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Bacula Enterprise vs Unitrends comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 2024

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

Bacula Enterprise
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
25th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Backup (19th)
Unitrends
Ranking in Backup and Recovery
26th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Bacula Enterprise is 1.0%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Unitrends is 0.7%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Backup and Recovery Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Bacula Enterprise1.0%
Unitrends0.7%
Other98.3%
Backup and Recovery
 

Featured Reviews

Davilson  Aguiar - PeerSpot reviewer
Analista Tecnologia Banco de Dados at Centro de Gestão da Tecnologia da Informação
Very cost-effective and well organized with good compression
It could improve its interface or offer a specific screen for the manager of the company. A managerial user who wants more information beyond the operational technician should be able to access it. It could include greater transparency regarding the volume of data trafficked on the network, as well as the expectation of deduplication. A more practical strategy could come with a backup policy model as a suggestion for both large and small companies. A simple suggestion is to visually implement the backup time as far as your physical media.
Derek Schneider - PeerSpot reviewer
Manager, Information Technology at a hospitality company with 201-500 employees
Daily recovery tests have validated restore readiness and ensured consistent data protection
The best features of Unitrends include the daily reporting functionality. When backups fail, it is obvious in the logs what caused the issue. Most times it is a credential problem, which is relatively easy to resolve. Though I have experienced a few more challenging issues, nothing has affected critical backup restore functionality. Every time I have needed to restore something, it has worked successfully. The support team is readily available when I need assistance, and they help walk me through issues, solving them within a reasonable timeframe. The automated backup scheduling feature has helped our organization in managing backup timelines and consistency by handling all the work automatically. We set the schedule, breaking things into smaller chunks since our main common area for files is large. I have staggered the backups so some areas receive more attention than others, particularly for less active data. Adding, removing, excluding, and inputting elements is straightforward. The system makes it simple to schedule portions and generate reports on their functionality. The impact of Unitrends' instant recovery features on strengthening data security measures is significant. I generally use instant recovery when restoring specific files or instances where we need data that has changed. The process involves loading the backup, selecting the desired version, waiting for it to unpack, and retrieving the file. Every restore attempt has been successful. I run instant recovery daily in test mode on two virtual machines. I use it to test my domain controller and file server to ensure they communicate properly in the test environment. This ensures that in case of failure, I can activate the recovery and restore server functionality.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It brought many advantages - such as the learning curve being very light."
"The solution has extensive documentation and a very active community."
"Bacula Enterprise, so far, has never let us down with their service and support."
"The most valuable features are the special plugins such as SAP HANA databases, Microsoft SQL, and various types of virtualization."
"The support is outstanding and world-class."
"It is easy to scale Bacula Enterprise even if your system is growing tremendously in data and servers."
"Technical support is excellent in my opinion."
"We have been using it for several years and we are very satisfied with how easy it is to configure and set up and run backups."
"When I have had to use tech support, they've been very good."
"It works as expected the vast majority of the time, which is an improvement over other products that seem to break with the slightest change in the environment."
"Unitrends changed my backup window to half the time spent before and the space used too, the de-duplication is very high"
"It's not easy to scale it."
"I've already received my ROI through many man hours being saved going from tape to hard disk."
"Reliable DR Backup/archive to multiple locations Excellent support"
"Unitrends allows us to easily add new assets to our existing backup strategy with no headaches."
"The backup feature and recovery option are good because they allow the instant recovery of Hyper-V nodes and files."
 

Cons

"We are looking for a unique interface that can rule both enterprise and open source editions. Such a thing does not yet exist."
"The interface needs to be easier for adding new devices to be managed."
"Relying solely on a desktop is a bit frustrating as its GUI isn't exactly responsive."
"Bacula needs a graphical user interface because, for administrators, the command-line interface is okay, but for the average user it is not very easy."
"Easier setup and configuration, perhaps including a GUI, would be an improvement."
"A more user-friendly interface (GUI) can be developed."
"Many features have been converted to commercial licensing, which restricts their availability."
"We would like to see an improvement in the functionality of the GUI."
"The ability to run just differentials without pulling the full on your archive."
"I would like to see more storage options for the free version."
"It could be a little more customizable."
"I would like to see the improve High availability features like switchover and switchback process. also unitrends boomerang compatibilities."
"For smaller K12 schools, I wish they offered a beefier free version with more storage and options."
"Technical support is quite inadequate. Techs don't seem to be well-versed in troubleshooting issues that arise and tickets stay opened for weeks for resolution."
"Having issues backing up systems with tons of small files."
"Every few years, an update may not be applied right and we may have to manually reload the software."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This is an open-source solution."
"We have a perpetual license."
"With respect to cost, my advice is to get what you need."
"No comment."
"Talk with the sales guys. They can work with you on the best package."
"I would rate the solution's pricing a four out of ten. The licensing is yearly and it depends on the customers."
"You should be aware how much the monthly costs are to use, what the initial costs for hardware are, and what the options to expand are, if needed."
"Make sure you do the homework to size the solution properly. Buy the Enterprise Plus licensing if you can afford it."
"The cost of Unitrends definitely draws you in. The licensing is all included in the appliance, which is a great incentive."
"When we renew the Unitrends maintenance contract and update it to the latest version, the cost would be $5,000 per year. There are no hidden costs. They've been transparent with the costs."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
8%
University
8%
Manufacturing Company
14%
Construction Company
14%
Retailer
10%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise16
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Bacula Enterprise?
Bacula is more expensive than various other solutions. It’s almost completely commercial now. Products like Veeam software are much more expensive.
What needs improvement with Bacula Enterprise?
Many features have been converted to commercial licensing, which restricts their availability.
What is your primary use case for Bacula Enterprise?
The last scenario in which I used Bacula was for a customer who needed some open-source tool which could support encryption at that time. We managed to convince the customer to use Bacula to deploy...
What needs improvement with Unitrends?
I would evaluate the impact of Unitrends' ransomware detection for strengthening our data security measures as somewhat misleading. The ransomware detection from the appliance incorrectly identifie...
What is your primary use case for Unitrends?
Our main use case for Unitrends is taking our on-premise virtual machines or bulk data store and backing it up on a daily basis, or more frequently depending on requirements, and testing the virtua...
What advice do you have for others considering Unitrends?
Regarding Unitrends' integration with leading cloud services, I utilize Spanning, which handles Microsoft 365 environment backup for a location without direct file server access. Their SharePoint d...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NASA, SwissCom, Navisite, Turner Studios, Bank Austria, Caixa Bank, SdV Plurimedia, Leibniz University Hannover, Zeta Global, Tricore, NetLog, Siemens, LocaWeb, wbsGo, itesys, Queens School of Computing, Escrypt.
NHL Players Association, Salvation Army, Sligro Food Group, Mason General Hospital, Tec Group, Saldab IT, Baker Tilly, Clinton Savings Bank, Ennit Magna Bank, Manukau Institute of Technology
Find out what your peers are saying about Bacula Enterprise vs. Unitrends and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
900,747 professionals have used our research since 2012.