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NetApp AFF vs VAST Data comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 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

Pure FlashArray X NVMe
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
14th
Ranking in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
6th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
36
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp AFF
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
2nd
Ranking in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
2nd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
313
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VAST Data
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
32nd
Ranking in NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
14th
Average Rating
10.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
File and Object Storage (18th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 3.2%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp AFF is 18.5%, down from 20.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VAST Data is 5.9%, down from 6.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
NetApp AFF18.5%
Pure FlashArray X NVMe3.2%
VAST Data5.9%
Other72.4%
NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays
 

Featured Reviews

Jaehoon Oh - PeerSpot reviewer
Supports efficient storage management through volume snapshots and offers reliable non-disruptive upgrades
I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could be enhanced. I can see the performance statistics in the Pure Storage console, but it does not show the performance by 4K byte unit. It displays IOPS and bandwidth, but IOPS is about real use, and I want to know how many IOPS are currently running in 4K byte units. I cannot see that IOPS because most storage systems report their performance by 4K byte unit. I want to see Pure Storage performance by 4K byte unit to compare with other storage or other internal NVMe SSD.
KennethEtsula - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers seamless installation and efficient data handling with robust support
NetApp AFF provides an all-flash storage solution for unified SAN solutions, supporting both SAN and NAS functionalities. Data reduction capabilities such as deduplication, compression, and compaction are standard features included with the license in NetApp AFF. With the storage efficiency from a NetApp AFF installation, users can manage substantial data running on all-flash. The features such as compaction and compression provide storage efficiency guarantees in an all-flash environment.
Alan Powers - PeerSpot reviewer
Stability-wise, a device that has been up and running for years
The failover capability and resiliency are some of the solution's valuable features. The big thing is resilience because it has richer coding in it, so multiple devices can't fail. Also, one can still access a number of CBoxes that can allow one to access their file system. Once a device fails, it fails the transparency of the end-user, and it just starts using another resource. The encryption capability, the snapshots, along with a whole bunch of features make the tool valuable. VAST Data keeps adding more and more features all the time.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution uses newer technology for deduplication and compression."
"The high availability of the product is the most valuable feature."
"I use the tool for Oracle databases, Oracle virtual machines, and Oracle Linux databases. I'm on the storage side, not a database administrator."
"Pure Storage has signature security technology, which cannot be deleted, even if you are an administrator."
"The most valuable features of Pure FlashArray X NVMe are its superior performance compared to other flash tiers, as well as its ease of use, with an intuitive user interface that is simple to deploy and use."
"On a scale of one to ten, I rate Pure FlashArray as ten."
"It is very easy to install and configure. It has got excellent diagnostics. If you really need to see how the box is performing, the console gives you a lot of information. You can set thresholds as well as alerts based on the thresholds, which is a very powerful functionality. They are very proactive. They know how to monitor and manage the systems. They see a problem, and they are all over it before us. They see the problem before we see it, which is very good."
"The solution is scalable."
"The most valuable features of the solution are the software bundle, replication, and cloud connectivity."
"It scales well, probably more so than the FAS. Because of the storage density with the SSDs, we can't buy enough SSDs to max one out."
"From my standpoint, NetApp AFF is the most powerful enterprise solution. I find it to be highly flexible, allowing me to do whatever I want."
"The tool's most valuable feature is efficiency."
"The speed is important; no more problems caused by high latency."
"With the storage efficiency from a NetApp AFF installation, users can manage substantial data running on all-flash, and the features such as compaction and compression provide storage efficiency guarantees in an all-flash environment."
"It impacts customer retention because of its overall ease. When you are running a business, where time is a factor, that is the biggest selling point. Things happen really rapidly, when they happen, and being able to say, "Yeah, we can get this up and running in a day, if you want," or even less time in some cases. Sometimes, that can be what makes or breaks our case."
"The in-line dedupe, and the compaction saves us a lot of space because most of our AFFs house VMware VMDK files."
"The solution is useful for machine learning and scientific applications, including computer simulations."
"This has been one of the most reliable storage systems that I have ever used."
 

Cons

"The tool's portfolio is minimal. It is expensive."
"Our use cases require more multi-tenant capabilities and additional VLAN interfaces for separating different customers. We currently use it to provide storage, sometimes shared storage, to different customers, but it is less flexible in comparison to a dedicated solution."
"You cannot tag a LUN with a description, and that should be improved. What I like on the Unity side is that when I expand LUNs or do things, there is an information field on the LUN. This is the Information field that you can tag on your LUNs to let yourself know, "Hey, I've added this much space on this date". Pure lacks that ability. So, you don't have a mechanism that's friendly for tracking your data expansions on the LUN and for adding any additional information. That's a downside for me."
"The UI for this solution needs to be improved."
"It feels more suitable for small and medium-sized businesses rather than enterprises."
"Right now, the box itself is just strictly working as a backend storage system. It would be fantastic if we could access it directly like a NAS device through network access or SIS drives. I think they have an interface, but I am not sure how good it is. If we could address a box directly on the network without having to go through a server, it would be great. The replication schemas could be improved. We are not using replication on the storage level right now. We use a different type of replication. If their replication would be as good as the one that we have, I would probably run the replication schema because it might be faster, but I don't know that for a fact. So, I cannot say that they have good replication. All I can say is that they need to inform us better."
"It's more multi-tenant functionality in their Pure1 manage portal that is lacking."
"There are some challenges with data encryption and reduction."
"We would like to have more behavioral reporting."
"ZAPI is kind of difficult to use. You know, it's SOAP-like, it's not really SOAP. I would like to see it more of a REST-based JSON, instead of XML."
"Stability could be improved."
"I would like to see aggregate level encryption in the next release. This is critical."
"Additional performance, additional data efficiencies, that's what everybody wants right now."
"Tech support is a place where there is room to improve the product experience. The response time when they are busy is not very good."
"We installed NetSender to test it. I think it could be a good solution. It is very small now, but will probably become bigger in the next few months to years."
"Going forward, I would like improvement in the response latencies, capacity size, cache, and controller size."
"The read/write ratio is an area in the solution with some flaws and needs improvement."
"The write performance could be improved because it is less than half of the read performance."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is expensive."
"Its price could be better. It is not too expensive, but it is the high-end cost. It is kind of a Rolls-Royce. You pay a lot, but you get a lot out of it. So, the price pressure on the way down would be great, but at the end of the day, if you need to do the work, you just pay for it."
"With VMware, we pay $300,000 annually."
"With Pure Storage, we would like to continue seeing price reductions with flash storage. I don't think we're any different than anybody else when we continue to look to the industry for price reductions of both NVMe and traditional SSD storage. We would like to see these prices continue to decline and erode, even displacing large spinning disks."
"They can tout the functionality and cutting edge technology that they have, but that's where the price tag comes in. The cost is high, but I think as they grow their business and get more customers that it will probably go down a little bit."
"The licensing is on a yearly basis."
"The tool is an investment that we've budgeted for. While the prices may be higher than those of other vendors, we see it as a market leader with benefits. We don't regret purchasing it."
"The support cost per array is about $20,000 a year for 24/7 support."
"ATTO bridges add to the total cost of the system."
"It's expensive but we think over time all the prices are going to go down."
"The pricing is not a lot considering what you get and it bundles hardware and licensing."
"The pricing is pretty reasonable for what we get. But if you have to buy any more disk space, it can be quite expensive."
"It's expensive. it's in the hundreds of thousands. It's beneficial, but at times, I feel compared to other vendors, we are paying a premium for the licensing that other vendors include."
"NetApp AFF is somewhat pricey. If they weren't as pricey, that would be a big deal for us."
"There is room for improvement when it comes to the cost. The cost is very high compared to other devices."
"NetApp AFF is an expensive product, although not compared to other vendors."
"Price-wise, VAST Data is not the cheapest, not the most expensive one."
"We acquired VAST Data as a one-time, capital purchase."
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Comparison Review

it_user186357 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 28, 2015
NetApp vs. XtremIO
Is there another storage platform as feature rich as NetApp FAS? I think it is fair to say that NetApp FAS running Clustered Data ONTAP is a very feature rich platform – the move to the clustered version of ONTAP has brought many next-generation features including Scale-out and Non-disruptive…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
6%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
5%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business15
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise12
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business44
Midsize Enterprise46
Large Enterprise242
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
The price of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is very expensive, though I do not know the actual price because I am using the E...
What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?
I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could ...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
Well, Is one thing NetApp Storage has vs other brand is the mix of protocol CIFS with NFS booth working together in t...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
This question is very dependent on your requirements. Both are among the best in the field. Of course, the intended c...
What is the Biggest Difference Between Dell EMC Unity and NetApp AFF?
The answer depends on your needs and budget. If you want high performance (who doesn't) or let's say the latency matt...
Ask a question
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Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X
NetApp All Flash FAS, NetApp AFF, NetApp Flash FAS
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company
DreamWorks Animation, FICO, Yahoo! Japan
Norwest Venture Partners, General Dynamics Information Technology, Ginkgo Bioworks
Find out what your peers are saying about NetApp AFF vs. VAST Data and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
871,688 professionals have used our research since 2012.