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VMware vSAN pros and cons

Vendor: VMware
4.2 out of 5
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Pros & Cons summary

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Prominent pros & cons

PROS

VMware vSAN offers scalability and reduced total storage costs over several years, effectively addressing business growth and budget concerns.
The software allows for easy setup and maintenance, enhancing operational efficiency and reducing the need for specialized skills.
Integrated high availability features enable uninterrupted service and data security, providing robust business continuity options.
VMware vSAN's performance is enhanced by local storage on hosts, which minimizes response times and boosts overall performance.
It gives users flexibility in hardware choices, allowing for a variety of configurations without vendor lock-in.

CONS

VMware vSAN faces challenges in hardware compatibility, with users seeking a broader Hardware Certification List and easier integration with various hardware components.
Performance issues are noted, particularly in handling high IOPS, latency, and scalability, where vSAN does not match traditional SAN performance for demanding workloads.
Cost is a significant concern, as many find VMware vSAN expensive, particularly for smaller businesses, with high licensing and support fees.
Users encounter difficulties with the complexity of setup and maintenance, often requiring command-line interaction rather than intuitive GUI-based management.
VMware vSAN lacks comprehensive built-in backup solutions, necessitating reliance on third-party applications, which users find limiting.
 

VMware vSAN Pros review quotes

Yves Sandfort - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 20, 2023
When we do to do more scaled load testing, we can run more dense workloads and still have the same results across all specific nodes
reviewer1381863 - PeerSpot reviewer
Oct 21, 2020
It is very easy to set up and very easy to use. It is very useful.
CC
Nov 9, 2021
If we decide to expand, vSAN could offer us some flexibility. We are researching ways to set this up from a new data center, which is located somewhere different from the current location right now.
Learn what your peers think about VMware vSAN. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: December 2024.
824,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.
PL
Oct 4, 2018
By eliminating dependency on that back-end storage, we now depend on everything that's in the VMkernel with vSAN. We eliminate the middleman.
LM
Feb 21, 2024
All orchestration and monitoring are routed to the cloud.
VH
Mar 22, 2024
The product's initial setup phase was very straightforward.
it_user473589 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jul 12, 2017
The most important functionality is the ability to extend cluster storage and cluster computing power securely without loss of data.
SS
Mar 18, 2024
vSAN Health is a feature designed to monitor the health and performance of the vSAN environment. It's crucial for us and our customers to frequently check on this to ensure everything is operating smoothly.
reviewer1266285 - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 16, 2022
The ease of use is great.
LN
Sep 13, 2021
The feature that I have found most valuable is that it is easy to deploy. It is easy to create and delete virtual servers. It is easy to create the load balancing and the clustering.
 

VMware vSAN Cons review quotes

Yves Sandfort - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 20, 2023
When we talk about improvements for vSAN, there is some way to go from a at least stability perspective. Adding all these new features is nice, but we are now at the level that most of the features you need in production are there.
reviewer1381863 - PeerSpot reviewer
Oct 21, 2020
If one node out of your ten nodes fails, it takes a lot of time to replicate and rebalance VMware vSAN. This time can be reduced. When a node fails and the data is not accessible, vSAN has to be rebalanced to make the redundancy level of two again. However, if it is taking a lot of time and any other hardware fails during that time, then we have a problem. Two disk failures mean that all data will be lost, and we may have to recover it from the backup. So, the number of threads that run to do the rebalancing could be more so that the time taken to make it fully redundant again is not so much.
CC
Nov 9, 2021
I would like to see better integration between the cloud and our VMware virtual environment. We only have one virtual environment, which is VMware vSAN. Right now, there is little interoperability with the cloud solution at the moment.
Learn what your peers think about VMware vSAN. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: December 2024.
824,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.
PL
Oct 4, 2018
I see room for improvement with vSAN in particularly in the reporting realm. Now, with vSAN 6.7, they're starting to include vRealize Operations components in the vSphere Client, even if you're not a vRealize Operations customer. So, that's really good. It exposes some really low-level reporting. I would like to see more of that. However, you have to be a vRealize Operations customer to obtain that. I would like to see more include of this included in the vSAN licensing.
LM
Feb 21, 2024
There's already a concern with VMware with ransomware and security issues. VMware could focus on improving security.
ManagerT5097 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sep 2, 2018
We would really like them to look at what Nutanix did for day-one/day-two operations deployment: Bringing in the equipment, getting it deployed, getting it setup, and ease of use of one-click for deploying our 30-node solution. With vSAN we had to go into each one individually and set it up.
VH
Mar 22, 2024
There are certain shortcomings in the stability of the product where improvements are required.
it_user473589 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jul 12, 2017
I lose a node in a cluster vSAN, which is also used as a cluster HA. I lose not only the storage part, which is not necessarily serious (depending on the configuration of the vSAN cluster), but on the other hand, I lose also a node of Compute, which can make things complicated quickly.
SS
Mar 18, 2024
The quality of the customer service and support depends on the vSAN case. For example, if I open ten cases, maybe two or three get resolved quickly. But the other cases have a slow response.
reviewer1266285 - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 16, 2022
The updating process could be easier.