DDN IntelliFlash vs VAST Data comparison

DataDirect Networks and VAST Data are both solutions in the NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays category. DataDirect Networks is ranked #14 with an average rating of 9.0, while VAST Data is ranked #12. DataDirect Networks holds a 1.8% mindshare in N, compared to VAST Data’s 6.2% mindshare. Additionally, 87% of DataDirect Networks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of VAST Data users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

DDN IntelliFlash and VAST Data offer competitive solutions in the storage market. VAST Data seems to have the upper hand due to its advanced features and higher perceived value.

Features: DDN IntelliFlash is valued for its versatile functionality, performance, and integration capabilities. VAST Data is noted for groundbreaking architecture, scalability, and efficiency.

Room for Improvement: DDN IntelliFlash users suggest enhancing GUI elements and adding more automation capabilities. For VAST Data, improved documentation and easier system management are suggested.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: DDN IntelliFlash is easier to deploy and has reliable customer support. VAST Data offers robust deployment options that are more complex but has highly responsive and knowledgeable customer service.

Pricing and ROI: DDN IntelliFlash users are happy with the cost structure and return on investment. VAST Data, though more expensive, delivers significant ROI due to performance efficiency and data reduction capabilities, making the higher price justified.

To learn more, read our detailed DDN IntelliFlash vs. VAST Data Report (Updated: January 2026).

Buyer's Guide

DDN IntelliFlash vs. VAST Data

January 2026

Download the complete report

Helped 881,733 peers since 2012

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

Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays category, the mindshare of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is 4.2%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of DDN IntelliFlash is 1.8%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VAST Data is 6.2%, up from 5.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Pure FlashArray X NVMe	4.2%
VAST Data	6.2%
DDN IntelliFlash	1.8%
Other	87.8%

NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays

Featured Reviews

Jaehoon Oh

Chief Technology Officer at Lambda256

Supports efficient storage management through volume snapshots and offers reliable non-disruptive upgrades

I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could be enhanced. I can see the performance statistics in the Pure Storage console, but it does not show the performance by 4K byte unit. It displays IOPS and bandwidth, but IOPS is about real use, and I want to know how many IOPS are currently running in 4K byte units. I cannot see that IOPS because most storage systems report their performance by 4K byte unit. I want to see Pure Storage performance by 4K byte unit to compare with other storage or other internal NVMe SSD.

Read full review

Anil Rahulwar

Storage Engineer at Movate

Good customer service and support and suitable for large environments

It is very easy to install. Users don't need to remember anything while deploying IntelliFlash because everything will be taken care of by tech support. They can easily modify the installation or change the password with the help of the tech support. It is very easy to integrate IntelliFlash with other solutions. We have plugins that can be integrated with other solutions. It will require maintenance. It is the same as any other storage solution: updates and upgrades, firmware upgrades, and drive upgrades.

Read full review

Alan Powers

HPC CTO at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees

Stability-wise, a device that has been up and running for years

The failover capability and resiliency are some of the solution's valuable features. The big thing is resilience because it has richer coding in it, so multiple devices can't fail. Also, one can still access a number of CBoxes that can allow one to access their file system. Once a device fails, it fails the transparency of the end-user, and it just starts using another resource. The encryption capability, the snapshots, along with a whole bunch of features make the tool valuable. VAST Data keeps adding more and more features all the time.

Read full review

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 feature of this solution is its ease of use."

"It's incredibly easy to use and greatly simplified our ability to both deploy and manage our storage subsystems."

"The most valuable feature of this solution is reliability."

"The solution is scalable."

"The tool's valuable features are speed, security, data compression, and reliability. Its data compression feature is the best that we have ever seen. It helps us to save money and resources."

"The initial setup was extremely simple and straightforward."

"I appreciate the performance."

"The solution is very straightforward to set up."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe pros

"We use IntelliFlash products for larger environments, like Qatar Airways."

"High performance and ease-of-management are the most valuable features."

"EasyTier/hotcaching: Valuable because it allows greater performance than standard SAS disks"

"It provides a combination of all the protocols that you need, without losing deduplication and compression."

"The initial setup is straightforward."

"Data Compression: Up to 80% space reduction in the database"

"It has reduced our electricity usage by reducing the amount of disks needed for the virtual environment."

"It's very fast. We were seeing read latencies of less than one millisecond. It is robust."

More DDN IntelliFlash pros

"The solution is useful for machine learning and scientific applications, including computer simulations."

"This has been one of the most reliable storage systems that I have ever used."

Cons

"You cannot tag a LUN with a description, and that should be improved. What I like on the Unity side is that when I expand LUNs or do things, there is an information field on the LUN. This is the Information field that you can tag on your LUNs to let yourself know, "Hey, I've added this much space on this date". Pure lacks that ability. So, you don't have a mechanism that's friendly for tracking your data expansions on the LUN and for adding any additional information. That's a downside for me."

"Maybe the price can be reduced since the solution is very expensive."

"Our use cases require more multi-tenant capabilities and additional VLAN interfaces for separating different customers. We currently use it to provide storage, sometimes shared storage, to different customers, but it is less flexible in comparison to a dedicated solution."

"Right now, the box itself is just strictly working as a backend storage system. It would be fantastic if we could access it directly like a NAS device through network access or SIS drives. I think they have an interface, but I am not sure how good it is. If we could address a box directly on the network without having to go through a server, it would be great. The replication schemas could be improved. We are not using replication on the storage level right now. We use a different type of replication. If their replication would be as good as the one that we have, I would probably run the replication schema because it might be faster, but I don't know that for a fact. So, I cannot say that they have good replication. All I can say is that they need to inform us better."

"I would like to see replication and DR features in the next release of this solution."

"It feels more suitable for small and medium-sized businesses rather than enterprises."

"There is room for improvement in the pricing of the product."

"We have run into a couple of instances recently where we are running out of space. So we have had to buy some more packs for it and they have deployed fine and it has increased smoothly."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe cons

"We had just one small stability problem with power flapping and it did not start up again automatically. We had to access service ports and manually restart the storage processors."

"It's somewhat scalable, but maybe not so much as some of the competition."

"In the proxy section you can’t choose a user account and password, so it is not allowed at the moment to go out, if customer has such constellation."

"It only keeps one hour of real-time data without the ability to do deep analysis of each element."

"Performance is horrible now. Our original intent was to buy new storage in about two years. But since it became a critical urgency for us, we decided to purchase a new one in two or three months."

"Snapshots are not as easy to access as on a NetApp device."

"They need to offer better integration for a virtual platform to enable you to create hyper-converged solution."

"In future releases, I look forward to more AI features."

More DDN IntelliFlash cons

"The write performance could be improved because it is less than half of the read performance."

"The read/write ratio is an area in the solution with some flaws and needs improvement."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pure FlashArray X NVMe’s pricing is cheaper than other products."

"The tool is an investment that we've budgeted for. While the prices may be higher than those of other vendors, we see it as a market leader with benefits. We don't regret purchasing it."

"Pretty much everything that you need is licensed when you buy the product. Licensing to me is different than the maintenance cost, but they can bleed into one another. We buy the product, and we expect three years of support bundled into what we negotiate on our storage arrays. I would start to see maintenance costs going into the fourth year, but we're not there yet."

"With Pure Storage, we would like to continue seeing price reductions with flash storage. I don't think we're any different than anybody else when we continue to look to the industry for price reductions of both NVMe and traditional SSD storage. We would like to see these prices continue to decline and erode, even displacing large spinning disks."

"Its price could be better. It is not too expensive, but it is the high-end cost. It is kind of a Rolls-Royce. You pay a lot, but you get a lot out of it. So, the price pressure on the way down would be great, but at the end of the day, if you need to do the work, you just pay for it."

"They can tout the functionality and cutting edge technology that they have, but that's where the price tag comes in. The cost is high, but I think as they grow their business and get more customers that it will probably go down a little bit."

"Given its price, Pure is not the first option."

"The tool's pricing is cheap; I rate it a six to seven out of ten. Most of our sales are not subscription-based. We sell the hardware, and customers keep using it. They only renew the service part annually. The support can be a bit pricey, but the solution is more cost-effective than anything else out there."

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe pricing and cost advice

"I think we pay around 100 grand per year for three arrays or four arrays."

"I recommend the full bundle software in order to have all the functionality. It is more expensive to purchase it one by one."

"We acquired VAST Data as a one-time, capital purchase."

"Price-wise, VAST Data is not the cheapest, not the most expensive one."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

881,733 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Government

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Healthcare Company

Construction Company

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

12%

Computer Software Company

12%

University

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	15
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	12

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	8
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	3

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

The price of Pure FlashArray X NVMe is very expensive, though I do not know the actual price because I am using the E...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

I have no specific improvements to suggest for Pure FlashArray X NVMe at this time. The performance statistics could ...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IntelliFlash?

It is a bit cheaper than other products, 10% to 20% cheaper.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IntelliFlash?

DDN IntelliFlash should improve in terms of sales. In future releases, I look forward to more features about AI and M...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for IntelliFlash?

We use IntelliFlash products for larger environments, like Qatar Airways. They have large scalability and use more th...

See all answers

Ask a question

Earn 20 points

Comparisons

Dell PowerStore vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 16% of the time

Dell PowerMax vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 12% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 10% of the time

TrueNAS R-Series vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 9% of the time

NetApp AFF vs Pure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 8% of the time

More Pure FlashArray X NVMe Competitors

NetApp AFF vs DDN IntelliFlash

Compared 9% of the time

Tintri VMstore T7000 vs DDN IntelliFlash

Compared 9% of the time

NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays vs DDN IntelliFlash

Compared 7% of the time

Dell PowerMax vs DDN IntelliFlash

Compared 7% of the time

SanDisk InfiniFlash System vs DDN IntelliFlash

Compared 7% of the time

More DDN IntelliFlash Competitors

Pure Storage FlashArray vs VAST Data

Compared 9% of the time

NetApp AFF vs VAST Data

Compared 8% of the time

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs VAST Data

Compared 7% of the time

MinIO vs VAST Data

Compared 7% of the time

Dell PowerStore vs VAST Data

Compared 3% of the time

More VAST Data Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Pure FlashArray X NVMe

January 2026

Download Pure FlashArray X NVMe product report

Buyer's Guide

DDN IntelliFlash

February 2026

Download DDN IntelliFlash product report

Buyer's Guide

NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays

January 2026

Download VAST Data product report

Also Known As

Pure FlashArray//X NVMe, Pure FlashArray//X, FlashArray//X

Tegile, IntelliFlash N-Series, IntelliFlash T-Series, IntelliFlash HD-Series

No data available

Overview

Pure Storage FlashArray//X is the world’s first enterprise-class, all-NVMe flash storage array. It represents a new class of storage – shared accelerated storage, which is a term coined by Gartner – that delivers major breakthroughs in performance, simplicity, and consolidation.

Pure Storage

Western Digital through its IntelliFlash arrays delivers high-performance storage with a complete range of features and connectivity options, including inline compression and deduplication, application and VM consistent snapshots, replication, RAID, data encryption, VMware vCenter integration, and multi-protocol support for SAN (FC, iSCSI) and NAS (NFS, SMBv3). IntelliFlash arrays deliver high availability through dualredundant and hot-swappable components, active/active or active/passive controllers, non-disruptive software upgrades, eMLC flash, and proactive cloud-based monitoring, analytics, and intelligence. A RESTful API provides scripted or programmatic control.

DataDirect Networks

Innovation to break decades of data storage trade-offs.

VAST Data

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company

Bank of Stockton, Barnsley College, Boyes Turner, Brigham Young University

Norwest Venture Partners, General Dynamics Information Technology, Ginkgo Bioworks

Buyer's Guide

DDN IntelliFlash vs. VAST Data

January 2026

Free Report: DDN IntelliFlash vs. VAST Data

Find out what your peers are saying about DDN IntelliFlash vs. VAST Data and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.

DOWNLOAD NOW

881,733 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our DDN IntelliFlash vs. VAST Data report.

See our list of best NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays vendors and best All-Flash Storage vendors.

We monitor all NVMe All-Flash Storage Arrays reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.