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Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 9, 2026

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
2.3
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN offers cost-effective features appealing to businesses, with varying ROI based on usage and initial costs.
Sentiment score
3.7
Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points offer high uptime, reduced costs, and long-term value, despite challenging ROI quantification.
The maintenance windows are very low because that essentially translates to uptimes.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Firmware updates can be performed from the controller, making the process straightforward and quite easy.
Network Architect at INT Inc.
After deployment, we do not hear complaints about people not having access to needed resources.
Systems & Network Administrator At Tropical Financial Credit Union at a media company with 201-500 employees
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
5.2
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN support is generally reliable, though users experience mixed accessibility and response times, prompting improvement calls.
Sentiment score
7.2
Cisco's Wireless 9100 Access Point support is praised for speed and effectiveness, despite RMA challenges and Cisco ID issues.
I would rate Cisco support a 10, as the response time and process via the dashboard are easy, and response times are always within the SLA.
Independent Information Technology and Services Professional at a non-profit with 1-10 employees
It would be better if the SLA of technical support was less than four hours.
Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk
There are some problems with their technical support when it comes to the whole Meraki system.
Senior Network Architect at Previder
On a scale of one to ten, that would definitely be a ten for the tech support.
Architect at ReBIT
On a scale of one to ten, I would rate Cisco's technical support a solid ten out of ten due to their quick response and assistance.
Network Administrator at cmc
I believe Cisco offers one of the best support teams available.
Chief Technology Officer at Future Point Technologies
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
4.9
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN provides scalable solutions for diverse needs but may face challenges due to licensing and cost considerations.
Sentiment score
8.0
Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points offer high scalability, efficient management, and compatibility for seamless network expansion and deployment.
I can add devices to my inventory and assign them to a new network, and it is for the most part automated and fairly quick.
Senior Network at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Meraki is not scalable enough since it straightforwardly maps its products to segmented specifications.
Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk
The good thing is that the functionality of the controller is the same whether you have five APs or 500.
Lead Engineer I (Network Manager) at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
You just spin up any number of wireless controllers, and you can control any number without limit of access points globally.
Senior Systems Engineer at a wholesaler/distributor with 51-200 employees
There will be bandwidth deterioration, and 100 clients using the same bandwidth will impact the quality of service.
Principal Associate IT at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
5.1
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is stable and reliable, handling high loads well, with minor issues during updates or peak hours.
Sentiment score
8.4
Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points offer stable, reliable performance with minimal downtime and consistently improve with regular updates.
Stability is not an issue for me because it comes with Cisco's proven manufacturer quality.
Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk
We have experienced many instances where we have experienced a lag in our network, and I am not sure if it is due to their devices or our network.
Manager, Information Technology at a performing arts with 11-50 employees
The campus network requires stable versions for all equipment to function properly.
Security Network Architect at novonordisc
The overall performance, coverage, and signal quality are good.
Network Team Lead at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
I have never had any stability issues with the WLAN controller.
Network Engineer at Information Technology University
 

Room For Improvement

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN faces challenges with licensing costs, technical support, scalability, security, integration, and performance improvements.
User interface, pricing, installation, and power issues hinder efficiency, despite strong support; improvements are recommended in AI and management.
The most important improvement needed is to eliminate the limitation of uplinks.
Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk
Some of the newer models of the Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN access point have encompassed the new wireless protocols and increased the strength of their antennas.
Manager, Information Technology at a performing arts with 11-50 employees
The solution supports Wi-Fi 6.
Senior Network Architect at Previder
When we ran a drill to quantify the time it takes for resolution, especially for bug fixes, it was less than one and a half to two days, which is quite impressive, especially for bugs that were not discovered earlier and the kind of recommendations offered.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
We can take advantage of these APs where there are no controllers available on-site.
Network Architecture at Softel Consulting
The traffic analyzer is something which is quite useful.
Network Design at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Setup Cost

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN offers high-quality features but is considered expensive, with licensing costs being a significant concern.
Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points offer high reliability and support, justifying their cost for demanding enterprise environments.
The pricing of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is not competitive enough for the SMB market compared to other brands.
Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is on par with other devices in that category, offering competitive pricing.
Manager, Information Technology at a performing arts with 11-50 employees
My experience with the pricing of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is that it is competitive with other providers offering paid subscriptions.
Independent Information Technology and Services Professional at a non-profit with 1-10 employees
If I compare that with Aruba, it is certainly at least 1.5 times more expensive.
Principle Cloud Architect at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Even compared to competitors, the pricing is similar, and there is value in paying for these access points.
Enterprise Account Manager at Ahlan Cyber
If you don't have numbers or substantial data for negotiations, the price will remain high.
Engineer Production at Universidade de Aveiro
 

Valuable Features

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN excels in ease of deployment, cloud management, robust security, remote management, and user-friendly interface.
Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points offer enhanced security, connectivity, and performance with advanced Wi-Fi technologies and seamless management.
It also manages security clients and switches, providing a single dashboard to manage multiple network infrastructures.
Sr. Officer Network Managed Service Product Management at PT. Indosat Tbk
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN has helped optimize network traffic very effectively, as we do prioritization for streaming and web conferencing apps, resulting in a clear, visible improvement in performance.
Independent Information Technology and Services Professional at a non-profit with 1-10 employees
When I am troubleshooting wireless connections, I have access to detailed client statistics regarding disconnects, RF channel information, and other relevant data.
Senior Network at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
DNA is a tool to manage all the devices in the same network, and the DNA center, which we call DNAC, automates a lot of things through this solution to push the configuration on different devices including switches, access points, WLCs, routers, and firewalls.
Security Network Architect at novonordisc
The assurance data provides visibility and highlights the issues that a particular user or particular network node is facing.
Solution Architect at Velocis Systems
You're not buying a home access point, so it has to support 200 users per access point along with a unifying controller.
Lead Engineer I (Network Manager) at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN
Ranking in Wireless LAN
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
4.7
Number of Reviews
123
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Cisco Wireless 9100 Access ...
Ranking in Wireless LAN
5th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2847906 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Network at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Wireless management has become efficient with rich client visibility for troubleshooting
In terms of specific challenges with hybrid environments, I face no issues. I assess the operational efficiency of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN in my IT environment as pretty efficient for the most part. I would rate it at approximately 80%. I have had some issues with the dashboard itself and as far as switch management goes, but that is not necessarily on the wireless side of things. The wireless side has been quite good. Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN optimizes the experience in a hybrid or distributed enterprise setup. My impression of the end-to-end visibility offered by Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is that it is quite good. I function as an admin. What stood out to make me choose Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is that I already leverage many products with Cisco. I have Catalyst switching, ACI infrastructure, and use them for my core and edge routers. I would give this review an overall rating of 8 out of 10.
Julian Bendix - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Systems Engineer at a wholesaler/distributor with 51-200 employees
Enterprise wireless has unified teams and has simplified global deployment and security
One thing I appreciate the most about Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points is that something absolutely stands out, especially about Cisco Wireless, which has made a huge impact on me personally, even though I have been a mentor in my company for a long time. The best thing about Cisco, which I experienced over 10 years, is that everybody knows it and everybody knows how to use it. If you look especially at the new series of Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points and their controllers, Cisco unified the GUI of the wireless controller with all their other GUIs that they have. They call it Magnetic UI, which they use nowadays on all their GUIs. Talent acquisition is just so easy because everybody in the IT networking field worked with any product of Cisco in their life, and all Cisco products fit so well together in an ecosystem and also have a very similar UI and are very easy to engage if you worked with anything from Cisco before. In my opinion, you save a lot on talent acquisition and also training people. Compared to other vendors I have worked with, you do not easily find people that have worked with their products or are experts in them. But especially with Cisco, there are so many people that have worked with it in the past, and you always have people that can implement, operate, and manage it. That is, in my case, the coolest thing about it. Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points has helped me to improve the interaction between my network, data center, and application teams. Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points can handle high-density environments with Wi-Fi 6, 6E, and 7. I have sold and operated Cisco Wireless in production areas and outdoor areas for automatic moving. I have a lot of high-ceiling models in use for logistics halls, for production environments with high ceilings and everything. Honestly, that is where they shine. They have some really cool models. The product variety is really great. For each and every use case, you can find a very specific model that does exactly what you want. I have a lot of the high-ceiling models in use which cover high-density areas where the clients are sometimes shielded, sometimes moving, sometimes moving very fast, and all those kinds of things. I am very happy with these environments with Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
17%
Outsourcing Company
15%
Marketing Services Firm
10%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business69
Midsize Enterprise27
Large Enterprise33
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business13
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise19
 

Questions from the Community

What are pros and cons of Aruba 515 Series AP vs. Cisco Meraki or Extreme Networks?
Depends. I have personally used both Cisco and Aruba so I am familiar with them. Extreme I am not, so unless they have some feature that I need or want, I wouldn't consider them. Do you have expe...
Which is better - Cisco Wireless or Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN?
Cisco Wireless is very robust, very rugged, and can handle indoor and outdoor coverage extremely well. We found it to be very reliable and to consistently run very efficiently. Cisco Wireless helpe...
How does Ruckus Wireless compare to Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN?
Cisco’s Meraki Virtual MX is a virtual instance of the Meraki SD-WAN appliance. We liked the Meraki. The Wifi APs are a great feature. The dashboard is a simple interface and easy to learn. It feat...
What needs improvement with Catalyst 9100 Access Points?
I want to diagnose and troubleshoot these issues with Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points, but in the end, I restart the AP and access point, and then the session timeout expires. The new user then c...
What is your primary use case for Catalyst 9100 Access Points?
My usual use cases for Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points include shutting down the respective AP, restarting it, and performing a hard restart. I use it for restarting, specifically to power on and...
What advice do you have for others considering Catalyst 9100 Access Points?
I use it as an end user. I like that, as a whole, the controller of Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points is performing much better, although there are connectivity issues at the AP end. Specific APs d...
 

Also Known As

MR18, MR26, MR32, MR34, MR66, MR72, Meraki Wireless LAN, Meraki WLAN
Catalyst 9100 Access Points
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Advanced Medical Transport, Banco de Guayaquil, Baylor Scott & White Health, BH Telecom, Bowling Green State University, Calligaris, Children's Hospital Colorado, City of Biel, Del Papa Distributing, Department of Justice, Dimension Data, Dualtec Cloud Builders, Electricity Authority of Cyprus, Grupo Industrial Saltillo (GIS), Hertz, K&L Gates , LightEdge, Lone Star College System, Management Science Associates, Mindtree, NBC Olympics, Quest, Sony Corporation, The Department of Education in Western Australia, Valley Proteins
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. Cisco Wireless 9100 Access Points and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
909,725 professionals have used our research since 2012.