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Cisco Enterprise Routers vs Juniper MX Series Routers comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 15, 2025

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
6.7
Number of Reviews
102
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Juniper MX Series Routers
Ranking in Routers
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
33
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Routers category, the mindshare of Cisco Enterprise Routers is 19.5%, down from 25.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Juniper MX Series Routers is 13.0%, up from 11.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Routers
 

Featured Reviews

Hafiz Umar Farooq - PeerSpot reviewer
Allows us to configure NAS through Cisco activities and to create GRE channels with different sites
You cannot configure internet policies or other options on Cisco routers. If you have a very limited budget, you can't afford two different pieces of equipment, and you can't afford yearly licensing. I would like Cisco to launch a small business router that has firewall capabilities as well. It would be a great initiative for small businesses. I would like to see two additional features: a remote access VPN with the MFA, multifactor authentication capabilities. At the moment, the ISR series only supports MFA, but not every company likes to use that tool. I think Cisco needs to consider MFA for the remote access VPN and should incorporate other MFA solutions as well. I would also like there to be some firewall features included in the routers. I'm not talking about a full-fledged firewall feature, but a limited set of features that can be used on the small and medium-sized enterprise level. These two features would be a great initiative. I would also like to recommend the licensing feature. Previously, the Cisco licensing model was either a perpetual or annual smart license. Now, Cisco has totally shifted over to the smart licensing feature, and perpetual licenses are about to be eliminated from Cisco. The licensing feature is a bit costly if we compare it to other vendors. The licensing features of the F5 are perpetual, but the support has periodic renewal. The license to use Cisco features like a firewall or the routers are actually yearly based and not perpetual. The lead times are extremely high. Normally, it's six to eight months initially, and they prolong it to up to one year for new device delivery by Cisco. If you say you need a brand new router, switch, or fiber from Cisco within one month, you will never get it, unless some stock is readily available with your vendor. Otherwise, it will initially take six to eight months, and then that will be prolonged to one year. This is what we're experiencing with our clients right now.
Kushtrim Arifi - PeerSpot reviewer
Highly scalable, especially suitable for complex and large-scale network deployments
The "Commit" feature stands out. When you try to commit commands, you have some options like sandbox config, leaving those temporary for 60 seconds. This feature allows you to commit configuration changes to the candidate configuration, and then review them for errors before committing them to the active configuration. Another feature that I like is the integration with Cisco routers. This allows you to connect Juniper MX routers to Cisco routers and have them work together seamlessly. We never have interoperability issues.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The VPN is the most valuable feature of this solution. The basic clients who don't use the VPN use it mostly for connectivity."
"The most valuable feature is the flexibility of the devices. Also, from a feature perspective, Cisco Enterprise Routers are complete."
"I am satisfied with the tool overall. Although I haven't used all of its features yet, it's been great for providing internet access to both customers, and employees within the company."
"Cisco Enterprise Routers are easy to use and configure through the CLI."
"The solution has great performance."
"The valuable feature is CLI."
"Provides good capabilities and performance."
"We achieve good performance in our data center."
"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."
"Juniper Enterprise Routers has a CLR and it's more reliable and faster than others."
"The solution is quite stable. We've found it to be very good. There aren't bugs, glitches, or crashes."
"The most valuable feature of Juniper MX Series Routers is its exceptional policy management capabilities."
"I think that the extensions are very valuable. The way you can test the configuration before applying that configuration permanently is very helpful. The rollback configuration is also very useful."
"It is a very stable product."
"The full Internet DGP is a valuable feature."
 

Cons

"An area of improvement would be the way the licenses are managed because, at the moment, you pay for a license for each router as opposed to paying a once-off cost."
"I think that it would be better if they can create menus and instructions in the Ukrainian language."
"The solution needs to offer some security features in a future release."
"If Cisco can give you one license and allow you to use all the features, that would be the best thing. We are using it only as a voice gateway, and there are other options available, but we need to procure licenses to use those options. We can use it as a security device, or we can use it for connecting the LAN side, but for that, we need all those licenses. They can provide one license and allow you to use all the features. This is my recommendation for Cisco."
"The overall price of Cisco Enterprise Routers should be reduced, it is expensive."
"Over time things have changed where Cisco has not invested in improving the orchestration and simplifying it for people who do not want to get into the details. Cisco has not gone into that focus."
"I would like it if Cisco Routers had a longer lifecycle. That's what we need. We don't want to renew or implement a new model. One model should be available for at least five years. This seems impossible nowadays."
"The only other thing we struggled with from time to time is when we were configuring access points through a controller."
"In terms of improvement, I would like for it to effectively protect against the broadcast storms, multicast storms, and DDoS attacks."
"Better documentation to assist with implementation would be helpful."
"There are areas for improvement in Juniper EX Series Ethernet Switches. One aspect that could be enhanced is the pricing; many clients acknowledge the quality of Juniper switches but find the pricing challenging, especially when compared to competitors like Huawei. Additionally, from a feature perspective, there's a desire for improved clarity and ease of configuration in Juniper switches. Some users find it difficult to understand and configure certain aspects, necessitating the use of external tools. This complexity, especially for Internet service providers, can be a barrier. Addressing these concerns could further strengthen the position of Juniper switches in the market."
"Finding market expertise is hard."
"The documentation needs to be updated to reflect the changes made in the latest update."
"Automation can also be improved."
"The pricing is a bit too high."
"The integration could be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If it could be cheaper that would be good, but I would rate it as a four out of five for price, with one being very expensive and five being very affordable."
"For a boost performance license, the cost is $2,000 to $2,500. There is an additional cost for more scalability."
"The price of this solution is high."
"There is a license required for the use of this solution."
"The price is reasonable."
"If Cisco Enterprise Routers could be less expensive it would be better. In Turkey, clients prefer cheap solutions, but working solutions."
"There is no licensing cost."
"It is a costly solution."
"An additional license can be purchased for support of a next-generation firewall."
"The pricing of Juniper MX Series Routers is okay compared to other technologies."
"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."
"$300 to $400 is the hardware cost and for licensing cost, it may be around, for support and all, $100 per year."
"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."
"I would rate the pricing model a seven out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. It is not cheap."
"The solution is more expensive compared to other solutions."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
7%
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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?
I rate the product's price a six on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price and ten is high price.
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?
Currently, I don't have specific concerns or ideas for improvement. Regarding functionalities, I appreciate the user interface of Juniper Elite. Additionally, I'm exploring the use of Juniper Route...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Juniper Enterprise Routers, MX Series
 

Overview

 

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
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Enterprise Routers vs. Juniper MX Series Routers and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
860,825 professionals have used our research since 2012.