Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN and Aruba Instant both compete in the wireless LAN market. Cisco Meraki seems to have the upper hand due to its centralized cloud management, extensive feature set, and solid performance even though it is relatively more expensive.
Features: Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN offers centralized cloud management praised for its comprehensive dashboard, flexibility, and visibility which is ideal for organizations with different technical levels. Layer 7 protections and management of multiple locations are additional advantages. Aruba Instant is known for its virtual controller that simplifies management, efficient cloud capabilities for easy scalability, and remote access which is especially beneficial for small to medium-sized businesses.
Room for Improvement: Cisco Meraki could improve error logging, logging features, and expand radio functionalities while also working on technical support consistency and customization capabilities. Aruba Instant might enhance its cloud management features, improve integration, and increase support for higher AP capacities with better documentation and quicker technical support response times.
Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Cisco Meraki has a simple deployment process due to its cloud-managed network which eases remote management and updates. Customer service is generally positive, but users have faced inconsistent support responsiveness. Aruba Instant offers straightforward deployment with flexible on-premises and cloud management, deemed helpful by customer service, though technical support could be improved.
Pricing and ROI: Cisco Meraki is often more expensive, with pricing tied to licensing, requiring careful consideration to manage costs. Despite this, its reporting capabilities give valuable insights, contributing to ROI. Aruba Instant is more cost-effective, particularly due to license simplicity and lower initial costs, offering good value for smaller deployments with RPIs realized in a reasonable timeframe.
Overall, it's a fair pricing and good in terms of cost-effectiveness or ROI.
I rate Aruba TAC as a 9 out of 10.
The technical support from Aruba is of high quality, and I would rate it a ten.
I would rate Cisco support a 10, as the response time and process via the dashboard are easy, and response times are always within the SLA.
It would be better if the SLA of technical support was less than four hours.
I find Aruba Instant to be highly scalable.
Meraki is not scalable enough since it straightforwardly maps its products to segmented specifications.
Aruba is a known name in the market providing sufficient support for all these products.
We have experienced many instances where we have experienced a lag in our network, and I am not sure if it is due to their devices or our network.
Stability is not an issue for me because it comes with Cisco's proven manufacturer quality.
Some features are not listed in the cloud management platform and still require offline access, so enhancing the cloud management features would be better for us.
An important missing feature is the console port, which allows direct management without the cloud.
The most important improvement needed is to eliminate the limitation of uplinks.
Some of the newer models of the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN access point have encompassed the new wireless protocols and increased the strength of their antennas.
We do not sell very expensive devices as we move to other products.
However, when compared to entry-level market segments, the price is higher.
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is on par with other devices in that category, offering competitive pricing.
The pricing of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is not competitive enough for the SMB market compared to other brands.
My experience with the pricing of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is that it is competitive with other providers offering paid subscriptions.
I highly value Aruba Instant for its ClearPass feature, which is an exceptional product for network access control and works as a NAC solution.
Aruba Instant's intrusion detection feature stands for application visibility and includes their latest technology such as Wi-Fi 6E and remote monitoring capability.
The most beneficial features for network management are the price and the cloud console.
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN has helped optimize network traffic very effectively, as we do prioritization for streaming and web conferencing apps, resulting in a clear, visible improvement in performance.
It also manages security clients and switches, providing a single dashboard to manage multiple network infrastructures.
The ability to program all access points from the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN dashboard, view the status of all of them, and examine the individual devices connected to each access point is very valuable.
| Product | Market Share (%) |
|---|---|
| Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN | 10.5% |
| Aruba Instant | 2.2% |
| Other | 87.3% |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 31 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 7 |
| Large Enterprise | 14 |
| Company Size | Count |
|---|---|
| Small Business | 69 |
| Midsize Enterprise | 26 |
| Large Enterprise | 31 |
Aruba Instant delivers the only controllerless Wi-Fi solution that is easy to set-up, and loaded with security and smarts needed to accelerate your business without breaking your budget.
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