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IBM Spectrum Scale vs Pure Storage FlashBlade comparison

IBM and Pure Storage are both solutions in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category. IBM is ranked #10 with an average rating of 9.0, while Pure Storage is ranked #8 with an average rating of 8.8. IBM holds a 3.9% mindshare in SDS, compared to Pure Storage’s 4.1% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Pure Storage users who would recommend it.
IBM Spectrum Scale
Read 13 IBM Spectrum Scale reviews
  • 1,419 Views
  • 951 Comparison Views
100% willing to recommend
Pure Storage FlashBlade
Read 38 Pure Storage FlashBlade reviews
  • 4,959 Views
  • 744 Comparison Views
94% willing to recommend
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive Summary
We performed a comparison between IBM Spectrum Scale and Pure Storage FlashBlade based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out in this report how the two Software Defined Storage (SDS) solutions compare in terms of features, pricing, service and support, easy of deployment, and ROI.

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To learn more, read our detailed IBM Spectrum Scale vs. Pure Storage FlashBlade Report (Updated: September 2025).
Buyer's Guide
IBM Spectrum Scale vs. Pure Storage FlashBlade
September 2025
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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 Scale
Ranking in Software Defined Storage (SDS)
10th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Software Defined Storage (2nd)
Pure Storage FlashBlade
Ranking in Software Defined Storage (SDS)
8th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
All-Flash Storage (15th), File and Object Storage (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category, the mindshare of IBM Spectrum Scale is 3.9%, down from 4.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 4.1%, down from 4.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Software Defined Storage (SDS) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Pure Storage FlashBlade4.1%
IBM Spectrum Scale3.9%
Other92.0%
Software Defined Storage (SDS)
 

Featured Reviews

Bernd Stroehle. - PeerSpot reviewer
Deliver improved performance in data processing and foster extensive AI initiatives
I find IBM Spectrum Scale to be an excellent product known for its fast parallel file system. It achieved the best results when integrated with IBM hardware. Even though it is complex, it provided significant performance advantages in large-scale data management. Its fault tolerance mechanisms and integration capabilities make it popular for extensive AI initiatives and data processing tasks for organizations like Daimler Benz and Bosch.
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Parul-Patel - PeerSpot reviewer
High performance and throughput enhance IT backup management
The multi-dimensional scale-out design feature of Pure Storage FlashBlade is not in use in our environment. Regarding data reduction technologies, we don't get much deduplication because the data is already deduplicated from our FlashArray before we get to backup, so there is no benefit of deduplication. Regarding the integration with cloud-native ecosystem tools, we are not on cloud; we are strictly an on-premises solution. Pure Storage FlashBlade is not used by any end-user; it's used only for IT backup, with only about four people in our group managing it. I cannot recommend Pure Storage FlashBlade to other users depending upon their financial situation because it's an expensive solution, and the cost is very high, including licensing and renewal every year. I rate Pure Storage FlashBlade an eight out of ten.
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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We are using it for monitoring all of our storage."
"We use GPFS Scale for parallel file access, the file management, and it's an essential part of our operations."
"It is a scalable solution."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to share files across different platforms."
"Its great servicing high availability. That is what it is used for."
"It makes our file system sharing a lot easier, even across different continents. We have had file systems shared across different continents with no performance degradation."
"The high performance of the solution is its most valuable aspect. If you compare it to other storage solutions, it's much better."
"I find IBM Spectrum Scale to be an excellent product known for its fast parallel file system."
More IBM Spectrum Scale pros
"It has also helped to simplify storage for us in the way that it's easy to manage. Their automatic monitoring really helps when things break or are about to break. They see a problem coming and alert us even before our own system does."
"The most valuable feature is Safe Mode."
"The onboarding and integrated monitoring tools are pretty good."
"The performance of FlashBlade is excellent. It does not necessarily leverage the SOS API that some of the newer products leverage, but I found its speed pretty much on par and comparable. It is fast, and it does what it is supposed to do."
"The initial setup was straightforward. If you know how to plug in power and network you're pretty much qualified. They were on site to configure the network, the box to fit into our network architecture. Other than that, we self-managed from there."
"The solution provides many controllers."
"Approximately 40% to 50% of my time is saved using Pure Storage FlashBlade compared to different products."
"The tool's most valuable features are data warehousing, speedy recovery, and analytics. Its latest release is cost-effective."
More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros
 

Cons

"Integration with other vendors is not available."
"They should probably simply the Red Hat implementation portion. This portion was not as straightforward as I would like it to be."
"The pricing and licensing model for this solution are complex and it is sometimes difficult to explain it to customers."
"It would be helpful if there was a graphical user interface that could walk you through the deployment process. The instructions surrounding setup aren't the best. They need to be more step-by-step."
"I wish there were some graphical user interface to access the GPFS file system creation and monitoring."
"There can be improvements in fault tolerance and making erasure coding faster."
"We do have some issues where Spectrum Scale does not work as expected. We have seen our Spectrum Scale servers go down unexpectedly, but because we have a cluster, it does not take out the entire organization."
"I believe there is no graphic user interface, so they should include it."
More IBM Spectrum Scale cons
"We haven't been able to use much of the cloud area of Pure Storage. We have a storage server and it would be better if it could integrate with other cloud features of this solution."
"There is some room for new features related to authentication and integration with Kubernetes, and other solution using S3 Bucket."
"The features provided for SMB customers are limited."
"Recently, while upgrading the version code, one of the controllers failed. Replacing the controller took between 14 to 20 days."
"File storage needs a lot of improvement. Mainframe connectivity also needs improvement because it requires additional components to be integrated with Pure Storage FlashBlade. If you want to keep your backup data, then this becomes an even more expensive solution because Pure Storage FlashBlade will not be able to meet your backup needs."
"I would also like to see better support for CIFS workloads."
"I would like to have Snapshots and Snapmail in the next release. People who came from a NetApp background, especially expect these features."
"To improve FlashBlade, some analysts suggest enhancing its handling of relational database management systems and SQL queries."
More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing model is complex and depends on factors such as the number of processing cores and the amount of storage."
"The solution is costly but reliable."
"The licensing is based on the number of terabytes."
"The pricing is relatively expensive due to the FlashBlade technology. However, for companies needing quick and reliable data access, the cost is justified."
"I feel that the price could always be lowered."
"Pure Storage FlashBlade is a hardware appliance, and it's very expensive if you compare its price with other solutions. You can get the same features and benefits from its competitor, VAST Data, but for half the price of Pure Storage FlashBlade."
"The price could be cheaper."
"I understand that it is competitively priced compared to other brands."
"The price of this solution could be made more affordable."
"Licensing fees are paid yearly."
"Our customers have seen a reduction in TCO."
More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise20
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Scale?
IBM Spectrum Scale is very expensive with complex pricing models usually based on the amount of storage used or the number of servers. Using Excelero for mirroring storage helped reduce Spectrum Sc...
See all answers
What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Scale?
There is room for improvement in the web interface. There could be more information available, such as charts and graphs to monitor performance.
See all answers
What is your primary use case for IBM Spectrum Scale?
My personal use of this product is for parallel writing or reading files.
See all answers
What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?
The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power outages when we need to quickly move data between different data centers. It ensure...
See all answers
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?
The pricing of Pure Storage FlashBlade is expensive compared to other products I used from other companies in the past, but one benefit is that they have built-in ransomware protection. Approximate...
See all answers
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?
I believe there is not much improvement needed because they have everything we need, but the interface is a little bit complex to understand. You have to understand it more deeply because it's hard...
See all answers
 

Comparisons

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs IBM Spectrum Scale Logo
Red Hat Ceph Storage vs IBM Spectrum Scale
Compared 19% of the time
Portworx Enterprise vs IBM Spectrum Scale Logo
Portworx Enterprise vs IBM Spectrum Scale
Compared 12% of the time
DDN IME vs IBM Spectrum Scale Logo
DDN IME vs IBM Spectrum Scale
Compared 11% of the time
Red Hat Gluster Storage vs IBM Spectrum Scale Logo
Red Hat Gluster Storage vs IBM Spectrum Scale
Compared 9% of the time
VMware vSAN vs IBM Spectrum Scale Logo
VMware vSAN vs IBM Spectrum Scale
Compared 8% of the time
More IBM Spectrum Scale Competitors
Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade Logo
Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade
Compared 19% of the time
Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade Logo
Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade
Compared 11% of the time
MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade Logo
MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade
Compared 10% of the time
Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade Logo
Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade
Compared 9% of the time
VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade Logo
VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade
Compared 7% of the time
More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors
 

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide
IBM Spectrum Scale
September 2025
IBM Spectrum Scale reportDownload IBM Spectrum Scale product report
Buyer's Guide
Pure Storage FlashBlade
September 2025
Pure Storage FlashBlade reportDownload Pure Storage FlashBlade product report
 

Overview

IBM Spectrum Scale is a cluster file system that provides concurrent access to a single file system or set of file systems from multiple nodes. The nodes can be SAN attached, network attached, a mixture of SAN attached and network attached, or in a shared nothing cluster configuration. This enables access to this common set of data to support a scale-out solution or to provide a high availability platform. IBM Spectrum Scale has many features beyond common data access including data replication, policy based storage management, and multi-site operations. You can create a cluster of AIX nodes, Linux nodes, Windows server nodes, or a mix of all three. IBM Spectrum Scale can run on virtualized instances providing common data access in environments, leverage logical partitioning, or other hypervisors. Multiple IBM Spectrum Scale clusters can share data within a location or across wide area network (WAN) connections.
IBM

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage
 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL
Buyer's Guide
IBM Spectrum Scale vs. Pure Storage FlashBlade
September 2025
Free Report: IBM Spectrum Scale vs. Pure Storage FlashBlade
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