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Cisco Wireless vs NETGEAR Insight Access Points comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 31, 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

Cisco Wireless
Ranking in Wireless LAN
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
5.2
Number of Reviews
154
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NETGEAR Insight Access Points
Ranking in Wireless LAN
21st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Wireless LAN category, the mindshare of Cisco Wireless is 9.8%, down from 11.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NETGEAR Insight Access Points is 1.6%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Wireless LAN Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco Wireless9.8%
NETGEAR Insight Access Points1.6%
Other88.6%
Wireless LAN
 

Featured Reviews

EvansEsezobor - PeerSpot reviewer
Group IT Head at Euracare
Has enabled centralized user management and improved wireless access point aggregation
To improve Cisco Wireless, the ports on the access points are all 100 Meg, not 1 gig. We have not gotten a gigabyte interface of about 1,000, but the controller we have is just 1 gig. We would prefer if we could increase the controller to a 10 gig interface because we want to connect our controller to a 10 gig interface, which currently limits us to 1 gig. When we want to move higher capacity data via wireless, it limits us to 1 gig.
DG
Owner at ERIM S.A.
Centralized management has simplified our home Wi‑Fi setup and supports multiple users reliably
Given my experience with NETGEAR Insight Access Points, my piece of advice for other organizations considering it is that they have to look at the rest of their system because NETGEAR Insight Access Points is quite useless with anything but the Wi-Fi system. I rate this product an 8 out of 10.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Overall, Cisco was stable and worked well for all our needs until we started having more and more students and teachers using YouTube and Zoom — what with classes being isolated and everything — which put a lot of strain on our Wi-Fi network."
"The product has valuable features for integration and authentication."
"Identity PSK helps save SSIDs."
"Overall Cisco Wireless meets my needs, it has been in place for a while, and I am happy with the solution."
"I find the tool to be 99 percent stable."
"The most valuable feature is the coverage."
"Support is fantastic. They are helpful and responsive."
"Cisco Meraki is easy to use, and the mesh is flawless over 37 locations."
"We use NETGEAR's Insight management solution to do off-property controls. It is user-friendly and provides network management, monitoring, and service deployment across multiple remote and local sites. That means I don't have to be physically at a location to do things if I want to make any changes to the network. It saves time and money."
"From the WiFi aspect, it's very intuitive and easy to use, and the solution enables me to manage my entire WiFi from anywhere in the world."
"With the Insight management solution, it is awesome that you don’t need an additional cloud controller, appliance, network manager, or PC/server to configure and manage your access points."
"This solution has been a big return on investment."
"My advice would be to go ahead and switch to this one, because this is the best-performing device I have seen so far."
"I'm able to do a lot of things, because the GUI is designed very well. I'm able to remotely make certain changes via my phone and apply them right away. It makes life easier when it comes to managing the equipment. The Insight management solution phone app is very good. It enables me to do what I want to do."
"[Being] able to configure the WiFi devices and to see utilization remotely, or from the cloud."
"The initial setup of NETGEAR Insight Access Points was straightforward."
 

Cons

"Cisco won't work with any other vendors. That is a significant problem with Cisco."
"Price is a concern. Although Cisco has an excellent solution, being competitive in the market is important."
"However, the wireless controllers themselves could be more reliable. When they work in high availability mode, we have had some issues with them."
"There is room for improvement regarding HA issues and Radius integration."
"Don't use Cisco Meraki. While pretty, the devices and licensing aren't worth the cost."
"If the wireless controller already had, built-in, those types of things for the technician or wireless engineer, it would be more attractive for the end-user to use WLC, more than any other product."
"The solution's pricing should be improved."
"The configuration interface could be easier. They should make roaming easier and should fix it so that when you cross a building you can keep the signal."
"The registration is annoying. I have to go back to NETGEAR and log tickets."
"The product's UI needs to be simplified and made more straightforward."
"I have some frustrations with the ease of use. It tends to be sluggish."
"A con is the backend system which is very, very slow."
"I have some frustrations with the ease of use. It tends to be sluggish. The graphical interface is pretty, but not useful. They have this tree that shows connected devices, which makes no sense whatsoever because the labeling field of the tree truncates all the items to the point that it's almost useless. You can't even tell what it is. I would prefer a spreadsheet list of the gear as opposed to a graphical representation."
"There is always room for improvement."
"Software-wise, they need to provide the ability to kick users out. If multiple users are abusing the system or the network, I should be able to block them for a time and, when I need to unblock them, I should be able to do so by using their MAC ID. That feature might already be there and I just don't know about it."
"The pricing and standard connectivity can be further improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Never pay the full GPL price."
"It's expensive. The pricing is an obstacle."
"I rate the tool's pricing a seven out of ten."
"The pricing is a bit high."
"Pricing is a little higher for Cisco Wireless than all other vendors. Cisco should work on improving the pricing because there are some other vendors out there in the market which may have the same features or equivalent features that Cisco has at a lesser price."
"Cisco is more on the expensive side, as compared to Aruba, but I must say Cisco's quality is unmatched, for sure."
"There is no license required to use Cisco Wireless solutions."
"It is expensive, and there are some costs in addition to the standard licensing fee. Its licensing model and cost should be improved."
"It is an expensive solution."
"I think that the price of the product is reasonable."
"My company does not need to pay anything related to the solution's licensing costs."
"The pricing seems to be reasonable."
"We have some basic models they give without a license."
"It wasn't much more than 100 dollars a year. For the devices that we have, the pricing was pretty fair."
"For what you get, the price of Insight access points is very reasonable."
"Price-wise, it is a little too high, about $20 higher than what it should be, but it's worth it. It's cheaper than Cisco's access point, but the products are not apples to apples."
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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Wireless LAN solutions are best for your needs.
908,834 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

it_user212721 - PeerSpot reviewer
President at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Mar 24, 2015
Cisco vs. Aruba Wireless Solutions
Cisco or Aruba Networks? If you are considering wireless access solutions, this is a common question that you are probably asking. You probably have sales people knocking at your door. How do you make sense of all the stories that you are presented with. If you have done any research, you are…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Construction Company
7%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Construction Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Retailer
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business79
Midsize Enterprise41
Large Enterprise73
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise2
 

Questions from the Community

Which is better - Cisco Wireless or Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN?
Cisco Wireless is very robust, very rugged, and can handle indoor and outdoor coverage extremely well. We found it to be very reliable and to consistently run very efficiently. Cisco Wireless helpe...
Which is better - Ruckus Wireless or Cisco Wireless?
Ruckus Wireless offers users the benefit of being both easy to set up and get running as well as being very user friendly. This user-friendly quality also renders it easy to learn how to use and ma...
How does Cisco Wireless compare with Aruba Wireless?
On the most basic level, Cisco Wireless can offer a rather straightforward initial setup. In the span of about three hours, the basic framework can be set up. Step-by-step instructions are availabl...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NETGEAR Insight Access Points?
My impression of the pricing aspect of NETGEAR Insight Access Points is that it is not exactly cheap. I find the pricing reasonable, but it is at the upper end of the reasonable bracket.
What needs improvement with NETGEAR Insight Access Points?
Managing users could be improved as it is quite difficult to block someone, and it is impossible to block someone on one specific access point. Regarding specific features that I would like to see ...
What is your primary use case for NETGEAR Insight Access Points?
We are using NETGEAR Insight Access Points in a domestic environment with four or five users.
 

Also Known As

Cisco WLAN Controller
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Aegean Motorway, Baylor Scott & White Health, Beachbody, Bellevue, Brunel University London, Bucks County Intermediate Unit , Chartwell School, Children's Hospital Colorado, Cisco Live Milan, City of Biel, City of Mississauga, Dundee Precious Metals, Electricity Authority of Cyprus, Erickson Living, Goldcorp, Great Ormond Street Hospital, Grupo Industrial Saltillo (GIS)
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Wireless vs. NETGEAR Insight Access Points and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
908,834 professionals have used our research since 2012.