Cisco Enterprise Routers vs Juniper MX Series Routers comparison

Cisco Enterprise Routers vs. Juniper MX Series Routers

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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

Cisco Enterprise Routers

Ranking in Routers

2nd

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.0

Number of Reviews

110

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Juniper MX Series Routers

Ranking in Routers

3rd

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Carrier Grade Network Address Translation (CGNAT) (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the Routers category, the mindshare of Cisco Enterprise Routers is 17.2%, down from 23.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Juniper MX Series Routers is 13.4%, up from 12.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Routers Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Cisco Enterprise Routers	17.2%
Juniper MX Series Routers	13.4%
Other	69.4%

Routers

Featured Reviews

reviewer2759889

Pre-Sales Technical Specialist at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees

Has supported robust enterprise deployments and management while pricing and market reach for advanced features need attention

I'm not sure what improvements could be made on the configuration scale since I'm not involved in complete configuration. Currently, it works effectively and they are incorporating AI adoption. Commercially and financially, the pricing is too high. Customers feel that Cisco Enterprise Routers will not offer the most competitive prices. If they can work on pricing, it would be easier for customers who are considering local products. In India, the government has implemented the Make in India initiative, and Cisco has established a manufacturing unit there. Regarding security products, they need to improve market reach, marketing, and training. While Cisco Enterprise Routers are user-friendly for network and wireless platforms, security product configuration and integration are considered complex compared to FortiGate, Check Point, Sophos, and Palo Alto. They have introduced solutions such as Cloud Defense Orchestrator and Firewall Manager (FMC), but the reach of Cisco security products in India needs improvement.

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Patrick Anaku

Senior Network Engineer at Roke Telkom

Performance excels with reliable uptime and robust features

The best features of Juniper MX Series Routers include their performance, which is quite good for us in terms of hardware performance. The Junos OS, the software, is stable, and we don't have many issues with the Juniper system itself. They have numerous features that allow us to deliver services, be it Layer 2 connectivity to customers, Layer 3 connectivity, data center connectivity, or even security features. Hardware performance has been a top-notch reason why we chose Juniper in the beginning, especially the MX series, which performs well in terms of network uptime and we don't encounter many failures. We have had a bad experience here and there with the ACX series, and their network performance is not so great compared to MX, so we have mostly done away with the ACX and only use MX at some of the core sites. I have seen a return on investment from the solution. Initially, we deployed MX80s on the network, and since our company has been in operation since 2006, from that point we used MX80s until around 2016 when we upgraded most of them to MX204s. From our experience, once we buy an MX204, we don't have issues with it; we have never had to replace an MX204 on the network. Once we deploy it, it works until we decide to upgrade the capacity. The return on investment is significant, as once we buy it, we have no worries about performance.

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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

"The stability is very good."

"Our customers have seen return on investment and value for money since implementing Cisco Enterprise Routers, and they have been using Cisco equipment for a long period and continue to return to Cisco for replacement technologies and everything else, so they are happy with Cisco equipment."

"I extensively used site-to-site VPNs, access control, etc., linking remote sites to the central location to create a highly distributed organization."

"Cisco Routers are quite robust. They don't malfunction, and we've had no complaints so far."

"I think Cisco Enterprise Routers are excellent."

"Cisco Enterprise Routers are simple. Everything is in a proper manner. You don't need to upgrade or do other things on a daily basis. Cisco sends you the updates, and they are automatically updated. They are good."

"We achieve good performance in our data center."

"Cisco Enterprise Routers is reliable and secure."

More Cisco Enterprise Routers pros

"It offers high protection and I like it."

"The flexibility of the MPLS configuration is very good."

"It's one of the more stable routers."

"Juniper Enterprise Routers is very flexible."

"We are able to easily build chassis with Juniper MX Series Routers."

"Juniper's custom Trio chipset drives their MX routers, offering superior performance. Juniper's design separates the control plane and the forwarding plane, which is a key aspect of their architecture. This separation provides high throughput, maintaining line-rate performance across the MX platform."

"I would say it is very user-friendly."

"The most valuable feature is the standard routing protocol."

More Juniper MX Series Routers pros

Cons

"Cisco has a lot of problems with the graphical interfaces used for management."

"Commercially and financially, the pricing is too high. Customers feel that Cisco Enterprise Routers will not offer the most competitive prices."

"I cannot assess the high-performance bandwidth of Cisco Enterprise Routers without knowing the purpose of the call."

"Depending on the customer, the initial setup could be complex."

"Cisco has acquired other companies, and due to this, there are many API-based integrations. There should be one platform that will enable a smooth integration. For example, Cisco acquired ThousandEyes, AppDynamics and Viptela. These are ideal solutions for big companies in terms of WAN connectivity. Cisco needs to ensure that there is a smooth integration mechanism in order to ease this process or point of integration."

"I would like to see the setup time reduced."

"The solution could improve by having multiple features inclusive of the router, such as a free firewall and VPN. Additionally, it should be a generic box that can act as a router, firewall, and switch."

"Cisco is not granular if we compare it to Juniper."

More Cisco Enterprise Routers cons

"One thing that the product can do better is clustering. Rather than just having two of them, it would help if there was one cluster to extend to more notes in the cluster itself."

"The web interface can be improved."

"The price of this solution should be improved."

"The initial setup is not easy."

"Juniper Enterprise Routers could improve by adding a graphical user interface(GUI). They do not have one. Most of our team has to have a background or expertise in Juniper. When compared to other solutions, they have a GUI. It will be easier for new team members to get familiar with, configure, or set up the router. Additionally, adding some monitoring tools would help us."

"While it is challenging to pinpoint specific areas for enhancement, there is room for better support and updates for Ansible."

"We'd like them to be capable of adding firewall options to the license."

"We'd appreciate it if they had a better GUI. It would be more flexible for the customers that way."

More Juniper MX Series Routers cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of this solution is high."

"Cisco Switches are an expensive product in India. Linksys products are cheaper than Cisco Switches."

"Our issues are basically currency related. The licensing is in dollars and the dollar is steadily rising. We've had an increase in the licensing fee due to the simple reason that the exchange rate is almost over 40%. That creates a major issue. If the currency devaluation doesn't stabilize, we may have to look at another solution."

"Cisco routers are an expensive product."

"The licensing fee is okay and matches industry standards, which is the benchmark."

"It's not a fair price, it's a bit too high."

"The cost of this solution is very low compared to other products."

"Cisco routers are very pricey."

More Cisco Enterprise Routers pricing and cost advice

"An additional license can be purchased for support of a next-generation firewall."

"I would rate the pricing model a seven out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. It is not cheap."

"The prices for Juniper MX Series Routers are reasonable."

"The price of this solution is better than other competitors, such as Cisco. We receive a lot of discounts which make the price less expensive and attractive."

"There is a license for this solution and the price is very competitive. The cost is less expensive than some competitors, such as Cisco. There are additional costs for support licenses."

"The solution is more expensive compared to other solutions."

"The pricing of Juniper MX Series Routers is okay compared to other technologies."

"$300 to $400 is the hardware cost and for licensing cost, it may be around, for support and all, $100 per year."

More Juniper MX Series Routers pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Performing Arts

Comms Service Provider

Computer Software Company

University

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	46
Midsize Enterprise	24
Large Enterprise	43

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	19
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	8

Questions from the Community

How do Cisco Enterprise routers compare with Mikrotik routers and switches?

Cisco Enterprise Routers are very stable and easy to use. They offer a very solid performance and are very secure. They also have a very good, long lifespan. We feel the command configuration is ve...

What do you like most about Cisco Enterprise Routers?

The most valuable feature of the solution is that it makes it possible for users to use encryption and decryption since our company aims to achieve transparency, and without it, the other system on...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Enterprise Routers?

It is expensive, but I am not the person purchasing the products; I just handle the configuration.

What do you like most about Juniper MX Series Routers?

For the Juniper MX Series Routers, it plays a crucial role in our network. They offer numerous features, enabling multiple connections and handling various reports. The routers efficiently manage ...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Juniper MX Series Routers?

I would rate it around a three. While I'm not deeply involved in pricing discussions, I believe it is comparatively more affordable than Cisco.

What needs improvement with Juniper MX Series Routers?

The areas of Juniper MX Series Routers that have room for improvement include the port count; for instance, the MX204 has only four 40G or 100G ports, which is quite limited. While I know there are...

MikroTik Routers and Switches vs Cisco Enterprise Routers

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Compared 24% of the time

MikroTik Routers and Switches vs Juniper MX Series Routers

Compared 17% of the time

Huawei Enterprise Routers vs Juniper MX Series Routers

Compared 15% of the time

A10 Networks Thunder CGN vs Juniper MX Series Routers

Compared 12% of the time

MikroTik Cloud Router Switch vs Juniper MX Series Routers

Compared 6% of the time

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Product Reports

Cisco Enterprise Routers

Download Cisco Enterprise Routers product report

Juniper MX Series Routers

Download Juniper MX Series Routers product report

Also Known As

No data available

Juniper Enterprise Routers, MX Series, Junos Address Aware

Overview

The high-performance Cisco Enterprise Routers are the market leader due to their breadth of advanced support for LAN/WAN services, redundancy, reliability, and performance.

Cisco

Juniper MX Series Routers are designed for high throughput with flexible MPLS configuration and robust policy management, offering reliability and scalability for enterprise needs. They feature seamless Cisco integration, strong performance driven by the Trio chipset, and user-friendly management.

Known for their exceptional performance, Juniper MX Series Routers enable enterprises and ISPs to expand network connectivity and efficiency. Their reliable hardware supports tasks like border routing and internet connectivity, catering to high-performance networking and automation. Trio chipset technology ensures stability, while interchangeable line cards maintain top-level performance. These routers are favored for their easy configuration and robust support, though improvements in pricing, VPN compatibility, and stronger DDoS protection are needed. Users seek additional cloud integration, enhanced security features, and expanded port options on models like the MX204.

What are the key features of Juniper MX Series Routers?

High Throughput: Ensures fast and efficient network data transfer.
Flexible MPLS Configuration: Adapts seamlessly to varied network environments.
Robust Policy Management: Provides extensive control over network traffic policies.
Seamless Cisco Integration: Simplifies operations for mixed equipment environments.
Trio Chipset Technology: Boosts performance and ensures network stability.
User-Friendly Interface: Facilitates easy configuration and management.

What benefits should users evaluate?

Scalability: Supports growing network needs without compromising performance.
Reliability: Offers consistent and dependable network operations.
Support and Documentation: Access to comprehensive resources for efficient management.
Performance: Maintains high levels of throughput and stability for enterprise needs.
Automation Support: Streamlines network operations for greater efficiency.

In industries like telecommunications and data centers, Juniper MX Series Routers are widely implemented to manage complex networking tasks such as VPNs, MPLS, and BGP deployments. Service providers often rely on these routers for backbone roles, benefitting from their performance and scalability to maintain robust and efficient network infrastructures.

Juniper

Sample Customers

Aegean Motorway, Boingo, Chartwell School, Children's Hospital of Orange County , Department of Justice, Explorer Pipeline, Linz AG, National Rugby League, New South Wales Rural Fire Service, Telecom Italia, Transwestern

AARNet Pty Ltd, Allegro Networks, Atlantech Online, Availity, Baloise Insurance, Black Lotus, CATV, Blue Box

Cisco Enterprise Routers vs. Juniper MX Series Routers