Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

FreeNAS vs NetApp FAS Series comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 7, 2024

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

FreeNAS
Ranking in NAS
12th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp FAS Series
Ranking in NAS
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
108
Ranking in other categories
Deduplication Software (3rd), Modular SAN (Storage Area Network) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the NAS category, the mindshare of FreeNAS is 2.0%, down from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp FAS Series is 11.5%, down from 12.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
NAS
 

Featured Reviews

Vincenzo D'Aniello - PeerSpot reviewer
Open-source with great disk management and task synchronization
The system itself allows you to add any feature. The only bad thing is that this maybe depends on FreeBSD, and sometimes finding documentation is difficult. For example, we knew that previous versions automatically enabled the Linux kernel, yet with the recent version, this was no longer the case. Now, there was the possibility of being able to create Debian-based jails, and finding the documentation was not easy or fast. That said, in the end, we succeeded. If you find the documentation, it is always incomplete and fragmented.
Arnaud Salmon - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers good performance and
Once, I've been in a program, but they stopped supporting protocols like HTTP, STP, and that kind of stuff. All of the DIP supports at the beginning were kind of support when it was just Python and just five storage. And it happened a few times that the customer required the STP and HTTP protocol for storage. And I was surprised I couldn't do it anymore with NetApp. So, it would be beneficial for them to support both kinds of protocols. The only little black points that I would put on top of NetApp FAS Series. There is room for improvement in deployment and configuration processes. The thing with ONTAP is that we have a lot of layers, from the raw disks to the volumes we present to servers and configure. There are quite a lot of things to configure. Probably NetApp should ease the way to install that. In NetApp products, such as ONTAP and FAS, a solid understanding of storage is still necessary to handle configurations in larger systems. It's not the same with Pure Storage or Huawei. Even someone less familiar with storage could manage it, making it more accessible.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"What I like about it is that I can work on it from any computer or any device. The initial setup is very simple. The setup wizard is really helpful."
"FreeNAS is much simpler and easier to use than other solutions, but we don't have the complete range of features that come with the full version."
"It integrates well into either Windows or Linux environments."
"It has the best storage capacity."
"The solution has been very stable so far."
"The ease of use of the 'jail', the management of backups, and copies to easily create test and pre-production scenarios have speeded up the development and distribution of business apps."
"Its stability is the most valuable. It is reliable, and we don't have to worry too much about it."
"NetApp FAS is highly stable and reliable, especially under a heavy load. That is what I like most about the NetApp."
"Reliable storage solution with an easy setup. It has high availability and makes single file restoration easy. It also has good stability and scalability."
"The storage efficiency provided a maximum savings in our storage utilization."
"It's a stable product. No issues there."
"They are very satisfied with NetApp and continue to use NetApp and upgrade to new solutions."
"For us, the greatest aspect of the solution is the fact that it just runs. It is amazingly resilient. That's very important to us, because we are basically, with some exceptions, have a 24/7 operation."
"I have found all the features useful in NetApp FAS Series."
"It changed the way we do Disaster Recovery (DR) around NetApp replication."
 

Cons

"The latest version of the dashboard doesn't work as good as the previous version."
"The one thing that I find difficult to do which is very time-consuming is that I like to have a backup of the important files."
"If you find the documentation, it is always incomplete and fragmented."
"They should include clustering for the solution."
"FreeNAS should be better prepared for clustering."
"The support for S3 needs to be improved."
"They can improve the integration with PSA systems. This functionality could be better."
"Cluster mode needs to be more ubiquitous."
"There is room for improvement in deployment and configuration processes."
"One area that needs improvement is the hyper-converged solution. Although NetApp has a solution, compared to Nutanix, it falls short."
"We would like to have further integration with some backup products. They have some of them already, but there could be more."
"I’ve found that I use command line more often than I thought needed. Some things should be done in the GUI, and command-line switches can be overwhelming and take up a lot of time."
"With scalability, we feel the system is limited."
"The user interface could be improved to have better graphics and the performance analyzer could be better."
"Dedicated storage efficiency accelerators could improve the overall performance of the system."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"For our configuration, we pay a little bit less than €10,000 ($12,000 USD) per year."
"We use the free version of the program."
"Its licensing cost is based on the hardware capacity."
"Its price is okay. It suits our needs."
"The price of the NetApp FAS Series is reasonable and it provides value for the money with the feature sets. NetApp FAS Series are competing with Huawei storage which has an office and does aggressive marketing with a discount. However, we found that if our customers do a technology refresh they are happy with the performance of the NetApp FAS Series."
"Most storage vendors also have software, or licensing bundles, which may offer the required licenses considerably cheaper, but do also maybe offer licenses, which are not needed."
"We purchased it for four years, and it wasn't expensive. It was reasonable. Every company has a different agreement with NetApp. We got everything we wanted with all the bells and whistles and all the features and functionalities."
"I've sold arrays for as little $20,000 USD and as high as $300,000 USD."
"We have considered upgrading to an All-Flash solution but when we evaluated the cost-benefit we discovered that we don't have enough money to invest in it. To maintain the same technology with All-Flash would be too expensive for us."
"When we need to implement a less expensive solution we use Huawei. NetApp FAS Series is a little bit expensive compared to the average of the market."
"The pricing of NetApp FAS Series is not cheap, but in comparison to other vendors, NetApp FAS Series is affordable because they also have deduplication, compression, and inline compression. They focus on storage only, which is really good; it works."
"In general, I find NetApp to be very expensive. That's the main issue I have with them. So it's a drawback in terms of pricing."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which NAS solutions are best for your needs.
861,481 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Performing Arts
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Educational Organization
26%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about FreeNAS?
The ease of use of the 'jail', the management of backups, and copies to easily create test and pre-production scenarios have speeded up the development and distribution of business apps.
What needs improvement with FreeNAS?
The system itself allows you to add any feature. The only bad thing is that this maybe depends on FreeBSD, and sometimes finding documentation is difficult. For example, we knew that previous versi...
Which SAN product would you choose: IBM FlashSystem (FS9500) vs PureFlash Array/X NVMe vs PureFlash Array/XL NVMe?
Have you considered a NetApp FAS Storage for your NAS needs? I am sure it fits very well.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetApp FAS Series?
The pricing of NetApp FAS Series is not cheap, but in comparison to other vendors, NetApp FAS Series is affordable because they also have deduplication, compression, and inline compression. They fo...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Morroni Technologies Inc., Creative Integrations
Children's Hospital Central California, Plex Systems, PDF PNI Digital Media, Denver Broncos, PDF KSM Legal, Clayton Companies, Virginia Community College
Find out what your peers are saying about FreeNAS vs. NetApp FAS Series and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,481 professionals have used our research since 2012.