updated year after year.

I recommend them. They're good, they're stable, and they are easy to set up. For people who don't have any technical background, I would recommend Huawei.

I’d rate the solution seven out of ten.

We primarily use the solution for access and distribution switches.

The functionality is great. The functionality is basically the same as Cisco. However, with Cisco, some protocols are standard proprietary on the Cisco side. Also, with Huawei, some protocols are proprietary. 

The pricing is much lower than, for example, Cisco.

It works quite well in general.

We haven't had anything to complain about yet.

The documentation needs to be better. When you run into issues, it's hard to figure out what might be wrong by referencing it.

We deployed the solution five months ago.

For the time being, the stability is very good. Much like RUCKUS, which we deployed five months ago, we need time to really evaluate its stability. It's still quite new. 

We have about 120 Huawei switches. We also have 200 Cisco switches, so we have a lot. 

Our users might use one or the other as they are interspersed throughout the organization. I can't give an exact number of users at any given time as they are mixed with Cisco. These devices basically work as one.

We haven't dealt with technical support yet. I can't speak to how helpful they would be.

We also use Cisco switches and firewalls as well. We use Ruckus as well. They are mainly for wireless access.

The initial setup is not like Cisco. If I had a problem with Cisco devices, I can look at the documentation and come up with a solution. I will find anything on the global site. However, with Huawei, it is difficult to find or interpret any fixes in the documentation, in the manuals. Cisco is better in that sense. Huawei is less clear when it comes to documenting everything.

There is a bit of maintenance required with the product.

We did have a company come and help us implement the switches. They also helped us with our Cisco solutions.

The pricing is reasonable. In comparison to Cisco, it's good.

That said, I can't speak to exact pricing as that is handled by the finance team.

We are customers and end-users. 

The solution has been pretty solid so far. I'd rate it nine out of ten simple due to the fact that we have not run into any problems. 

I'd advise those considering using Huawei that Huawei and the Cisco switches are the same. They only really differ in some manual configurations. It is good to try them out. While everything, of course, has its pros and cons, Huawei is a decent product.

We utilize the solution for asset layers and then also for the core. The ones around the core have been failing, and I've been replacing them as they fail with Cisco replacements.  

The solution easily integrates and operates well with Cisco.

Pricing-wise, Huawei is quite good.

I've found that the Huawei switches around the core fail, or at least the 9300 series do. I've had to move to Cisco. They tend to freeze and cause problems on my network, so I've needed to replace them with a bigger Cisco switch that can handle the network more effectively.

With Cisco, there are a few particular routine protocols that are not supported on Huawei. Cisco has these proprietary routine protocols which they try to maintain. Since we have the two switches integrated together, it would be helpful if Huawei could offer a more open routine protocol that can be standardized, and they should offer the same protocols that are standard on Cisco on their service as well so that the switches can match up a bit more elegantly. It would be great if the two solutions could somehow actively collaborate a bit more together.

The solution needs to provide a lot more availability. There needs to be more information on the internet to help people more easily configure the solution, etc. Right now, if you need to know something or need to find something, you have to go directly to Huawei. 

There needs to be more documentation. If they opened up a bit and shared more information and maybe allowed for YouTube videos about their products and how to work them, it would benefit the users quite a bit. 

I've used the solution for over five years now.

The solution isn't completely stable. There are some glitches, but for the assets there, it doesn't cause me any real issues. 

The solution is scalable, but it really depends on what you buy. The first core switch I bought was very scalable because they have almost eight channels and I could scale everything so easily. You can buy an appropriate switch to accommodate future groups that you can align, to gather to the core switches. Even if you don't make provisions for it you can actually scale, but it's better to plan ahead and know what you need.

We've reached out to technical support and have occasionally come across language barriers. Sometimes the person speaks English, and other times it's Chinese with English as a second language, and it can be difficult to converse and to describe the issues we are having. It would be better if they had more staff on hand that were able to communicate in English a bit better, but the help itself isn't too bad.

I currently also use Cisco switches. In fact, I'm slowly, as Huawei switches fail, subbing in Cisco switches. Currently, our network has both integrating with each other and working together. We're phasing out Huawei and we won't be using them anymore.

The initial setup is pretty straightforward if you are well trained on the solution. However, if you are not trained, then it may be more complex. 

If you are trained, it's as simple. It just has a few different commands. With training, it's no problem.

I didn't directly handle the implementation myself. However, my team did.

We are both an installer and considering becoming a Huawei partner.

About five years ago I began working with Huawei, and I decided then whenever they failed, I'd just replace the old ones with Cisco. However, after five years, many are still working, so we have a hybrid system where we use both Huawei and Cisco switches. However, whenever they do fail, I replace them with Cisco, so there may come a time int eh future where I will no longer be working with them and will have completely switched over to Cisco.

I don't have the exact version number, but I'm dealing with the 9300 core switch.

Although we are currently in the process of phasing out the Huawei switches in favour of Cisco, I'd still recommend the solution.

I'd rate the solution six out of ten.

We primarily use the solution for user accessibility.

The HTTP features for security are very good. We use all of the regular features.

The software could be more stable. There are a lot of bugs reported for the IS portion.

The GUI could be improved. It could be much more adaptable.

We've been using the solution for six or seven months.

We haven't faced any issues with scalability yet. There was one issue on the client-side where our mainframes weren't working because of a change on the packet side. The solution needs to add overhead to the packets. We have about 10,000 users on the solution currently. We don't have plans to increase usage on the appliance.

We've had contact with technical support and they are okay. The amount of assistance they provide is average. The response time they offer is typically too long and should be shortened. A lot of issues take hours.

We use a variety of switches. Depending on the requirements, we use Huawei, Cisco, HP, or Aruba. 

Most of our IT team members have a background in Huawei, so the solution is easy to set up.

We have contractors from Huawei come and handle the implementation for us since the solution is on-premises.

We use the on-premises deployment model.

I'd rate the solution four out of ten. The OS, features, and usage aren't great. There's a lack of resources and support. There's also a lack of implementers and very few partners.

This product is used in our network infrastructure for normal office use.

The Huawei switches are stable, easy to set up, and cheap.

The graphical user interface could be much better.

The vendor needs to make a better marketing effort to promote this product because you don't find a lot of good articles promoting it. Other brands are more aggressive in marketing.

In the future, I would like to see a feature that includes a dynamic picture of all of the ports, and what is connected to them. The functionality may be there, but I haven't seen it yet. Being able to see what is going through the ports would be helpful.

I have been working with Huawei Ethernet Switches for approximately five years.

We have not had any issues with glitches or bugs, so it has been stable.

We have not had any limitations in terms of scalability. We have fewer than 100 users.

I have not had an issue that necessitated contacting technical support.

We have Cisco products in addition to Huawei.

We have an in-house team for deployment and maintenance.

Compared to other brands, I think that the price is quite fair. I don't require them to be much cheaper, as it's already fair.

My advice for anybody who is considering this product is not to be afraid of it, just because Huawei is not a true American brand. It is an international brand. When you use it, you have the feeling that it can do even more than some Cisco or Fortinet products. The technology and brand name are good, so my advice is to trust it.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

For my own use case, I am a reseller for the switches. For my clients' use case, it is using the products as switches to build out their network connections.  

The most valuable features will be those features that are really considered as basic features of this type of switch. That includes things such as spanning tree protocol, Huawei's proprietary intelligent stacking called iStack, and the routing features that come along with the switch software package.  

Because Huawei does not charge any license fee on extra features I can repackage it. When you buy a switch from Huawei, the switches come along with a lot of features that you do not need to pay extra money for but you can use these features to build out similarly to something like Cisco switches. There are some features that it does not include, so you have to pay some extra license fee to enable those capabilities.  

To improve the ethernet switches, I think first of all that Huawei should improve their knowledge base library. When people like me are trying to look for documents to study about the product to find a solution, sometimes the particular information I am looking for is quite hard to find. It should be an easy task to find a suitable document as a reference. By comparison, it is very easy to locate the information that you need for the Cisco systems. I just type the name of any features or any questions I might have into Google and I can find what I need in a matter of minutes. With Huawei, it is not that simple.  

I think the support also needs to be improved. Right now you have to be able to speak Mandarin in order to communicate with those technical experts and express your problem to make them understand what it is. When they know they can give you a solution to solve your problem, and the support is good in that way it is good. But they need more support for other languages. When I work with Cisco, for example, you can generally speak in English. I am not saying that the support people at Huawei do not know how to communicate in English at all, but find it quite difficult to communicate well with them because they have a very heavy Mandarin accent when speaking in English. It is better to just speak with them in mandarin if you can.  

Because I work only so often with the Huawei brand, I think these might be the only suggestions I have. I spent a long time with the technology but have not gotten very deeply into discovering the smaller details of Huawei switches until recent years.  

I have been using the product for three years.  

The stability of the brand is constantly getting better and has improved over time. Early on, I actually was working with this brand and have experience with it from seven or eight years ago for a short period of time. As I worked with it, I found it was sometimes hard to explain to the customer when the system became unstable. But Huawei seems to have resolved these issues now.  

In terms of scalability, Huawei is catching up to the big brothers in networking. For example, it is doing more to compete with Cisco, i-Tree or Brocade switches. Their scalability is quite good and sometimes they develop proprietary technology similar to other brands, like borrowing from Cisco. But some people say that the brand is just trying to copycat features that already exist in other brands. To copy is good sometimes, but to develop their own new technology is more important than copying something from other companies. It is not quite best practices to steal some technology and ideas from other companies.  

I would say that the technical support responds quite well. Because we are in the same time zone, it is quite easy to find people for troubleshooting or support. Just in case they cannot solve my problem, they can look for other knowledgeable resources within the same time zone who can address the issue. Some other brands, like Cisco, will usually pass the case to another time zone. They work in a protocol which some people call "follow the sun." So sometimes when people are working in one time-zone and they pass the case to people in another time zone, there might be some problem or some information that gets lost about the dialogue explaining the issue. When that happens, you have to repeat the questions and dialogue and it can take the people responding some time to pick up what had already been explained. So it wastes time at the end of the day.  

I believe that the question about setup complexity really depends on which models of the switches are being used. For the middle to low-end switches, it is quite intuitive. But for higher-end models, you must have experience in understanding not only Huawei technology but should also have a very clear concept of what you want to accomplish in networking. So, configuration-wise, I do not personally find any difficulties in configuring Huawei switches provided that I find the configuration guide and read it briefly before I put in any commands into the switch. However, less experienced users could potentially have problems.  

Huawei comes with a lot of features out of the box that you have to pay extra for with other products. They do charge extra in the licensing for certain other features, however, so some of those capabilities are an additional charge.

I have used quite a few ethernet switches. I have mostly been involved with Cisco, Huawei, and Meraki and I primarily use these three brands. It is not really a matter of choosing only Huawei as a solution in my situation. As a reseller, I need more than one option to satisfy client needs.

The advice I would give people who are considering this product as their switching solution is that if you are looking to satisfy the needs of a small scale project and want a pretty good price, then you might go for it. But you might be sacrificing security or risking involvement in a politically unstable situation. China and the U.S. are very tense with their political positions at the moment. They are facing some sort of trade war. If you need some components to produce or manufacture a product like a Huawei switch it is possibly going to be a tense situation. The chips are an important and really a vital component to complete development and upgrades or maintenance. Without that availability, the switch cannot work properly if something happens. So security and material swapping are the major issues to consider as a potential risk of adopting the product.  

On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate the Huawei ethernet switches as a five. I rate it a five, or really average, compared with a product like Cisco switches. Cisco switches really rate something more like an eight or eight-and-a-half.  

The solution is an IoT router but we primarily use it as the layer for industrial switches for CCTV video transmission.

The solution is very inexpensive. The documentation is very good. 

Technical support is also very good.

They have the ability, since they have a very big R&D team, to create an upgrade for any feature or patch very easily.

Troubleshooting documentation should be improved.

The interoperability of the devices, in general, on the Huawei switches is not good and is known to be not good. Maybe they can improve this a bit.

In terms of being able to patch quickly, if you have both a quality device, a quality switch that has a specific capability, Huawei won't necessarily have the same capability until a patch is created for it. 

I've been using the solution for approximately one year.

I'm satisfied with the stability of their equipment. There are no crashes, unexpected events, outages, or reboots.

We've never tried to scale the solution, so I can't speak to how scalable it is. We do have a client with 1,000-5,000 employees.

We've been satisfied with the level of technical support we've received from the solution. We've used technical support a lot, and it's one of the main advantages of the solution overall.

The initial setup is straightforward. It's very easy. Initially, the implementation took longer than we thought. We set it up over a period of two or three weeks.

We deployed the solution ourselves.

We use the on-premises deployment model.

When compared to Cisco switches, the Huawei switches are a bit lower in quality. They have similar properties that the Cisco switches have. Often Huawei brings in the features to match the competition later, and, in general, the overall quality a bit lower. Sometimes, because of this, you might have some unexpected results. The documentation is generally good, but troubleshooting documents for some unusual bugs or glitches are never created.

I generally recommend Huawei switches because although they are lower quality, they are cheaper than other switches. If you compare the price to quality ratio, it's pretty good, which is why we bought them.

Initially, many users are tempted by the idea of getting something that's that cheap. I recommend users to explore and investigate how they will use the switches and what they will purchase. Huawei is both good and not good. It depends on how you look at. If you really want to go with Huawei, then just be aware that Huawei has interoperability problems with many other vendors. In this case, I'd recommend going with all Huawei products to avoid issues.

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten.

We provide Huawei Ethernet Switches as a solution our customers based on their project requirements; we prefer this solution over Aruba due to its affordability. But Huawei Ethernet Switches have almost equivalent features to their Aruba counterparts. Huawei can be considered as a tier-1 switches provider. 

Huawei Ethernet Switches has multiple security features but the campus switches feature is vital. For some projects of our company, Huawei Ethernet Switches are more affordable than Aruba solutions. But for layer 3 or high-level switches, in some cases the Aruba switches are cost-effective, thus the price depends upon the project, configuration and the design. 

Huawei Ethernet Switches also have effective network switching features. 

I have been working with Huawei Ethernet Switches. 

Our company works with Huawei Ethernet Switches, which are mostly for enterprise-level businesses or hospitals, to be specific. The product can be easily scaled by integrating additional hardware or extending the licenses. 

Huawei Ethernet Switches can be easily configured and deployed. The configuration of the solution takes around a few hours but the total deployment may take longer. 

Huawei Ethernet Switches are available at a competitive market price. Competitor solutions from Cisco, Aruba and Juniper almost have a similar price point to Huawei Ethernet Switches. 

Our organization's system integrators analyze the main features of Huawei Ethernet Switches and competitor solutions and implement the ideal one for the client. The vendors also interact with our company's customers to convince them about the product through a pros-and-cons analysis. 

Huawei Ethernet Switches were successful in improving network efficiency for the clients of our organization. The solution matched our clients' requirements across the new sites and projects. 

Presently, the solution doesn't offer any AI integrations with the product hardware. I would recommend Huawei Ethernet Switches to others. I would overall rate the product an eight out of ten.