Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN Reviews

I've worked on this solution for a couple of clients who already had it deployed. It has many good features and good integration. This is more of a hybrid setup where the switch takes over a lot of responsibility depending upon what you have deployed. It takes a lot of control and allows for cloud-based management of your Wi-Fi network.

One of the key problems is that, similar to a solution like Ruckus, if you lose connectivity with the controller, your Wi-Fi network is immediately impacted and users are unable to connect to the network. It's a challenge because then your budget inflates as you have to invest in a high availability kind of solution and have more than one controller. If you are spread across a large area geographically, then you may want to have multiple controllers at different sites so that if one fails you always have a backup to go to and you're not dependent on the links that connect to your offices. It can become costly as a result. 

There is nothing much that can change but I believe the hardware could become more economical. The licensing part is okay, and compared to other cloud-managed Wi-Fi's, Meraki is well placed on the pricing, but the hardware costs a bomb. If they could reduce the price of the hardware, the access points, that would be a great benefit for them.

The solution is stable and more secure when you compare it to Ruckus because if you have an MX firewall, you automatically get the firewall features over your Wi-Fi as well. The outcome is that all the data passing through the Wi-Fi definitely passes through the firewall. 

Meraki is quite scalable. 

Thanks to my experience with Wi-Fi, I haven't needed tech support from Meraki. One good point about Meraki and Cisco overall would be the documentation. It's extremely comprehensive so that you don't need to call tech support unless you encounter a specific problem, and you can find most things by doing a Google search.

I believe the initial setup is pretty straightforward although I've never deployed the solution - I've managed it for clients. We currently have three companies that are using this product. From a maintenance perspective, it requires a couple of maintenance staff to keep a tab on the solution, depending upon your work environment. 

Licensing is on an annual basis and there is also the hardware inventory. If the firewall goes down, for example, that could cause a problem. The point of failure and the work involved around it makes it a more costly solution.

For anyone looking for a simple management solution in a geographically spread-out network, Meraki is a good bet compared to Ruckus. However, they lose points on the cost as well as on the complexity of its multiple-tiered structure, where you have an MX firewall or a switch, your Wi-Fi access points, and then the cloud. It's too much and could be as easy as having the cloud and access points, but the product has an additional tier integrated, which makes it somewhat complex.

I would place them at eight out of 10. 

I do networking fit-outs for schools. I'm an advisor to about 30,000 schools.

The most valuable thing to me is the stability of the product.

I've been in the business 47 years, and I've been using Meraki for as long as they've been in business, which is about 14 years now.

I don't have an issue. It meets specifications.

I don't get involved on that end of it.

I don't get involved in the setup or installation.

The price could be slightly better, but then again, we negotiate deals every time so the market price isn't really relevant.

I would rate it eight out of 10.

With Cisco Meraki, I've tried motherboard, switches, and wireless, and everything is good. If you want to complete visibility, then you are required just a firewall and switches, and wireless. 

The solution offers good features and good performance. It's quite stable. We have never faced challenges just from our ID access point.

You can scale the solution easily.

The problem with the solution is that if you go for firewall, then there is no SSL encryption available. If you are talking about deep packet inspection, that is not available. If you want SSL encryption, then you have to integrate with Cisco Umbrella. 

If they could work on the Meraki firewall hardware, and add SSL decryption as well as more application control and deep packet inspection, that would be ideal. 

Also in Cisco Meraki access points, MAC filtering is not available. If they could add that feature, that would be great.

I've been using the solution for two or three years at this point. It's been a while. 

The stability is very good. There are no bugs. There are no glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable. 

This is a cloud-based product and the best thing about a cloud-based product is if you have a cloud controller and access point, then you don't have to worry about that key for licenses. If you've got 70 access points, you can register there. If you have 1,000 and 2,0000, you can also register there. There is no need to change any controller hardware as that is a cloud-based product, which makes it fully scalable. You can add to it and still maintain a single point of management. 

This is a pure cloud-based solution and everything is managed by the cloud.

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

We primarily use the solution for our campus environment.

The solution has worked very well in our campus environment. 

The solution has proven itself to be very stable so far.

The product is very easy to use.

The initial setup is very straightforward and easy.

We've found the connectivity to be excellent.

We would like the solution to work on the pricing of the solution. It would be ideal if it could bring the overall costs down.

We haven't even used the solution for a year yet. We've used it for about six months or so. It hasn't been that long just yet.

The stability is very good. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable. It's been good so far.

The solution can scale quite well. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so fairly easily.

We currently use the solution in order to cover 500 users at our company.

Our company does plan to increase usage in the future.

Technical support has been fine. We've found them to be helpful and responsive. We're satisfied with the level of support we receive.

The installation was very straightforward, from what I recall. A company shouldn't have any trouble with the initial setup. It's not overly complex or difficult. 

The deployment is pretty fast. It only took us about two hours or so. 

We did not need the assistance of a consultant or integrator. We handled the initial implementation ourselves. We handled it in-house.

The pricing could be cheaper. It's the one pain point.

We pay a monthly fee.

We are using the latest version of the solution. I can't speak to the actual version number.

I'd rate the solution at a nine out of ten. We haven't used it for that long, however, we have been quite satisfied with its overall capabilities.

I'd recommend the solution to other organizations and users.

We use it for Wi-Fi.

It is cloud-based. You can manage it remotely from anywhere in the world, and you don't have to be on-site, which is a very big advantage.

It is super expensive for what you get. I just wish it was less expensive.

I have been using this solution for 20 years.

It is stable and very reliable.

You just buy more. In terms of the number of users, it is used by everyone in the organization. It is Wi-Fi, so you hook your phone or laptop. Everybody uses it.

Their technical support is very good. I would rate them a ten out of ten.

I've used Ubiquiti. The reason I use them is that they're very inexpensive, but they're not cloud-based. You have to be on-premises in order to manage them.

It is really easy.

It is super expensive for what you get. You also have to buy a license every year. Otherwise, it stops working.

If you can afford it, you should go for it.

I would rate Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN a six out of ten. The biggest downside is the yearly fee and the initial price, but it is very reliable.

There are so many use cases. You can have multiple SSIDs and different LANs such as
guests, private, or hidden. There are so many options with it.

It is cloud-based, but the physical hardware is on-premises. We are using the Enterprise version.

It is cloud-based. It has a GUI rather than a command line, and it just works.

The biggest pain point is that they limit you through firewall throughput. I understand why they do it, but that really grates me. For instance, for 450 Mbps throughput, you're looking at £800 for a router, whereas if you look at the one gig connection, for some of us are lucky enough to have a gig connection, you could almost be spending £3,000 for the option to have one gig connectivity. That's one of the pain points I've got. I don't mind paying for throughput, but I should at least have the option to be able to update that throughput, maybe through extra licensing or something else. It is crazy expensive to jump through to the next one.

I have been using this solution for a good couple of years.

It is perfect in terms of stability.

It is perfect in terms of scalability. I've got one system here in the UAE and one in London, and I haven't even touched the one in London, and I can do it all from here.

Their support is perfect. They're there 24/7, 365 days a year. Whether you email or phone in, there is always someone there to help you.

Its initial setup is straightforward.

Its licensing is on a yearly basis. It can be for three, five, or ten years.

I'm happy with the pricing. You basically pay for what you get. It is that simple. When you look at Ubiquiti or Aruba, Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN far outweighs what you get. If you're in the UK, Ubiquiti gives a three-year or five-year warranty, whereas here in the UAE, they only give a one-year warranty, which is no good to me. Who buys a piece of equipment with only one year warranty on it? It doesn't make sense.

I would recommend this solution, but there are limitations with some of these devices. The main issue that I have is related to the throughput. You can get any router that will do a gig connection, but you don't get the other features.

I would rate Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN an eight out of ten.

We are using it in our school. We are using an old version. It is five years when my contract expires.

It has improved the way our school functions.

I like the record that is being kept and multiple SSDs.

Its price could be improved.

I have been using this solution for eight years.

It is stable. I didn't have any issues with its stability.

We have probably 30 to 40 users.

It is scalable. I need to add a couple more and upgrade to four.

I did not use their technical support.

I didn't use any other solution.

It was pretty straightforward.

It is expensive, but it is a good product.

If you have some money, it is a good thing to buy. It is a trouble-free product.

I would rate Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN a nine out of ten.

The product is used mainly for wireless switching security. I like to call it network security, however, they also have products on that end, such as FC LAN. I don't focus too much on the wireless stuff. I focus on the services and products.

The network security the solution provides is its most valuable aspect.

Overall, it's a very solid product. I really like it.

The initial setup is pretty straightforward.

The solution scales very well.

We've found the product to be quite stable.

On the performance side, there are always updates to different versions. It's more just getting it out to the client-side that's often the issue. 

The licensing could be a bit better.

They should market Meraki as a mid-level solution for SMBs. There are a lot of SMBs out there, and they could use this technology.

I've used the solution for a while, however, it's hard to give a timeframe. I use it as clients use it. They can go on and off of it, or I can be on different accounts.

The stability has been very good. It's very solid. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. It's reliable.

The solution can scale very well. There are not problems expanding it if you need to as an organization. It's easy enough to do. Even on an enterprise-level, you can scale.

Technical support is more channeled to the partner side of things. However, Cisco is a great product and has a great team.

I can name a lot of companies that do network security, however, we pull up Cisco Meraki and we read off everything they do. 

The initial setup isn't overly complex. It's pretty straightforward. A company shouldn't have trouble implementing it.

I don't deal with pricing directly, however, it's my understanding that it is around $40 per unit. I'm not well versed in MDM pricing, to be honest. It's not something I work with.

I'm more on the managed services, professional services, which includes getting everything set up and dealing with all the problems around it, versus the actual licensing part.

We're partners with Cisco. Meraki is probably one of the number one solutions. On my team that's all we've talked about or sold. Cisco is 100%, one of our top partners.

Just in terms of network security, there's a lot of digital transformation happening. There will be a lot of moving to the cloud for many customers and you'd be surprised how many enterprises still just aren't prepared for the changes that are coming their way.

I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten. It's a legitimate switch and a legitimate solution. It does what it says and it gets the job done.