AWS Storage Gateway vs CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and CTERA are both solutions in the Cloud Storage Gateways category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.8, while CTERA is ranked #1 with an average rating of 9.2. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 11.7% mindshare in CSG, compared to CTERA’s 14.2% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of CTERA users who would recommend it.

AWS Storage Gateway

Read 16 AWS Storage Gateway reviews

560 Views
549 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

CTERA Enterprise File Servi...

Read 10 CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform reviews

2,170 Views
803 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

AWS Storage Gateway

CTERA Enterprise File Servi...

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 2, 2025

CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform and AWS Storage Gateway compete in cloud storage solutions, each with distinct strengths. While CTERA excels in providing robust security and data privacy, AWS Storage Gateway stands out with better integration and scalability within its ecosystem.

Features: CTERA offers secure file sharing, localized data storage, and granular access controls. AWS Storage Gateway is known for its seamless integration with AWS services, efficient data transfer, and robust hybrid cloud support.

Room for Improvement: CTERA could improve in areas such as enhancing integration with non-proprietary platforms, offering more extensive cloud provider partnerships, and reducing complexity in multi-location deployments. AWS Storage Gateway may enhance its localized security features, offer improved data privacy controls, and simplify the interface for non-AWS users.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: CTERA provides straightforward on-premise deployment and dedicated customer support, which suits organizations favoring local control. AWS Storage Gateway facilitates streamlined cloud-based deployments utilizing AWS's extensive support resources.

Pricing and ROI: CTERA typically involves a higher initial setup cost but provides long-term ROI through efficient data management and minimized compliance risks. AWS Storage Gateway offers competitive pricing with scalable options, making it a cost-effective investment leveraging AWS's comprehensive cloud infrastructure.

To learn more, read our detailed AWS Storage Gateway vs. CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

AWS Storage Gateway vs. CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

September 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 869,566 peers since 2012

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

AWS Storage Gateway

Ranking in Cloud Storage Gateways

4th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

CTERA Enterprise File Servi...

Ranking in Cloud Storage Gateways

1st

Average Rating

9.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

File System Software (2nd), NAS (4th), Cloud Migration (3rd), Cloud Storage (4th), Cloud Backup (7th), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (6th), Content Collaboration Platforms (9th)

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Cloud Storage Gateways category, the mindshare of AWS Storage Gateway is 11.7%, up from 11.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform is 14.2%, down from 14.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Storage Gateways Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform	14.2%
AWS Storage Gateway	11.7%
Other	74.1%

Cloud Storage Gateways

Featured Reviews

Sumit Mundik

Application Development Senior Analyst at Accenture

Provides really good documentation so that information is easily accessible

When we opened a ticket for AWS Storage Gateway, the support team was responsive but could not resolve the issue. When we sent a file from MOVEit to AWS Storage Gateway, it sent the file twice. We were not able to figure out why it was doing it. In the AWS S3 bucket, you will find an option called versioning. If a file is sent multiple times, the versioning feature will increase the version one by one. For example, if I send the same file thrice, it will have version one, version two, and the original file. Likewise, they have the versioning. Whenever we send file one, the files are getting duplicated. When we opened a ticket, even the AWS team could not figure it out. They just told us the configuration might be wrong on the AWS Storage Gateway side, and we need to look at it. After that, we also did not follow up because the destination team changed the architecture on their end. Instead of running the Lambda function immediately when the file arrived, they added a sleep time of four to five minutes and then started processing the file.

Read full review

Richard Saini

Lead Infrastructure Architect at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees

The ransomware recoverability has helped with our data protection mandates

File replication and versioning seem to work very well. We did have some challenges at the beginning, but all of that has been resolved now. It works very well. It does what our users require. Replication is excellent. We needed that, and the versioning is also pretty important. One of the reasons we chose CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform was the requirements we had to have ransomware protection. Our existing solution at the time would not have met those requirements of being able to restore from a ransomware incident. What we wanted from a platform was the ability to restore a snapshot or restore a file system or data back to a previous point in time, and CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform offered us that. Availability was a very key feature of why we liked the solution. It is effectively like the disaster recovery feature, and that also lends itself to replication. It works very well for our ransomware recovery objectives. There is business growth due to being able to offer greater storage capacity for them. Before, we were running into storage limitations, and now that we have enabled CTERA, we can accommodate more data and users. When it comes to reduction in recovery time objectives, we have not used it in that way. However, we are anticipating that our recovery time objectives will come down from over a month to hours or days. Recovery point objectives will also effectively be down to hours. It is hard to say how much it has freed up IT resources for other projects or tasks. Now that it is fully implemented and fully working, we are spending a lot less time looking after it. It has drastically reduced the amount of time we used to spend on backups. It is hard to provide the metrics, but six hours a month or something like that would be fair. The ransomware recoverability feature has definitely helped with our data protection mandates. It has reassured our security teams that we are in a good place with regard to securing the data and being able to recover the data.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We like the flexibility and easy-to-use storage. I'm happy about the response time."

"The most effective features are the asynchronous server functionality, which improves latency and stabilization. I also like the distributed data capabilities for data management."

"The solution's most valuable features stem from its ease of use, including how easy it is to set up, configure, and manage the tool."

"AWS Storage Gateway is very customer friendly in terms of their features, though perhaps not in price."

"The solution has low latency."

"The stability is probably the most valuable aspect of the product."

"The solution gives us the ability to move large amounts of data to the cloud and it gives us on-premises connectivity. Additionally, the storage can be shared from the cloud to on-premise."

"It's a cloud storage solution, which makes it quite flexible. If you have one terabyte today and need ten tomorrow, it's not a problem."

More AWS Storage Gateway pros

"The solution provides data eviction, where unused data is evicted from the local file, freeing up space. It also allows data to be rehydrated from the cloud when needed."

"The features I find most valuable are in the gateways themselves. They have done a great job over the years of providing insight into what is happening with our products, with the batches that come through that are scanned. I enjoy that part of it, and it is fairly easy to use from our standpoint once we get to know the product."

"CTERA's instantaneous and redundant file replication, available across multiple geographical locations, ensures easy and user-friendly recovery."

"I like that the glass is always half full with CTERA file services. It keeps the data hot for users on location and then tiers off older data. If you need it, the stub is still there. You can click on it, and it's back on the device."

"CTERA stood out due to its ease of use and superior security features."

"Our main reason for going for this solution was the uncontrollable growth of file data. It was unsustainable on our previous platform or technology. We needed something scalable like CTERA, so it was the scalability that we required."

"It is a three-in-one solution for us. It is a file-sharing platform, an archiving solution, and also a backup solution."

"The solution provides substantial flexibility, allowing the separation of workloads across various hardware platforms without vendor lock-in. This flexibility makes it adaptable to future infrastructure changes."

More CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform pros

Cons

"It would be better for us if they improved their integration capability."

"Pricing is an area of concern, and it can always be improved no matter what it is."

"Data migration and collection could be made easier for improvements - there's still work to be done there."

"We've had issues with bandwidth in the past, and we don't know where the bottlenecks are. We're not sure if it's on the AWS side or with the clients or the configuration in between. There's no visibility."

"I cannot say it's perfect."

"Initial setup could be simplified and that would make the user experience better."

"AWS Storage Gateway's cost can be an issue."

"AWS Storage Gateway could improve by having different kinds of storage. For example, allowing all kinds of data, whether it's images or structure, not structure data. This would be great."

More AWS Storage Gateway cons

"More monitoring from the platform would be good. There is some monitoring, but it is paid. It is a chargeable service. It would be good for that to be included in the base."

"One area for improvement is the migration tool, which at times does not work as designed, necessitating the use of alternative solutions like Robocopy."

"One of the bigger things that I would like to see is additional logging. There are logs in there. They provide us with the initial logs on what is happening on our CTERA device. I appreciate that, but they do not give us any further information. I would like to have more information on the logs themselves."

"It has a learning curve."

"However, in some cases, they could improve performance."

"They fixed all the requirements that we had in the beginning. The beginning was a little bit rough, but we tuned it nicely. However, in some cases, they could improve performance."

"The new Edge filer that they have comes with a lot more features than what we purchased. It would be better if we are able to add those extra features without having to swap out the hardware. A clear upgrade path for legacy customers would be beneficial."

"The web portal that our users access to view data and backups could be optimized. CTERA could apply some of the improvements made to their administrative interface on the user side. The administrators are a much smaller group of people than the users, so it would be helpful if they targeted user experience resources to them."

More CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is a monthly subscription for the use of this solution."

"AWS Storage Gateway is reasonably priced. The price depends on how much you need. The whole synopse model comes into the picture for the cloud where it depends on how many instances per VM and the price will increase. It's a reasonable price because with all the competition around the price has to be competitive. It's not very costly."

"We pay a monthly license."

"The solution's price is reasonable."

"Licensing is paid monthly. Pricing is in the mid-range - not too high or too low."

"My company needs to get monthly licenses to use the tool."

"It is fairly priced. I am not too involved in the pricing of what we used to pay, but it would have reduced the cost of ownership. I cannot give a figure, but the EMC solution was very expensive compared to CTERA."

"I find the pricing reasonable. They offered us deals that helped us. Especially with the upgrade to a bigger unit last year, they were helpful with the deal."

"So far, pricing seems to be fine."

"CTERA's pricing model is competitive compared to other companies that achieve the same thing. Their closest rival is Nasuni, and CTERA is significantly more affordable than Nasuni."

"It is hard to compare the costs if we want to retain the same model of a separate high-performance storage or certain things, but it is one of the cheapest solutions available in Israel."

"I am not directly involved in the pricing aspects, but I understand that CTERA's pricing is competitive and within industry standards."

"CTERA's pricing seems to be on par with some of the other players, such as Nasuni and Azure. They all have benefits, but CTERA is competitive for its features."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Cloud Storage Gateways solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

26%

Insurance Company

Performing Arts

Healthcare Company

Computer Software Company

68%

Educational Organization

Financial Services Firm

Retailer

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	4

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	2
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	6

Questions from the Community

Is AWS Storage Gateway only suitable for AWS?

No, I'm pretty sure you can't. This is a service of AWS and so you're probably only able to use it there. I haven't used any of the Amazon Web Services personally but from what I know, they usually...

See all answers

Is AWS Storage Gateway easy to use?

Hi, yes, I think it is very easy to use. You can install it rather quickly, and then when you start using it, it's all explained to you on the native platform's website. I think the best thing abou...

See all answers

Is AWS Storage Gateway free for users of AWS?

No, this service is not provided for free by AWS. If you visit the AWS website and you look for AWS Storage Gateway pricing, you'll be sent to a very helpful calculating page. There, based on what ...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?

I believe CTERA could improve their pricing experience by customizing price lists per region. For example, there is a difference between what is sold to customers in Israel versus U.S. customers. I...

See all answers

What needs improvement with CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?

There’s an issue with permissions, they aren’t always as transparent for customers as Microsoft’s, for example. Integrations with AI could also be improved, and error messages should be clearer, mo...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?

CTERA connected us with Bezeq, which is a communications company in Israel that also sells similar solutions, and we also set up a portal. We were then Bezeq's integrator, until Bezeq decided to st...

See all answers

Comparisons

Nasuni vs AWS Storage Gateway

Compared 79% of the time

NetApp Cloud Backup vs AWS Storage Gateway

Compared 21% of the time

More AWS Storage Gateway Competitors

Nasuni vs CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

Compared 28% of the time

Panzura CloudFS vs CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

Compared 11% of the time

Qumulo vs CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

Compared 9% of the time

Egnyte vs CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

Compared 7% of the time

Microsoft OneDrive for Business vs CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

Compared 7% of the time

More CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

AWS Storage Gateway

October 2025

Download AWS Storage Gateway product report

Buyer's Guide

CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

October 2025

CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform report

Download CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform product report

Interactive Demo

Demo not available

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

CTERA

Overview

AWS Storage Gateway provides hybrid cloud storage services that give users access to unlimited cloud storage. As a part of the Amazon Web Services, one of the leading on-demand cloud computing platforms, the AWS Storage Gateway allows you to use the AWS storage without the need to rewrite your applications. It does this by providing protocols like iSCSI, NFS, and SMB. It works by caching frequently accessed data on premises and simultaneously storing data on AWS, as well as optimizing data transfer in the cloud. The optimization it provides for AWS is done by sending only changed data and by compressing data.

AWS Storage Gateway provides the option for in-cloud processing by integrating with Amazon S3 and FSx for Windows File Server. It works with AWS Identity and Access Management to secure access management to services and recourse. It is also compatible with data encryption in the cloud by working with AWS Key Management Service, for monitoring with Amazon CloudWatch, and for activity of account logging with AWS CloudTrail. Through AWS Backup, you can manage backup and retention policies for AWS Storage Gateway. Users have access to a maximum supported size of local cache per gateway of up to 64 TiB on a virtual machine.

The use cases for AWS Storage Gateway include the ability to store incoming data from on-premises instruments in Amazon Simple Storage Services, as well as using AWS for data analysis. It provides the opportunity to modernize your interactive file sharing while simplifying management and reducing costs. AWS Storage Gateway is also suitable for backing up data in the cloud, giving users virtually unlimited scale.

The following services allow Amazon Storage Gateway to provide on-premises applications with access to cloud storage:

Amazon S3 File Gateway: Using file protocols like Network File System and Server Message Block, users can store and retrieve objects in Amazon Simple Storage Service S3.
Amazon FSx File Gateway: Store and retrieve files in Amazon FSx for Windows File Server through the Server Message Block protocol.
Volume Gateway: AWS Storage Gateway offers users block storage for on-premises applications. Users can make copies of volumes and manage retention, as well as restore snapshots.
Tape Gateway: Backup applications are provided with an iSCSI virtual tape library (VTL) interface that consists of virtual tape drivers, virtual tapes, and a virtual media changer.

AWS Storage Gateway Benefits

Due to its value-added features, AWS Storage Gateway has many benefits, which include:

Ability to store data in AWS on various devices
Provides virtually unlimited cloud storage because it's based on the AWS cloud
Integrates with many AWS management services, such as AWS CloudTrail, AWS Identity, Access Management (IAM), Amazon CloudWatch
Effectively optimizes data transfer to AWS storage

Reviews from Real Users

Rohit V., Associate Manager at UnitedHealth Group, says that the best part about AWS Storage Gateway is that it has flexibility, securitye, and little maintenance. His company no longer worries about security and vulnerability issues since they've started using AWS Storage Gateway.

The Chef manager at an insurance company says AWS Storage Gateway is scalable, handles large amounts of data, and has a straightforward installation. His company uses it for migration purposes from their on-premise data.

Bahattin Y., CTO at BE1 consultancy, says that AWS Storage Gateway is a flexible solution with a good response time and easy-to-use storage. His organization uses it for a crypto exchange.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

The CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform provides a cloud-native global file system over public and private object storage, revolutionizing the world of hybrid cloud data solutions. Enhanced by a rich data services ecosystem, CTERA enables enterprises to gain full control of their data for optimal edge performance, data insight, and governance. The platform focuses on security, providing features like data encryption, access controls, and ransomware protection. Centralized management tools enable efficient data control and monitoring. The platform is being used to replace legacy NAS and file servers, especially at remote locations, and simplify backup and disaster recovery of file data while providing the flexibility of multi-cloud deployments with infinite scalability. CTERA is at the core of hybrid cloud transformations of some of the world’s largest banks, healthcare organizations, global media groups, and government agencies, in deployments that scale to tens of petabytes.

CTERA

Sample Customers

King, NEWLOG Consulting, Southern Oregon University, Religare Enterprises Limited, TGIX CloudCover, Moderna Therapeutics, JustGiving, VeriStor

McDonald's, WPP, US Navy, Gore, Festo, Stryker, Bezeq, PERI

Buyer's Guide

AWS Storage Gateway vs. CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

September 2025

Free Report: AWS Storage Gateway vs. CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform

Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Storage Gateway vs. CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our AWS Storage Gateway vs. CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform report.

See our list of best Cloud Storage Gateways vendors.

We monitor all Cloud Storage Gateways reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.