Principal Network Architect at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Top 10
Jan 31, 2024
Juniper EX model is ok for the campus network as the ex4300 is EOL in a few years and the new ex4400 is the standard. Now for the QFX model, 5k/10k in CRB mode IP fabric Ethernet switching is horrible too many bugs and hardware issues as I have encountered. Juniper is abandoning the CRB Asymmetrical IRB mode and moving toward ERB symmetric IRB but the question is how many customers have deployed them and what issues have been fixed as this is pretty new for Juniper?
The physical maintenance of the solution is low. After you install the solution and have done the fine-tuning they run well by themself. The only time there is maintenance involved is if there is a critical security vulnerability we then upgrade the switch with the patch which we use one engineer. My advice to others is many are afraid to tackle the Juniper Ethernet Switches EX switches because of the command line interface. It's can be a lot different from the other manufacturers. However, once you get to know it, it's a lot faster to configure and set up. I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches an eight out of ten.
Principal Network Architect at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Top 10
Dec 6, 2022
I would rate Juniper as six out of ten. It's not a bad product, but there are a lot of bad features, code, and hardware. Juniper does ethernet switching, but they also do campus switching and access switching. Those are very basic setups. They also do next generation data centers. You're supporting these compute nodes, storage, and DNS. The next generation data center fabric is horrible. I built a leaf and spine design in Juniper, but we can't get the MC-LAG to work properly, so we have to use ESI-LAG. We can't use type five EVPN. We have to use type two EVPN. When you're dealing with internal routing like IBGP, it's very hard to troubleshoot. You can't use features like ASPAP, local preference, and other things like route maps and prefixes. You can't really do any of that because it's all internal. I wouldn't recommend Juniper. If you want to implement it, then evaluate what you're trying to do. If you're doing a lot of campus switches and access switches, then it's fine. If you're doing a lot of policy-based, zero trust, and micro segmentation, and all these parameters are being driven by security, my advice is not to use it. Many companies, especially trading companies, stock market companies, hedge funds, and banking companies all use Arista for their lower EC platforms, high speed, and high throughput. I build a lot of major corporations, so I see a lot of companies that do that.
I would rate this solution as nine out of ten. For those who are using and investing too much in Cisco, my advice is that you can use Juniper for half of the cost and almost get the same result.
Learn what your peers think about Juniper EX Series Ethernet Switches. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: January 2026.
I rate this solution an eight out of ten. They are my number one recommendation for anybody, but the security features could be improved. Startup companies may not have the funding for a new purchase of devices and needed support. However, if your company needs it and can afford it, I would recommend it.
Manager Networks at a financial services firm with 201-500 employees
Real User
Jun 27, 2022
I'm an end-user. We're currently using the latest version of the solution. It's around version 20. We're looking to replace this solution due to performance issues and we are in coordination with other principals, like H3C and other switching manufacturers. We'll soon see what they can offer us.
In our environment, we are using a different vendor approach as we don't want to depend on a single vendor. I'd advise other companies, especially if they are an enterprise, to not deal with a single vendor. I would rate the solution a seven out of ten.
Fraud Risk Analyst at a university with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Mar 17, 2022
Juniper products are very stable. I would recommend this solution to others who are interested in using it. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a nine out of ten.
Network Engineer at a non-tech company with 51-200 employees
Real User
Dec 17, 2021
I started using Juniper two and a half years ago with zero experience, and it was a steep learning curve, but I've become a fan of this product. I would advise others to consider vendors other than Cisco, including Juniper. I'd give this solution a score of nine out of ten.
Team Leader Solution Specialists at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Sep 14, 2021
I would recommend Juniper Ethernet Switches to others who want a well-integrated, stable, and easy-to-use solution. I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a nine out of ten.
We have over 1,000 customers making use of the solution, mainly in Taiwan. I would recommend the solution to others. I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches as a nine out of ten.
Network Admin at a government with 11-50 employees
Real User
Jul 29, 2021
It has more features than I'm currently using. Their support is fine, and their prices are also competitive. It is cheaper than Cisco, so I would definitely recommend it over Cisco because of the price. Juniper provides training for free on their website. You can do all their courses for free through their website. I would highly recommend doing these courses. They are free, which is awesome. You're not going to get free Cisco courses. I would rate this solution an eight out of 10. The only reason for not giving it a 10 is its high learning curve. In terms of capabilities and feature set, it is right up there.
Video conferencing Admin at Akshara Enterprises India Pvt Ltd
Real User
Apr 12, 2021
If you look at the market shares, Cisco is more than Juniper. I would definitely recommend this solution to others, but not Huawei. I would not recommend Huawei, there is no chance for Huawei in the market. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a six out of ten.
Owner at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
Real User
Feb 23, 2021
I would totally recommend Juniper Ethernet Switches to others who are interested in using them. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a ten out of ten.
Senior Systems Engineer at Caribbean Development Company
Real User
Top 20
Dec 6, 2020
We will be doing an upgrade internally, so we are a bit undecided on whether or not we will continue using this product, or a new solution altogether. We are evaluating the price and system functionality. It's not for the average user, you have to be more technical in order to use it. There are other solutions that are better, with a GUI and easier to use. If you are comfortable with a pure command line or if you are looking for something simpler where the entire thing could look up the monitoring, support, and cost, I think there are other brands with more features. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a seven out of ten.
System Engineer at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Nov 26, 2020
I would recommend these switches, but what I would also highly recommend along with this new trend or new experience is to at least get training for Juniper configuration, at least the basics. Training will help you be more familiar with it. You will at least have the basics in case of maintenance or troubleshooting. Juniper has good documentation for its ethernet switches. I would rate Juniper switches a seven out of ten.
I would highly recommend this solution because people are used to the common model. They don't need to try other available models. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a seven out of ten.
Manager at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Real User
Nov 17, 2020
I would recommend this product to anyone who is interested in using it. We plan to continue using these switches in the future. It still works and it's quite stable. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a nine out of ten.
Whether you are on the lower end of the business scale with a smaller portfolio, or whether you are a Fortune 500 or 1000 company, you can not go wrong with Juniper's back-end products. It is a cost-effective solution in comparison to the competition. I do not like to have to touch switches or routers or anything of that nature unless I am doing a new configuration or a firmware upgrade. The Juniper product helps me with that by having impeccable reliability. Saying that this solution is impeccable could be the entirety of my review. I have been a network architect for a long time. At one time in my career, I thought Nortel and Juniper were on par. They were the two best-engineered equipment supplier manufacturers out there from both a cost and performance standpoint. I had never been a big Cisco fan. The number one reason behind that is the per-port cost for Cisco is 30% higher than everybody else. Number two, they have too many proprietary protocols that are not friendly with what other technicians know. That is particularly true on their routers. I found that in practice, we had to reboot the Cisco products in enterprise and Fortune 500 company levels too many times. When you had 400 and 500 sites out there and you had to rebuild the routing tables, you were screwed. We did not ever have that same problem with Nortel or Juniper. So I got a bad taste in my mouth from Cisco many years ago. I spend a lot of time in cybersecurity and I find the Cisco IOS is one of the most vulnerable and most often patched by comparison to other high-end vendors, like Juniper. I have very few problems with Juniper products and they are easy to configure. They do a good job and they just continue doing it for a long time. On a scale from one to ten (where one is the worst and ten is the best), I would rate this product as a ten overall for where they are in technology, their solid engineering, and the product. That includes the software and the hardware. Even the lack of a few features is not a point to knock them down to a nine because we are on a road where we are taking a trip. I do not care what the literature says, SD-WAN is still new. We are still pushing the envelope on how we want to use it and how we want to design our systems to work with it. I can not mark Juniper down for being on the cutting edge of innovation.
Federal Field Systems Engineer at a government with 51-200 employees
Real User
Aug 23, 2020
You can have Junos as your operating system but if you wanted to write a script to automatically update all of the versions of your software, you can do that automatically. If you wanted to gather information, you can write a script using JSON, or Python. This is already available on the Junos operating system. Cisco is the most popular, but if you have seasoned or experienced people like DevOps that write code and they are engineers, then Juniper would be the better choice because they have the flexibility to do that. Cisco is starting to catch up now, where you can automate Cisco's switches using the same methods. To this point, Junos has been way ahead of Cisco in that aspect. Because of our relationship, customers can better pricing with us. Cisco tends to be a little higher. Before getting started you have to know your network, know the current state of your network, and know what are the pain points of your network are. Do you see bottlenecks in your network? Is your equipment responsive? Is your data backing up, because you don't have enough bandwidth? There are many factors to consider and it depends on the network and where the switches are going. I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
Network Security Specialist at Pars Khodro Company
Real User
Feb 12, 2020
My advice to people who are considering using Juniper switches is to try them out because the Juniper brand is very good. I myself really like the Juniper devices because, in comparison to other products in this category, they are a very good value and are worth much more than the cost. These switches are much more stable and you have better performance than the other guys, so long as you are aware of the potential issues with the OS. I think I can say this in one sentence: you can have better performance at a lower price if you choose Juniper. The biggest lesson I have learned from using Juniper Ethernet switches — besides the fact that the most popular name is not always the best product or the best solution — is that using the commit confirmed feature instead of just committing is very valuable. It can help you to be sure your commit is successful. If it is not for whatever reason, the product deals with the issue. After a certain amount of time, the product can roll back automatically if something did not commit successfully. Not all products have anything like this feature. On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches as a nine overall. It is a nine and not a ten because there should always be room for product improvement.
Manager - IT at a non-tech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Feb 2, 2020
My advice is regarding switches. If someone is deploying switches in a critical environment, they should go for Juniper switches. I would rate this product a nine out of 10.
The stability of this solution should be improved. We have a customer that is using Cisco switches, and they don't need to reconfigure it as often. It is less complicated to update or reconfigure, and we have had problems with needing to do so more than once. I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.
Compliance, Security & Testing Manager at a financial services firm with 11-50 employees
Real User
Oct 21, 2019
If you're looking at this solution from an ethernet switching point of view, we don't use any of the in-depth features. We selected this solution for its reliability and ease of management on the command line. My advice to anybody who is implementing this solution is to plan it out in advance. Other than that, they're relatively straightforward. There are no major issues or items that I could call out as a problem. It's just a case of making sure that you plan our your deployment before you start. I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
Network and Service Development Manager at a comms service provider with 51-200 employees
Real User
Oct 16, 2019
There are many different types of switches in different categories. It is best to look, right from the beginning, at what features are needed. You do not want to pay for Enterprise licenses if you don't need those features. Be sure to look at the right family in order to protect your investment in the future. For example, if you want to go from 1G to 10G to 25G, then they will need to buy a new product. Going from 10G to 25G can be done on the same machine if it is from the right family. The planning makes it easier to upgrade bandwidth in the future, protecting your investment. This is a good product, but it is not extraordinary. It does the job. I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.
Juniper Ethernet Switches are made up of the EX Series product line. These EX Series Ethernet Switches provide branch, campus and data center networks with access, aggregation and core layer switching solutions. The end result is secure, fast and efficient application and data delivery.
Today's enterprise networks increasingly demand mobile access, optimal availability, virtualization, and unified communications. The Juniper Ethernet Switches EX Series caters for all of these requirements,...
Juniper EX model is ok for the campus network as the ex4300 is EOL in a few years and the new ex4400 is the standard. Now for the QFX model, 5k/10k in CRB mode IP fabric Ethernet switching is horrible too many bugs and hardware issues as I have encountered. Juniper is abandoning the CRB Asymmetrical IRB mode and moving toward ERB symmetric IRB but the question is
how many customers have deployed them and what issues have been fixed as this is pretty new for Juniper?
Overall, I would rate this solution an eight out of ten. It is very reliable, scalable and easy to configure.
The physical maintenance of the solution is low. After you install the solution and have done the fine-tuning they run well by themself. The only time there is maintenance involved is if there is a critical security vulnerability we then upgrade the switch with the patch which we use one engineer. My advice to others is many are afraid to tackle the Juniper Ethernet Switches EX switches because of the command line interface. It's can be a lot different from the other manufacturers. However, once you get to know it, it's a lot faster to configure and set up. I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches an eight out of ten.
I would rate Juniper as six out of ten. It's not a bad product, but there are a lot of bad features, code, and hardware. Juniper does ethernet switching, but they also do campus switching and access switching. Those are very basic setups. They also do next generation data centers. You're supporting these compute nodes, storage, and DNS. The next generation data center fabric is horrible. I built a leaf and spine design in Juniper, but we can't get the MC-LAG to work properly, so we have to use ESI-LAG. We can't use type five EVPN. We have to use type two EVPN. When you're dealing with internal routing like IBGP, it's very hard to troubleshoot. You can't use features like ASPAP, local preference, and other things like route maps and prefixes. You can't really do any of that because it's all internal. I wouldn't recommend Juniper. If you want to implement it, then evaluate what you're trying to do. If you're doing a lot of campus switches and access switches, then it's fine. If you're doing a lot of policy-based, zero trust, and micro segmentation, and all these parameters are being driven by security, my advice is not to use it. Many companies, especially trading companies, stock market companies, hedge funds, and banking companies all use Arista for their lower EC platforms, high speed, and high throughput. I build a lot of major corporations, so I see a lot of companies that do that.
I would rate this solution as nine out of ten. For those who are using and investing too much in Cisco, my advice is that you can use Juniper for half of the cost and almost get the same result.
I'd rate the product nine out of ten.
I rate this solution an eight out of ten. They are my number one recommendation for anybody, but the security features could be improved. Startup companies may not have the funding for a new purchase of devices and needed support. However, if your company needs it and can afford it, I would recommend it.
I'm an end-user. We're currently using the latest version of the solution. It's around version 20. We're looking to replace this solution due to performance issues and we are in coordination with other principals, like H3C and other switching manufacturers. We'll soon see what they can offer us.
The new Juniper Ethernet Switches have improved. I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches an eight out of ten.
In our environment, we are using a different vendor approach as we don't want to depend on a single vendor. I'd advise other companies, especially if they are an enterprise, to not deal with a single vendor. I would rate the solution a seven out of ten.
Juniper products are very stable. I would recommend this solution to others who are interested in using it. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a nine out of ten.
I started using Juniper two and a half years ago with zero experience, and it was a steep learning curve, but I've become a fan of this product. I would advise others to consider vendors other than Cisco, including Juniper. I'd give this solution a score of nine out of ten.
I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a ten out of ten.
I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches Seven out of 10.
I would recommend Juniper Ethernet Switches to others who want a well-integrated, stable, and easy-to-use solution. I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a nine out of ten.
We have over 1,000 customers making use of the solution, mainly in Taiwan. I would recommend the solution to others. I rate Juniper Ethernet Switches as a nine out of ten.
It has more features than I'm currently using. Their support is fine, and their prices are also competitive. It is cheaper than Cisco, so I would definitely recommend it over Cisco because of the price. Juniper provides training for free on their website. You can do all their courses for free through their website. I would highly recommend doing these courses. They are free, which is awesome. You're not going to get free Cisco courses. I would rate this solution an eight out of 10. The only reason for not giving it a 10 is its high learning curve. In terms of capabilities and feature set, it is right up there.
If you look at the market shares, Cisco is more than Juniper. I would definitely recommend this solution to others, but not Huawei. I would not recommend Huawei, there is no chance for Huawei in the market. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a six out of ten.
On a scale from one to ten, I would give Juniper Ethernet Switches a six.
I would totally recommend Juniper Ethernet Switches to others who are interested in using them. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a ten out of ten.
We will be doing an upgrade internally, so we are a bit undecided on whether or not we will continue using this product, or a new solution altogether. We are evaluating the price and system functionality. It's not for the average user, you have to be more technical in order to use it. There are other solutions that are better, with a GUI and easier to use. If you are comfortable with a pure command line or if you are looking for something simpler where the entire thing could look up the monitoring, support, and cost, I think there are other brands with more features. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a seven out of ten.
I would recommend these switches, but what I would also highly recommend along with this new trend or new experience is to at least get training for Juniper configuration, at least the basics. Training will help you be more familiar with it. You will at least have the basics in case of maintenance or troubleshooting. Juniper has good documentation for its ethernet switches. I would rate Juniper switches a seven out of ten.
I would highly recommend this solution because people are used to the common model. They don't need to try other available models. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a seven out of ten.
I would recommend this product to anyone who is interested in using it. We plan to continue using these switches in the future. It still works and it's quite stable. I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches a nine out of ten.
Whether you are on the lower end of the business scale with a smaller portfolio, or whether you are a Fortune 500 or 1000 company, you can not go wrong with Juniper's back-end products. It is a cost-effective solution in comparison to the competition. I do not like to have to touch switches or routers or anything of that nature unless I am doing a new configuration or a firmware upgrade. The Juniper product helps me with that by having impeccable reliability. Saying that this solution is impeccable could be the entirety of my review. I have been a network architect for a long time. At one time in my career, I thought Nortel and Juniper were on par. They were the two best-engineered equipment supplier manufacturers out there from both a cost and performance standpoint. I had never been a big Cisco fan. The number one reason behind that is the per-port cost for Cisco is 30% higher than everybody else. Number two, they have too many proprietary protocols that are not friendly with what other technicians know. That is particularly true on their routers. I found that in practice, we had to reboot the Cisco products in enterprise and Fortune 500 company levels too many times. When you had 400 and 500 sites out there and you had to rebuild the routing tables, you were screwed. We did not ever have that same problem with Nortel or Juniper. So I got a bad taste in my mouth from Cisco many years ago. I spend a lot of time in cybersecurity and I find the Cisco IOS is one of the most vulnerable and most often patched by comparison to other high-end vendors, like Juniper. I have very few problems with Juniper products and they are easy to configure. They do a good job and they just continue doing it for a long time. On a scale from one to ten (where one is the worst and ten is the best), I would rate this product as a ten overall for where they are in technology, their solid engineering, and the product. That includes the software and the hardware. Even the lack of a few features is not a point to knock them down to a nine because we are on a road where we are taking a trip. I do not care what the literature says, SD-WAN is still new. We are still pushing the envelope on how we want to use it and how we want to design our systems to work with it. I can not mark Juniper down for being on the cutting edge of innovation.
You can have Junos as your operating system but if you wanted to write a script to automatically update all of the versions of your software, you can do that automatically. If you wanted to gather information, you can write a script using JSON, or Python. This is already available on the Junos operating system. Cisco is the most popular, but if you have seasoned or experienced people like DevOps that write code and they are engineers, then Juniper would be the better choice because they have the flexibility to do that. Cisco is starting to catch up now, where you can automate Cisco's switches using the same methods. To this point, Junos has been way ahead of Cisco in that aspect. Because of our relationship, customers can better pricing with us. Cisco tends to be a little higher. Before getting started you have to know your network, know the current state of your network, and know what are the pain points of your network are. Do you see bottlenecks in your network? Is your equipment responsive? Is your data backing up, because you don't have enough bandwidth? There are many factors to consider and it depends on the network and where the switches are going. I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
Overall, this is a good product and I recommend it. It has been working fine, for us. I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
My advice to people who are considering using Juniper switches is to try them out because the Juniper brand is very good. I myself really like the Juniper devices because, in comparison to other products in this category, they are a very good value and are worth much more than the cost. These switches are much more stable and you have better performance than the other guys, so long as you are aware of the potential issues with the OS. I think I can say this in one sentence: you can have better performance at a lower price if you choose Juniper. The biggest lesson I have learned from using Juniper Ethernet switches — besides the fact that the most popular name is not always the best product or the best solution — is that using the commit confirmed feature instead of just committing is very valuable. It can help you to be sure your commit is successful. If it is not for whatever reason, the product deals with the issue. After a certain amount of time, the product can roll back automatically if something did not commit successfully. Not all products have anything like this feature. On a scale from one to ten where one is the worst and ten is the best, I would rate Juniper Ethernet Switches as a nine overall. It is a nine and not a ten because there should always be room for product improvement.
My advice is regarding switches. If someone is deploying switches in a critical environment, they should go for Juniper switches. I would rate this product a nine out of 10.
For people who are considering this solution, I recommend the QFX series. I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.
In general, I cannot find anything that is bad about this product. I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
We use the on-premises deployment model. I'd rate the solution no more than seven out of ten.
The stability of this solution should be improved. We have a customer that is using Cisco switches, and they don't need to reconfigure it as often. It is less complicated to update or reconfigure, and we have had problems with needing to do so more than once. I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.
If you're looking at this solution from an ethernet switching point of view, we don't use any of the in-depth features. We selected this solution for its reliability and ease of management on the command line. My advice to anybody who is implementing this solution is to plan it out in advance. Other than that, they're relatively straightforward. There are no major issues or items that I could call out as a problem. It's just a case of making sure that you plan our your deployment before you start. I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
There are many different types of switches in different categories. It is best to look, right from the beginning, at what features are needed. You do not want to pay for Enterprise licenses if you don't need those features. Be sure to look at the right family in order to protect your investment in the future. For example, if you want to go from 1G to 10G to 25G, then they will need to buy a new product. Going from 10G to 25G can be done on the same machine if it is from the right family. The planning makes it easier to upgrade bandwidth in the future, protecting your investment. This is a good product, but it is not extraordinary. It does the job. I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.
It works with third-party SFPs.