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HPE Synergy vs Lenovo Flex System comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 3, 2025

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

HPE Synergy
Ranking in Blade Servers
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
91
Ranking in other categories
Composable Infrastructure (1st)
Lenovo Flex System
Ranking in Blade Servers
9th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Blade Servers category, the mindshare of HPE Synergy is 12.7%, down from 21.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Lenovo Flex System is 4.7%, up from 3.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Blade Servers Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
HPE Synergy12.7%
Lenovo Flex System4.7%
Other82.6%
Blade Servers
 

Featured Reviews

MS
Works at Saudi Telecom Company
Manage servers efficiently with an integrated view while reducing downtime
My use case is to serve the complete IT environment of the telecom, including all cloud applications. I use HPE Synergy servers for my private cloud and for network management systems. 70% of my workload is running on HPE servers The integrated view, such as managing complete servers and…
FA
Senior System Administrator at Khushhali Microfinance Bank
Used to run the compute load on servers, but firmware and driver upgrades are a bit difficult
We use the solution for multiple purposes, such as in the virtualization cluster and the standalone applications We use the solution as a compute model to run the compute load on servers. The solution's firmware and driver upgrades are a bit difficult. I have been using Lenovo Flex System for…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"OneView is head and shoulders above the competition in this space."
"Synergy is much easier to use, which is saving us time. We are able to set the profiles for firmware upgrades. This makes the process for the care and feeding of the IT environment much simpler, quicker, and cleaner."
"This is above and beyond anything else any of the competitors have on the market. If you're researching this, you're going down the right path."
"The most valuable features are the evolution of our existing HPE portfolio, the integration with our existing tool sets, and the enhanced capabilities that OneView bring."
"The temporal value of it. If I only need a particular amount of compute for a specific period of time during business hours, then at night, I'm running a bunch of batch jobs, or doing something else, that ability to swap a profile, swap templates, and have compute assigned to something else, saves significant amount of money. As long as you are tying it into the automation and orchestration layers, it becomes much easier to do."
"Its versatility, performance, and size are most valuable. It is very decent for its size. It has very good performance and very good specifications."
"The stability of the solution is very reliable."
"The benefit is that it's going to be maintained, contrary to what we had last year, when the maintenance went off for the last generation of the servers that we had there."
"The product is very user-friendly and has many resources at the enterprise level."
"Flex System's best features are its performance and stability."
"The Lenovo Flex System is very stable."
"It comes at a good price. We didn't face any problems with this product."
"The stability and speed are always good. The processor is good and it's still working with our loads."
"One of the most valuable features of this solution is its ease of use."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"The functionality is reliable and requires minimal support."
 

Cons

"ICMs could be better in this model. When you look at its competitors, the most critical point is the throughput. HPE is the best with the ICM module, which is an interconnect module that connects the servers of the frames to the LAN and SAN. HPE Synergy should also support the latest processors provided by Intel."
"This solution could be improved by increasing the speed on the conversion adapters. It should be 100 gigs."
"The main challenge we faced was that when it was installed it just did not work. There were faulty components and it took weeks of troubleshooting to find the faulty components, get them replaced. Getting help from HPE was difficult. Nobody knew about the product. It was a brand-new product and people had not been trained on it. That part was not a great experience."
"I'd get the firmware to be a little more secure and a little more streamlined."
"The initial setup was complex. It was slow and just didn't work. Even HPE couldn't make it work for 45 days."
"HPE Synergy could improve by developing the chassis to allow for more drives or disks. Currently, it supports only two drives in the blade server, which can be limiting."
"They have not improved their product since it was purchased."
"The speed in OneView and how it updates the entire configuration needs improvement. If they can do that, and it could be a little more clear on what impact different actions will have for certain things, that would be good."
"The product could improve its integration capabilities."
"Flex System's integration with the XClarity Management System could be improved."
"The user-interface needs improvement, because they have an application from which we have to manage the whole system and all the infrastructure. This application is not working at our premises, because of some problem with the hardware itself. So although we brought it with our systems, and we used it to manage all the systems: the storage, the switches, and everything, nevertheless we have to support every part alone and enter the interface in one-by-one."
"The solution could improve by providing more integration with other platforms."
"I had some difficulties with the initial setup."
"The solution's firmware and driver upgrades are a bit difficult."
"The most valuable feature of the Lenovo Flex System is the storage system."
"Forced restarts due to free upgrades is an issue that needs to be resolved. We can manage this as we have high availability and redundancy, but without that it could be a real problem."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing is more around the software for RGS, because we are deploying bare metal installs. It is mainly the operating system and any lights-out management. So, licensing is minimum. We are licensing it annually."
"The solution can be expensive because it requires both hardware and software purchases."
"The solution has reduced our IT infrastructure costs by 50 percent."
"The platform that we run Synergy on is all virtualized. Our primary cost is likely VMware."
"We do a biannual renewal. I know how much that renewal is, but I don't know how much it breaks down to be just Synergy, since we have our VMware, all of our physical equipment, etc. all rolled up into one renewal, which is a little over $300,000 every two years. However, only a subset of that is the Synergy product."
"There is a perpetual license given when you purchase HPE Synergy."
"The solution has reduced our IT infrastructure costs because we have had to buy less services than we used to."
"When we made the purchase of the hardware, we added Professional Services to it."
"The 14 blade server allows significant room for upscaling before having to invest in another chassis. You would have to purchase another chassis much sooner in the case of an eight or nine blade server."
"We are just paying the operational cost, which is not much."
"The is an annual license cost to use the Lenovo Flex System. If the price was less expensive and flexible overall and for additional features, our customers would be happier."
"The price is interesting. I am able to quote a client based on their needs and offer them either Lenovo or Dell."
"There is a one-off payment to buy the equipment and the support is purchased annually."
"We have the whole maintenance for the 3 years, starting the deployment. We also have the VMware license for 3 years and I think we have another license to buy. There are no additional costs besides licensing."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
7%
Government
7%
Government
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Construction Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise56
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

How would you choose between HPE's Bladesystem and Synergy?
For me, choosing between HPE’s Bladesystem and Synergy came down to which solution was more powerful, reliable, and stable. It turns out Bladesystem was the winner. Bladesystem is excellent because...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE Synergy?
As far as the prices are concerned, rack mount solutions are less expensive than HPE Synergy prices; however, HPE Synergy prices are higher but justify themselves as the solution accommodates all t...
What needs improvement with HPE Synergy?
In my opinion, for future improvements in HPE Synergy, there should be better management of power consumption complexity as well as an increase in the number of servers that can fit in a single Syn...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Lenovo Flex System?
Compared to its quality, the pricing is very reasonable and represents good value.
What needs improvement with Lenovo Flex System?
Continuing the production of this product is necessary. It is currently out of support, and we are seeking support from other sources besides Lenovo.
What is your primary use case for Lenovo Flex System?
We are using Lenovo Flex System on the server for our VMware environment, which includes our VMs and all our servers, Linux and Windows. It manages the daily operation efficiently.
 

Also Known As

No data available
Flex System Blade Servers, Flex System SN Series
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

HudsonAlpha, Virgin Media, EMIS, United
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about HPE Synergy vs. Lenovo Flex System and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,360 professionals have used our research since 2012.