NAKIVO Backup & Replication Reviews

As a software house, we make heavy use of the VMware vSphere environment for hosting our test lab along with the software repositories and other data.

There are some software repositories, file shares, and a VMware vSphere environment with about 60 virtual machines (few transient but the majority evolving), all weighing in at around 3.4 TB of data to backup.

Our data is mostly NAS-centric so we need a comprehensive solution to back up our NAS, possibly without allocating an additional instance of operating system and related hardware.

It is also necessary to make local and offsite backup copies of our data without recurring, if possible, scripting.

Nakivo permits easy installation natively on a NAS and has a low-impact footprint for needed resources. It can be quickly configured via web pages.

It is strongly oriented to backup VMware vSphere environments yet permits us also to protect data based on CIFS (Microsoft SMB) shares, thus covering our needs.

We can protect our environment by backing up data to local, offsite, and Amazon storage - making use of backup and copy jobs offered natively by Nakivo.

After an initial configuration and calibration work, the software now works successfully.

It can be installed natively on NAS appliances (it supports Qnap and other kinds of NAS) permitting the use of underutilized appliances without installing the software on Windows or Linux Servers.

The solution has frugal resource needs.

We can backup natively our VMware Virtual Machines and File Shares.

We can store backups (or make copies of them) onto Microsoft shares, Amazon S3, (which is ultimately on more economical Backblaze), and remotely to other sites using their little transporter VM.

Jobs can be chained one after the other to not overload the system with overlapping jobs or to start a backup copy job after its relative backup has ended.

We have rapid add/remove/reorder priority of VM to backup and their backup archive.

Nakivo Service is very helpful and pretty fast to respond (about 1-2 days).

We would like to back up File Shares to Amazon S3/Wasabi.

Email notifications should allow for the subject to be customizable and permit the use of some predefined variables (like {JOBNAME}, {DATETIME}, {JOBRESULT}) that will be substituted when mail is sent.

The backup view of a repository could be adjusted. In addition to the Name, Job, and Size columns, it would also be useful to see the number of recovery points for each object and the backup type for each row.

The backup view of a VM repository is necessary. If you have several protected virtual machines, you have correspondingly different pages to navigate to reach a specific VM. After entering the detail view of a backup, when you click "<" on the page, you are returned to the first page of the repository instead of being returned to the nth page you were on before. Alternatively, having a field where you set the number of rows to show would help.

Also, with the backup view of a VM repository, it would be nice to have a tooltip showing the summary data of the backup you are hovering over (or by clicking the hyperlink).

I've been using the solution for more than four months.

Previously we use MicroFocus VM Explorer (formerly Trilead VM Explorer).

Upgrading the vSphere platform makes VM Explorer no more able to support new environments. Further, we need a more comprehensive backup solution.

The setup of the software is simple and rapid.

The price is reasonable for our needs and with respect to the features offered.

We looked at Acronis Cyber Protect and Altaro VM Backup.

Our customers moved to VMs on VMWare and Hyper-V and due to this, a new backup solution was needed. 

I have tested most of the brands on the market and looked at Nakivo. From the start, this was an easy-to-use no-nonsense tool that just worked. The price was low, and it was flexible to install, both on Windows servers and as a Linux VM.

Recently I have started to use the Linux appliance from Nakivo and they work great. I like the idea of having the backup software on a different platform disconnected from the production system.

The management of NAKIVO works great. They make it simple to get an overview of the status, backup progress, and the used disk space in the repository.

It is very useful for all types of backup and a copy function to external media works smoothly.

It is the first time I have been able to set up backup systems that work and is easy for the customer to access and check the status of the system.

It can be used on many systems, like VMs, physical machines, and Office 365, from the same installation - depending on the license.

The easy management and a good overview are the most important aspects.

The compression function optimizes the use of disk space and the error reporting that sends emails if anything goes wrong.

And the great service from the support, I have never experienced that they couldn’t help and if I forgot to answer, then they reminded me, to keep tracking the error until it was solved.

Since I have started to use NAKIVO backup I have not got a complaint from my customers about the backup system.

It is easy to create new users by giving the customer access to the management system and they do not have to install anything.

Right now, nothing is wrong.

The product fits my needs 100%. I use it for the backup of VMs. Some customers only have two VMs and others have more than 30.

The only thing I can think of is better options for adjusting the text in the mails that the system sends, both for reporting and for errors. When you review these emails from different customers, then it can be hard to identify from what system they have been sent.

The process for getting unused diskspace back from the data repository is slow. This could need an update to improve the speed.

I've used the solution for five years.

The system is very stable. Most problems have been from other systems.

The scalability is really good.

They offer super professional technical service.

Positive

We used Symantec Backup Exec and tried Veeam.

The initial setup is straightforward.

The setup is easy and they have really good guides. The price is also good, specialy for systems with many VMs.

We looked into Veeam, Symantec, and some other backup systems for host systems.

We use this software to back up all of our servers, databases, and log files as well as create bare metal recovery backups incase a server fails. 

When a server has failed in the past, Nakivo's been a great help as it's able to restore an entire operating system with its configuration and files basically everything. Therefore, when a server failed we simply wiped the drive and restored everything via Nakivo and haven't had a single problem. We've never had a restore operation fail on us due to a corrupted backup. 

This amazing software is highly recommended. We also use it on our Hyper-V environment and it's able to restore directly into Hyper-V and start the VM with no configuration required afterwards as it's a 1:1 replica of the server.

Nakivo improved our backup environment as it added yet another backup for us to have. 

We use multiple backup software like the Windows Server backup, EaseUS TODO Backup, and SQL SMSS DB Backup including other third-party backup software dedicated for their software. 

Nakivo's able to do everything these programs can do and is able to work with NAS shares, SMB shares, and many others. The best part about it is when we've ever tried to restore to verify the backups we've never had a problem in the four years and we regularly verify the backups every three months.

One of the most valuable features we've been using is the whole system backup. It works the best out of so many different applications without a doubt. The ease of use management server website, reliability, email notifications if the job is unsuccessful (and successful), and the performance are top-notch. It uses all the bandwidth available if not limited and backs up entire servers with all data about four times faster than Windows Server Backup and EaseUS TODO Backup.

One of the things I liked least about this software is when an update was pushed to one of the servers we had, somehow we didn't receive the update and needed some quick troubleshooting. That said, the customer service team was able to help out within the hour and was amazing and very helpful from the first reply. Like you cant go wrong with their customer support team. If you have a problem, an inquiry, or just a general question about what you can do or how else you can incorporate it they will answer your question to your satisfaction within the first two replies - unlike a lot of other support teams that just follow scripts and procedures, these guys get right down to the point from the first email.

I've used the solution for about four years.

We verify backups every 3 months and have never had a single problem with them over four years. They are highly dependable.

The product is 100% the best in terms of scaling. It offers high-speed transfers for both restores and backups and doesn't congest networks even without bandwidth throttling.

They reply with a useful answer within the first two emails from starting the case. They are very knowledgeable people and don't follow a useless script like many big companies.

Positive

We used the Windows Server Backup which was unreliable.

We also used the Easeus TODO Backup, which had lots of failed backups due to files in the network sharing in the same folder as the backup job (previous backups causing errors).

The setup is very straightforward once you figure out what needs to be done.

The solution doesn't require that many resources for the actual virtual machine/dedicated server for its software. It is very efficiently designed and has very high performance without congesting the network.

Windows Server Backup - Unreliable but came with windows so assumed it should be able to get the job done but lots of corrupted backups when trying to verify integrity.

Easeus TODO Backup - Lots of failed backups due to files in network share in the same folder as the backup job (previous backups causing errors) other than that no problems with it. lots of cool functions too but nakivo offers everything plus extra.

I recommend this software for any medium to large businesses. It offers very good integrity of backups.

We're using Nakivo primarily for backup, replication, and recovery. It helps us back up our databases and files in Microsoft or other OS types. There are other features we don't use, like multi-environment management. 

In the future, we might use some of the features they've added in the latest edition, like VM monitoring. I discussed this option today with one of our partners, and they said you could consolidate tools instead of buying another solution for VM monitoring tools. That way, you can manage two solutions from one console. However, we only need backup replication for our current infrastructure needs. We have not used the multi-site capabilities because we have no current demand.

All our customers give the same feedback on Nakivo. They tell us they appreciate the user-friendly interface and the space savings they realize from Nakivo's compression. The slick interface, low price, and compression are valuable for us. 

Nakivo's reporting features have helped a lot. They give my boss high visibility into what's going on, which is crucial because we had a data breach in the past where we lost about 12 years of data. That's why we bought several appliances, and we replicate the same backup twice a day to three different depositories. 

Nakivo is fast and user-friendly. Compression over Othernet is the best feature, and Nakivo's object-level restoration is also excellent. All the features are well designed, work properly, and meet our needs, and there are some extra features that we don't use.

Some of Nakivo's backup features need improvement. For example, I would like some more options for job scheduling. We can only schedule incremental and full backup, but there are no differential backup features in the same job. I can only schedule one incremental and one full backup in a week. 

I schedule three jobs for each repository, which is the simplest way to plan your jobs. It's possible to consolidate three jobs into one, but when you want to explain the backup registration schema to someone, they can't understand what they don't see. When you schedule some jobs, you should be able to see a list of the jobs contained within each. You have to open up the editor to see what is inside. You must click through and edit stuff. Each time, it asks you to save or discard changes. It's very annoying. You only see the name of the scheduled job, and you need to edit it to see what's it's inside.

I am a Nakivo regional reseller, and I've been using this product since 2015.

Nakivo is highly stable. In the past six years, I've never had a backup fail. It can sometimes happen, but only if you run out of space. 

You can scale up just by paying for more licenses. There are options. For example, if you buy a new server, you need extra licenses, and when you purchase an additional license, you must buy another month for the previous license. The scalability is flexible. One of our clients has 12 circuits, but we sell six circuits for each on average.

We had a big problem where we didn't know what happened to our clients' servers, but we ultimately realized it was a problem on our side. Overall, Nakivo's support was fast. They instantly respond via call or via email.

The backup and replication method for most solutions is the same. For example, Nakivo and Veeam are similar, but Veeam has many options we will never use, and we get a lot of questions about features customers don't need.

It's more complicated to perform the same jobs using Veritas, which is designed for huge companies, like telecoms and multinational companies. It's more of an enterprise solution, so the price is much higher.

The deployment process is about the same for any client because some features are grayed out when you have a licensed product. The specific installation and deployment process depends on the licensing, but the basic menus are the same. You can buy Nakivo online and start using it in less than an hour. 

I took two or three different training courses to learn how to use Nakivo. They were helpful. We have several engineers involved in deploying and maintaining the solution, but their jobs are mixed. We don't have one designated person who handles backup solutions.

However, Nakivo handles most of the maintenance on our ongoing projects. For example, if you make a backup, Nakivo will check the integrity of your data. It's a valuable feature. 

A backup and replication solution is an essential investment for most businesses. If you're using replication, you don't need to spend money on testing infrastructure, so Nakivo will save you about 60 percent on testing costs. 

Nakivo's licensing is straightforward compared to some other vendors who make purchasing hard. Nakivo's licensing is flexible. If your infrastructure changes or you have some new needs, you can find the cheapest price. 

I rate Nakivo 10 out of 10. The two major advantages of going with Nakivo are support and price. We work with mid-sized companies, and these are their primary concerns. 

We are using Nakivo for backing up multiple Virtual Machines hosted over ESXi hosts in various locations.

The hosts vary from 6.0 to 6.7 and previously we had Nakivo running for 5.5 hosts as well, which have since been dismissed.

When we started, we had also older 4.1 hosts which were covered by a special transporter used for legacy systems.

Since then, we have performed various upgrades to both the ESXi hosts, and Nakivo always worked flawlessly. It becomes better with each upgrade. 

For us, the capability of using Nakivo with the un-licensed version of ESXi is the biggest selling point.

The ease of use and the intuitive interface are also quite nice, and the various upgrades from Nakivo's side are great.

The UI has been reworked from the 9.x to the 10.x version and the new one is really good.

Thanks to Nakivo, we were able to perform a disaster recovery procedure during early 2021, losing little to no data, and the only thing slowing us down during the recovery was the speed of the new host.

The ability to backup Virtual Machines on the un-licensed version of ESXi is the main selling point for us.

The backups, especially of the incremental type, are really quick (ranging from five to 10 to 45 to 50 minutes depending on the size of the VM).

The recoveries are also quite quick, of course, depending on the host system. Generally, it recovers over the network and does not take more than an hour, again, depending on various factors unrelated to Nakivo.

The ability to retrieve individual files from a backup is a welcome plus which we discovered and found pretty useful.

Personally, I would like to have the ability to backup older legacy systems on the new versions as well.

I'd like the ability to perform individual backups (so a backup from inside the system instead of on the host side) - which right now is limited to newer Operating Systems, which, while is a good thing from a security point of view. That said, sometimes there is an older machine or VM which could use backups like this.

For our usage, we've found the connections to remote shares (like CIFS or NFS) while quite easy to set up are a little bit prone to interruption. Of course, in the next availability check performed autonomously by Nakivo, the connection is restored. This could of course be a problem with the destination share, however, it's really the only "issue" we've had with this software.

I've used the solution since 2018.

The stability of the software is great; we've never had a problem with it or with the updates.

The customer support is awesome and the support service is also great and quite qualified.

We don't have much experience with them as we had to contact them just once for clarification and not a real problem. 

Positive

Previously we had a custom backup procedure. We switched due to the impracticality of maintaining that system and the ease of use of Nakivo.

The initial setup is totally straightforward with little to no specific competence required, at least, not on the networking side.

Our in-house team managed the implementation.

The software did completely repay itself, especially when we had to activate the disaster recovery plan.

The price is really competitive. The offering, as well as the ability to use it with free ESXi, is awesome.

The setup is as easy as deploying a VM.  

We valued other options, both for individual and granular files backups, such as BackupPC, and also for host systems, such as Veeam.

We chose Nakivo due to its higher feature offering at a lower price point compared to other alternatives.

We're pretty satisfied with the product. I'm also evaluating it for personal non-work-related use.

We needed a backup solution that would back up all over Virtual Machines (VMware) and have a safe, fast, and reliable recovery process when needed.

Nakivo has allowed a worry-free backup process. 

The interface is basic and very easy to use which is what we are looking for. Setup is a simple task I manged to setup all the backup process by myself and if I had any questions the technical team was there to guide me and backup reports and notifications keeps you informed if there is any issues.

The solution is very simple to use in every way - including in the setup process, configuration, and backup process. 

Backups are done if all your connections are online. We tested and keep testing the restore process and we found that the restore process is quick and easy. 

You can also connect to different repositories so that you can have multiple backups on different devices to keep the backups stored in and safe and secure location. 

With Nakivo, we have a worry-free backup process and restore feature.

We always had an issue where we could not download a file if a user deleted it by mistake. We needed to restore the image or use another backup program to be able to just restore single files or folders if needed.

With Nakivo, we can do this and have the option to be able to download single files or folders from an incremental or full backup. It has saved us a lot of time.

You also have the option to download it locally to your PC or restore it back into the virtual machine, which, again, is time-saving and cost-effective in the long run.

We have a lot of clients on the network and we need to back up their local files. Space is always an issue and we try to backup just the files in certain folders, which the users are aware of. A good solution would be if we could create backups of files and folders from the users' local machine.

It might sound old-fashioned, however, we are limited on space and this solution will be a great feature. The user might lose their laptop or have it stolen, so having a backup of their local files would be just what we need.

We are now moving in on two years of working with this product.

The solution is very stable and easy to use. 

Backup times really depend on your overall systems. If you have fast systems, it will back up fast. In regards to our older solutions, it is way more impressive.

Technical support is always ready to respond always helpful.

Positive

We did use a different solution. We switch as the last solution was very expensive.

The initial setup is very straightforward and easy.

We did the implementation ourselves in-house.

We found everything more cost-effective with Nakivo. We had a reduction of 70% in costs when we switched.

We looked at some other options. Acronis and Veeam were some solutions we looked into.

We have used the solution for backup and restoration in a vSphere Environment. Nakivo can be used to backup nearly any virtual infrastructure. For us, it keeps incremental and full backups in a repo with deduplication that will keep storage usage low and restores very quickly. It integrates well with NFS storage for larger storage needs. There is also a monitoring dashboard that we use to monitor our virtual hosts. We use the fast restore option to quickly spin up virtual guests when there is no time to copy it back to the virtual host datastore.

Nakivo has been great for incremental backups of our virtual infrastructure. Restoring from backups is very simple. Nakivo, similar to Veeam Backup gives you peace of mind and confidence in your virtual infrastructure. 

If you were to lose a virtual host or a local datastore or remote datastore, Nakivo quick restore allows you to immediately spin up the virtual guest from backup on another virtual host, eliminating downtime and allowing for quick migrations to new hardware in the case of a catastrophe.  

The following aspects are the most valuable:

Quick Backups. Nakivo backups operate quickly, generally around 50 to 100MB/s, depending on your environment. This speed combined with only incremental changes being uploaded allows for quick hourly or nightly backups that don't bog down your infrastructure and take resources away from other needs.

Lightning-quick restores. Restores can run directly from the Nakivo Repo. You don't need to transfer back to the datastore until you have the time to do so.

Low Price. The price is much lower than competitors that do the same function.  

Support. Support has been friendly and responsive.

It would be great if they had a Let's Encrypt integration. Since LE provides free SSL certificates, it would be great. 

If you already have an internal CA authority you likely wouldn't need this, however, LE integration would allow shops without an internal CA to easily and freely (at no cost) auto-renew SSL certs. As it currently stands, you need to process your SSL renewal on another machine and then import it into Nakivo. It would be nice if Nakivo integrated LE and supported both HTTPS and DNS Validation for those machines behind Firewalls.

I have used the solution for three years.

The stability has been consistent.

The solution scales well.

Technical support offers fast knowledgeable response.

Positive

We tested Veeam, however, the price didn't seem worth it. Nakivo performs the same functions for a better price.

We used the Virtual Appliance for an easy setup experience.

I'd advise new users to reach out to CS at Nakivo and they will be happy to work with you on a quote that fits your needs. They got back to us quickly.

We did evaluate Veeam.

We primarily use the solution for VM replication and backup. 

We replicate 6 VMs (both Windows and Linux) from one ESXi host to another ESXi host (VMware) and we make backs-up to a NAS of all 6 VMs with various types of retention. We used Nakivo also to duplicate the VMs for upgrade purposes on the server infrastructure. VMs are both servers and client machines.

Nakivo makes our backs-ups more reliable and easy to recover in case of full damage or partial retrieval of files - all at a convenient cost. Every time a user asks us for a missing file to be retrieved, we can satisfy his/her request in a few minutes. Notifications of Nakivo make us sure of the accuracy of backup jobs. 

VM replication is a great solution. Now, I can also duplicate VMs without the need for a vSphere vCenter server. It's with easier ESXi hosts. Also, for system administration purposes (tests, upgrades, etc.) it offers perfect functionality. 

I have no remarks. I need no more valuable features for backs-up. I have not yet tried the latest release, however, I have all the features that I need. The web interface is very usable and easy to understand, as is the planning of backs-up. The granular recovery is very useful for the ordinary activities of users. I have no comparison with other products, so I can't imagine other features.  No remarkable features are missing for me.

I've used the solution since 2018.

In about 3 years, we have never had stability problems and the appliance has been running 24/7/365.

We have not tested scalability, so I can't give an opinion.

Italian support of the vendor is quite good and competent. Sometimes they are slow to respond.

Positive

Our previous backup solution was a self-made server script without replication capabilities and only backed up at a file system level, not at a block level.

It's an easy setup of the appliance.

We implemented via our internal team.

Veem was more (and too) expensive for small companies. Nakivo was at the correct price point.

We also evaluated Veem.