Azure NetApp Files vs Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct comparison

The compared NetApp and Microsoft solutions aren't in the same category. NetApp is ranked #8 in CM , with an average rating of 7.3, and holds a 12.2% mindshare in the category. Microsoft is ranked #9 in SDS , with an average rating of 7.8, and holds a 7.3% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of NetApp users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 80% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

Azure NetApp Files

Read 17 Azure NetApp Files reviews

2,520 Views
882 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

Microsoft Storage Spaces Di...

Read 11 Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct reviews

3,980 Views
1,473 Comparison Views

80% willing to recommend

Azure NetApp Files

Microsoft Storage Spaces Di...

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Azure NetApp Files and Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about NetApp, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Nasuni and others in Cloud Migration.

To learn more, read our detailed Cloud Migration Report (Updated: August 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Cloud Migration

August 2025

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Helped 867,341 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

Azure NetApp Files

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Migration (8th), Cloud Storage (9th), Public Cloud Storage Services (10th)

Microsoft Storage Spaces Di...

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Software Defined Storage (SDS) (9th)

Mindshare comparison

Azure NetApp Files and Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Azure NetApp Files is designed for Cloud Migration and holds a mindshare of 12.2%, down 16.5% compared to last year.
Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct, on the other hand, focuses on Software Defined Storage (SDS), holds 7.3% mindshare, down 7.5% since last year.

Cloud Migration Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Azure NetApp Files	12.2%
NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP	12.4%
Nasuni	9.2%
Other	66.2%

Cloud Migration

Software Defined Storage (SDS) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct	7.3%
Red Hat Ceph Storage	18.9%
DataCore SANsymphony	7.1%
Other	66.7%

Software Defined Storage (SDS)

Featured Reviews

AjayKumar13

Cloud/Data/Database Manager at a government with 10,001+ employees

Fast, reliable, and helps meet our SLAs

The most valuable feature is that the sixty-terabyte database snapshot can be done in less than two to three minutes. It is faster. It is quicker. It is reliable. You don't need to take the snapshot. Snapshots are compressed. It doesn't take storage from the back end. It takes three minutes to do sixty terabytes of the database. You don't have to go to the tape and store it outside, which takes hours and hours. It also uses a lot less of the storage. It's very easy to restore or copy the snapshots to other locations for disaster recovery. There are a lot of benefits. In terms of the snapshot's rapid restore capability, we were testing the load of performance testing, and we needed to rebuild the DR site. If I need to rebuild the DR for a standby database, it takes sixty terabytes to copy onto the another site, which will take at least a day. Now, the snapshot is easy. We just copy the snapshots, and then we do the cross-region application. The snapshots came along with that, and that's where we were able to build the DR site within a few hours rather than days. All together, instead of a four-day process, instead of a day.

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Stanislaw Mielicki

Solution architect at Netland

Achieve cost-effectiveness with superior performance while needing to address cluster support

I am working with Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct for applications, SQL, and VRS. I am an integrator for this solution The price performance is the best advantage of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct. They introduced the All-Flash array using SSD or NVMe drives without cache drives. It is…

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Since we have NetApp's internally, we use the SnapMirror predominantly for this process in the cloud which is beneficial."

"Using NetApp Files got us out of a really difficult situation quickly, effectively, and at a reasonable cost."

"The most valuable feature is that the sixty-terabyte database snapshot can be done in less than two to three minutes."

"I like the SnapMirror feature in Azure NetApp Files. It helps me create backups with snapshots and makes data recovery and compression."

"Azure NetApp Files has been stable."

"It has saved a lot of time. Because in the older, conventional hardware system, they need to raise a ticket to go to storage engineering, then storage engineering would increased the size. Now, it's dynamic. You don't have to do anything. This improved the time by more than 50 percent."

"The availability is good, meaning downtime or network issues rarely occur. The system also offers flexibility, allowing for increases in data volume, IOPS, and other capabilities without requiring downtime, which is a strong point. Based on the money spent, we can get performance improvements and high availability."

"The critical features of this solution are SnapMirror for replication, data protection, and SnapLock."

More Azure NetApp Files pros

"The main positive impact that Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct has had on my company over the years is increasing performance; our checks show it is three times faster than VMware, making us extremely happy and motivated to keep using it."

"The price performance is the best advantage of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct."

"Its technical support is excellent."

"The most valuable feature is that there is no single point of failure."

"The most valuable feature are the caching capabilities using the storage class memory."

"The flash ability, in terms of tiering and caching, is amazing"

"The performance, reliability, and affordability has been most valuable."

"It's mainly about the storage expansion, like in hyper-converged solutions."

More Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct pros

Cons

"The main hurdle in promoting this solution is the price. Its price definitely requires an improvement. It is more expensive than other options, so customers go for a cheaper option."

"Its pricing can be better."

"The pricing definitely needs to be improved."

"The main area for improvement is in the support ticket system. Since it's a SaaS platform, support tickets are managed by Microsoft or NetApp backend. This can sometimes lead to cross-functional challenges for organizations."

"This solution would be improved with more innovation."

"We would like for the files which are coming in that we can version them. So, if a file is accidentally deleted, there should have a recycle bin option where we can go back, and at least once, clean it up."

"We were looking for a clustered solution that has over-complicated things because we had it in AWS, which is Amazon. There was a solution for clustered NetApp. That meant there would be two NetApps that were not clustered because there was no solution for a cluster. We would like there to be an HA cluster solution."

"The solution needs to improve it's ABS environment."

More Azure NetApp Files cons

"Microsoft closed the shared cluster support, which is important for the solution."

"It is scalable, but only beyond two nodes. If I go for two nodes it's not scalable. I need to build a complete cluster from the beginning if I'm going for two nodes."

"On a scale of one to ten, I would rate the customer service and technical support of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct a three, as there were issues that the Microsoft team could not pinpoint, leading to delays in finding solutions."

"The integration is not difficult because there is no GUI, but we need to use a PowerShell command. This makes it difficult to monitor and to see the components' statuses."

"More optimization could be done in terms of mirroring."

"There is a lot of room for improvement. I would like to have more tools to monitor the function and problems."

"It is difficult to get a hardware compatibility certification for the solution."

"Microsoft closed the shared cluster support, which is important for the solution."

More Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing fees for this solution vary, ranging from a single shelf to a full suite."

"NetApp is a premium offering, so it's not a cheap product, but it is well-priced. It combines a couple of properties which customers like us are willing to pay. Could it be cheaper? Yes, but if you combine fully supported, fully managed, easily provisioned, scalable, and quick all in one product, it's a good selling point. You can ask a lot of money for all these. If you have a use case like we do, it's a perfect match. It's like the Porsche of storage solutions in the cloud. It is totally worth the cost."

"We are currently on a pay-as-you-go model with the storage that we use."

"The price of Azure NetApp Files could be better."

"It is expensive, especially with NetApp Ultra Storage."

"The solution’s combination of the ease of use, simplicity, and reduction in IT management versus the cost has helped a lot. It is very fast to deploy. It's very easy to maintain. You don't have to do a lot in the cloud to maintain this thing, so it gives good performance. It's fast to deploy, easy to maintain, and it gives a better performance. These are the most basic three criteria for any application. This saves cost because the manpower you need to deploy is going down. You're getting better performance and not buying new resources. You have resources available in the cloud. It's just a couple of clicks, then you're good to go."

"This solution is very expensive compared to the alternatives."

"Our pricing has not been determined because we are still waiting on additional features."

More Azure NetApp Files pricing and cost advice

"The solution is expensive."

"Cost-wise the product is one of the more affordable within the category of products."

"With the data center licensing and everything that is connected to that, this solution is relatively costly."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

12%

Retailer

Computer Software Company

16%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	4
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	13

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	7
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	3

Questions from the Community

How does Azure NetApp Files compare to NetApp ONTAP?

Azure NetApp Files is a Microsoft Azure file storage service built on NetApp technology. The platform combines the file capabilities of Azure and NetApp to move critical file-based applications to ...

See all answers

What do you like most about Azure NetApp Files?

The availability is good, meaning downtime or network issues rarely occur. The system also offers flexibility, allowing for increases in data volume, IOPS, and other capabilities without requiring ...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure NetApp Files?

It is expensive, especially with NetApp Ultra Storage.

See all answers

How does VMware vSAN compare with Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct?

We found VMware’s vSAN was easy to set up, configure, and manage compared to other solutions we considered. It is best suited for small- to medium-sized organizations. It is easy to create load bal...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct?

Overall, I find the cost of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct to be affordable for the on-prem Windows pure solution, but I find the Azure Local to be a bit expensive, especially due to hidden costs ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct?

Microsoft should improve the management aspect of Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct, as we have raised multiple recommendations but they often refer us to use Microsoft Arc instead of Windows Admin C...

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Azure File Storage vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 28% of the time

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 25% of the time

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 8% of the time

Nasuni vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 7% of the time

Amazon FSx vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 7% of the time

More Azure NetApp Files Competitors

VMware vSAN vs Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct

Compared 58% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct

Compared 16% of the time

Nutanix Unified Storage (NUS) vs Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct

Compared 8% of the time

StarWind Virtual SAN vs Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct

Compared 6% of the time

DataCore SANsymphony vs Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct

Compared 4% of the time

More Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Azure NetApp Files

September 2025

Download Azure NetApp Files product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct

August 2025

Download Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct product report

Also Known As

NetApp ANF, ANF

MS Storage Spaces Direct

Overview

Azure NetApp Files is designed for unstructured data, virtualized SAP systems, SQL backups, NFS and CIFS protocols, Azure Virtual Desktop storage, and optimizing file share services. It supports high performance and networking integration in Microsoft Azure.

Azure NetApp Files offers features such as SnapMirror for data protection, rapid provisioning, elastic scaling, and ultra-fast SQL backup and restore. It provides a seamless experience with fast snapshotting, high availability, security, and ease of setup. Users benefit from significant performance improvements and the ability to manage substantial workload migrations effortlessly. This service is ideal for environments like Azure Kubernetes Service and cloud EPM platforms, where speed, flexibility, and performance are crucial.

What are the key features?

Flexibility: Adaptable to diverse storage needs.
Rapid response time: Ensures quick data access and operations.
SnapMirror: Provides replication and data protection.
SEC compliance: SnapLock ensures regulatory adherence.
Ultra-fast SQL backup: Quicker backup and restore operations.
Elastic scaling: Easily adjusts resources based on demand.
Fast snapshotting: Enables quick data snapshots.
High availability: Ensures consistent data access.
Security: Robust measures for data protection.

What are the expected benefits and ROI?

Performance: Notable improvement in processing speeds.
Simplicity of setup: Easy deployment and configuration.
Scalable management: Handles significant workload migrations with ease.
Cost efficiency: Allows comparing throughput versus cost effectively.

Azure NetApp Files is implemented in various industries requiring robust file storage solutions, from educational environments where performance boosts are critical to businesses leveraging Azure Kubernetes Service for containerized applications. It supports high-demand environments, optimizing data management and improving efficiency.

NetApp

Storage Spaces Direct uses industry-standard servers with local-attached drives to create highly available, highly scalable software-defined storage at a fraction of the cost of traditional SAN or NAS arrays. Its converged or hyper-converged architecture radically simplifies procurement and deployment, while features like caching, storage tiers, and erasure coding, together with the latest hardware innovation like RDMA networking and NVMe drives, deliver unrivaled efficiency and performance.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

SAP, Restaurant Magic

Acuutech, Quest Technology Management, Bradley, Mead & Hunt

Find out what your peers are saying about NetApp, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Nasuni and others in Cloud Migration. Updated: August 2025.

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