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HPE Nimble Storage 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
2nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
232
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
HPE Nimble Storage
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
15th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
122
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp AFF C-Series
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
28th
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 July 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Everpure FlashArray is 7.2%, up from 6.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE Nimble Storage is 2.9%, up from 2.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp AFF C-Series is 0.7%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Everpure FlashArray7.2%
HPE Nimble Storage2.9%
NetApp AFF C-Series0.7%
Other89.2%
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.
reviewer752799 - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Manager at a retailer with 501-1,000 employees
Cloud management improves problem identification and future performance forecasting
My official job title is Technical Manager. I never sell the T-Series PowerEdge for Tower servers; I just sell the rack. I am familiar with OpenManage and we have been implementing it for the customer, but I am not familiar with Dell CloudIQ for infrastructure monitoring or SharePlex. I know about OpenManage Integration for VMware vCenter, but we don't have a customer that is using this. I don't know much about Flash Optimized Architecture, but my customer is using both hybrid and full flash, and the customer that uses hybrid has benefited in terms of performance. HPE Nimble Storage is fairly priced compared to Dell; they are directly compatible and can compete with each other. Based on my direct experience, HPE Nimble Storage is easier to use compared to Dell, although I don't have much experience with Dell Storage. The interface and the concept of the storage structure make it easier to use. My overall experience as a reseller with HPE Nimble Storage is very good, and I would rate it 10 out of 10.
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

"If you need faster storage and a good product, this is the one you should go ahead with."
"Because we were able to afford to go all flash, we don't manage the tiers, we're not moving data up, and we're not waiting for overnight cycles."
"The solution offers amazing performance."
"It reduces space and the polar consumption. It also accelerates the application."
"Very efficient storage"
"Overall, I am sure that Everpure FlashArray is the best option on the market."
"The initial setup was very straightforward and very quick. It was up and running in our data center within 24 hours of receiving it."
"It allows engineers to focus on other things rather than doing the more manual tasks. It automates tasks, so the ease of use is extreme. It simplifies the storage."
"The support for this solution has been phenomenal."
"We use InfoSight predictive analytics. It helps us from a performance perspective by identifying potential bottlenecks."
"I use InfoSight quite a bit. It works well. It allows you to get some insight into what's happening in your environment immediately, instead of having to send things off and having them analyzed and sent back to you."
"HPE Nimble Storage is quick to release updates that fix bugs or problems and the failover has been good."
"Their tech support is very professional, know their products, know what they do, and they are very informative in terms of keeping the customer updated."
"Performance, reliability, InfoSight, the ability to upgrade the O/S on the SAN without taking it down, and cost."
"The new servers, running on the faster Nimble storage, allowed processing times of two hours or less to be achieved, allowing for faster results, as well as the ability to process more datasets concurrently, servicing more customers."
"It is great, no downtime, with no care and feeding from my point of view."
"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

"Everything has been good, but we faced one issue last year while migrating volumes from one Pure Storage to another. The snapshots were not visible in the Veeam backup portal."
"I would like a feature to integrate with external or cloud solutions. For example, if I want to use this storage for a backup from the cloud, I want to have integration with the cloud vendors, such as Microsoft, Oracles, or Amazon. It could be available as an API to allow seamless integration. Additionally, the solution could improve by having native integration with a cloud provider, such as VMware or Microsoft, this would reduce the need to use third-party solutions to complete the task."
"The main disadvantage of Pure Storage FlashArray is the price."
"Everpure FlashArray can be improved as the pricing is expensive, but you do get what you pay for; you are paying a premium for better service, better warranties, less downtime, and other things, so I do not know that a lower price would work out because you probably would not have that high of quality for those things."
"We do have an issue with the vCenter integration. Pure Storage says it has a lot of free space, but vCenter says its completely full. This is because their dedupes are saved as space, but Vcenter still detects the disk as completely full. So, we do have an issue with that."
"The price of this solution is high and should be lowered."
"The only minor issues that come to mind are that, every once in a while, a hard drive will go bad. Also, the solution should be cheaper."
"I would like to see a Nagios monitoring plugin which watches the health and performance of the system. The only one available just checks volume capacity."
"It's a good product, but the implementation with the new systems is done via the cloud dashboard from HPE. I can't activate the system without a cloud connection, which is a bit laggy if I don't have the right firewall settings, making it take longer to implement the storage."
"Nimble requires its DNS to work in order to interface with VMware vCenter is a little thorn in my eye, but I am being nitpicky here."
"An area that needs improvement is extending the life of the device after five years."
"I want it to be an active-active array. Nimble would be great as an active-active array because then everything checks out. It would give a feeling of comfort."
"The VDI is supposed to be smooth, but we still saw a little delay in typing and performing general work even though we didn’t put much load into it."
"There have been a couple of instances where we discovered previously unreported bugs."
"I don't think it is officially released yet, but the main reason that we chose Nimble is because of the sync rep feature. So, I would like to see that further evolve. This feature will be essential for our setups."
"So far, the only area I have noticed that requires improvement is the ability to console directly to the device."
"We faced one bug that impacted our NetApp last month, and it took some time to identify the underlying issue."
"There is still some room for improvement when it comes to scalability, mainly in the interoperability and integration aspects."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of Pure Storage is all-inclusive. It is very fair, and very easy. In comparison, Dell EMC has licensing that needs to be added if you wan to work in a complex environment or in specific functionalities."
"Pure came in at a better price point than EMC and performed better than Compellent."
"There should be quite a bit of reduction of TCO with just licensing (and stuff) because we run the VM environment off it."
"We consume it as a service, and that's actually something we really like, or at least I really like from the technical perspective. That's because it means there is no hassle when we need to upgrade arrays to add capacity. We just interact directly with technical counterparts, and we say, "Hey, we're filling up," and they say, "All right, here's another data pack." They ship it in, and we install it. So, the as-a-service model has worked very well. Given the outstanding data reduction rates, it has improved our profitability because we're selling allocated volumes as part of the cloud service or recovering those costs from our tenants. It is very efficient, but that has offset the premium price. It started out that way, but over time, as we've added capacity, the price per gig has gone down a lot because we have a lot of it."
"We do not incur additional costs beyond the licensing fee."
"I would rate the pricing of Pure Storage FlashArray a five out of ten. It is expensive but not too much."
"Pure Storage is expensive. It comes with features, so you get what you pay for. It is expensive compared to our old storage systems, but from the amount of human effort that you have to pay to babysit a storage system, it reduces that. I don't know if the TCO is reduced, but it's not a concern for us."
"The pricing of Pure Storage FlashArray is reasonable."
"We pay a one-time fee for terabyte licenses, and the support is paid yearly."
"From a price/performance perspective, Nimble simply can’t be beat. From a TCO perspective, the stability alone pays for itself."
"The solution’s licensing is on a yearly basis."
"I would classify it as an expensive product."
"Performance per dollar, when we looked at it, was the highest that we could get for what we needed."
"It is cost-effective, which is important for a service provider, because you're competing with hyper-scale providers who do things at extremely large scale, who tend to kill you on price if you're not careful."
"It is a CAPEX investment. Over the anticipated lifespan, I would say the pricing is $10,000 a month."
"I rate HPE Nimble Storage's pricing an eight out of ten. It can be expensive, especially when considering console ports and renewals."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Construction Company
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Construction Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Outsourcing Company
9%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business71
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise159
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business46
Midsize Enterprise43
Large Enterprise40
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?
I have knowledge about the licensing part, which we obtained for around 10 years from the time of deployment, but I d...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?
When it comes to Everpure FlashArray ports shown in the GUI, it would be better if, when one of the Pure array ports ...
How does HPE Nimble Storage compare to VxRail?
HPE Nimble Storage dHCI Vs. VxRail One of the best things about the HPE Nimble Storage dHCI is the three, two, one, z...
Which would you choose - HPE Nimble Storage or HPE Primera?
HPE Nimble is a versatile synced WAN San solution. It is easy to use and doesn’t require much training for admins. Th...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE Nimble Storage?
Other storage companies are very expensive, similar to HPE Storage. We choose HPE based on the know-how we have, whic...
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
Nimble Storage
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Ace Relocation, Atkins Nutritionals, Berkeley Research Group, Canadian International School, City of Hot Springs, Clackamas County, Corona-Norco Unified School District, Ideal Integrations, Linear Technology, P&O Maritime, Retail Apparel Group (RAG), Virtual Radiologic
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Find out what your peers are saying about HPE Nimble Storage vs. NetApp AFF C-Series and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
902,988 professionals have used our research since 2012.