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Dell XtremIO vs NetApp AFF C-Series 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

Everpure FlashArray
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
4th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
219
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Dell XtremIO
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
19th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp AFF C-Series
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
27th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
3.6
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Everpure FlashArray is 7.5%, up from 6.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell XtremIO is 1.6%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp AFF C-Series is 0.6%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Everpure FlashArray7.5%
Dell XtremIO1.6%
NetApp AFF C-Series0.6%
Other90.3%
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Sowjanya MV - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Lead at Wipro Limited
Has improved performance for mission-critical workloads and enabled seamless non-disruptive upgrades
The availability is 99.99%, which is the main factor any customer would need because their data should be available whenever they want to access it. This is one main critical thing. It is very easy to upgrade since Pure Storage FlashArray handles it well. Everything is non-disruptive now; previously, there were forklift shifts, but now that is not the case. Pure Storage FlashArray says no to forklift upgrades. Usually hardware requires downtime, but Pure Storage FlashArray has improved their footprint so that they are not asking for downtime; everything is just a non-disruptive activity, which is why customers are more inclined towards Pure Storage FlashArray. Customers want more of the models in their environment due to the performance they are giving, and everything is in one Pure1 Array console where we can view all the models on one page or just an orchestration tool. You don't miss anything; you have replication, notifications about replication, and details about which host groups replication is happening in and if that replication is successful or failed. On a daily basis, our purpose is to create volumes for infrastructure; our daily activities include creating volumes and mapping them to the host, doing any migrations from a VM, clearing the data stores, and carving the volumes to those VMs. One key factor is the data compression with a ratio of 5:1, focusing on space efficiency, inline deduplication, and the compression Pure Storage FlashArray works on; that is a major factor we can suggest to any customer. Analytical capabilities are crucial. Daily, we check the throughput and consumption, and Pure Storage FlashArray provides predictions for one year regarding usage. This prediction helps plan updates well ahead. For support, we just raise a case, and they follow up and get it done. There is also AI readiness, but with the model R2, we don't have much of that AI readiness. For others, we do have AI readiness that predicts capacity based on daily or monthly trends, enabling us to analyze how much space we need or if we need to expand the disk shelf. From an operational point of view, a good feature is that if you accidentally delete a volume, it will be retained in the destroyed state for the next twenty-four hours, which is not the same with any other vendor. I have worked in this storage domain for the past fifteen years, and this option is remarkable, benefiting any L1 or L2 engineer. Additionally, from a compliance perspective, Pure Storage FlashArray has REST APIs enabled. I have not explored automation much, but from a security standpoint, it is strong with encryption data. If you want to automate, you can easily integrate with all clouds and explore Pure Cloud for scheduling workloads, including volume creation. Customers find benefit in Pure Storage FlashArray's single management pane of glass due to the dual controller and active-active setup. If one of the controllers goes down, all workloads automatically shift to the other controller, ensuring their data is safe and accessible at all times. This is a highlighted feature that any customer desires because their data should always be accessible. For SAN workloads, we use Pure Storage FlashArray because for SAN FC fiber channel, we don't use it; we use NetApp for NAS activities. We have clearly split this, so SAN is for mission-critical applications, while network-attached storage handles file systems. This architecture helps us maximize the benefit from Pure Storage FlashArray due to the significant workloads from this giant retail client. From a footprint and energy consumption perspective, you can see energy consumption from the Pure1 storage portal on a daily basis, and it is very compact. The three models we use consume only three units, which is quite low. From a footprint and data center perspective, it doesn't occupy much space. As everything moves to cloud, there are requirements to avoid excess spending on data centers, and Pure Storage FlashArray is efficient in energy consumption and is environmentally friendly.
AS
System Engineer at Exaware
Has improved data reduction and snapshot efficiency while supporting critical workloads
There are some areas that could be improved with Dell XtremIO. The API to connect with command line or to see performance very clearly could be enhanced, similar to how NetApp works with Grafana and NetApp monitor, which shows you a comprehensive view of the whole picture. The snapshot functionality could work more similarly to Snap Center. If I want to see all the VCenter with the VM, I think it needs the API for this. I do see big differences between Dell and other products. NetApp works very closely with VCenter, and Hitachi also integrates well, but Dell is not very clear and does not proceed well with VCenter integration with Dell. It needs the API, and I need to see all the snapshots. If I want to restore a VM from only a few directories or a few files that I need to restore, it is very difficult. I do see some differences in licensing. For the last few years, the Dell EMC price is acceptable. A few years ago, Dell EMC was expensive, approximately 20 percent more than NetApp. Right now the budget between EMC and NetApp is very closely aligned. Regarding the installation process and deployment of Dell XtremIO, I notice that in Israel, a lot of professional services and engineers who work with Dell EMC have moved to another storage company. I do not know why. Dell EMC does not have enough engineers, system engineers, or professional services engineers to provide service to the old clients, similar to how NetApp or Hitachi do. I think Dell XtremIO is between easy and complicated to deploy; it gives you the whole picture, but I need to go closely to VCenter to connect to VCenter to see the snapshot and to see performance with more dashboards of performance. I also need to connect the switch fiber channel to see all zoning to give me more flexibility to install or configure fiber channel or to see the performance of the fiber channels. I think there should be some fiber channel disconnect adapter or better troubleshooting from hardware for errors.
Shailendra Choudhary - PeerSpot reviewer
Solution Architect at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Reliable flash storage has delivered strong data reduction and secured sensitive information
There is still some room for improvement when it comes to scalability, mainly in the interoperability and integration aspects. Every storage vendor has certain limitations, and this is not limited to NetApp; it applies to everyone in the industry. I do not see any other significant areas for improvement with NetApp AFF C-Series at this time. NetApp is working on their roadmap, which is solid, and they are developing certain features that are yet to be released.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Technical support is very good."
"One could tell, the minute we switched to this program, everything ran a lot faster."
"It's easy to use, and the maintenance upgrades to get free controllers work really well."
"It does efficient work of storing data while still delivering the performance that you would normally expect from a higher priced solution."
"There was a dramatic improvement in operating costs just as a result of the environmentals and space, let alone the cost of the unit itself."
"The ease of use. That's what our customers love. They say it's very easy, they don't need special training, they don't need to call us or any other company or integrator to help them do their job. That's the main reason they purchase Pure."
"Now, with Pure Storage, we have totally eliminated that problem."
"Everpure FlashArray is very good with AI development and is very suitable for low downtime and critical mission storage, so customers who need critical mission storage and those chasing performance should consider this solution."
"I have leveraged XtremIO to reduce data center foot print significantly saving my company tens of thousands annually in floor space, power, and cooling."
"It is great for applications like Microsoft Exchange, ERP, SQL and VDI; basically saved the VDI buy-in from users, as now performance was seamless in comparison to a physical PC."
"Dedupe, because we achieve 3.5X space savings with XtremIO Snapshot copies Ease of use Improvement in storage efficiency without compromising on performance"
"The most valuable features are that it is fast and reliable."
"We used the product for our internal customers (Banking) and the performance really improved for the end users with reduced costs."
"Moved and zoned our Prod Client facing Applications, providing quicker response to the business and more efficiency, and it also assisted with large datasets, thus dramatically reducing our batch runs."
"Xtrem10's features are more simple to implement, and the integration and interface are also good."
"We mostly use it for backup, because we cannot measure anything, and we are afraid to use it for surveillance systems. We were planning to use it for mostly for surveillance systems."
"NetApp AFF C-Series is a good product for entry-level flash storage, the system is competitive in terms of pricing, and the value proposition is strong."
"NetApp offers a cost-effective solution with very robust hardware."
 

Cons

"The price of this solution could be improved."
"I would like to have support available in Spanish."
"Pure Storage FlashArray could improve some aspects. There are certain features that are good and there are some features that I see some issues with at the technical level."
"I would like to get a weekly report of how our storage has been used, and if there is any storage sitting there not being used."
"They're also talking about a phone home centralized analytics database being used as a centralized management console with a list of new cloud features, but this doesn't seem finalized."
"I would rate this solution an eight. There's always room for improvement, nobody is perfect to get a ten out of ten. They do what they do well. It's not cheap but we it's for uses that we needed."
"In Pure Storage FlashArray, the area with room for improvement is local MFA login."
"In terms of the future, I have been excited by some of the copy data management stuff that they're talking about building into the environment. There are feature sets where I've done a lot of automation work. So, I am always looking forward to extensions of their API. They're also talking about a phone home centralized analytics database being used as a centralized management console with a list of new cloud features, but this doesn't seem finalized."
"We had issues at the data corruption level, which resulted in multiple X-Brick failures."
"Dell's technical support could be better."
"Scalability could be better."
"The GUI is still Java based, and this needs to be fixed."
"The XtremIO by itself without a virtualization layer has some drawbacks, like storage replication."
"What needs to improve is that the end compression uses a lot of CPU, which makes it difficult or impossible to upgrade."
"The product is highly expensive. Additionally, there is a significant lack of training, support documents, and forums available for Dell XtremIO, making troubleshooting difficult for third-party individuals."
"The interface could be simplified for beginners to ease the configuration of special objects in the system."
"We faced one bug that impacted our NetApp last month, and it took some time to identify the underlying issue."
"We faced one bug that impacted our NetApp last month, and it took some time to identify the underlying issue."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is a more expensive solution, but it is worth it. You are getting what you paid for."
"I'm good with the licensing. Of course, pricing can always be less... It's actually not a bad pricing model, considering I don't have to rip-and-replace."
"We have seen a reduction in TCO."
"The solution could be cheaper."
"You can pay extra for Evergreen support, which gives you free upgrades when new features are introduced."
"The cost of Pure Storage is subjective and determined by your environment. Pure Storage tends to be more expensive than NetApp, but it is cheaper than EMC. Performance varies with data workload, making cost considerations complex."
"Pricing is moderate. It is neither cheap nor expensive."
"I would rate it a seven out of ten for pricing. It could be improved."
"The license for XtremIO is in the box, so you don't have to buy anything."
"You can get a two-year or three-year license for the tool. You can also opt for a perpetual-based licensing model, which can be renewed on a yearly or two-year basis."
"It's not cheap, but it absolutely gets the job done. I don't have any real comment regarding licensing specifically."
"This is the best flash array on the market for high-end workloads, so expect to pay for that. But the support subscription cost is fixed for seven years, which made it easier for us to plan on the maintenance costs."
"XtremIO is pretty straightforward about pricing. However, you need to look at your data so you can estimate, with the advice of DEL EMC, what data reduction ratio you will reach. In our case, a 3:1 reduction ration gave us a positive case compared to other storage arrays."
"XtremIO is an all-flash array, which means it's a costly solution. When compared with general mid-range storage solutions, this is more expensive. As far as I know, there are no additional costs besides the license."
"The price of the solution should be reduced. The price matches the price of a VMAX service but it does not have the capability of a VMAX service. However, the prices of Dell EMC XtremIO can be reduceable."
"The licensing cost is on a yearly subscription basis, which can be expensive but is necessary for ongoing support and services. The pricing could be improved to make it more accessible."
Information not available
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Comparison Review

it_user182013 - PeerSpot reviewer
Federal Civ/Intel Engineering Lead at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
May 1, 2015
Measuring Up: EMC XtremIO and HP 3PAR
Leading up to EMC World 2015, IT Central Station asked how I would compare EMC XtremIO and HP 3PAR. Until recently, the flash storage conversation in my organization and many others has centered on XtremIO and Pure Storage, the leaders of the all-flash array (AFA) space. To that end, I've written a…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
11%
Marketing Services Firm
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Outsourcing Company
8%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business66
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise155
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise29
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which should I choose: HPE 3PAR StoreServ or Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform F Series?
Both are great platforms, but if you are considering all flash solutions, I would recommend you to consider Pure Stor...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?
The only issue is the pricing. Because we have competition, our customers always take another brand and say they can ...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?
Our customers using Dell storage also use competing solutions. Our customers who have Everpure FlashArray may also ha...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell XtremIO?
Pricing is hard to determine as it depends on the given configuration. XtremIO offers features that justify a potenti...
What needs improvement with Dell XtremIO?
There are some areas that could be improved with Dell XtremIO. The API to connect with command line or to see perform...
What is your primary use case for Dell XtremIO?
I was using Dell XtremIO as a storage admin and system storage admin internally within my company. My major use case ...
What needs improvement with NetApp AFF C-Series?
There is still some room for improvement when it comes to scalability, mainly in the interoperability and integration...
What is your primary use case for NetApp AFF C-Series?
I would recommend NetApp AFF C-Series for various types of companies depending on the use case. A small company, an e...
What advice do you have for others considering NetApp AFF C-Series?
I recommend Dell PowerStore to some of my customers, but usually the differences are taken care of. I focus primarily...
 

Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray
Dell EMC XtremIO Flash, Dell EMC XtremIO X2, XtremIO, XtremIO X2
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Raiffeisen Bank Bulgaria, Wentworth-Douglas Hospital
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Dell XtremIO vs. NetApp AFF C-Series and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
894,738 professionals have used our research since 2012.