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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
14th
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
7.0
Number of Reviews
110
Ranking in other categories
Deduplication Software (4th), Modular SAN (Storage Area Network) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the NAS category, the mindshare of FreeNAS is 3.7%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp FAS Series is 10.6%, down from 11.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
NAS Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
NetApp FAS Series10.6%
FreeNAS3.7%
Other85.7%
NAS
 

Featured Reviews

Vincenzo D'Aniello - PeerSpot reviewer
Software developer at TREXON S.R.L.
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.
Srikanth Purushothaman - PeerSpot reviewer
DIRECTOR at Vellore Online Systems
Has supported long-term data protection and backup while requiring better part availability and pricing options
For monitoring purposes, we normally use flash access storage exclusively. We utilize a hybrid system because we need performance, combining NL-SAS for the volume and SAS flash to use as a fast cache system that provides more IOPS. We normally implement RAID 10, which we prefer over RAID 6's n plus 2 combinations. We utilize it for data redundancy, even with write intensity on. Regarding the unified storage architecture for NetApp FAS Series, we normally opt for exclusivity unless budget constraints exist. Our IOPS are very high, reaching somewhere about 50k to 150k or 1.150k. The high performance ensures minimal latency. An advantage we've seen with NetApp FAS Series is that snapshots provide very rapid backup and fast recovery. We basically use snapshots for data protection as first-level protection, with deduplication between the two storages serving as second-level protection.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It integrates well into either Windows or Linux environments."
"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."
"The fact that no data are lost when a hard drive fails is extremely reassuring, as I have had two of five drives fail at one time and no data were lost."
"The program is fast, fun to work on and easy."
"After using FreeNAS I will never spend money for commercial products like Dell or 3Par."
"Its stability is the most valuable. It is reliable, and we don't have to worry too much about it."
"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."
"Reliable storage solution with an easy setup. It has high availability and makes single file restoration easy. It also has good stability and scalability."
"It helps us meet all customer requirements. Customers have been using NetApp for many years. They are very satisfied with NetApp and continue to use NetApp and upgrade to new solutions."
"Scalability especially in SMB range has been well-received."
"It is good to have a unified storage where you can have block and file level protocols."
"End-users like that they can rely on the Snapshot technology so they can do their restores themselves."
"The strong point is that our clients like this are RadLV (Radiology Low-Value). They also use SnapMirror and MetroCluster."
"In the 20-some years I've been working with NetApp stuff, the system has caused one outage."
"This solution is very, very, very, very stable."
 

Cons

"Make it easier to find out how to fix things when something goes wrong."
"They should include clustering for the solution."
"If you find the documentation, it is always incomplete and fragmented."
"FreeNAS should be better prepared for clustering."
"One of my hard drives has failed and the documentation that I've been able to find has not helped."
"The support for S3 needs to be improved."
"The latest version of the dashboard doesn't work as good as the previous version. Sometimes we change our dashboard back to the previous version because the latest version just doesn't work as good."
"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."
"We told him that we need better documentation for customers to understand automation of APIs."
"It may need more flexibility to fight with other competing arrays."
"We are not able to connect to the support of NetApp from Sudan. We have to go through many agents for support, which makes it difficult."
"Cost is always a factor. Some people choose EMC or Dell because they perceive NetApp as being more expensive."
"It is very unstable. We have a lot of issues with antivirus programs interrupting us from providing services to our customer."
"Needs to ​add wizards for newer, inexperienced users."
"We'd like to get more access to level-two engineers. Sometimes its been a difficult time explaining the problem to level-one people."
"Absolutely, it’s just some compatibility variance with some of the production environment aspects, like AV, and Archiving systems which needed to be integrated with."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its price is okay. It suits our needs."
"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."
"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."
"The solution’s cost is reasonable."
"We are on a perpetual license."
"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."
"I don't recall the price, but in general, pricing can always be better."
"It is a one-time license charge for NetApp FAS Series to run and we pay annually for upgrades and support."
"NetApp FAS Series' pricing is competitive."
"It's not cheap, but at the same time, it's also inexpensive. It's somewhere in between."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
12%
Performing Arts
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
9%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Large Enterprise2
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise58
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
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?
I do not handle the pricing part of NetApp FAS Series since it is managed by the sales team.
What needs improvement with NetApp FAS Series?
There is room for improvement when it comes to response time and first-level support quality. If a new feature needs to be added, it takes some time because it is altogether a new development; othe...
 

Comparisons

 

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: June 2026.
900,838 professionals have used our research since 2012.