MinIO vs NetApp StorageGRID comparison

MinIO and NetApp are both solutions in the File and Object Storage category. MinIO is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.0, while NetApp is ranked #8 with an average rating of 8.0. MinIO holds a 19.0% mindshare in FaOS, compared to NetApp’s 5.8% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of MinIO users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 88% of NetApp users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 4, 2024

NetApp StorageGRID and MinIO are prominent competitors in the object storage solutions category. While both have significant strengths, NetApp StorageGRID appears to have an upper hand with its enterprise-grade features like fast data backup and recovery, integrated lifecycle management, and strong niche market presence, particularly in Canada.

Features: NetApp StorageGRID's notable features include fast data backup and recovery via AltaVault, effective deduplication and compression, and integrated Information Lifecycle Management for seamless data operations. MinIO shines with its on-demand tenant deployment, erasure coding, and robust API, ensuring flexible data management and compatibility with various storage types.

Room for Improvement: NetApp StorageGRID users suggest enhancements in menu logic, storage efficiency, and metadata handling. Improved pricing strategies and easier initial setup are also desired. MinIO could refine its user interface, enhance documentation, and improve multi-tenancy support. Both platforms could benefit from enhanced monitoring capabilities.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: StorageGRID offers solid deployment options focused on on-premises and private cloud with reliable support, though expertise concerns exist. MinIO’s deployment is simplified due to its open-source nature, but recommendations for improved customer support and feature enhancements are prevalent.

Pricing and ROI: NetApp StorageGRID features enterprise-grade pricing, offering long-term cost savings and efficiency suitable for large-scale deployments. MinIO’s open-source model offers a cost-effective solution for smaller deployments, although enterprise support incurs additional costs.

To learn more, read our detailed MinIO vs. NetApp StorageGRID Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

MinIO vs. NetApp StorageGRID

June 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

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the File and Object Storage category, the mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 5.8%, down from 6.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of MinIO is 19.0%, down from 24.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp StorageGRID is 5.8%, up from 4.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

File and Object Storage

Featured Reviews

Eric Black

Solutions Architect at Recovery Point Systems

The ability to leverage multi-tenancy along with immutability is a huge benefit for us

The only thing I feel FlashBlade is missing is the SOS API. If it had SOS API, that would put it well over the top. Veeam Backup specifically has started to streamline their API, and they are doing that with SOS API. They have optimized it. Any of the S3 devices out there that support this SOS API can have far more API calls at once. On our side, that translates to better restoration. With SOS API, it can leverage far more restorations at a single given time or read from the device in simple terms. That results in maximizing the output and throughput from the device itself.

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Abdelrahim-Ahmad

Data Scientist at a tech vendor with 501-1,000 employees

Provides good object storage functionalities

MinIO should provide an easier subscription model for companies that don't have a huge amount of data. Our company has a maximum of 100 terabytes of data. The solution should provide more bugging tools in the open-source version to encourage people to buy the support services. It's not an easy decision. If I go to the management and tell them that I need to buy a service, there should be an easier subscription model for companies that don't have huge amounts of data. For me, getting a subscription for 15,000 a year for a system already in production might be a bit hard. I think MinIO supports a minimum of one petabyte or 100 terabytes of data. Since we don't have such huge amounts of data, buying a subscription for the solution is a bit difficult. Hence, we're only using the open-source version for now. If MinIO becomes really crucial for our business, we could ask the management to get a subscription.

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Mir Gulzar Ahmed

IT Manager at Synergy Computers

Object-based storage and offers intuitive management tools, making it easy to configure and maintain

The only thing missing is flexibility in configuration to cater to specific customer requirements. Another area of improvement is marketing. NetApp's marketing of StorageGRID isn't optimal. They should present it more effectively, especially in regions like Pakistan. Here, I haven't seen any marketing campaigns from NetApp for StorageGRID or the Solid State Platform (SSP). While StorageGRID is a globally recognized product, I haven't seen any marketing efforts from NetApp in Pakistan. Even competitors are promoting object storage solutions here, but NetApp seems less efficient in selling StorageGRID. There might be one or two customers, but even as a NetApp partner, I'm not aware of any major sales. I've been trained on StorageGRID, and it is a good product. I'm unsure why it hasn't gained traction in Pakistan compared to other countries. So, I just recommend improving the marketing campaigns in Pakistan. I'm pretty confident that if we have one example of successful StorageGRID implementation in Pakistan, other customers will follow suit.

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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

"I would rate this solution an eight plus. It has has good flexibility and stability, it's easy to manage and the response time is good."

"I like its size. It is smaller than the other competitors. We can plug in many blades, and we can have data up to one terabyte."

"The product is scalable and easy to expand."

"It has absolutely simplified our storage because the dashboards on the consoles show a clear understanding of where you are, and it is also very easy to provision. This been a big help for our teams."

"We have seen a reduction in the total cost of ownership by around 20%."

"Speed and ease of use are the two most valuable features."

"The most valuable features of this solution are the rewrite speed and the nonstop services."

"The onboarding and integrated monitoring tools are pretty good."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"The product does save time for our company."

"I use the solution's basic object storage functionalities, like AWS S3 compatible APIs and creating buckets."

"The most valuable feature of MinIO is its ease of use, replication, and active directory. All the capabilities are in this solution."

"The container installation features are good. The S3 feature provisions the storage buckets making it easy. It allows me to spin up the public buckets with open-source technology."

"Nice web interface, easy to use, with a low memory footprint."

"This is an all-in-one, user-friendly data storage."

"The stability of MinIO is good."

"The initial setup was very easy - one click, and it was installed."

More MinIO pros

"StorageGRID is designed for cloud-based, highly scalable storage. Think big names like service providers like Google who need massive storage volumes with scalability. It also offers cloud-enabled storage capabilities with cloud management functionality. So, if you prioritize scalability and cloud integration, StorageGRID is the way to go. Its object-based storage is built specifically for that purpose."

"It improves our operational efficiency."

"The speed of the disks removed the bottleneck from our storage."

"The scalability is very effective for our customers."

"The backup features are valuable. I've heard from our backup and data protection people that our clients are very satisfied with the performance in junction with the backup, which they archive on this type of object storage."

"The technical support is good."

"The most valuable feature is tiering."

"The scalability is very effective for our customers."

More NetApp StorageGRID pros

Cons

"The features provided for SMB customers are limited."

"I would like to have Snapshots and Snapmail in the next release. People who came from a NetApp background, especially expect these features."

"The documentational aspect of FlashBlade needs improvement."

"The Pure Storage Orchestrator is our biggest pain point at the moment. If we can have more say in future developments of feature sets that we will need to support for our use case, that would be pretty beneficial to us."

"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."

"It would be beneficial if the layer could support the S3 protocol and be container ready in the next release."

"I would like to see better integration."

"I would like to see the licensing fees improved as well as the price per terabytes."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"Documentation could be improved."

"MinIO should provide an easier subscription model for companies that don't have a huge amount of data."

"The monitoring capability is really bad and needs to be improved."

"The product's initial setup phase is complex."

"The tool’s pricing needs to improve. We also encountered challenges while deploying the tool in Kubernetes. The documentation also was not too great. We have currently deployed the solution in a stand-alone fashion."

"The only downside I see is that you do not have a complete picture of an object."

"With problems, visibility is hard because everything is in containers. Difficult to get to the logs in order to figure out what the problem was."

"The documentation of the solution should improve."

More MinIO cons

"The redundancy and reliability are great, but I also see room for improvement there. I would like to see more efficiency in the storage and dedupe/compression solutions."

"The price is something that NetApp could improve, as with most companies. NetApp is known for not being the cheapest storage option, which is also valid for StorageGRID. There are other storage options on the market which we are aware of and have done proofs of concept for, but you cannot really compare the list prices because, as a big user of NetApp storages, we have totally different prices than some list prices. Still, the price information we got for other options are almost always less expensive than StorageGRID."

"It's quite complex, which is a disadvantage; it's enterprise-level, it's complicated to set up, and you need external support."

"I would like to see them integrate more with the monitoring platforms. It is a bit difficult to get automated monitoring of the system."

"There was a small amount of confusion when working with StorageGRID and Active Directory for access. We had to do things three to four times resulting in our engineer troubleshooting a couple of things. The location of the menu, along with what is inside the menu: configurations, settings, etc., is not straightforward to users. Most users are Windows-based. So, when make logical changes to the menu which are not similar to Windows, users and administrators get confused."

"They can enhance the deduplication and compression features, which are crucial for saving more disk space."

"It has its quirks here and there, but it is an older NetApp system."

"The only real issue that we have run into is, when we are cloning, we cannot do a thin provision clone, it has to be a full clone."

More NetApp StorageGRID cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is very expensive."

"The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate."

"I have seen ROI. It has allowed me to increase the density of my VMs without having to purchase anything additional."

"Our licensing is renewed annually."

"The pricing is relatively expensive due to the FlashBlade technology. However, for companies needing quick and reliable data access, the cost is justified."

"I understand that it is competitively priced compared to other brands."

"It is within reason for what you get. From what we have found comparing it to other vendors, it is in the same range as others. Given the choice, we would definitely redeploy it based on the cost."

"The price is a little high."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"MinIO is a free open-source solution."

"We use the solution's open-source version."

"My company hasn't tried the version of the solution where we need to pay to use it."

"This is an open-source solution but I am using the licensed version."

"This solution is open source so it is free."

"We use the solution's open-source version."

"It is very cost-effective."

"The price is attractive."

"NetApp is not known for being the cheapest storage option on the market. Almost all of the other storage options we looked at were less expensive than StorageGRID. The price is one thing to criticize, which is what we hear internally and from customers as well. They find the cost of the terabytes in this class of storage a little bit higher than expected."

"The licensing that the S3 service provides them from a FabricPool standpoint is more attractive than the licensing from AWS or Azure."

"Our licensing is in INR it was around 25 lakhs, which is roughly two million."

"The pricing of StorageGRID falls within the typical range for enterprise-grade solutions and is comparable to other vendors such as Dell, NetApp, and Pure Storage."

"The pricing is quite flexible and depends on the specific customer requirements. The initial cost is primarily based on the desired capacity, so it's not a fixed price."

"While we have been able to save money on storage costs, it could be better."

More NetApp StorageGRID pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

14%

Computer Software Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

18%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Financial Services Firm

21%

Manufacturing Company

19%

Computer Software Company

16%

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

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 out...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The pricing for FlashBlade is between cheap and moderate. FlashBlade is worth the money due to the experience and per...

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What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

Its configuration should be easier. There should be easier language for the configuration.

See all answers

How does Red Hat Ceph Storage compare with MiniO?

Red Hat Ceph does well in simplifying storage integration by replacing the need for numerous storage solutions. This ...

See all answers

What do you like most about MinIO?

I like that if you have a problem, you can buy the home server. It is stable and robust.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for MinIO?

We use the solution's open-source version.

See all answers

What do you like most about NetApp StorageGRID?

The management portals have most significantly improved our data retrieval times. They've made it much easier to rest...

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

It would definitely be more on the expensive side, especially if you compare it with open source solutions like Ceph.

See all answers

What needs improvement with NetApp StorageGRID?

If I could change anything in NetApp StorageGRID, that would be pricing. In terms of functionality, reliability, and ...

See all answers

Comparisons

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 20% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 10% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 10% of the time

Dell PowerStore vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 2% of the time

More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs MinIO

Compared 53% of the time

Dell ECS vs MinIO

Compared 5% of the time

Cloudian HyperStore vs MinIO

Compared 5% of the time

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs MinIO

Compared 4% of the time

Scality RING vs MinIO

Compared 3% of the time

More MinIO Competitors

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs NetApp StorageGRID

Compared 25% of the time

Dell ECS vs NetApp StorageGRID

Compared 22% of the time

Scality RING vs NetApp StorageGRID

Compared 7% of the time

Hitachi Content Platform vs NetApp StorageGRID

Compared 5% of the time

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs NetApp StorageGRID

Compared 2% of the time

More NetApp StorageGRID Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure Storage FlashBlade

June 2025

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

Buyer's Guide

MinIO

June 2025

Download MinIO product report

Buyer's Guide

NetApp StorageGRID

June 2025

Download NetApp StorageGRID product report

Also Known As

No data available

Storage GRID

Overview

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

MinIO is an open-source object storage system. It is designed to efficiently store and retrieve unstructured data, such as photos, videos, and backups. MinIO can be used as a standalone object storage server or as part of a larger system, such as a data lake or a private cloud, and can be deployed on-premise, in the cloud, or in a hybrid environment, making it a flexible storage solution for a variety of use cases.

MinIO’s features include erasure coding, bitrot protection, and checksum validation, which help ensure data integrity and reliability. The solution’s multi-tenancy support makes it ideal for multi-user environments. MinIO’s edge computing tools enable data storage and processing closer to users' locations, reducing latency and improving performance. MinIO can easily scale to accommodate storage and power demands, making it ideal for use in large-scale, data-intensive environments.

MinIO Benefits and Features:

MinIO offers several key benefits and features for organizations looking for a scalable and high-performing object storage solution:

Scalability: Horizontally scale to increase storage space and processing power as your needs grow.

High performance: MinIO’s edge computing and low latency provide fast data access.

Seamless integrations: MinIO is compatible with the Amazon S3 API, which enables integration with third-party systems and tools.

Data integrity: Security features, such as erasure coding, bitrot protection, and checksum validation, ensure data integrity and reliability.

Reduced costs: MinIO is an open-source solution, making it a cost-effective option for organizations looking for a scalable object storage solution.

Support: MinIO’s large open-source community of developers and users provides a wide range of resources and an active support network

Multi-tenancy: Multi-tenancy support makes MinIO suitable for use in multi-user environments.

Easy deployment: MinIO is easy to deploy and can run on a variety of platforms, including on-premise, in the cloud, or in a hybrid environment.

Access control: Role-based access control, enabling you to control access to data based on users permissions.

Event notifications: Automate workflows based on changes to objects in your storage.

Cross-region replication: Duplicate data between different regions for disaster recovery and data backup.

Intuitive interface: MinIO’s user-friendly dashboard can be accessed via any browser and can be used to perform multiple object operations including object creation and management.

Reviews from Real Users

MinIO stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Several major ones are its flexibility, integration options, and performance.

Süleyman Fazıl Y., a senior software engineer at a tech services company, writes, “The most valuable features are that MinIO is open, it works on-premise, and is compatible with the Amazon industry which is great for finding compatible libraries in many languages which is very good for developers.”

Rebecca S., CTO at NIASE, says, “MinIO is much improved over the prior solution, updates are simple to apply, and we anticipate that future capacity requirements will be easier to meet. Our customers are using this solution to retrieve tens of thousands of objects (documents and files) per hour, and MinIO seems to be able to keep up with it.”

MinIO

Store and manage unstructured data at scale using NetApp StorageGRID for secure, durable object storage. Place content in the right location, at the right time, and on the right storage tier, optimizing workflows and reducing overall costs for globally distributed rich media.

NetApp

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Information Not Available

ASE, DARZ GmbH

Buyer's Guide

MinIO vs. NetApp StorageGRID

June 2025

Free Report: MinIO vs. NetApp StorageGRID

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