Cisco Nexus vs Dell PowerSwitch N-Series comparison

Cisco and Dell Technologies are both solutions in the LAN Switching category. Cisco is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.6, while Dell Technologies is ranked #12. Cisco holds a 8.9% mindshare in LS, compared to Dell Technologies’s 3.6% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of Cisco users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 50% of Dell Technologies users who would recommend it.

Cisco Nexus

Read 105 Cisco Nexus reviews

1,564 Views
1,090 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

Dell PowerSwitch N-Series

Read 2 Dell PowerSwitch N-Series reviews

249 Views
194 Comparison Views

50% willing to recommend

Cisco Nexus

Dell PowerSwitch N-Series

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 2025

Dell PowerSwitch N-Series and Cisco Nexus compete in the networking hardware sector. Dell PowerSwitch N-Series provides competitive pricing and reliable customer support, while Cisco Nexus offers advanced features, making each appealing based on user priorities.

Features: Dell PowerSwitch N-Series provides robust scalability, energy efficiency, and seamless integration with third-party products. Cisco Nexus offers high-performance capabilities, advanced security features, and extensive support for virtualization.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Dell PowerSwitch N-Series is noted for its straightforward deployment and responsive support team, ensuring a smoother installation process. Cisco Nexus, with its more complex setup, benefits from comprehensive documentation and advanced support, aiding large-scale deployments.

Pricing and ROI: Dell PowerSwitch N-Series is preferred for its lower initial setup costs and effective ROI, appealing to budget-conscious buyers. Cisco Nexus requires a larger upfront investment but delivers long-term value through high performance and innovative features.

To learn more, read our detailed Cisco Nexus vs. Dell PowerSwitch N-Series Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Nexus vs. Dell PowerSwitch N-Series

April 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 849,686 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

Cisco Nexus

Ranking in LAN Switching

3rd

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.6

Number of Reviews

105

Ranking in other categories

Data Center Networking (3rd)

Dell PowerSwitch N-Series

Ranking in LAN Switching

12th

Average Rating

6.6

Reviews Sentiment

5.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the LAN Switching category, the mindshare of Cisco Nexus is 8.9%, down from 11.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell PowerSwitch N-Series is 3.6%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

LAN Switching

Featured Reviews

Joe Benítez

Systems Engineer at GAD Municipal de Guayaquil

Offer high performance capabilities and enables efficient data transmission and processing

Before Nexus, I used to have Catalyst 6500 switches. Those 6500 series chassis gave us a lot of problems. Too many problems, actually. And we had a Cisco ASA firewall blade within those chassis. And they were running outdated software. So, in fact, it was the firewall blade that caused us too many problems instead of the chassis. The chassis itself was working well and performing fine, but the firewall card was not suitable for our needs. That was one aspect. Additionally, those chassis had been in operation for more than five years. As we are a local government, we have a policy to renew hardware every five years. That's because we need to maintain all the hardware and software in the latest versions and keep up with the technology lifecycle of the technology we use.

Read full review

Al Vasek

Executive Business Development Manager, Cloud and Managed Services at Presidio Networked Solutions

Performs well, but the support and stability could be improved

There is a lack of support because there is a lack of adoption. Because Cisco switches are so widely used, anyone in the world can support them. It was two Cisco engineers who released Arista's code. In terms of programming functionality, they essentially duplicated the Cisco iOS, so all Cisco commands work on the Arista commands. You can do an Arista if you can do a Cisco. Aruba isn't all that different. It's a little different, but they have all of HPE's money and stuff behind it and things like that. I would say the same thing about Extreme or some of the other switches where it's penny-wise, pound-foolish. You save some money if you are a small shop with only one or two guys, it's understandable. Fortinet is now in the switch business, and they have their FortiSwitch devices, which are controlled by the FortiGate firewalls to do all of the programs. There is a lot to choose from. But, in my opinion, a lot of it is dependent on the use case and the customer type. Meraki is a nice little Cisco product for the right kind of business, but I wouldn't use it in an enterprise setting.

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

"The scalability of Cisco Nexus is good. We've had them for the entire lifetime. We've never had to upgrade them yet."

"It is a scalable, reliable, stable and efficient solution."

"The most valuable features are the access layer security, OpenConfig, and OpenFlow."

"This solution has saved us both time and money because we now have the ability to control all of these telephony devices that are deployed nationwide."

"The most valuable feature is the automation that we can do with it."

"It's easy to use, and the performance is great."

"It speeds up the network data transfer time."

"Cisco Nexus has good overall reliability and configuration options. It is fairly straightforward to access the switching platforms."

More Cisco Nexus pros

"For a customer, it is easy to configure and to add ports through the LAN the GUI."

"Port density and port speed performance are both suitable. It has some appealing intangibles."

Cons

"We lag on the configuration. The changes make a difference in troubleshooting."

"The initial setup was pretty complex, mostly because of our environment, having to do multi-context. That's where you have a lot of different logical routes that are in one physical device, and it can get kind of complex trying to think about how to set all that up. You really have to whiteboard it out a lot."

"The initial setup wasn't simple or user-friendly."

"If we could get some more automation integrated into it, it would make it easier."

"The installation process lasted too long, taking 16 to 24 hours for full completion."

"The GUI interface could be improved to make it more user friendly."

"The initial setup is always complex."

"The flexibility and configuration could be better."

More Cisco Nexus cons

"Customers do not prefer this to connect to multiple cities."

"Instead of competing at the enterprise level with that product, they should probably scale it. With all of the ports, they should develop a good mid-level business to truly scale it and gain adoption before attempting to go after the enterprise."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is very expensive. Its licensing is on a yearly basis."

"We have a three-year subscription for our licensing fees."

"Our licensing fees are approximately $2,000 USD per year."

"The solution is expensive."

"Cisco Nexus is not cheap compared to Fortinet, Palo Alto, and Check Point."

"Our licensing costs for this solution are approximately $100K a year for the switching part."

"We consider Juniper switches to be more affordable."

"The licensing fees for this solution are approximately $800,000 USD annually."

More Cisco Nexus pricing and cost advice

"You are selling it to larger customers and in larger environments, where it's a less expensive model than Cisco, which is attempting to use the same approach Arista did, but with a completely different programming language."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which LAN Switching solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

24%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

24%

Comms Service Provider

13%

University

Educational Organization

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco Nexus?

The product's initial setup phase is very easy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Nexus?

The price of Cisco Nexus is on the higher side due to the premium services Cisco offers. Despite the cost, it offers valuable features and services.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Cisco Nexus?

When I talk about data centers, which are critical infrastructure and centralized application hubs, the Nexus platforms should be highly stable. Initially, the codes I received through ACI were qui...

See all answers

Ask a question

Earn 20 points

Comparisons

Juniper QFX Series Switches vs Cisco Nexus

Compared 44% of the time

Arista Networks Platform vs Cisco Nexus

Compared 20% of the time

Cisco Catalyst Switches vs Cisco Nexus

Compared 11% of the time

ExtremeSwitching vs Cisco Nexus

Compared 5% of the time

Alcatel-Lucent OmniSwitch LAN Switches vs Cisco Nexus

Compared 3% of the time

More Cisco Nexus Competitors

Cisco Catalyst Switches vs Dell PowerSwitch N-Series

Compared 69% of the time

More Dell PowerSwitch N-Series Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Nexus

April 2025

Download Cisco Nexus product report

Buyer's Guide

LAN Switching

March 2025

Download Dell PowerSwitch N-Series product report

Overview

The Cisco Nexus family of switches is designed to meet the stringent requirements of the next-generation data center. Not simply bigger or faster, these switches offer the following characteristics: infrastructure that can be scaled cost-effectively and that helps you increase energy, budget, and resource efficiency, transport that can navigate the transition to 10 Gigabit Ethernet and unified fabric and can also handle architectural changes such as virtualization, Web 2.0 applications, and cloud computing and operational continuity to meet your need for an environment where system availability is assumed and maintenance windows are rare if not totally extinct.

Cisco

Dell PowerSwitch N-Series bring users efficient connections to the network with highly functional access and aggregation switching. Products consist of: Dell EMC Networking N1100 Series, Dell Networking N1500 Switches, Dell Networking N2000 Series, Dell Networking N3000 Series and Dell Networking N4000 Series.

Dell Technologies

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

Norwich University of the Arts, Shelby American, City and Islington College

Buyer's Guide

Cisco Nexus vs. Dell PowerSwitch N-Series

April 2025

Free Report: Cisco Nexus vs. Dell PowerSwitch N-Series

Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Nexus vs. Dell PowerSwitch N-Series and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our Cisco Nexus vs. Dell PowerSwitch N-Series report.

See our list of best LAN Switching vendors.

We monitor all LAN Switching 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.