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Aruba Orchestrator vs Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 1, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Aruba Orchestrator
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
16th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms
Ranking in Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
12th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions category, the mindshare of Aruba Orchestrator is 1.3%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms is 0.5%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms0.5%
Aruba Orchestrator1.3%
Other98.2%
Software Defined WAN (SD-WAN) Solutions
 

Featured Reviews

LipazHessel - PeerSpot reviewer
CTO, Co founder at IT-Guru
Has streamlined SD-WAN management and improved network segmentation but would benefit from stronger multi-tenancy and pricing adjustments
It would be great if they would have a fully multi-tenant solution on their Orchestrator. Aruba SD-WAN solutions are always expensive. I don't think that it will change. It's an argument for many years. This is why we are doing other vendors as well, which today were bought by Aruba, Juniper for example.
IgnitiusMolepo - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior IP Network Defense at MTN
Network operations have become intelligent, secure, and efficient for large-scale growth
The only improvement I can suggest for Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms is that in the AI era, it will be important to embed machine learning capabilities. It will be important to embed some agencies within that technology and ensure that the technology is able to manage the traffic coming from the agent and also from the robots. Nowadays, companies are starting to adopt new technology with robot agents. I believe that there will be a lot of traffic coming from those agencies. We need to understand the capabilities on how we can onboard them on our technology, on our network on Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"I rate Aruba Orchestrator ten out of ten."
"The solution has a single pane of glass view that allows you to see everything happening in your SD-WAN world."
"Aruba Orchestrator has notably reduced enrollment setup times from several hours to within an hour if prepared and planned."
"We had to deal with separate management models for Wi-Fi and switches. With Aruba Orchestrator, it's now a unified solution, making things much easier for us. We log in and manage everything from a single console. It provides complete internal visibility from LAN to Wi-Fi, resulting in higher stability and easier troubleshooting. The management process is much quicker and more streamlined."
"The Business Intent Overlay is a great feature."
"The product has reduced OpEx expenditure."
"If you compare the solution to Cisco, I believe when it comes to security and of course optimization, Silver Peak Unity Orchestrator is much better and recommendable compared to Cisco."
"I can say that 100% the ROI from Aruba Orchestrator is really good because we have reduced the number of people needed; there is no need to have a team of people to manage the huge network, and with a relatively smaller number of resources, we are able to manage."
"Everything is good, and I very much enjoy this product."
"Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms positively impacts my organization because, although we were using Meraki MX for a long time with no new model from them, we were concerned about supporting the increasing bandwidth requirement for our sites, and Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms helps with this, as we understand it is a newer platform with many optimizations under the hood that can be done to make it more powerful and able to support larger bandwidth requirements."
"Compared to other vendors, such as Huawei and others, Cisco switches are more powerful and very intelligent."
"The great thing about Cisco Catalyst is the performance and how it can handle so much traffic and information at the same time, forwarding using CEF technology compared with other brands."
"As a customer, the biggest advantage of Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms that I think of is its reliability, which makes me really confident to use it."
"Overall, it is a solid platform that ensures reliability and scalability for network edge connectivity."
"The flexibility of the models in Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms helps my organization because it is easier to add any Catalyst 8000 series to Catalyst Center for management, and it is also easy to add to the SD-WAN manager if needed, which makes operations very easy from both an intuitive and operational handling perspective."
"Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms is a very good product, and with this, we can do so many things, including integrating with the firewall, URL filtering, VPN, IPsec segmentation, and other capabilities."
 

Cons

"We also had a POC with a Juniper product, and the Juniper Mist is actually outstanding. If you compare it with Juniper, that is the reason I have given it an eight."
"Aruba Orchestrator should implement dynamic certificate changes for security."
"They could provide essential training to understand the product functionality."
"The solution can be improved by lowering the cost and making it more user-friendly for first-time users."
"We don't see return on investment, but we love the technology, so we purchase because of the technology."
"The initial setup is complex, depending on the overall planning for the entire environment."
"The management menu should be simplified."
"The solution lacks sufficient security features."
"The price for Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms is somewhat higher compared to Chinese brands, though the difference is not huge."
"Sometimes it takes a little bit, and sometimes they do not give a lot of information, so it is better to make calls and have meetings with the support team."
"The only improvement I can suggest for Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms is that in the AI era, it will be important to embed machine learning capabilities."
"Additionally, the firewall management requires significant improvement, as the current behavior resembles firewalls from 25 years ago; it lacks central management policies and objects that modern firewalls possess."
"I believe Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms could improve the overall management and troubleshooting experience."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I rate the platform’s pricing a five out of ten."
"Aruba Orchestrator is free to use."
"The solution's licensing costs are yearly. It is not expensive, and I rate it around three to four out of ten."
"I think it is quite expensive compared to other vendors in the market because it depends on what kind of features you really want to acquire in the product."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
20%
Outsourcing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
University
8%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise5
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Silver Peak Unity Orchestrator?
Regarding my experience with the pricing and setup costs, I find it expensive software compared to others.
What needs improvement with Silver Peak Unity Orchestrator?
It would be great if they would have a fully multi-tenant solution on their Orchestrator. Aruba SD-WAN solutions are always expensive. I don't think that it will change. It's an argument for many y...
What is your primary use case for Silver Peak Unity Orchestrator?
The typical use case for Aruba Orchestrator is to manage the SD-WAN EdgeConnect.
What needs improvement with Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms?
The only improvement I can suggest for Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms is that in the AI era, it will be important to embed machine learning capabilities. It will be important to embed some agencies w...
What is your primary use case for Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms?
Currently, we are using the Cisco 5585 and the Firepowers, and the Firepower IPS, which comes as part of the firewall module, and the switching and the routing. For switching, we have the Catalyst ...
What advice do you have for others considering Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms?
I still work with the product, specifically with this solution, but I have low hands-on experience myself. However, I am managing the team which is hands-on. 90% of the time, even now, if you call ...
 

Also Known As

Silver Peak Unity Orchestrator, Unity Orchestrator
No data available
 

Overview

Find out what your peers are saying about Aruba Orchestrator vs. Catalyst 8000 Edge Platforms and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
915,341 professionals have used our research since 2012.