We performed a comparison between Aruba Wireless and Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Of the two solutions, Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is the more popular choice with PeerSpot users. While both have great features, users of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN seem to find fewer things lacking with it and are generally satisfied. In regards to service and support as well, Cisco users are happy with the service they receive. However, users do feel that it is an expensive solution.
"The simplicity is great."
"The most valuable feature of Juniper Wireless Access Points (AP Series) is the ability to troubleshoot ports on the network. Additionally, when there is an update on the APs they are able to reboot quickly reducing downtime. Other solutions have a longer downtime when updates are done."
"With Mist, every Wednesday they roll out new features."
"The solution is pretty generic and easy to use."
"In terms of reporting, in terms of all the user reports, it's very rich."
"The most useful feature of Juniper Wireless AP is the reporting Marvis."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is Marvis, the AI-driven network management system."
"Overall, it's a very strong solution."
"Aruba Wireless has been straightforward to set up."
"I have found the most valuable features are the new Wi-Fi six technology and it also integrates with triple-A solutions. It has good bandwidth and virtual control."
"The main features of Aruba Wireless in my country is its popularity, long hardware warranty when compared to other solutions, and it integrates well with our network access control solution."
"Aruba Central is a valuable feature because I can monitor access points remotely, even if I'm not in the office."
"The most valuable features of Aruba Wireless are the seamless feature and the concurrent user."
"The feature I found most valuable to customers in Aruba Wireless is not a technical feature. It's more of its image, trademark, or brand as the product is very well-known in the market, and that's a good point to offer to customers. My customers just ask about the basic features of the product, and usually, when asking about Aruba products, customers don't pay too much attention to any specific feature as long as the product is solid and sure, and that you can change or modify it, as what you can get from Aruba Wireless."
"Although there are other solutions available and some with a lower initial cost, they don't offer the same level of integration with IoT as this solution without having to add additional hardware, which ends up costing more."
"Cloud managed wireless LAN product that's stable and scalable. It's an easy to deploy and easy to troubleshoot solution."
"Great architecturally based dashboard and the solution is accessible from anywhere."
"The settings of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN can be very granular. You can lock down and block devices with the controls. For example, we have four different wireless settings, such as guest, employee, security, and backup. For example, the settings for the employees, if they use laptops, they're required to have certain settings, such as an antivirus installed. If they do not then Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN will not let them connect. This is very good protection because the network works on the bringing your own device(BYOD) principle. It's a BYOD environment now, and you also don't want them to bring infection into the environment because these people are connecting to the LAN via wireless connections. We have to be careful because we're managing it, we have to be very strict with regards to the rules and policies."
"It is easy to set up. You can do everything on the GUI. You don't need to trace cables. You don't need to connect to the switch. Everything is there, right in front of you."
"I have found the scalability to be very good."
"The visibility of the site is most useful."
"The single dashboard of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is the most valuable feature for me."
"Meraki is a decent solution for a small company, and we use it in a pretty typical way. We need Teams and Zoom to work, and we need a high level of security because we want our business to remain confidential."
"I need a bit more time with it before criticizing the features."
"The price could be better."
"The product should include adaptive Wi-Fi to show a more accurate location."
"Juniper Wireless AP can improve by continually improving its reporting and integration with other systems."
"The solution is expensive."
"Juniper Wireless Access Points (AP Series) could improve if the MIST platform had a built-in master key. This would be an advantage."
"If you want to do more specific stuff, it's a bit limited."
"The solution's documentation could be better organized in an information portal."
"They could work on energy consumption as this equipment needs a lot of energy."
"What needs improvement in Aruba Wireless is its access point, in particular, it should have more flexibility. Aruba Wireless has Campus AP, Instant AP, and Unified AP, but it would be better if the product has a generic access point that you can manage over the cloud, on-premise, etc. Another area for improvement in Aruba Wireless is scalability. In terms of what additional features I'd like to see in the product, I'm unsure if it's already on the roadmap, but if possible, it would be good to have an SD-WAN functionality on the AP in Aruba Wireless."
"The solution needs to add features and enhance security."
"The dashboards that represent the network access control in Aruba Wireless could improve."
"The stability and management could be improved."
"The price could be better. In the next release, I would like to have more analytics features."
"Aruba is missing some features that are available in other solutions, such as the email notifications. It's a bit complex to configure the notification part. Mainly I'm talking about the rogue WiFi detection. This email notification is crucial for us, but it isn't possible to configure with the built-in software. You need something else, like an external system log collector or another Aruba software. These notifications are essential in hospitality for PCI compliance. My colleagues in famous luxury hotel chains need that report."
"The solution cannot be looked upon for one year or short term because you will pay back all the discounts they offer the next time you pay for renewal."
"An area for improvement would be that Meraki doesn't work well in a warehouse environment. The device is too sensitive to other wireless devices, which provokes noise and can require a reboot to erase this."
"The technical support from Cisco is good, but they can improve themselves in some areas. Sometimes it takes a while to provide a solution or an answer to our problem."
"The solution should be more secure."
"They're great. If there's anything that they need to change, it is just simplifying the site to which you go to make changes on the admin side."
"Meraki leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to the technical capabilities in terms of throughput, spectrum, management, higher-level functions, etc"
"They could also add some more controls for guest access. For example, when you have a captive portal, it would be nice to limit the amount of time users can stay connected per day. Right now, you can only configure the splash frequency. And you can set the connection for one hour, but you have to use the billing feature."
"The way Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN groups certain things, as far as the devices for either monitoring and or configuring them should be done better. They should be grouped a little bit differently because if I want to configure something, a different setting on an SSID, I have to go to their specific area where I would have thought it should be clumped as a dropdown menu in another area."
More Juniper Mist Wireless Access Points Pricing and Cost Advice →
Aruba Wireless is ranked 1st in Wireless LAN with 48 reviews while Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is ranked 2nd in Wireless LAN with 44 reviews. Aruba Wireless is rated 8.2, while Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Aruba Wireless writes "Simple to install, easy to use, and cost-effective". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN writes "Highly reliable, effective site blocking, and beneficial reports". Aruba Wireless is most compared with Cisco Wireless, Ruckus Wireless, Ubiquiti WLAN, Mist AI and Cloud and Ubiquiti Wireless, whereas Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is most compared with Ubiquiti Wireless, Cisco Wireless, Mist AI and Cloud, Ruckus Wireless and Aruba Instant. See our Aruba Wireless vs. Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN report.
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Pricing is different based on region; it depends on Aruba's and Cisco's strategy in the region. You must contact the respective partners to get an accurate price for comparison.
That being said, in MENA where I live, as of a few months ago (21H1), Aruba pricing was cheaper than Cisco.
Aruba licensing for the AP's is much cheaper compared to Meraki.
You can get a 1/3/5-year cloud license per AP.