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IBM Spectrum Protect vs Veritas NetBackup comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 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

IBM Spectrum Protect
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
14th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
149
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Veritas NetBackup
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
116
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of IBM Spectrum Protect is 2.2%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Veritas NetBackup is 3.4%, down from 5.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

Syed Habib - PeerSpot reviewer
Manageable and comprehensive and integrates robust backup features for core banking
It's adequate for my core banking, however, I am looking for another solution for all systems. It is not compatible with other operating systems like Windows or Linux, and lacks a consolidated dashboard from Browser Spectrum. This is why I am searching for another solution. The product also lacks any centralized graphical user interface (GUI), such as Jarek Pod, and I am limited to using a console-based text user interface, which my local partner handles completely.
Wesam Qashou - PeerSpot reviewer
A mature backup solution, with many features, and great support
Veritas NetBackup is the first line of defense when disaster strikes. Before performing disaster recovery, we must have a good backup of our image that is also protected from ransomware. This way, we have a golden image that is resilient to ransomware attacks. We saw the benefits of Veritas NetBackup within the first three months.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Performance and recoveries are better. Our clients and customers are happier with the performance of it."
"Because of the flexible parameters, everything can be fine-tuned to the customers’ needs in their environment."
"With data deduplication and compression, we are reducing our overall storage footprint for our disk histories. Therefore, we are reducing the actual cost of the disk for our data protection and data backups."
"In the past, one of the most valuable features, and the biggest advantage, was the incremental forever feature. Not many other backup vendors provided that. In the pre-virtualization environment, it was very robust and simple technology, especially writing to tape."
"Forever incremental - allows TSM to optimize storage needs."
"I find the whole product useful. The backup archive client, snapshot, spectrum for virtual environments are beneficial features."
"The most valuable feature for data recovery in IBM Spectrum Protect is its database protection capabilities."
"It allows us to have one interface."
"The solution is easy to learn."
"The client side deduplication reduces the backup window."
"We were evaluating other products and getting confused between Commvault and Veritas NetBackup. The one reason that we started with Veritas NetBackup is the pricing of the license. There's no other reason from a technical perspective or even operation or capability of the two software. The main reason we chose Veritas NetBackup was that in our use case it is more cost-effective."
"Veritas NetBackup is a scalable solution."
"The simulation engine is highly valuable as it allows us to simulate what a failure would be like and generate reports."
"We can easily expand the ability of the solution."
"The documentation is good."
"The most valuable feature is that you don't need any special connectivity - you just need to give your seller name, and then it automatically discovers all your virtual machines, which is a great benefit, especially in a bigger environment."
 

Cons

"There could be various client systems and process integration included in the product."
"I find the Level 1 and Level 2 support spend 80% of the time communicating the same information that I have already provided."
"I should be able to backup Linux. I would like SUSE for Linux on POWER. Right now, we have to use Storex, which is a pain to use."
"Integration with some applications in the healthcare field could be added, as that is a big part of our business."
"They are behind on many things, especially security. They are catching up a little bit now, but the competitors are doing better security-wise. There should be malware detection and prevention and higher security."
"We did not see any drawbacks to IBM Spectrum Protect before assisting a customer using Windows that wanted to migrate to using UNIX. IBM Spectrum Protect does not offer an option to migrate from other operating systems."
"Stability is very good now. It used to be rocky years ago."
"I would like a little more ease with the virtual platforms, because it is a huge thing that is coming up."
"What needs to be improved in Veritas NetBackup is its interface, e.g. they should make it more user friendly. Scalability for this product could still be improved, particularly its hardware appliance scalability."
"The pricing could be improved, and the interface could be more intuitive."
"Lacks a reporting feature."
"The deployment time is longer than it is with other products."
"Support for the solution needs improvement."
"The implementation process could be simplified to make it quicker."
"It needs support for Kernel-based Virtual Machines (KVMs)."
"It was very complicated, and it required a lot of work in terms of management. We have moved to Rubrik. One of the reasons for getting rid of Veritas NetBackup was the fact that at one point, we had the support staff with 12 to 15 people to manage Veritas NetBackup, whereas, with Rubrik, I'm the only one managing Rubrik. There is one more person who works with me mostly due to the fact that in case I'm not around, someone else knows what to do, but I'm the only one who is a full-time manager of Rubrik. The complexity of Veritas required a large staff to manage it. We had daily issues that had to be looked into and resolved. A lot of these issues revolved around Veritas' handling of VMware, which is why first we moved VMware off Veritas. After we did that, we were also able to reduce our staff count. Their licensing is a disaster. It is extremely complicated. In most cases, Veritas themselves can't understand their own licensing."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"That's a hard estimate. It depends on the licensing, the hardware, and other stuff, but it is fairly expensive. It is generally more expensive than other solutions."
"We have spec'd out our build, and the cost of it can work quite easily today for our future needs."
"We have been at our size for a few years. We are not really looking to battle the licensing costs, as this is our primary system."
"Its licensing is complicated. It goes by CPUs, and it is pretty expensive as well."
"The licensing is varied. If we have small environments (not many TB being managed) it is best to license by PVUs (depending on the number of cores of the machine). If we manage many TBs we look at licensing by capacity which allows us to use all the agents of the product."
"Regarding retro-compatibility of the product between versions, your data is always available and the ROI is unquestionable."
"We have found that the pricing is high in our country."
"The price of IBM Spectrum Protect is expensive. However, there are a few packages and it is unclear because, for the entry suite they have both options, which are the back-end storage capacity and the front-end storage capacity."
"The licensing fees are expensive."
"Veritas NetBackup's price could be a problem for small businesses."
"Licensing fees are charged based on the number of CPU cores."
"If you have a source size of one terabyte then they will charge for a one terabyte license, although what is actually being stored is much less."
"The price is okay."
"Veritas NetBackup is more expensive than Cohesity and Rubrik, but it is comparable in price to Commvault, IBM, and Dell."
"Our license is capacity-based."
"We purchased a perpetual license and perform SMS renewals."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
8%
Educational Organization
8%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Protect?
One point for improvement for IBM Spectrum Protect is security, as IBM has not been investing as much as in the past. There is a need for additional layers of security to fill the gaps, which is wh...
What is the best next generation backup tool?
Assuming you have an onprem ecosystem which runs the VMware, physical systems on Win, Linux and Unix and run both traditional DB's and nosql DB's like mongo, then Netbackup (NBU) will be the right ...
What do you like most about Veritas NetBackup?
The most valuable feature of cloud integration is the ability to send data outside of your location. This can be achieved by integrating cloud tier options or other object storage solutions.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Veritas NetBackup?
The product is cost-effective, and I would rate its pricing as an eight out of ten. The pricing model is based on the amount of data transferred, making it manageable for us.
 

Also Known As

IBM TSM, IBM Tivoli Storage Manager
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CERN, Einstein Healthcare, Nyherji, Allianz Australia, TZM, ABT Online, NCT, Kindred Healthcare Inc., Cobalt Iron, TransGrid, Baptist Health of Northeast Florida, Cash America, Piedmont Healthcare, RWGV, Arkansas Tech University, British Columbia Institute of Technology
Beta Offshore
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Spectrum Protect vs. Veritas NetBackup and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,390 professionals have used our research since 2012.