Azure NetApp Files vs Microsoft Azure File Storage comparison

NetApp and Microsoft are both solutions in the Public Cloud Storage Services category. NetApp is ranked #8 with an average rating of 7.3, while Microsoft is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.2. NetApp holds a 7.6% mindshare in PCSS, compared to Microsoft’s 10.3% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of NetApp users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 97% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

Azure NetApp Files

Read 17 Azure NetApp Files reviews

2,213 Views
1,452 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

Microsoft Azure File Storage

Read 48 Microsoft Azure File Storage reviews

2,969 Views
2,478 Comparison Views

97% willing to recommend

Azure NetApp Files

Microsoft Azure File Storage

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 1, 2024

Microsoft Azure File Storage and Azure NetApp Files are competing in the cloud storage solution category. Microsoft Azure File Storage appears to have the upper hand for its pricing and support, while Azure NetApp Files is favored for its advanced features and performance.

Features: Azure NetApp Files offers robust integration, superior performance for complex workloads, and advanced features. Microsoft Azure File Storage is noted for its simplicity, reliability, and ease of use.

Room for Improvement: Microsoft Azure File Storage needs better scalability, improved access controls, and more intuitive management. Azure NetApp Files could benefit from a less steep learning curve, a more intuitive interface, and streamlined deployment.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Deployment of Microsoft Azure File Storage is straightforward with comprehensive support. Azure NetApp Files has a more complex deployment but high-quality customer service helps offset the challenge.

Pricing and ROI: Microsoft Azure File Storage is favored for its cost-effectiveness and high ROI. Azure NetApp Files is pricier but offers worthwhile returns due to its extensive features.

To learn more, read our detailed Azure NetApp Files vs. Microsoft Azure File Storage Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Azure NetApp Files vs. Microsoft Azure File Storage

April 2025

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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

Azure NetApp Files

Ranking in Public Cloud Storage Services

8th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Migration (3rd), Cloud Storage (7th)

Microsoft Azure File Storage

Ranking in Public Cloud Storage Services

4th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Public Cloud Storage Services category, the mindshare of Azure NetApp Files is 7.6%, up from 7.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Azure File Storage is 10.3%, down from 13.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Public Cloud Storage Services

Featured Reviews

AjayKumar13

Cloud/Data/Database Manager at a government with 10,001+ employees

Fast, reliable, and helps meet our SLAs

The most valuable feature is that the sixty-terabyte database snapshot can be done in less than two to three minutes. It is faster. It is quicker. It is reliable. You don't need to take the snapshot. Snapshots are compressed. It doesn't take storage from the back end. It takes three minutes to do sixty terabytes of the database. You don't have to go to the tape and store it outside, which takes hours and hours. It also uses a lot less of the storage. It's very easy to restore or copy the snapshots to other locations for disaster recovery. There are a lot of benefits. In terms of the snapshot's rapid restore capability, we were testing the load of performance testing, and we needed to rebuild the DR site. If I need to rebuild the DR for a standby database, it takes sixty terabytes to copy onto the another site, which will take at least a day. Now, the snapshot is easy. We just copy the snapshots, and then we do the cross-region application. The snapshots came along with that, and that's where we were able to build the DR site within a few hours rather than days. All together, instead of a four-day process, instead of a day.

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PrashanthR

Lead Software Engineer at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees

Seamlessly streamlines document processing with advanced file storage and OCR integration

We need to store data over there. We process documents through Kofax Time is a major benefit, as well as ease of processing. With configuration, it happens quite easily, and we can finish tasks early. File storage is complemented by OCR with Azure Cognitive Service. This enhances the processing…

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable features of the solution is replication to another region and the performance. The solution is stable. The solution is scalable. The initial setup is straightforward."

"This solution definitely makes us more efficient in being able to provide storage quickly to our customers in the Azure Cloud."

"It's elastic, so it scales with our demands. We can start small, then with the addition of customer loads, we can expand on-the-fly without the need to reprovision something."

"I like the SnapMirror feature in Azure NetApp Files. It helps me create backups with snapshots and makes data recovery and compression."

"One aspect of Azure NetApp Files that I truly appreciate is its remarkable performance capabilities."

"I think the easiest part is, when you do a comparison, it is the throughput versus the cost. And it's much easier to set up."

"We use Azure NetApp Files mainly for backup."

More Azure NetApp Files pros

"File storage is complemented by OCR with Azure Cognitive Service."

"Azure File Storage gives us easy access to cloud solutions at the storage level."

"This solution supports all file formats."

"Azure File Storage gives us easy access to cloud solutions at the storage level."

"It is very easy to use SSTP and some traditional code to move the data into a database because we can easily use the permissions and we don't have any integration or conversion issues."

"It's a scalable solution."

"Azure File Storage gives good value for money, so I don't find it expensive."

"File storage is complemented by OCR with Azure Cognitive Service."

More Microsoft Azure File Storage pros

Cons

"Azure NetApp Files could improve by being more diverse to integrate better with other solutions, such as Splunk and the on-premise version. There are some use cases that are not covered natively by Azure. It is not the best solution because it is not external from the cloud which for me is the best type of solution."

"The initial setup was not straightforward. We had help from the NetApp team."

"The pricing definitely needs to be improved."

"We would like for the files which are coming in that we can version them. So, if a file is accidentally deleted, there should have a recycle bin option where we can go back, and at least once, clean it up."

"We would like to see more paired regions for the replication."

"We were looking for a clustered solution that has over-complicated things because we had it in AWS, which is Amazon. There was a solution for clustered NetApp. That meant there would be two NetApps that were not clustered because there was no solution for a cluster. We would like there to be an HA cluster solution."

"The main area for improvement is in the support ticket system. Since it's a SaaS platform, support tickets are managed by Microsoft or NetApp backend. This can sometimes lead to cross-functional challenges for organizations."

"I would like to see multi-zone redundancy so that I don't have to worry about it. I just back up my data to that one SMB share and I know that it's replicated to a different region."

More Azure NetApp Files cons

"It’s a challenge to find the right support person."

"Microsoft Azure File Storage is not that scalable. Once you reach the boundaries, you need to migrate to another solution."

"The upload speed has room for improvement."

"The product name keeps changing. It can be confusing when product names change frequently, especially with Microsoft. Sometimes, if you refer to a product by a certain name last year, it might have a different name six months later."

"It would be good if they added some features that make the solution easier to access for everyone."

"If the file is large, there may be a delay in download time."

"Microsoft Azure File Storage needs more integrations. In the future, I also want to see GRC added to the portal. If you enroll or sign up for Azure services, your country may not have GRC available in the portal, so you may have to choose a strange country, for example, Kenya, to activate credit."

"A lot of things could be better, especially when it comes to accessing File Storage for monitoring. Azure Copy is fine, but there could be additional integration and security features for those who want more privacy and control over access to Azure."

More Microsoft Azure File Storage cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution’s combination of the ease of use, simplicity, and reduction in IT management versus the cost has helped a lot. It is very fast to deploy. It's very easy to maintain. You don't have to do a lot in the cloud to maintain this thing, so it gives good performance. It's fast to deploy, easy to maintain, and it gives a better performance. These are the most basic three criteria for any application. This saves cost because the manpower you need to deploy is going down. You're getting better performance and not buying new resources. You have resources available in the cloud. It's just a couple of clicks, then you're good to go."

"This solution is very expensive compared to the alternatives."

"NetApp is a premium offering, so it's not a cheap product, but it is well-priced. It combines a couple of properties which customers like us are willing to pay. Could it be cheaper? Yes, but if you combine fully supported, fully managed, easily provisioned, scalable, and quick all in one product, it's a good selling point. You can ask a lot of money for all these. If you have a use case like we do, it's a perfect match. It's like the Porsche of storage solutions in the cloud. It is totally worth the cost."

"It is expensive in small environments, which could be better. The reason is the four terabyte minimum. A one terabyte minimum would be better."

"The performance has improved by about 30 percent."

"Its price is double the price of the premium disks, which is the main reason why customers don't go for this solution in the end."

"The price of Azure NetApp Files could be better."

"It is expensive, especially with NetApp Ultra Storage."

More Azure NetApp Files pricing and cost advice

"The pricing could be more flexible."

"I think the pricing of the product can be reduced."

"The price of Microsoft Azure File Storage is expensive, we do not know exactly how the price is calculated."

"We have Microsoft Azure File Storage's enterprise license."

"I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten, with ten being the most expensive. It's not cheap."

"One needs to pay according to the storage they plan to use in the solution. The payments are to be made yearly. It is usually monthly, but we opted for yearly subscriptions in our company."

"The price is comparable to other competitive solutions."

"The pricing is usually dependent on your storage requirements. Overall, I believe Microsoft Azure File Storage's price is reasonable."

More Microsoft Azure File Storage pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

27%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Computer Software Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

How does Azure NetApp Files compare to NetApp ONTAP?

Azure NetApp Files is a Microsoft Azure file storage service built on NetApp technology. The platform combines the file capabilities of Azure and NetApp to move critical file-based applications to ...

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What do you like most about Azure NetApp Files?

The availability is good, meaning downtime or network issues rarely occur. The system also offers flexibility, allowing for increases in data volume, IOPS, and other capabilities without requiring ...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure NetApp Files?

It is expensive, especially with NetApp Ultra Storage.

See all answers

Which file storage system is better - Amazon EFS (elastic file storage) or Azure File Storage?

Amazon EFS is easy to set up: you can use the AWS management console, API, or command-line. Amazon EFS can grow to petabytes and deliver consistent low latencies and high levels of throughput. This...

See all answers

What do you like most about Microsoft Azure File Storage?

The product is a reliable cloud solution.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Azure File Storage?

The pricing for Microsoft Azure File Storage is five out of ten, not so expensive and not so low.

See all answers

Comparisons

NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 29% of the time

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 8% of the time

Amazon FSx vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 7% of the time

Nasuni vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 7% of the time

NetApp ONTAP vs Azure NetApp Files

Compared 3% of the time

More Azure NetApp Files Competitors

Amazon EFS (Elastic File System) vs Microsoft Azure File Storage

Compared 46% of the time

Wasabi vs Microsoft Azure File Storage

Compared 15% of the time

Amazon S3 vs Microsoft Azure File Storage

Compared 7% of the time

Amazon S3 Glacier vs Microsoft Azure File Storage

Compared 6% of the time

Google Cloud Storage vs Microsoft Azure File Storage

Compared 3% of the time

More Microsoft Azure File Storage Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Azure NetApp Files

May 2025

Download Azure NetApp Files product report

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Azure File Storage

May 2025

Download Microsoft Azure File Storage product report

Also Known As

NetApp ANF, ANF

MS Azure File Storage

Overview

Azure NetApp Files is designed for unstructured data, virtualized SAP systems, SQL backups, NFS and CIFS protocols, Azure Virtual Desktop storage, and optimizing file share services. It supports high performance and networking integration in Microsoft Azure.

Azure NetApp Files offers features such as SnapMirror for data protection, rapid provisioning, elastic scaling, and ultra-fast SQL backup and restore. It provides a seamless experience with fast snapshotting, high availability, security, and ease of setup. Users benefit from significant performance improvements and the ability to manage substantial workload migrations effortlessly. This service is ideal for environments like Azure Kubernetes Service and cloud EPM platforms, where speed, flexibility, and performance are crucial.

What are the key features?

Flexibility: Adaptable to diverse storage needs.
Rapid response time: Ensures quick data access and operations.
SnapMirror: Provides replication and data protection.
SEC compliance: SnapLock ensures regulatory adherence.
Ultra-fast SQL backup: Quicker backup and restore operations.
Elastic scaling: Easily adjusts resources based on demand.
Fast snapshotting: Enables quick data snapshots.
High availability: Ensures consistent data access.
Security: Robust measures for data protection.

What are the expected benefits and ROI?

Performance: Notable improvement in processing speeds.
Simplicity of setup: Easy deployment and configuration.
Scalable management: Handles significant workload migrations with ease.
Cost efficiency: Allows comparing throughput versus cost effectively.

Azure NetApp Files is implemented in various industries requiring robust file storage solutions, from educational environments where performance boosts are critical to businesses leveraging Azure Kubernetes Service for containerized applications. It supports high-demand environments, optimizing data management and improving efficiency.

NetApp

Fully managed file shares that use the standard SMB 3.0 protocol

Key scenarios:

Share data across on-premises and cloud servers
Migrate file share-based applications to the cloud with no code changes
Integrate modern applications with File storage
Simplify hosting for high availability workload data

Microsoft

Sample Customers

SAP, Restaurant Magic

Talon, Camden

Buyer's Guide

Azure NetApp Files vs. Microsoft Azure File Storage

April 2025

Free Report: Azure NetApp Files vs. Microsoft Azure File Storage

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