Ruckus Wireless Reviews

We have an enterprise wireless solution with multiple vendor access points deployed across buildings and have implemented 802.1x authentication with dynamic VLANs. We have more than 100 Ruckus devices with Wpa2 enterprise authentication mode, and requests are getting authenticated from our NPS server.

Our classrooms are equipped with 4*4 Mimo Wi-Fi 6 technology-based Ruckus access points that will handle more than 80 high bandwidth clients at the same time. Moreover, our meeting rooms are also equipped with 2*2 Mimo models that easily handle high bandwidth applications.

We have been migrating from Fortinet access points to Ruckus Wireless over a period of 5 years. We could experience good coverage and have increased the overall Wi-Fi quality in our organization to a large extent. We were able to provide stable bandwidth for students even at peak hours, so overall, students could learn even from hostels with uninterrupted Wi-Fi. 

The reliability and stability issues of Fortinet have been considerably reduced after implementing Ruckus to hostels to a large extent. Overall, internet bandwidth utilization has also been utilized effectively after the Ruckus implementation.

Ruckus has two important features that proved to be very useful to us 0 Channelfly and background scanning. Channelfly was proven effective in areas where changes in Wi-Fi usage are at the least. It builds a a great utilization matrix and uses channel efficiently to manage bulk users and in highly dense Wi-Fi environments. 

Also it has a quality rogue AP detection and exact real-time logs of intrusions. 

Also configurations are highly customizable and we could tune easily to suit our Wi-Fi requirements. New Wi-Fi 6 models proved to be highly effective in our highly dense environment also.

Ruckus should have an option to migrate existing licenses from an old controller to a new purchase; presently, this is not possible. Also, the rates are a bit higher compared to its nearest competitors - like Cisco and Aruba.

The New Ruckus VM controller has an increased set of options, yet all options are scattered and is a bit complicated for even users who handle earlier hardware versions.

It would have been great if Ruckus Wireless had the standalone version which they had before. Presently, it can be used only in controller-based or cloud environments.

We have been a legacy user of Ruckus wireless for the past nine years with models from the old Ruckus 2942 to the latest model Ruckus 650 in our environment.

Extremely stable Wi-Fi coverage is ensured with Ruckus Wireless.

It is highly scalable and can be done in virtual machine environments with scalable resources.

It was pretty good customer service and support from the Ruckus team. RMA devices were shipped promptly without any delay.

We previously used Fortinet as well as Ubiquiti access points and were literally struggling to keep our Wi-Fi stable until and unless we got Ruckus into our environment. 

We were forced to switch to Ruckus for better performance at peak times and also due to its increased penetrative power through hard walls.

It was pretty straightforward; we got nice support from the Ruckus TAC team.

We have an in-house experienced networking team for all configurations.

We could really utilize our bandwidth effectively after our Ruckus implementation. We could handle the yearly bandwidth cost and server access expenses when stable Wi-Fi access is being provided to end users.

Pricing and licensing are a concern for average enterprises as Ruckus is overpriced when compared to Aruba and Cisco. Also, it is better to go with a new controller license rather than adding to an old one since, over a period of time, most of the new devices will be supporting only the latest controllers.  

We looked into Aruba and Cisco. However, Ruckus has the upper hand in terms of advanced Wi-Fi features. It has got a highly customizable controller to meet our flexible Wi-Fi requirements.

Currently, Ruckus is the best in this arena, and I would highly recommend having this solution on your premises to get superb and stable Wi-Fi infrastructure.

I use the solution in my company's warehouse and office. The product is useful as a wireless tool to deal with the pickup trucks in the warehouse and also for the end users who are seated in the office premises.

The solution's most valuable features are that it is easy to set up and works flawlessly without a problem, as expected.

The product is stable, which is why my company does not want any extra features, as it already provides everything that we want.

In my company, we still has to do some manual calculations on where we should set the access points, which is a time-consuming process as there were no automatic setup functions provided by the tool. The aforementioned area can be considered for improvement in the product.

I have been using Ruckus Wireless for three or four years. I am an end-user of the tool.

Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

It is a scalable solution. Scalability-wise, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

Around 30 to 40 people in my company use the product.

My company has previous experience with Cisco. My company switched to Ruckus Wireless because it was price-friendly and easier to use compared to Cisco.

I rate the product's initial setup phase a ten on a scale of one to ten, where one means it was difficult and ten means it was easy.

The solution is deployed on a private cloud since the controller is in the cloud and our access control is on an on-premises model. The tool's management is cloud-based.

The solution can be deployed in a couple of days. The problem was to set up the access points in our company's warehouse as it took most of our company's time. Once the access points were up and running, the overall product would become functional in an hour or two.

The product is critical for our business since, without it, we cannot work.

I rate the product price as six to seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is a low price, and ten is a high price.

Ruckus Wireless' BeamFlex technology has been very good, and my company has not faced any issues with connectivity as it works fine currently.

I recommend the product to others who plan to use it, considering that it is a tool that is easy to use and easy to set up. I think the tool's price is okay compared to other vendors.

I rate the tool a ten out of ten.

Ruckus Wireless is an easy-to-manage solution.

We didn't face any issues with the solution's stability and performance, and we had no downtimes.

We can add the hardware and licenses to scale the solution.

The installation of Ruckus Wireless was quite fast, taking a few months, depending on the project.

Ruckus Wireless is a cheaper solution than Cisco.

On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a five out of ten.

Ruckus Wireless is an easy to manage solution. I would recommend the solution to other users.

Overall, I rate the solution a seven out of ten.

The most valuable feature of Ruckus Wireless is the Beamforming feature. The solution's BeamFlex technology provides good connectivity. There are various models that can be used for high-density environments. If you select a product good for high-density environments, it can scale up to 400 to 500 users. If you have a controller for Ruckus Wireless, it is better for manageability.

The solution's pricing could be cheaper.

I have been using Ruckus Wireless for eight to ten years.

Ruckus Wireless is a very stable product. The device's connectivity will also be stable if your power is stable.

You can scale the solution up to your controller capability. Ruckus Wireless has a license-based controller, and you can scale up to several devices based on the license you get. More than 250 users are using the solution in our organization. The solution's scalability depends on how you engineer your area.

The solution's technical support is good. The technical support team helps replace faulty devices. The solution's service engineers are technically sound and good.

I am also using Tanium, which is also a very good product. I chose to use Ruckus Wireless because I wanted to separate my production environment from the office environment so that nobody could disturb the production environment.

It is easy to deploy the solution by referring to the document.

I deployed the solution by myself and used my colleague's help for the physical installation. The solution's deployment is easy. I first cleared the controller side and then configured the access point.

Ruckus Wireless is an expensive solution. Ruckus Wireless has a one-time licensing, and you have to renew the controller license. If you want more technical support, you also have to take license support for access points.

Managing Ruckus Wireless is very easy. I get the access list for my device, and my selected device users can only connect with my Wi-Fi network. If you have the budget, you should choose Ruckus Wireless.

If we have a support license, the device will be replaced if there is a hardware failure. That is the main thing for any technical person because nobody can start his own network if the hardware fails.

Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

I have a software company, so I use the Ruckus Access Point API solution.

This solution has a very good user-to-speed ratio. Even when the number of users increases to almost forty, the speed doesn't drop. It manages the traffic in a very smooth way. 

Reliability is a key feature. I haven't had a single complaint in four years, which is impressive. It handles increased loads effectively and has a very good range. These are the three points that highlight the product's value. 

I haven't had a single complaint in the last four years, which shows its reliability. If there were complaints, I wouldn't still be using it.

The price is one area for improvement, as it is an expensive solution. However, it is worth it. In the new models, they have improved features significantly, especially regarding more security layers and enhanced traffic handling capability. These are the areas where improvement is needed.

I have been using it for almost four years.

I do experience scalability issues.

I have no issues currently. The service is good, and I hope to continue receiving the same quality of service.

Neutral

I am using this as the only solution.

I was using TP-Link, however, as the number of users increased, TP-Link was not a reliable solution, so I switched to Ruckus.

If customers want a high-end product that is very reliable, very secure, and low on maintenance costs, they should choose Ruckus. 

The product is great, with a rating of eight out of ten.

Our clients use Ruckus as a controller base in active-active mode or active-passive mode depending on their needs. We work primarily with universities that have over 30,000 users. 

Ruckus Wireless is reliable. The most valuable features are BeamFlex technology, Wi-Fi 6, and channel management.

I have been providing Ruckus for seven years.

I rate Ruckus six out of 10 for reliability.  Mostly, we face issues with this port.

I give Ruckus nine out of 10 for scalability.

I rate Ruckus support seven out of 10. We have experience in this field, so we don't need vendor support, but my customers say the support is excellent. 

Neutral

I rate Ruckus eight out of 10 for ease of setup. It depends on the size of the deployment, but we can deploy Ruckus for most clients in a day or two. It's straightforward,

I rate Ruckus Wireless seven out of 10. Some customers have issues with the price because it's more expensive than Ubiquiti, but they can accept the cost because it's reliable and has more features.

I rate Ruckus Wireless nine out of 10. I would recommend it.

What I like best about Ruckus Wireless is that it's a controller-based product, so it's easy to configure.

An area for improvement in Ruckus Wireless is automating its guest WiFi access function. Currently, the product requires token generation, so it would be better if there's a portal for the guest to log in and get the password rather than the IT team needing to give passwords to guests.

A minor area for improvement in Ruckus Wireless is its technical support.

I want a built-in RADIUS server on Ruckus Wireless in the next release, as that would add some value to the product.

My company has been using Ruckus Wireless for five years.

Regarding stability, I rate Ruckus Wireless as eight out of ten.

Ruckus Wireless is scalable. Every controller has a limit on the number of APs, and my company's controller can handle one thousand APs. Still, my company only uses two hundred APs, so Ruckus Wireless is a scalable product.

My rating for Ruckus Wireless technical support is eight out of ten. It has a small room for improvement.

Positive

My company purchased Aruba Wireless for a new location based on Gartner recommendations. My company also made a technical comparison and found that Aruba Wireless is the number one product in the world, which is why the company is leaning toward it versus Ruckus Wireless.

Ruckus Wireless has a simple initial setup.

An integrator deployed Ruckus Wireless for my company, but my company is responsible for maintaining the product.

Regarding pricing, Ruckus Wireless is a five out of ten. Though it's cheaper than Aruba Wireless, pricing for Ruckus Wireless, when you look at its functionality, could be more affordable.

My company has Ruckus Wireless switching and AP products.

In the company, about one thousand five hundred people use Ruckus Wireless.

Four network engineers maintain the product within the company.

Ruckus Wireless is a seven on a scale of one to ten.

I'm recommending the product to others.

My company is a Ruckus Wireless customer.

We are an integrator working primarily with government healthcare providers and clients in the education sector. We have multiple deployment modes, including on-premise, direct permission, and layer-to-layer. We have also cloud-based and virtual deployment.

Wireless is an essential technology these days. People use it on their phones or tablets. It works for many clients and numerous number of employees in different locations and in centralized board as well.

Since we became a Ruckus partner, we've managed to increase our sales, and it has helped us deliver better solutions for our clients. It's highly competitive with American and Chinese products, like Huawei and Aruba.

Ruckus features a centralized architecture solution with ultrasound technology, which helps us with communication and roaming.

The switching could be improved. The active component requires a data center. Cisco and HPE have a complete solution for data centers. Ruckus has a core solution, but the data center aspect needs to be improved.

I've been using Ruckus Wireless for five years.

Ruckus' stability is excellent. Aruba is good as well, but Ruckus is better in my opinion. We receive fewer calls and tickets. Their sales and warranty are superb. 

Ruckus Wireless is scalable. It's an IP-based process that's interoperable, so you can deploy it in any environment. 

We are a tech support provider for Ruckus. We take calls and open tickets. 

We were previously an Aruba partner, but we switched to Ruckus because it's better. We've been in business for 15 years, and we have used Cisco, HPE, Extreme, Juniper, and several other vendors in that time.

Ruckus provides us with tools that help us implement the solution. Also, our engineers are certified to do the design and implementation. We don't have a ready-made software design solution for it. It's all predeveloped from Ruckus. Most deployments are straightforward, but they can be complicated if a high level of integration is necessary. 

The time needed to deploy depends on the project and type of setup. For example, it takes about an hour to deploy the controller and AP, so it would take 100 person-hours for a project with 100 APs. The access point sometimes requires cabling, which takes time because you need technicians to do this. You may need one or two system engineers and one after-sales engineer. 

I can't give precise figures. Some partners or resellers get benefits from using these wireless in a hospitality setting. In our job, the ROI is clear.

It is affordable. We get special codes from the vendor, so we can compete with others in the market. There are no hidden costs. The pricing is transparent. 

I rate Ruckus Wireless nine out of 10.

My organization is a college, so we just want to make sure we have a reliable Wi-Fi connection for the students.

We are using the latest version of Ruckus. It is deployed on-premise.

Right now, there are over 2,000 people using this solution.

We were in a bad shape, especially with remote teaching and things like that, so now everything's all right because of the reliability of Ruckus.

The most valuable feature is that this solution is reliable.

We use this solution in a certain way, and it works very well. So, I don't expect it to do a lot more, but to do what it's doing probably better or faster. But it's not a problem with the features; it's more the operations.

I've been using this solution for the past 12 months.

The stability is fine. We haven't had any problems.

We haven't had any issues with the scalability.

Technical support is good. I would rate it a 4 out of 5. There's still some improvement that could be made.

We have also used Cisco. We switched because of many reasons, but staying with Cisco would have cost us almost double the price. So, we had to change. It's not a question of reliability because Cisco is reliable also. It's more a question of something that's not for corporations and more for education in our case.

Initial setup was pretty straightforward. On a scale of 1 to 5, I would rate it a 4.

Deployment took a week. We require less than 5% of our staff for maintenance of this solution to be hassle-free.

We used an integrator for deployment.

I would rate their pricing 3 out of 5.

There is no annual licensing cost.

I would rate this solution 9 out of 10. 

It's very good for our needs, but because it's a school, it maybe wouldn't be as good for a corporation or for other users. For our school, it's very reliable. We have peaks, but it's always well-managed. We don't have any problems.

We primarily use the solution for its performance, compatibility, and capability.

We do a lot of schools, some colleges, large civic centers, large arenas, that kind of stuff. We know how to deploy this so that they get great client connectivity and have easy guest onboarding. We can onboard guests really easily. Each guest that connects has a pre-shared key that they get. They're all unique. We have some great control over guest traffic, and great control over say, corporate traffic. We control how much bandwidth a guest user gets versus a corporate user, and who gets priority on the network.

When COVID happened, we deployed external access points to the outside of a lot of the buildings that are very weather-resistant, all-metal enclosures, and their students have been able to do assignments and schoolwork and that kind of stuff from the parking lots of the schools. They can drive up in their car, get their assignments, or do work that they need to while they're connected to the school. It made it pretty seamless as everything was already set up on their laptops. Most of the schools are what they call the one-to-one initiatives, where every student gets a laptop. They've been able to work through COVID from their cars in parking lots when they need to be at the school for something. It's really benefited a lot of the schools to be able to do that.

The solution has an easy configuration.

The performance is good.

Ruckus is way ahead of the game on a lot of stuff, like Wi-Fi 6. They're already rolling out their second version of Wi-Fi 6 which is a huge improvement over even Wi-Fi 5. The way wireless started is you had 802.11b, 802.11a, then 802.11g and 802.11n, then 802.11ac, then AC wave 2, 802.11ax, which is Wi-Fi 6, the first version. Now, the next version of Wi-Fi 6 is rolling out already.

These guys are an engineering company that has some very awesome patterns on how their radios work and their antennas and antenna patterns, and how their signaling and stuff works. That's why nobody can touch them. If they go head-to-head with anybody, they blow Cisco and Aruba out of the water, and Mist, for radio client connectivity. 

They compete head-to-head with all the big names.

As far as what they can improve, that's a good question, as they're leaders in what they do in my opinion. I don't know what they can do to improve what they're doing currently. 

They're not the most expensive, and they're not the least expensive. They're right there in the middle. Pricing might be a deciding factor for some companies. If they were cheaper, they might land more customers.

They've got a rotation or a life expectancy of about four years for the radio. Not that the radio is going to die. I've got some that are way older than that that the customers are still using. However, they take them and they end the life of them at four years.

Many of their wireless products are end of life by year four. That's most of it as technology has changed so much that those old radios can't do stuff that is now available for PCs to connect or phones to connect to, etc. What they do is they force you into upgrading. We've got a couple of cloud controllers. If I've got a cloud controller that is in the same version 5.1, and I want to go to version 5.2, due to the fact that I need to support the new radios coming out, I can't if I have some older radios on that controller. They make it so I can't upgrade that controller to the latest software to support the new radios as I've got some end of life radios on there that go end of life when I upgrade the software.

They need to be able to allow us to keep some of the older products on our cloud controllers or any of their controllers longer and just start supporting the new controllers. They force you into an upgrade unnecessarily. We have some customers that have just a few APs, small businesses that don't want to or don't need to upgrade their controllers. For us to be able to work with their latest access points, we've got to upgrade their controller, but we can't as it's got some older ones on it, and that bites us every year.

I know the reasoning behind it. It's because it could be security features or it's something that the access points don't support that newer devices do, like your laptops and cell phones. They'll support this new Wi-Fi 6 coming out, yet I can't run the same types of radios on this particular controller software anymore. They can't have both. That kind of puts me off a little bit. But that's the only thing that the company's done that's made me mad.

There's a lot of new features coming out of Wi-Fi 6 that they don't even have the chips in the phones for yet. 

I've been using the solution for six years or so at this point.

The solution is very stable. We don't have any issues with it at all.

The solution is very scalable. I can have up to three controllers, each one housing 10,000 APs. Therefore, I can have a cluster of controllers controlling 30,000 different APs. I don't have anything that big. The closest one is close to 1000, however, still, it's nice to be able to have redundancy. I can build in more redundancy if I need to. 

As a Ruckus partner, I've got access to Ruckus. I've got access to tech support and it makes things a lot easier for our end-users and the businesses that I work with. If they have an issue they can come directly to me, or they can go directly to Ruckus. It doesn't matter. I'll be happy to help them. If I can't answer the question or get them fixed, then we'll deal with tech support. I don't call tech support very often. Maybe once a year, if that. They make a good product and have good training. Once you learn it, it's pretty easy to manage. We used to have Cisco's products die on us every one or two years. I don't know the last time I had to turn in an RMA for a Ruckus radio. They have a solid product.

I've been doing it a long time, so for me, the setup is straightforward. If a person is a brand new to the system, like any system, it can be fairly complex. However, they have great documentation on their website on how to set it up. To do very complex things, that takes somebody who knows what they are doing. I've got a very complex scenario that I need to set up then that's what I get paid for - to help set that stuff up. I will go in and configure things securely for guest access and BYOD devices and corporate laptops with 802.1x. 

You can have a controller version, or it could be a controller-less. I have a standalone AP, I just got one office with one AP, I don't need it to be controlled by anything. I've got one or two SSIDs, and that can still be configured. It's just that you're doing it on the AP or they have what's called Unleashed, which is controller-less. The AP is the controller and that can do up to 50 APs all controlled by one AP. But if that AP was to die, it doesn't matter that configuration is saved on all of them and the next one in line will just take over as the controller AP. There are several different interfaces you may run into to be able to configure the things, however, they're all very similar in how they work and react. The full controller has much more capability than Unleashed, and Unleashed has more capability than the standalone. 

In terms of deployment, we figure for an AP it's about an hour and a half. That's for both configuration and installation. Therefore, if you have 20 APs, it's about 30 hours for 25 APs. That's setting up the controller, virtual or cloud-based, setting up the APs, your SSIDs, passwords, 802.1x, and then physically mounting them.

Our clients definitely get a return on investment when they purchase Ruckus.

We are a customer and reseller.

I'm using the latest version of the solution.

Through a controller, we use 802.1x. There are multiple ways to deploy it to customers, including via a cloud controller. We typically do a virtual controller on our client's systems.

I would advise, if a company is new to Ruckus, to work with a partner. It's important to have somebody that knows what they're doing, and knows what questions to ask so that you're getting the right information. When I go to do an implementation, I've got a list of 50 different questions. I'll ask somebody, what about this? What about this? What about this?

You get what you pay for. People will throw in Lynksys and this other home stuff up. I'll say, that's great. If you're a business, it won't cut it. Say you're a coffee shop and I've got 50 customers sitting side. you want all of them to get the same performance all the time. If I've got three people, four people in that coffee shop streaming videos or watching movies or whatever it might be, I want to make sure everybody gets an equal amount of time without anybody getting any interruptions. With Linksys and Ubiquiti and all these other brands, you don't get that. In head to head competition, Ruckus far outshines them 10 to one. You just can't compete. When they say it's going to do something, it'll do it. They don't put documentation out that is misleading. If it says it'll do 1,024 clients it'll do 1,024 clients. If it says it'll do 4.3 gigabytes, it'll do 4.3 gigabytes.

I'd rate the solution at a nine out of ten.