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DDN EXA5 vs Nasuni comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

DDN EXA5
Ranking in File System Software
7th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Nasuni
Ranking in File System Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
36
Ranking in other categories
NAS (13th), Cloud Migration (8th), Cloud Storage (14th), Cloud Backup (30th), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (19th), Cloud Storage Gateways (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the File System Software category, the mindshare of DDN EXA5 is 3.8%, up from 2.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Nasuni is 16.3%, down from 24.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
File System Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Nasuni16.3%
DDN EXA53.8%
Other79.9%
File System Software
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2544219 - PeerSpot reviewer
Chief Architect at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Enhancing AI cluster training with reliable performance and good customer service
This is for AI training cluster. The customer is using DDN as a default de facto standard for their AI cluster DDN is one of the storages actually supporting by NVIDIA Superport. The customer is using NVIDIA Superport, which helps in terms of scalability. The DDN Exascaler uses a parallel file…
SD
Infrastructure Architect at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees
Cloud data management that achieves cost efficiency with advanced data protection features
I am currently using Nasuni for seismic data. We have a huge data size, and we want to reduce costs. Nasuni acts as a caching solution, so we put some data into the cache, and the rest goes to the blob, which helps us save on costs. We use it for applications like Petrol and Tech Log, where 3D…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The performance is outstanding, and customers are very happy with it."
"The DDN Exascaler uses a parallel file system, Lustre, which is proven for HPC and AI workloads."
"Nasuni has the capability of taking a snapshot every five minutes. If a user has accidentally deleted their data, we can recover it from the snapshot and provide the latest data to the user. It's a really great feature, one that is not provided by other vendors."
"The nice thing about Nasuni storage is that it is immutable. This means the data is only written once. So, you never modify the files. When you write a file out to the storage, it doesn't modify it when you change it. The technology knows how to figure out what the difference is between the original file write and what the changes are. Therefore, it only saves the changes."
"The most important feature is that things are backed up automatically in AWS. We have a lot of remote sites where there is a tiny server onsite and, in a lot of cases, we really don't have to back them up because the data is automatically copied to AWS. The cloud replication is the most useful functionality for us."
"Nasuni reduced our overall storage footprint at our sites by 70 to 80 percent."
"With a shift to more remote work during this past year, we deployed a new instance of Nasuni in Azure, which allowed us to be more flexible and support remote work better, something we wouldn't have been able to do with legacy file storage."
"I can see who is logging in on files from all over the globe. For example, if a file is locked, maybe a user in Shanghai has locked files or something, I can see that from the Management Console, then unlock the file."
"We like Nasuni's snapshot technology. The snapshot and recovery features are the things we use most frequently. Ideally, I would recommend NFS or CFS, which gives you more benefits for clients or anyone who wants to access FTP protocol, FTP utilities, SAN, and MSS."
"The global file locking feature is valuable. The ability to quickly deploy new sites is also valuable."
 

Cons

"There are challenges with the operation cost and upgrading process, which is disruptive, especially with the node."
"The performance monitoring could be improved."
"I suggest Nasuni improve their syslog forwarders to support TCP protocol, as it's more secure than UDP, which is plain text and not protected at all."
"When we first set up our bandwidth limiting, we had a few problems when it came to managing it. This is something that could be made easier; however, we were able to make the changes that we needed to for our environment."
"Its pricing can get a tad expensive."
"Some of their cross-platform features are really good, but it could always use more."
"One area that we've recently spoken to Nasuni about is single sign-on."
"I would like to see Nasuni create a Dropbox or Box alternative. One of the things that people like about those tools is that they are very easy to implement. They look just like a file server. With Nasuni, you have to be online to get your file storage. With Dropbox, there is a thing running on your PC that downloads the files to it when you need them, i.e., an agent."
"The only thing that I'd like to see is more support for platforms like OneDrive or Box.com."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"Its pricing can get a tad expensive. When we first took Nasuni out, we were just paying for the service. We got storage at a reduced rate. It has now changed, and they're now more of an all-in-one type of thing. It can be quite expensive, but it works out. Apart from that, licensing-wise, it's very simple."
"There are cheaper forms of storage, but Nasuni is fairly priced for the functionality it offers. I can get basic file shares provisioned in Azure and pay for the storage and the CPU. The overall cost would be much less than Nasuni, but I would need to build the management console and encryption process, so it would cost a lot to develop that kind of functionality."
"It has a license fee as well as hardware costs, which we would incur if we want to use Nasuni Cloud Storage Gateway for upgrades."
"Nasuni should provide small-scale licenses, like a 20 TB license. Currently, the smallest is a 30 TB license."
"There are annual costs that we pay for maintaining all of the snapshot history in the cloud. That is the primary cost that we pay. We occasionally buy newer Nasuni appliances or deploy them to new offices when the need occurs. That capital equipment expenses is less than the cost of buying new file storage systems. For the most part, you are trading a CapEx cost of storage equipment for an OpEx cost for management of all the snapshot data in the cloud."
"With this solution, the license renewal is pretty swift. With the virtual appliance, you just need to take care of the OS versions and patches. In a way, we don't have to struggle much with renewals because the only thing that we need to take care of are the licenses. We renew it every three years. This aspect goes with infrastructural costs because it doesn't cost us too much to maintain the solution."
"Our agreement is set up such that we pay annually per terabyte, and we buy a chunk of it at a time. Then if we run out of space, we go back to them and buy another chunk."
"The pricing is on par with everybody else, and fair."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Construction Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise24
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for DDN EXA5?
The cost is higher compared to other offerings, but the performance is good. The challenge in comparison to other offerings is that DDN is a little bit expensive.
What needs improvement with DDN EXA5?
There are challenges with the operation cost and upgrading process, which is disruptive, especially with the node. Some customers have moved away due to these operational issues.
What is your primary use case for DDN EXA5?
This is for AI training cluster. The customer is using DDN as a default de facto standard for their AI cluster.
Does Nasuni have a good pricing model?
Based on the experience of my organization, Nasuni is definitely worth the money, since it gives you an all-in-one solution where you'd usually need several programs. About the cost, there isn't a ...
Is it easy to restore files with Nasuni?
As someone who has used this feature of Nasuni I can tell you - yes, it's good for file recovery and you'll definitely benefit from very quick times. I can't tell you if it's the best one because I...
What features and services does Nasuni offer?
Hi, if you pick Nasuni, you'll be benefiting from many services for a good price. Well, it's a personalized price you get after an agreement with the company but in my organization's case, it is a ...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

EXA5
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ICR, Recursion, Toyota Technical Development Corporation (TTDC), Deluxe, Buff Dubs
American Standard, CBRE, Cushman & Wakefield, E*TRADE, Ithaca Energy, McLaren Construction, Morton Salt, Movado, Urban Outfitters, Western Digital
Find out what your peers are saying about CTERA, Panzura, Nasuni and others in File System Software. Updated: October 2026.
917,403 professionals have used our research since 2012.