VMware Workspace ONE Reviews

We used AirWatch or VMware Workspace ONE to protect mobile devices on a large scale. They were known for being focused on mobile, more than desktops. They may not be as good on desktops, but the main use case is to monitor and manage mobile endpoints, e.g. wireless devices such as  tablets and phones. AirWatch became well known for being really good at monitoring and managing mobile endpoints.

VMware Workspace ONE isn't that good with patching and fixing, especially when compared to BigFix. This is an area for improvement. BigFix did a really good job in terms of patching and fixing, but it had a lot to do with IBM's integration to virtually every other platform out there. That integration really helped from just a server patching and endpoint management situation.

They (IBM) are very good at doing discovery, which is basically surveying the endpoint asset and finding out what vulnerability was there. It might be you're running Windows 10.647, and there are known vulnerabilities below that, so the prioritization of that patching became easy to create rules for, and make sure that you patched all devices with that current OS expeditiously.

Training for VMware Workspace ONE could also be improved, especially when compared to HCL who did a good job, either remote or self-paced.

VMware support has always been good, even if they became a really large company. They have what I call "Amazonitus", e.g. there's a lot of level two triage or level one triage, but you definitely get a response back, though a lot of people have moved away towards self-service. The goal is never to take a phone call if they don't have to, which I understand.

Their tech support is still rock solid on both sides, but would really depend on the kind of problem you have.

The setup for VMware Workspace ONE is good, e.g. there are no complexities, and they all have good discovery now. You plug them in, make sure the nodes are aligned on the network, then you can get to them. The setup process for VMware Workspace ONE and one of its competitors IBM, is very good. They've both done a very good job of it.

I was able to evaluate HCL (BigFix), Microsoft, Blackberry, and Ivanti.

AirWatch evolved into VMware Workspace ONE, so it's the same product. AirWatch was more of a competitor of mobile device management and security, so they weren't as good in patching and fixing.

There's another type of solution now that we call unified endpoint management (UEM), and that's a whole new category. I actually have quadrants in that. I know that AirWatch, even when they were acquired by VMware, e.g. it's now VMware Workspace ONE, was still highly rated. HCL is still highly rated. Microsoft was also good. Ironically, another company that was very good for mobile device management and one of the security companies out there is BlackBerry. They're still alive.

I've worked on most of the UEM solutions, including VMware Workspace ONE. For Blackberry, we haven't touched that lately. We have touched BigFix. I do have customers that are still running BlackBerry Spark®. I know even Google is trying to get in the game. Ivanti is also another UEM solution we've been dealing with. There are a number of different ones, e.g. even IBM has moved their MaaS360® platform to try to do unified endpoint management now.

The advice I'd like to give to others looking into implementing VMware Workspace ONE, is for them not to have any qualms about implementing it. Things are quick to set up, even if our team does some very hardcore security things, e.g. identity and access management, all kinds of threat landscape stuff, attack surface monitoring and modeling, etc. VMware Workspace ONE is one of the easier technologies that can be implemented for what we do, so I'm recommending it to others.

In terms of rating VMware Workspace ONE, there are a lot of "mini-categories", so they don't do some of the things I was talking about, or they're just newer into it. If I look at unified endpoint management, e.g. mobile, desktop, and everything combined, I would probably put BigFix high up there. For mobile, I would put VMware Workspace ONE high up there along with some others. Some of the SaaS ones, e.g. Tanium, do a good job, too. BlackBerry actually does a really good job with unified endpoint management, too. They just don't have billions of their devices out there, but in terms of managing their own devices, they were really the best in the early days, with a very secure platform.

HCL for UEM could be rated the best. For mobile, VMware Workspace ONE would rate the best, because they were really focused on that from the very beginning. They led the way, even if in that space you'll see 500 competitors, with people jumping up and jumping down, and constantly moving. VMware Workspace ONE in the mobile space has been very sustained in terms of how they've been rated and how they've grown over time. They owned the market with four or five of these solutions, and they were able to maintain the lead.

I could rate VMware Workspace ONE eight out of ten, but it would still depend on the use cases. BigFix is better for unified endpoint management, the ability to patch all assets, etc. VMware, on the other hand, is more focused on mobile. VMware being an infrastructure company and everybody inexpensively spinning up VMs all over the place: they've tried to pull that side a little more toward the infrastructure side, desktops, and PCs, and even on the networks, but both of them have grown tremendously.

In the last two or three years, for obvious reasons, with all the resiliency planning we do now for mobile workforces, it's really important for them to develop new capabilities, which I think they have, but this has been really good for their development. They've seen everything at this point.

One of our customers used it for centralizing and managing the identity and access of a SaaS-based solution. They used Workspace ONE to provide identity-based services and authentication, such as MFA. It integrates with Microsoft Office, Google Cloud, and things of that nature.

It is deployed in the cloud with a tie-in. It synchronizes to on-prem.

It has really easy and quick onboarding. Its transition and migration capabilities have been very helpful as we transition applications to the cloud. It was a central piece for enabling that to happen very quickly.

Clear and concise documentation is most valuable. That's a feature for me. 

Its UI is extremely easy to use whether you're an advanced user or a novice user. When I first opened it up and had to learn the product, I was easily a novice. By the end of the third month, I was digging into the backend of the system and using it as a highly advanced user to accomplish what I needed to accomplish, and I was able to do it through the UI mostly.

Support is probably the main challenge that we have. Their support was not very good. We had to tell them what we told them four or five times.

This product makes use of SAML across the board, which has seven known security flaws. It would be good if the company created a way to protect against SAML flaws. One way would be to integrate a firewall server or an endpoint out in the cloud with which you could establish trust. If you knew nothing about SAML and you did some Google searches about what SAML is, what are the flaws, and what are the known vulnerabilities, eventually, you'll find that there are seven flaws. There are two methods that you can use to solve those seven problems. They essentially involve putting a firewall or putting rules, such as access controls, so that anybody in the world can't just come in, authenticate, and either be a good guy or be someone trying to knock on my door and get into my house. If I could eliminate that, it would be awesome.

I used it about 30 days ago. It was a three-month project.

We didn't run into any bugs. In terms of performance, we didn't really test it for performance. We were not at all looking at performance metrics.

It seems like it would scale, but I can't really be sure because we did not test the scalability.

Our client has probably 2,000 people with all types of job roles. They are admins, engineers, and then there are regular users with no special privileges.

Their support needs to be improved. I don't know if this is a new area that the support people are learning, but the people supporting the product, or at least the people giving us the response back from support, were not very good. We had to tell them what we told them four or five times.

I didn't use any other solution previously.

There were five people involved. We had everyone from network architects to myself, an enterprise architect, and then we had representatives from each application. Everyone had their own little part to do, but the deployment was pretty straightforward and simple. It was so simple that we didn't believe some of the documentation. All you need to do is B and then C. It took having a little bit of faith and just walking through the instructions, and then, of course, we had to blow everything away and start again to try to repeat the deployment process so that we knew that all the steps were valid and accurate in multiple use cases, and they were.

It took us two and a half to three days to stand up the product. From there, onboarding applications went from two weeks to two days.

It requires ongoing maintenance. It's like running a cruise ship. You need to constantly monitor and maintain the product. We do that on behalf of our client.

It's definitely a bit on the expensive side. It is more for smaller organizations and not large, massive enterprises.

I am not sure about any additional costs. As far as we could tell, the billing was what the billing was.

Workspace ONE is one component of the solution. It is not the solution in itself. Workspace ONE is the front door and the locking mechanisms of all the doors, but you only need that if you're going to build a house.

I would rate it an eight out of 10.

Workspace ONE has a pretty broad range of features and capabilities. It's like a market-wide buffet that hasn't yet spread out. However, when compared to its competitors, such as Microsoft Intune, Intune is behind the game, but it has been catching up in terms of the capabilities and features that it now has to offer.

The Identity component of this solution is its most valuable feature.

VMware provides a wide range of services that are second to none.

They need a more flexible pricing model.

I have been working with VMware Workspace ONE for four years.

In terms of stability, I would say VMware Workspace ONE is fairly stable, but not every OEM vendor in the world can provide products that are error-free. When it comes to fixing errors, I believe VMware is on the right track. The problems aren't bothering the customers.

There are some errors but nothing that is of concern and it gets corrected quickly.

When compared to its competitors such as Microsoft, VMware is a much more scalable product, in my opinion.

When it comes to their SaaS offering, I would say the product is a little more flexible and scalable.

In terms of support, I would say it is adequate. When compared to Microsoft, I would say VMware support is excellent. However, there are times when you need to escalate certain issues in order to gain traction. And if you're not getting anywhere with your support cases, you may need to escalate internally.

Previously, I worked with Microsoft Intune.

Microsoft's licensing is more flexible and adaptive, in my opinion. In Microsoft, you pay for whatever you use. In terms of services, it is more evenly distributed. You only need to pay for one license to get access to a suite of products. From your office to your endpoint, you are essentially managing your endpoint. Everything is combined into a single console. somewhat more flexible on the Microsoft side, which is lacking on the VMware side.

In terms of features, I believe VMware has struck the right chord. However, there are some features in Microsoft that are lacking. I'm confident that Microsoft will try to catch up over time, and it will be there, within the next year or two.

I would say it was a straightforward process because if you are a potential lead for the product, the relevant stakeholders, such as the sales team, take action and then convert it. They perform POCs.

I would say that at the very least the pricing needs to be revised. Workspace ONE is on the higher end of the pricing band when compared to other players in the market.

Pricing may need to be subsidized.

The price is reasonable given the features that Workspace ONE provides. 

Not every company or every organization in the world can afford the VMware Workspace ONE just for the features. Some companies might be using some of the features, and they will have to pay for the rest of the features, even if they are not utilizing them.

I am not currently affiliated with any company, such as a solution provider, an MSP, or a product company that sells this product. I'm now more interested in DevOps.

I haven't been in touch with MDM technology in about six to eight months. We were gold-certified partners with VMware, as well as Microsoft.

I was a partner selling services and developing solutions for their customers.

I would advise them to first prioritize what they want to achieve. Rather than wandering aimlessly through the market in search of a specific product. First, they must understand or, more likely, articulate their use cases. And then, based on the pricing model, decide whether they want a lot more features so that they can use the services later on, rather than just going with whatever players are available in the market.

Make certain that it is the solution you require.

I would rate VMware Workspace ONE an eight out of ten.

The solution has VMware Horizon embedded which allows the utilization of many types of applications. We inform our clients how they can use this tool to convert applications and move them inside any type of device, such as tablets and smartphones.

There is a lot to learn in the process, you need to create a new policy to include mobility and security. The security policy is important when it comes to mobility. You have VMware Workspace ONE with Horizon, to bring the older type of devices, such as bring your own device (BYOD), all consolidated in the same console.

You can make many types of applications available, not only applications developed for mobility or smartphone but any older types of applications can be brought together. We showcase all these features to our clients for them to have an understanding of what can be created by this type of system. Because of the pandemic, the mobility market here in Brazil will soon grow and there is a need for innovating, the purchases of this solution have grown a lot in the last year.

The most valuable feature depends on the use case of the clients. However, one feature I like is the Kiosk Mode. In the Kiosk Mode in most cases, the clients only can make available one application developed by the solution and permit the employee or the final client to use only this one application for interaction. This provides a security control layer limiting only one application functionally.

There are other solutions that might be better for certain use cases. This is not an all-purpose solution.

I have been using this solution for approximately six years.

The solution is stable.

VMware provides the use of the cloud which allows the client the ability to create more research inside this environment and can expand quite well.

If the client has an on-premise solution or has an older environment there can be some challenges. I need to understand if more storage, virtual machines, or other types of additions is need to be made to create a higher availability. It is important for the client to share with me the limitations of their operation to allow me to figure out a proper solution to get around their limitations.

The technical support is very good. The agent was always helpful and responsive.

I have previously used MobileIron and Intune and along with this solution, are the top three. Depending on the use case, one might be better than the other and the main difference is the cost.

The installation and configuring of the solution are easy for a beginner. We help clients with some parts of the environment if needed but mostly the solution is straightforward to understand.

In a standard version, one week is enough to start using the solution, configuring the GUI, and getting through any obstacles that might be encountered. At this point, there can be discussions about the cost. The disadvantage of the older type of license is I need more time to understand the whole installation environment and processes. For example, whether I need to do some integrations or not.

We do the implementation of this solution.

For most of the projects, we use the standard license but for complex ones, we use the older type of processes, integrations, and licenses inside the solution.

Apple and Google need to improve the APIs internally to permit VMware access to updates and use this to create granular security policies inside devices, such as smartphones and tablets. A lot of the time we have to use an older approach because Google and Apple do not release these APIs to VMware. However, they release the same APIs for their own solutions, for example, Apple uses their own configuration.

I rate VMware Workspace ONE a nine out of ten.

The primary use case was to containerize data and allow us to deploy applications securely. That was the use case that was predicated on and funded as a security initiative.

We had no MDM in place before, and we had one after the fact. When we had a departing employee, we were able to close off their access immediately.

Basically, the data containerization and the ability to publish and consistently push apps is the most valuable aspect of the product.

It has good stability.

The product can scale. 

There was nothing that the product couldn't do except force upgrades of iOS on iPhones.

The management interface needs to be better.

We'd like more useful support.

The scripting language is all very unique to the product as opposed to using any kind of industry-standard methods. That might be frustrating for some teams. 

The initial setup can be complex.

I've worked with the solution for three years. 

The solution seems to be stable. 

This product scales well. 

At the high water mark, we had 3,200 users. We're down to about 2,100 now.

We do not have plans to expand the solution for a few reasons. Number one is cost. Number two is the management interface is poor. Number three is the absence of support from the vendor. Number four would be how hard it is to support Gene Pool. Finding people with expertise with the product are few and far between.

Support is absolutely horrible. 

If I was not escalating through the account team that I've got, I would have practically no support on it whatsoever. In terms of quality, it's an absolute one out of ten.

Negative

Initially, the setup itself is quite complex. We had bought what VMware called a starter kit, which came with some professional services to get us up and running with the product. I'd rate it a four out of five in terms of ease of deployment as we did have those professional services to help us.

Unfortunately, the implementation, I would have to call a fail. We had several existing devices, and installing the product properly involved wiping the phone and installing and then restoring the user's information. And we had a very large resistance to that approach from our client community. We ended up installing more of a BYOD model, which limited the value of the platform to our organization.

We had the help of VMware professional services. 

While they were helpful, we were not prepared for the amount of change it would be inflicting on our user base, and as a result, it was not as successful as we would've liked.

The ROI was predicated on a more secure environment. That was achieved.

It's a subscription from VMware. We have a hybrid setup with a physical gateway on site, however, beyond that, it's subscription-based.

We are paying about $145,000 a year on a three-year subscription with no ability to scale up or scale down within that class model.

I was not here when the initial purchase was made, so I don't have that comparative analysis from three years ago. It does not strike me as particularly expensive, however, given that Intune is now included with my E3 subscription, it's on the expensive side now.

Typically, the solution comes as part of a package deal. 

We are end-users. 

I'd warn future users not to underestimate the impact on an existing environment.

I'd rate the solution three out of ten. It's hard to use in the absence of support. It does what it needs to do. However, I don't like it.

I'm a reseller and help our customers implement the solution. We're using version 20.

Most of our customers deploy the solution on a public cloud. It's the VMware shared cloud. Most of our customers are small enterprises because most of the businesses in Hong Kong are small. Our customers usually have 20 to 100 devices.

There are two distributors in Hong Kong. We buy from the distributor, resell the solution, and we help other IT or telecom companies to implement the solution for their customers because they don't have professionals to do it.

Our customers request this solution because they like the repetition.

The solution is too complicated. A lot of end customers don't know how to start when they go into the console. They request our service to help them implement the MDM policy.

The distributor and VMware's people can't tell me what's the differentiation or the spec, because MDM products are very similar these days. Some of that might be because the vendor thinks it's good but it's not what the customer wants. That's why it's very difficult.

I have used this solution for about three years.

I would rate the stability as eight out of ten.

I would rate the scalability as eight out of ten.

I would rate technical support as six out of ten.

Usually, we solve most of the problems that our customers have. If they have a problem and need us to raise a ticket to VMware, then usually it's a very serious problem, and it takes time to find the right person to solve it.

Last time, it took three to four weeks for technical support to find the right person to solve the problem.

I'm also working with SOTI and Samsung Knox.

If it's the government center, we usually recommend that they use SOTI. If it's a commercial center, what we recommend depends on their budget. Depending on the budget and the type of device that the customer uses, we would recommend either Samsung Knox or Workspace ONE.

Most of our customers deploy the solution on the cloud, not on-premises. The most complicated part of the installation is installing the server.

Implementation can take six weeks to two months.

First, we get the requirement from the customers. They tell us what they want on the mobile and the features or result that they want. Then, we input and create the policy for them. After that, we test the result on the device. If it's okay, then we do the training after implementing the policy.

For deployment, usually one project manager and two engineers are needed.

If you lower the price too much, then the reseller and distributor don't earn money and they won't promote your product because software is a service.

The solution is about $45 per device for a 12 month subscription. The price is standard across the world. 

For the enrollment service, if the project is too big and there are too many devices, sometimes a customer will outsource the enrollment service or the professional service.

I am also working with SOTI and Samsung Knox.

I would rate this solution as seven out of ten.

My advice is to find a company that knows MDM. For example, the team in my company mainly specializes in MDM, which is why we can help customers. Not many companies in Hong Kong can help customers to implement.

VMware Workspace ONE is used mainly for mobile device management.

What I found most valuable in VMware Workspace ONE is that it's user-friendly. It has a good interface for users to get access to applications and files. It's also a good source of feedback between IT and users.

A room for improvement for this product is its integration with Microsoft. It could be better, though most of it is there. There are some dependencies with Microsoft that aren't 100% yet, for example: compliance synchronization. It's something VMware is probably working on, but that's what's missing currently.

I've been working with VMware Workspace ONE for six years.

VMware Workspace ONE is a stable solution.

VMware Workspace ONE is scalable. When they're in the cloud, scaling will be handled by VMware, but for on-premises environments, it's easy to scale up if you need more resources for servers.

VMware technical support is good. It depends on what trouble we get, but if there's a known fix, they're able to fix it fast. If there's a fix that needs to be created, they will focus on it and prioritize it.

The initial setup for this solution is straightforward, especially because I've done this for six years. If you know what you're doing, setting it up is easy.

This solution was implemented in-house. I could probably have done everything, but I don't have time to do everything myself, so we work as a team and share tasks between us. We don't need VMware tech support for the deployment, not unless we find some bugs.

VMware Workspace ONE has a yearly license. You pay upfront for one year. You have to buy licenses for one year at a time.

I evaluated Microsoft Enterprise Mobility.

I work as a consultant, so I'm working with VMware Workspace ONE for my customers. I work with several different versions of this solution, but mostly with the latest version, and it will also depend on the requirement. Deployment is both on-premises and on cloud.

Completing the deployment for a cloud configuration of VMware Workspace ONE depends on how much you want to do, but a good, basic configuration could take three to five days.

We work with different customers, so this solution scales from a few hundred to several thousand users. I'm working mainly with iOS, Android, and macOS. They also have colleagues that handle the Windows desktop configurations.

The number of people needed for a VMware Workspace ONE deployment varies. I can't do everything alone, but if you are running it on-premises, the company should have resources, including handling vacations and sickness. There should be available resources for its deployment.

I'm giving VMware Workspace ONE a score of eight out of ten.

We use VMware Workspace ONE for desktop virtualization.

When compared to competitors, VMware Workspace ONE is quite good.

As we are driving this business for the credit bureau, all of the benefits and features are available, as well as a few regulatory terms from the RBA. We have to abide by the rules and the regulatory terms. The MDM solution satisfies all of the requirements.

The performance is good, and it is easy to configure.

The user interface is very friendly.

Our central authentication mechanism is not integrated with this solution, which we deployed three years ago. So far, our goal is to integrate it with our two directory servers, but we've run into a few challenges. We are not able to connect with support to help us resolve this integration issue.

I would like to see improvements made to both the support, and the pricing.

We have been using VMware Workspace ONE for three years.

VMware Workspace ONE is a stable solution.

This system may be scaled up with further licensing, which is beneficial to the company.

It has scalable capabilities.

In our organization, I believe we have 100 users.

Technical support is an area that needs improvement.

I'm having difficulties with VMware support, with AirWatch, Workspace ONE. We would like to integrate it with our central authentication system, but there are some issues. We have been trying to connect with the technical support team to help us resolve this issue.

We are using AirWatch, which is an MDM solution, and we are also using SaltStack, for automation. 

VMware recently acquired SaltStack. According to my knowledge, the merger with SaltStack occurred this year.

After you've deployed the solution for your company, there are only a few things left to accomplish, such as adding or configuring new users. If someone leaves the organization, you have to remove them, which does not require further administrative effort.

I believe it takes around 10 to 15 minutes to configure a new user.

A technical team of only two to three people is sufficient, especially considering they have 24/7 assistance.

The installation can easily be done yourself, it's easy. 

Anyone can follow the instructions or watch the video and do it themselves.

It's a costly solution.

While it is not inexpensive in terms of price, it is definitely worth it. In terms of pricing and the functionality we get with the MDM, I believe it is more than adequate.

We have a three-year subscription.

With the many solutions available such as IBM MaaS360 and Microsoft Intune, you have to consider the business requirements, the software you will be using, and the strength of the security it provides.

This solution is very secure, and I would definitely recommend it to others.

I would rate VMware Workspace ONE a nine out of ten because the support is lacking.