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NetBrain vs VMware NSX comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 6, 2025

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
5th
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Network Troubleshooting (17th)
VMware NSX
Ranking in Network Automation
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
107
Ranking in other categories
Network Virtualization (2nd), Cloud and Data Center Security (2nd), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (5th), Network Detection and Response (NDR) (6th), Microsegmentation Software (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Network Automation category, the mindshare of NetBrain is 9.1%, down from 12.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware NSX is 4.5%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware NSX4.5%
NetBrain9.1%
Other86.4%
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

"Chain management is a good feature. I don't get it on other solutions."
"Other advice to users considering the solution would be: go with NetBrain."
"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."
"This product has good network monitoring and troubleshooting capabilities."
"NetBrain is faster, better and level sets the engineering technical sets."
"NetBrain is a very simple tool."
"This tool is exactly what we wanted and needed."
"A reliable, time-saving tool for providing accurate layer 2 and layer 3 network mappings."
"The most valuable feature of VMware NSX is the high bandwidth."
"One of the big improvements between the NSX-V and NSX-T is that in NSX-T you are no longer dependent on V-Center anymore."
"I have found VMware NSX to be easy to use."
"The most valuable feature of VMware NSX is the ability to set up virtual networking environments."
"It's pretty stable. Just deploy it and just forget about it."
"From a security standpoint, the customer was able to better secure critical workloads while routing L2/L3 worked normally, giving them more confidence that they would be ready for any potential security incident mitigation or outage (DR)."
"This product is like the layer between traditional networking and virtualization, giving you the flexibility to deploy and have network virtualization on different types of firewalls."
"The stability is great. That's one of the things that we can quantify and leverage through NSX, because it's less complex. We have the availability to manage multiple things at the same time. You can identify problems before they manifest."
 

Cons

"Each device needs to be configured to allow NetBrain to poll for the information it needs, which can be very time-consuming for a large network."
"The pricing needs to be improved."
"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."
"The IP interface brief isn't consistent."
"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."
"Netbrain must get AWS functionality done."
"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."
"The solution could integrate more automation."
"It might be nice to have more AI in the future."
"One drawback is this solution requires a lot of other products in the VMware ecosystem to have a full end-to-end operation orchestration monitoring. You have to buy a lot of add-ons to fully utilize the functionality."
"The setup of the solution could be simplified."
"We would like better integration with the standards on the market. For example, with OSPF, their integration in NSX is very low. It's not a full OSPF integration. It is too thin from a protocol perspective."
"The integration with other brands is not the best."
"Occasionally the licensing is not very clear. They should make it easier to understand."
"I would like to have automating reporting built into common service management platforms, such as JIRA, Serviceaide, and ServiceNow."
"In the next release, they should enhance the visual interface."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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 product is expensive, but less expensive than some of the competition and worth the price."
"The price is based on the virtual desktop infrastructure(VDI) side and also is dependant on the size of the environment. The price is expensive and it could attract more purchasers in smaller organisations if it was reduced."
"The price could be better. We pay for the license every three years. The last time I checked, it cost around three million pesos in the Philipines. Most of the expense will go towards implementation and renovation."
"It is an expensive product, but cheaper than some competing solutions."
"The price is pretty high."
"If five is a good price and one is a high price, I would rate the price a one out of five."
"We have saved man-hours and decreased our security exposure."
"The price is significantly high and it can be a hurdle for many potential users."
"The price of VMware NSX is optimal. Additionally, the price of the solution can be negotiated with the vendor. Many areas of the solution can impact the cost, such as features, time for onboarding, and support needed."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
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

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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: April 2026.
892,383 professionals have used our research since 2012.