IBM Storage Protect vs NetApp SnapCenter comparison

IBM and NetApp are both solutions in the Backup and Recovery category. IBM is ranked #14 with an average rating of 7.5, while NetApp is ranked #48 with an average rating of 7.5. IBM holds a 2.3% mindshare in BRS, compared to NetApp’s 0.7% mindshare. Additionally, 86% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of NetApp users who would recommend it.

IBM Storage Protect

Read 3 IBM Storage Protect reviews

4,197 Views
3,525 Comparison Views

86% willing to recommend

NetApp SnapCenter

Read 27 NetApp SnapCenter reviews

1,188 Views
1,105 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM Storage Protect

NetApp SnapCenter

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 12, 2025

NetApp SnapCenter and IBM Storage Protect compete in the data management category. NetApp SnapCenter seems to have the upper hand in terms of pricing and customer support, making it more attractive for budget-conscious buyers.

Features: NetApp SnapCenter provides efficient application integration, rapid deployment, and management simplicity. IBM Storage Protect offers extensive scalability, robust data protection, and comprehensive reporting functions.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: NetApp SnapCenter offers a straightforward deployment model with responsive support. IBM Storage Protect requires more intricate deployment due to its extensive features, supported by excellent customer service that guides through challenges.

Pricing and ROI: NetApp SnapCenter is praised for its cost-effectiveness and lower initial setup costs, leading to notable ROI. IBM Storage Protect demands a higher upfront investment yet offers long-term benefits that justify the expense for advanced data management solutions.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM Storage Protect vs. NetApp SnapCenter Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM Storage Protect vs. NetApp SnapCenter

July 2025

Download the complete report

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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 Storage Protect

Ranking in Backup and Recovery

14th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

NetApp SnapCenter

Ranking in Backup and Recovery

48th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of IBM Storage Protect is 2.3%, up from 2.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp SnapCenter is 0.7%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Backup and Recovery

Featured Reviews

Syed Habib

Head of Infrastructure Security (S.A.V.P) at EXIM Bank Ltd

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.

Read full review

Mir Gulzar Ahmed

IT Manager at Synergy Computers

Integrates well with various applications , provides a cloning feature for creating snapshots or clones of volume and a centralized command

It is basically centralized command control software. When the users visualize the workflow of the backup, the management and the customer storage administrator know the ins and outs of the backup and recovery. They can make the strategy for their backup and recovery and the certainty of their backups and restore. Strategic planning: Also, it is easy to make a strategy when you have visualized the inflow and outflow of the backup and recovery. With the CLI or native way, without any UI or management tool, you might not be able to create any strategy at all. This is especially important when you have multiple storage systems inside your data center or organization. You need a tool that connects and visualizes the workflow of the backup and recovery from all the storage systems and NetApp storage systems installed within the organization. It is very important when you have multiple storage systems, and you need to manage your backup and recovery workflow. Ease of Management: Unlike other storage vendors, NetApp has its own product called SnapCenter. Other vendors need to acquire third-party software or integrate with other software to manage storage systems. NetApp has its own solution, which is SnapCenter. NetApp's SnapCenter gels well with their storage systems and products. Ease of management is already there. It's a fine software with easy installation, management, and understanding. It's not a complicated software to understand.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It saves you a lot of storage."

"The ability to do dedupe in the product is nice to have."

"The backup of Sybase databases is the most valuable feature in the existing environment. They have got the most documentation out there on the internet for its software protection. The documentation is excellent, and there are a lot of blogs, websites. Because it's still one of the oldest products out there for data protection, there are also lots of people who have a lot of experience in using this solution."

"I've had no problems with the stability of this solution."

"It is scalable beyond anything my customers ever aspire to."

"You can do restores very quickly. You can mount a drive and restore it right from the drive."

"Scalability: Our customers are able to grow the product without having to buy additional hardware, so it is very scalable."

"Traditional archiving. One of our revenue streams involves maintaining archives of our customers' data for very long periods of time."

More IBM Storage Protect pros

"The support from NetApp is very good, and I would rate it as ten points."

"The product’s most valuable feature is cloning."

"Being able to add everything in as resource groups is a valuable feature... Having all the SQL servers put into specific buckets, based on their year of release - 2008, 2012, 2014 - allows us to get almost immediate backups that are easily seen and reported on."

"Technical support has been very helpful when we have issues."

"It helps with strategic planning because it is easy to make a strategy when you have visualized the inflow and outflow of the backup and recovery."

"The way that it interconnects with VMware is really handy, because you can go right into your vSphere client, where you spend a lot of the day anyway, right-click on one of the VMs where you have backups running for however long, and you can restore either some files or restore the entire thing."

"The most valuable feature is that it's centralized. In the old SnapManager days, we had software for each server. Now, with a centralized system, we're able to manage all systems remotely, and all agents remotely, and update them remotely. That's a huge benefit for us."

"The backup process finishes very quickly."

More NetApp SnapCenter pros

Cons

"An area for improvement would be the ease of use - the GUI is not up to the mark compared to other products in the market."

"Customers have migrated off of it because of its lack of virtual environment functions."

"High availability (HA) is a scalability challenge."

"We would like to see cloud integration."

"I would love to see something which allows us to do an auto restart of backup jobs."

"The main admin console from the UI cannot do anything in the product. It just allows us to maintain, maybe, 30% to 40%. For the rest, we have to use the command line."

"The product should improve its GUI. It should also support Windows clustering."

"It does not do too well in our virtual environment."

More IBM Storage Protect cons

"Since the solution's initial setup is complex, it should make training documents available in the public space."

"I have an issue with SnapCenter because sometimes a VM cannot be backed up... The way SnapCenter works is that it makes a backup of all the VMs and then it removes all the old backups. If one VM cannot be backed up for some reason, it has already created a new backup for all the VMs but it cannot remove the old backups. It ends up creating so many backups in VMware and it will cause a performance problem if the condition is not fixed."

"The GUI is still so-so. I' don't use the GUI that often anymore because it's really slow, refreshing disks, refreshing hosts, and you have to click a lot."

"I feel a little bit that during the whole process of putting this software into production we were like a beta program. It was full of bugs... For example, we had a problem with truncating our Exchange log files... It has improved over time."

"The compatibility with other manufacturers, like Oracle and Hyper-V, could be improved. I would like to see it be more compatible with other software."

"If it was possible to create backups on non-NetApp storage, that would be helpful."

"I would like to see replication support between systems. Right now, it's kind of limited. We manage them separately from the storage system interface, not from SnapCenter. It would be nice if it was integrated into SnapCenter."

"There is one area that needs improvement and that's in the alerting. When you set up your SMTP alerts, it only has - and I don't understand why - the ability to send an anonymous SMTP. It doesn't do basic authentication, which frustrated me for a while until I figured out that I'm not missing something. It's just not there."

More NetApp SnapCenter cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is expensive."

"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."

"Use capacity licensing. It's easier and cheaper."

"The license model that they have at IBM, which is due to volume, from a certain volume onward is not the right license model."

"Customers need to pay for licensing in order to use IBM Spectrum Protect. The customers that have been using it for a long time are okay and happy with it. From a cost point of view, it's better for them to renew their licenses than to go through the difficult process of changing a backup product in their environment, and migrate from one product to another."

"Its licensing is complicated. It goes by CPUs, and it is pretty expensive as well."

"Some of the new advanced features are definitely more into cost savings, e.g., dedupe compression, so doing more with less."

"It can be perceived as expensive since it is designed for enterprise use."

More IBM Storage Protect pricing and cost advice

"It's free. The license is included with other NetApp products."

"We see a financial value with SnapCenter because we don't have to license Commvault, which is pretty expensive."

"Pricing is very good because if you already have NepApp controllers, then it's included."

"It comes free with the amount of equipment we purchase from NetApp. In terms of pricing, zero is my favorite number."

"The license for SnapCenter was included with the storage array."

"We have a site license, so it comes with the product."

"The product is inexpensive."

"The licensing is well-designed because it's already included in some packages with NetApp storage. Therefore, for most customers, it's okay as the SnapCenter license is already included in some NetApp bundles."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

15%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Manufacturing Company

19%

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Educational Organization

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Storage Protect?

The best point about IBM Storage Protect is that it can use IBM tape environments, which we still use and will continue to use in the future.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Storage Protect?

IBM Storage Protect is generally an expensive tool. However, with good contracts with IBM or its partners, the cost might not be so high. New customers can expect very high prices.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Storage 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...

See all answers

What do you like most about NetApp SnapCenter?

Most banks and financial institutions use the solution.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetApp SnapCenter?

The product should be free because it is just software to administrate systems purchased from NetApp, which are already expensive.

See all answers

What needs improvement with NetApp SnapCenter?

The interface usability needs improvement. It should be more user-friendly and easier for customers to use.

See all answers

Comparisons

IBM Spectrum Protect Plus vs IBM Storage Protect

Compared 14% of the time

Veeam Data Platform vs IBM Storage Protect

Compared 14% of the time

Dell PowerProtect DD (Data Domain) vs IBM Storage Protect

Compared 10% of the time

Commvault Cloud vs IBM Storage Protect

Compared 9% of the time

HPE StoreOnce vs IBM Storage Protect

Compared 7% of the time

More IBM Storage Protect Competitors

Synology DSM vs NetApp SnapCenter

Compared 24% of the time

Commvault Cloud vs NetApp SnapCenter

Compared 17% of the time

Veeam Data Platform vs NetApp SnapCenter

Compared 12% of the time

Veritas NetBackup vs NetApp SnapCenter

Compared 10% of the time

More NetApp SnapCenter Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Backup and Recovery

July 2025

Download IBM Storage Protect product report

Buyer's Guide

NetApp SnapCenter

August 2025

Download NetApp SnapCenter product report

Also Known As

IBM Spectrum Discover

SnapCenter

Overview

IBM Storage Protect offers data protection and management to secure critical business information efficiently. It's designed to be a scalable and flexible solution for data backup, recovery, and archive needs in complex IT environments.

IBM Storage Protect delivers comprehensive data protection by integrating backup, recovery, and archiving functionalities. It supports a range of workloads and infrastructures, from on-premises to cloud environments, facilitating efficient data management. Its platform provides seamless scalability to meet evolving business needs, underpinned by reliable security measures. Organizations leverage its capabilities to ensure business continuity and minimize data loss risks, making it vital in a data-driven world.

What are the key features of IBM Storage Protect?

Advanced Data Protection: Offers robust encryption and data integrity for secure backup processes.
Scalability: Grows with your data demands, supporting large data volumes without compromising performance.
Cloud Integration: Seamlessly integrates with cloud platforms, enhancing backup strategies with hybrid options.
Automated Operations: Simplifies management tasks with automation, reducing manual intervention and errors.

What benefits should users expect when evaluating IBM Storage Protect?

Cost Efficiency: Reduces storage costs by optimizing backup processes and data retention strategies.
Data Safety: Ensures data accessibility and integrity during recovery efforts, building trust in data protection strategies.
Operational Efficiency: Boosts productivity through streamlined and automated backup management workflows.
Compliance Readiness: Helps maintain compliance with data protection regulations by providing thorough reporting and audit trails.

Industries like finance and healthcare implement IBM Storage Protect to safeguard sensitive information against threats. In financial services, it's crucial for maintaining client data confidentiality, while healthcare institutions use it to protect patient records, ensuring both accessibility and compliance with regulations.

IBM

Unified, scalable platform for application-consistent data protection and clone management. This software simplifies backup, restore, and clone lifecycle management with application-integrated workflows.

NetApp

Sample Customers

CEMEX

All for One Steeb AG, Accenture

Buyer's Guide

IBM Storage Protect vs. NetApp SnapCenter

July 2025

Free Report: IBM Storage Protect vs. NetApp SnapCenter

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Storage Protect vs. NetApp SnapCenter and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.

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