No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

NetBrain vs VMware NSX comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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

NetBrain
Ranking in Network Automation
7th
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Network Troubleshooting (18th)
VMware NSX
Ranking in Network Automation
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
107
Ranking in other categories
Network Virtualization (1st), Cloud and Data Center Security (6th), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (7th), Network Detection and Response (NDR) (9th), Microsegmentation Software (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the Network Automation category, the mindshare of NetBrain is 7.8%, down from 13.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware NSX is 4.3%, up from 3.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware NSX4.3%
NetBrain7.8%
Other87.9%
Network Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Deborah Gamelin - PeerSpot reviewer
Vice President at Asset Track for Cloud, LLC
Good monitoring and troubleshoot capabilities, improves overall network traffic visibility
In my organization, we had 130,000 network devices that needed to be brought into the solution and mapped. NetBrain can handle the scale but the engineers that manage those devices have to go in and update all of them to allow NetBrain permission to poll them. It can get a little stressful for everybody when you're trying to roll out new stuff when you've got other issues that have to be addressed with other devices. In some cases, our devices had no automation at all. One example is the Cisco 3650. Right now, if you went through the inventory list, you see that we have different versions running. Some are on one version, whereas others are on another version. The problem with upgrading them is that they need to be done overnight because we don't want to disrupt any network traffic during business hours. Consequently, it could take us years to upgrade the versions before we can even get them onto these new tools. This may be an internal issue but it's a big one when you have a lot of devices. Even if you had 10,000 devices, it's still an issue. You have to consider the compatibility of the device against the tool, and being able to use certain commands to upgrade it.
TAIYAB HASAN - PeerSpot reviewer
Windows Redhat Linux Vmware & Azure & Cloud & Nutanix Ahv-Vmware & Backup Senior System Administrator at AlDawaa Medical Services
Has improved network visibility and security through micro-segmentation and SDN capabilities
This feature gives us flexibility and allows us to manage everything under one pane. We can see everything on one console, including network operations and behavior. Monitoring and security are among the best features for VMware NSX. For micro-segmentation, it's integrated with our endpoint security. If there are any issues with servers or VMs, it notifies us so we can isolate the servers and investigate. It provides distributed security features such as firewall and intrusion, IDS, IPS. The security level with IPS and IDS in VMware NSX is excellent. It also provides logical switching and routing which gives an extra layer for Layer 2 and Layer 3 switching requirements. The solution provides flexibility, automation, and self-service capabilities, resulting in cost savings as extensive expertise isn't required. Once automation and self-service are implemented, many tasks can be completed automatically. Load balancing is another excellent feature. Multiple servers can run on load balancing features, which is particularly useful since we have many application servers running. Sharing loads between servers provides the best performance.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Enables maps to be drawn out."
"Once it's up and running and you don't have the strange requirements I had, and you just want some basic maps, it'll work."
"NetBrain is faster, better and level sets the engineering technical sets."
"Chain management is a good feature. I don't get it on other solutions."
"This tool is exactly what we wanted and needed."
"Other advice to users considering the solution would be: go with NetBrain."
"NetBrain is very good when it comes to network mapping, as it looks for different assets within the network available, so router, firewall, applications, et cetera, and it gives you the full mapping, asset mapping along with the full range including the firmware software update and all those things."
"This product has good network monitoring and troubleshooting capabilities."
"The most valuable features are security and dynamic routing."
"It has reduced the number of people on the network team along with the system engineer involved in the security process, so it is valuable and we can't go without NSX, so it's invaluable from this perspective."
"They have a lot of support and specialists who can meet with the customer."
"When using for K8s container platforms or a networking backed for on premises cloud using a CMP(VRA, VIO) then VMware NSX is the best SDN solution."
"We secured our organisation with Micro-segmentation."
"NSX is good in managing security or controlling the security and the access control for each single VM."
"The most valuable feature is the integration with the firewall."
"I value the ability to dynamically configure our network on the fly using VMware NSX."
 

Cons

"Support needs to improve for the installed product and some of the reporting could be more flexible to provide more complete cataloging."
"It would be nice if the setup was a little simpler. Also, if the solution could provide more training materials for new people coming into our company so they can quickly learn how to use the functionalities."
"If you're comparing NetBrain as an NDR, I would rate it as a four or five, however, NetBrain has a different aspect of looking at things within the network."
"Licensing is based on a per-device basis, which means that it can get very expensive if you have a large number of devices."
"The solution could integrate more automation."
"It's okay on the value, a bit expensive for just maps, but makes it a lot easier to see things visually and take it from there."
"Netbrain must get AWS functionality done."
"When I used the installed product before, I wasn't very satisfied with the support."
"The price could be better. The non-enterprise version of the product should also be improved. I would like VMware to expand beyond the network and provide some VLAN technologies and more. I think we have one, but it's more on the distribution side because it's more on the upper side of the network. I'm looking forward to that."
"The scalability is not perfect."
"There could be an improvement in regards to security. This solution cannot migrate all assets smoothly and continuously, for example, sometimes the physical hosts are not able to be converted into virtual ones, which needs to be fixed."
"Lacks integration with other solutions."
"To those who say this solution is complex, I would say it is but not for the key user."
"It should be more adapted to the physical side of network topology in order to prevent unavailability."
"They could do more with cloud management."
"It needs to be cheaper."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is expensive, but less expensive than some of the competition and worth the price."
"Licensing is based on a per-device basis, which means that it can get very expensive if you have a large number of devices."
"The pricing model for VMware NSX is good."
"This solution requires a licence."
"The subscription is on a yearly basis."
"The price of VMware NSX is reasonable."
"I would rate the pricing of VMware NSX as seven out of ten"
"The tool's pricing is reasonable."
"We have saved man-hours and decreased our security exposure."
"If five is a good price and one is a high price, I would rate the price a one out of five."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Network Automation solutions are best for your needs.
906,887 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise69
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
There are some very major differences between both the Products and to name a few. -Cisco ACI have physical network gear (9K Switches) where the Code runs in ACI Policy Mode & the UCS server wh...
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
Once you know your way around the Cisco ecosystem, using Cisco ACI is not so difficult. It is a global product, so when you change one interface, changes are automatically reflected on every switch...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware NSX?
When measuring complexity and costs for our organization, we consider some parameters for effectiveness. In terms of effectiveness in reducing operational complexity, I measure it to be high on the...
 

Also Known As

No data available
VMware Nicira, Lastline Defender
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CompuCon, TD Ameritrade, Move Inc.
City of Avondale, Lumeta, Kroll Ontrack, Heartland Payment Systems, Baystate Heallth, Exostar, Tribune Media, iGATE, NTT Communications, Synergent, California Natural Resources Agency, Bloomington Public Schools, Columbia Sportswear, Join Experience S.A, Schuberg Philis
Find out what your peers are saying about NetBrain vs. VMware NSX and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
906,887 professionals have used our research since 2012.