Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN Reviews

I am using Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN mainly for enterprise customers.

The most valuable feature I find in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is application aware routing.

I am not aware of the end-to-end visibility offered by Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN.

I assess the operational efficiency of Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN in the IT environment as overall good, and it is a competitor that we are able to propose to our customers.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN optimizes the experience in both hybrid and distributed enterprise setups, and we are positioned well to promote Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN.

I see some room for improvement for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN with G2 routers, as we are expecting more customers.

To bring Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN closer to ten, I would like to see improvement in the GUI, Graphical User Interface, and for it to be more user-friendly.

I find it complex to use and complex to learn how to use it.

I have been working with Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN for the last one year.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is used in our company for around five to ten years, and I also recommend the product to my customers.

Based on the rating scale from one to ten, I would assess the stability and reliability of Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN as eight.

I have not experienced much downtime, crashes, or performance issues, and it is good as of now.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is currently steady in scaling with the growing needs of our organization, and we can expect in one or two years that we will have more bandwidth.

Currently, around six customers in my customers' company are using Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN.

They are mostly enterprise companies.

I would rate their technical support a seven.

I see there is room for improvement when it comes to response time, which should be improved, as well as first level support quality.

With respect to support, we expect some improvement regarding stability and reliability.

Before Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, I have hands-on experience in Cisco Meraki.

Regarding Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN's price, I find it reasonable, based on commercial pricing and CDCS support, although we see that there is some lack in TACACS and other support.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is one of the competitors on the market at the moment.

I rate Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN around eight overall.

There are no specific challenges I face with hybrid and distributed enterprise networks that Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN addresses.

We are a system integrator and a Cisco Select Partner, deploying all the Cisco portfolios like SD-WAN, switching, firewall, access point, and then Secure Access, our cybersecurity product. We have been a partner at Cisco for the last 8.5 years, dealing with Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN.

The features I find most valuable in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN are based on our customer requirements, as the SD-WAN solution now has two solutions: Viptela-based SD-WAN and then Meraki-based SD-WAN. Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN has detailed features, and Meraki is a better solution, but compared to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, some features are not as detailed.

From the visibility perspective, I find that we are able to monitor and manage the entire branch and user-level activities, providing better visibility. We can integrate with cloud-based solutions, such as Secure Access, and get all the information regarding who is accessing from branch to headquarters, source to destination, the servers, and all related data. We can monitor and manage who is accessing and what traffic is flowing, covering all the necessary aspects.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN can be improved in minimal ways, because they have updated it now, and the updated version is really good. The only concern is the cost; compared to others, the cost is higher, but the features are the same as a superior product, so we are expecting that cost. Some customers feel the cost is high, as not all users utilize all the features. They want some limited functionality, and we have two or three models of licenses only, where they need to buy either one license version or another. They are not using all the features, so they end up paying for everything.

The pricing is the only concern regarding Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN; otherwise, all aspects are good.

8.5 years

I see the competition to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN mainly as the Palo Alto product, specifically the IRON product, which is the SD-WAN device similar to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN. It features a centralized dashboard, management, large-scope deployment, and visibility, making them a competitor. Other products are available, but they are not at that much of a competitive level; Silver Peak is one example.

Cisco does optimize the experience in a hybrid or distributed enterprise setup with the previous solution being Viptela Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, which has now changed to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN. We can now integrate Secure Access with Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN devices, allowing us to do all the policy optimization and distributed distribution functions.

I think the operational efficiency of Cisco in my IT environment is a good aspect compared to Palo Alto, which is another competitor in enterprise-level solutions. Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN has some more features, enabling us to integrate with multiple platforms to monitor, manage, and adapt a single point of management. I would rate this solution a 9 out of 10.

The use case for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is to have the edge devices connected to a dashboard controlled system, allowing branch edge devices to get controlled through a dashboard.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN benefits my organization by giving us easy onboarding of the branches. It operates as a plug-and-play system where you onboard and deploy a template to those devices, allowing a company template to be deployed on all the devices, making it easy to spin up a branch.

What I appreciate most about Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is the GUI, although the license allocation can be improved. The syncing presents a challenge in terms of user-friendliness. Now that we have configuration groups compared to the classic template base, it is better, but the migration from template to configuration base is not seamless because it is not one-to-one, leading to problems with the migration tool.

The operational overhead when managing hybrid WAN transportation links such as MPLS, broadband, and cellular through a unified overlay is more seamless. It can integrate both cellular, WAN, and everything for the device in one go.

There are plenty of things I would suggest for improvement. I would not rate it a 10 because there are many improvements needed yet. The UI can be improved, the licensing experience can be improved, and the dashboard can be more useful since it is somewhat cluttered.

I have been using Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN for two to three years.

The stability and reliability of Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN have been good. So far, I have not experienced any incidents of edge failing.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN does scale with the growing needs of organizations. So far, we have not hit any ceiling, and we have experienced no problems.

I have used the customer support for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, and they have means to access the portal by themselves through an impersonation request. They can manage and see what I see on the dashboard, so we do not need to have a separate session.

Because the licensing is backend connected, we had many issues with the licensing recently. They had to release it backend; only then were we able to assign it to the devices.

The licensing issue involved needing to involve the TAC, which took a considerable amount of time for them to figure out and release the licenses. After that, I synced again and was able to assign them to the devices.

I would rate the support a nine on a scale of one to ten, with one being worst and ten being best. They performed well, but they took longer than expected due to a long delay, probably because it had to go through multiple teams.

Prior to adopting Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, I used Forti SD-WAN. I did not switch over; I use all of them. As an MSP, I use everything: Palo Alto, FortiGate, Cisco, all flavors.

My deployment experience with Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN has been positive so far, although it can be improved. We recently added another edge device for a new site, and there were some issues, though I do not recall them off the top of my head.

On a scale of one to ten, with one being worst and ten being best, I would rate Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN an eight.

My main use case for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN involves remote sites, administration, and connectivity. I connect our remote sites back into our call center and all of our data centers, and then also to the other sites.

The best features Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN offers are the ease of use. The interface is what makes it easy for me. Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN has positively impacted my organization, as it allows us to connect easily and provides us a view of how the connectivity is working.

The visibility that Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN gives me mainly comes from the dashboards, which helps us confirm our systems and sites are running as expected, and if there are any alerts for us to be aware of.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN can be improved with better data and more in-depth information on the traffic that traverses our SD-WAN network, and the ability to delve into what could be causing high usage, along with probably better deep packet inspection information. I rate it a seven because of the additional visibility into the traffic that is going through the network, additional information on what is using the bandwidth, and additional metrics that will help us troubleshoot.

I have been using Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN for six years.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is mostly stable in my experience.

The scalability of Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN for my organization is sufficient for now.

The customer support for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is managed through a managed service provider, so I do not normally get involved with that side of it.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is currently deployed in my organization through a managed service provider, which is on-premises for them.

Before choosing Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, an evaluation was done, but I was not involved in the process.

I rate Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN a seven.

My advice for others looking into using Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is to fully understand the features that it provides, look into what your costs will be, and confirm what information you need out of it, and conduct the research before deployment.

The main use cases for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN are in the retail sector and enterprise. The product is used for Cisco routing, specifically for configuring traffic engineering with protocol BGP.

With Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN, I have centralized orchestration and management. The transport independence of MPLS or connectivity and internet connectivity is another excellent feature. End-to-end segmentation is also provided.

I use the application-aware routing feature. Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN supports dynamic police-based routing decisions based on application type or different performance metrics such as jitter or latency.

The benefit of that feature is that it improves user experience. The principal benefit of application-aware routing is that critical applications are prioritized or routed over the best performing paths to reduce outages and service degradation. There is full visibility of applications.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN has integrated security features which include base firewall, URL filtering, IPS, and secure segmentation, and it supports integration with other Cisco products such as Umbrella or Snort. This feature is beneficial for the client because the information is secure.

It is important that Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN supports cloud, on-premises, and hybrid environments for my organization because it allows for scalability and faster deployment in the cloud. It reduces operational needs because I don't need to manage physical controller hardware, and updates and maintenance can be centralized and automated.

The zero-touch provisioning feature is very important for the speed of deploying new branch locations. I can deliver the device to the branch, and it is important because simplified deployment makes the implementation start more easily since devices are auto-configured and authenticate without manual intervention.

Cisco can improve Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN by simplifying licensing and platform integration with other Cisco products such as Catalyst Center or solutions with Meraki.

A license needs to be permanent for me. The client feels that it is very expensive.

I have used Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN for two years.

I have experience with the Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance, but I haven't configured it. I am currently working in pre-sales.

I would rate Cisco's support, their customer service, and technical support as excellent. The support of Cisco is very good, and the attention is immediate.

Positive

I have sixteen years of work experience in enterprise architecture with Cisco, including networking, switching, routing, and solution SD-Access.

AWS is the main cloud provider in my use cases.

My company, Sonda, is a Gold partner of Cisco.

I am a solution architect at Sonda.

I rate this solution 10 out of 10.

My main use case for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is managing more than twenty to thirty branches with Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN.

I think that regarding Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN's AI capabilities, its governance and security are fully secure.

I give Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN a nine out of ten because I can see there is still some room for improvement.

I have been using Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN for the last two years.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is not really stable.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN's scalability depends on the design, but it is quite scalable.

I find the customer support for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN very good and very nice.

I would rate customer support for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN an eight to nine because sometimes it depends on the engineer. If the engineer is capable of solving the issue, then they could be able to solve it. Otherwise, I could see some other engineers who are not capable of doing that, but I would say it is eight.

I had a previous legacy solution with layer two and layer three, and that is why I switched to the latest software-defined networks.

I am a technical person focused on implementation and design.

I would rate Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN a nine on a scale of one to ten. I would advise others reading reviews on PeerSpot to use Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN.

The main use cases for Juniper vSRX would be primarily for a data center scenario device, and there's a significant focus on the other core elements.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN's main use cases for us will be data center deployment for enterprise level.

The most useful feature for Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is the single pane of glass management because we also use Meraki onsite. It's a standard Cisco solution, and because Cisco is who they are and what they can provide, we use Cisco for compute and network, and we use NetApp for storage, so that's what we generally do.

I have absolutely seen scenarios where the decentralized management capability improved operations and workflows.

There's nothing I could put my finger on right away for improvements in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN. There is definitely nothing that Juniper does that Cisco doesn't do. Cisco will do everything Juniper does and then some. The negative, or the downside of Cisco is the knowledge base; you need to be a little bit more tech-savvy and network-savvy to work with Cisco, while Juniper is a lot more user-friendly from what I can see, especially in terms of configuration and any kind of roll back. But in terms of market leaders, Cisco is capable of doing anything you want it to do, as far as I can see.

I have just recently been working with Juniper.

I have contacted Cisco support for one-on-one support for a very unique or bespoke configuration where there are a lot of rules and policies going on in the background, maybe some interconnecting or conflicting with one another, but in terms of the actual product or problems with the product, nothing I'm aware of.

I would consider Cisco support a 10 out of 10.

Positive

In my experience, customers are realizing the return on investment with Cisco in 12 months. Within the year, I've done work with customers in the last couple of years that we've upgraded from Avaya six to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN in a Cisco network environment, and they are now back to do that with the remainder of their company, so they've realized the value in 12 months and are willing to invest in the remainder of their organization.

I am working on the Juniper vSRX solution.

I work with switches, routers, firewalls, and any IT consultant tasks, and I work at the core. I have a CCNA, and I'm actually doing a Juniper certification exam in 3 hours, so I continually work on upskilling, as part of what I do.

If it's enterprise level, you'll deploy your Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN in a couple of hours. You can draw it down there if you've already got a Catalyst or an existing environment. If you are starting up from scratch, it's hard to put a timeframe on it because it depends on criteria, but if you're replacing something with a Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN and you know what you're doing along with using the CLI and your backups, a couple of hours would be plenty of time, a half a day or maybe a little bit more wouldn't hurt.

There are AI features, and I'm not 100% privy to them because I just haven't been involved in that element, but they do exist.

I would rate Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN an eight.

My title is Information Technology Consultant at a company named Island Networks.

The primary use case for Cisco SD-WAN is the standard configuration across all sites, facilitated by templates. This solution helps in the ease of management and compliance configuration, which is deployed everywhere. 

It also simplifies troubleshooting and provides full mesh topology for branch connectivity to data centers. All branch locations, along with central locations, are on SD-WAN and gathered in the data center. Many customers combine it with local Internet breakout for SaaS applications.

The valuable features of Cisco SD-WAN include its security policies and zone-based firewall that are applied to every site, as well as application-aware routing. Security is standard compliant, eliminating config drift that was prevalent before manual configurations. Application-aware routing offers flexibility in using different lines for traffic, depending on the policy implemented.

The main area for improvement in Cisco SD-WAN is the lack of documentation, which often lags behind the software releases. This is especially notable since Cisco acquired the solution and is still integrating it into its overall environment.

I have been using Cisco SD-WAN for the last three years.

I would rate Cisco SD-WAN an eight out of ten for stability. While some software-related issues and bugs were encountered, they did not cause the whole environment to crash. Sites were able to continue functioning, although there were limitations in making changes at those times.

The ease of configuration and features like zero-touch provisioning enhance the scalability of Cisco SD-WAN, especially in disaster recovery situations. I would rate scalability a nine out of ten. The initial implementation faced some issues, but it has improved with newer software versions.

The customer service and support for Cisco SD-WAN are satisfactory, rated as eight out of ten. 

However, Cisco's ongoing reorganizations have affected the quality of technical support, which varies depending on the engineer handling cases.

Positive

Before Cisco SD-WAN, I used traditional MPLS or eVPN, IPVPN networks. The switch was made for easier management and standard compliance, which is enforced by the SD-WAN product itself.

The initial setup involves getting the underlay and controllers in place to migrate from the old to the new network. I deployed in parallel, allowing both networks to coexist, and then migrated sites to the new central control plane.

For a complete project, we had two central administrators and designers, along with three or four teams managing the remote locations. The process took approximately one year to migrate about 280 sites.

The pricing for Cisco SD-WAN is rated eight out of ten, with some variability depending on the reseller discounts and the size of the enterprise. It is also relatively cost-effective for smaller businesses when using the Meraki version.

We evaluated other solutions but chose Cisco SD-WAN due to its flexibility, support for our requirements, and the preference of many of our customers who were already using Cisco-based solutions.

I would recommend working out detailed use cases and requirements before implementation. Cisco SD-WAN is quite flexible, however, without a solid foundational design, users might struggle with too many options, leading to a poor rollout design. 

Overall, I rate Cisco SD-WAN as nine out of ten.

In my view, Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN would be less effective when it comes to SD-WAN functions compared to Versa.

The overall operability of Versa is better than Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN. As a seller, I still find Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN to be a little complicated.

The ease of use, interface, and implementation are better with Versa.

Functionality-wise, both Versa and Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN possibly would be at par. I would not comment on that for sure, but from the deployment perspective, I still feel Versa has got an easy interface to get things managed.

The integrated threat protection and end-to-end encryption features in Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN are good.

More or less, it's the same with Cisco in terms of complexity and pricing, so there's not much of a difference. They might want to consider incorporating features seen in Versa or other competitors to improve their points.

I would rate the technical support by Cisco as nine out of ten.

That's even a little bit better than what Versa has, because Cisco engineers can be found everywhere compared to Versa. This is an advantage that they carry.

Positive

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is positioned ideally where customers already have Cisco routers and other equipment, making migration to Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN easier. In these use cases, Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is very competitive.

When discussing application-aware routing features, this is a standard feature all the OEMs are offering.

Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN would be more expensive compared to Versa. I have been a partner and reseller of both Versa and Cisco.

I rate Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN eight out of ten.

The primary use case for Cisco SD-WAN is to connect multiple offices or branch offices across the globe or within a country securely. It facilitates branch-to-branch or office-to-office transactions and provides easy access to primary data centers.

Cisco SD-WAN is valued for its operational efficiency and ease of operation. It allows prioritization of packages based on production requirements, and integration capabilities provide comprehensive security. Integration with Cisco ISE, Cisco Firewalls, and other Cisco solutions is beneficial. Furthermore, it is appreciated for its insights, visibility, and ease of use.

Integration with other OEMs and the API part needs improvement to be more user-friendly, especially in terms of GUI. Including more features like integrating with Splunk for monitoring vulnerabilities would help eliminate the need for other SOC solutions.

I have been working with the Cisco SD-WAN solutions since 2018.

I have not faced any stability issues with Cisco SD-WAN.

Cisco SD-WAN is highly scalable and can be expanded to more than 10,000 sites, so there are no issues with scalability.

The initial setup is not straightforward, as it requires experienced personnel to size and optimize the solution. Otherwise, it could be costly.

For Cisco SD-WAN deployment, following Cisco's published best practices is advisable, starting with vManage and then adding all devices for better remote control.

Operational ROI is observed by cutting down internet and branch connectivity costs, while securely accessing hosted applications using various types of connectivity like 3G, 5G, or MPLS.

Cisco SD-WAN is a premium product priced on the higher side, however, its pricing is justifiable due to the comprehensive solution it offers.

I have evaluated Aruba and Fortinet SD-WAN solutions.

For enterprise customers with significant security concerns, Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN is a recommended choice. It offers comprehensive integration under a single umbrella, which is advantageous compared to other OEMs. 

I would rate the overall solution as a ten out of ten.