Dell XtremIO vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays comparison

Dell XtremIO vs. NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

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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

Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Everpure FlashArray X NVMe is 2.0%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Dell XtremIO is 1.3%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is 1.1%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Everpure FlashArray X NVMe	2.0%
Dell XtremIO	1.3%
NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays	1.1%
Other	95.6%

All-Flash Storage

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.

Has improved data reduction and snapshot efficiency while supporting critical workloads

Avi Shpaner

System Engineer at Exaware

There are some areas that could be improved with Dell XtremIO. The API to connect with command line or to see performance very clearly could be enhanced, similar to how NetApp works with Grafana and NetApp monitor, which shows you a comprehensive view of the whole picture. The snapshot functionality could work more similarly to Snap Center. If I want to see all the VCenter with the VM, I think it needs the API for this. I do see big differences between Dell and other products. NetApp works very closely with VCenter, and Hitachi also integrates well, but Dell is not very clear and does not proceed well with VCenter integration with Dell. It needs the API, and I need to see all the snapshots. If I want to restore a VM from only a few directories or a few files that I need to restore, it is very difficult. I do see some differences in licensing. For the last few years, the Dell EMC price is acceptable. A few years ago, Dell EMC was expensive, approximately 20 percent more than NetApp. Right now the budget between EMC and NetApp is very closely aligned. Regarding the installation process and deployment of Dell XtremIO, I notice that in Israel, a lot of professional services and engineers who work with Dell EMC have moved to another storage company. I do not know why. Dell EMC does not have enough engineers, system engineers, or professional services engineers to provide service to the old clients, similar to how NetApp or Hitachi do. I think Dell XtremIO is between easy and complicated to deploy; it gives you the whole picture, but I need to go closely to VCenter to connect to VCenter to see the snapshot and to see performance with more dashboards of performance. I also need to connect the switch fiber channel to see all zoning to give me more flexibility to install or configure fiber channel or to see the performance of the fiber channels. I think there should be some fiber channel disconnect adapter or better troubleshooting from hardware for errors.

Offers flexibility and top-notch technology

Tayo Olubanke

Managing Director at GCET

You can go to bed peacefully if you have a NetApp. If you have NetApp within your data center, you get to know about power failure if you are using it. Your NetApp will still come alive. Even if it does not come alive, I can say that it is not like other tools when it comes to dealing with power failure. The tool is affordable, and the technology is top-notch. It is the only technology that has software for what we call inline compression and deduplication. All the products under NetApp are aiming to use AI. I know that you can achieve whatever you want to do with NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays. I rate the tool a nine out of ten.

More Everpure FlashArray X NVMe pros

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Using this solution has benefitted us operationally by making us more efficient."

"Overall stability is very good."

"Overall stability is very good. It is a very stable solution."

"I use the tool for Oracle databases, Oracle virtual machines, and Oracle Linux databases. I'm on the storage side, not a database administrator."

"It has benefited my organization because it has reduced time to insights."

"FlashArray has some fresh efficiency features, I've never seen a storage solution with a compression rating this high before, it's at least 4-to-1 on Oracle databases, it's the best flash storage for Oracle."

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

"The solution is scalable."

"XtremIO is very stable."

"It has improved the end-user experience: More fluid VDI, faster SQL searches, and quicker data migrations."

"I like the deduplication and auto-tiering features."

"Several processes that used to take several hours to complete are now taking minutes to complete."

"The most valuable features are that it is fast and reliable."

"Flash provides good performance."

"XtremIO’s capability to run any workload without much in the way of design considerations makes this very easy to use and size."

"From a price perspective, the XtremIO cost would be slightly cheaper than the VMAX and from a space perspective 1/3rd the size (with SAN Fabric)."

More Dell XtremIO pros

"The stability, speed, and reliability are the solution's best features. The information is also very secure."

"We have high use cases for SQL databases, most of our business critical applications use SQL to allow us to complete the DoD mission needs, so we have been using the EF-series for about two years now and everything has been going smoother and faster."

"Our use case is both corporate storage and for all of our datacenter and back-end enterprise applications."

"Go with the NetApp EF-series All Flash Arrays, if you want good quality, reliability, speed and size."

"Its performance is most valuable; this solution is much faster than other as well as older storage solutions, and we are getting 50 times better experience than the older storages."

"The most valuable feature for us is the ability to move the workload between peers, and it also has a huge advantage of helping us cut down on power consumption."

"The solution allows us to segregate one storage unit from another."

"We found all of those things in NetApp."

More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays pros

Cons

"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."

"Managing data isn't difficult for me. The performance is usually perfect, but we sometimes have capacity problems."

"Many options to check performance, like read, writes, random writes, and random reads, are missing in Pure FlashArray X NVMe."

"Adding some functions to the product would be beneficial. Storage replication should be essential, and the analytics should not incur extra charges."

"I'd like to see the product implement active replication for vehicles such as VMware."

"The solution should improve its logon requirements."

"One area that I haven't been sold on yet is the POD replication."

"They could add more support for file storage and different types of storage."

More Everpure FlashArray X NVMe cons

"Dell XtremIO needs to provide better performance to keep up with new products."

"Customer support, when we have needed it, has been OK. We recently had some volume configuration issues related to VMware ESXi 5.5 and it took entirely too long (over eight hours) to get us back going."

"When we upgraded the capacity from five to ten TB, the price of the disks was high."

"I would like to see more scalability."

"Management: At the time, there was no snapshot scheduler, so I had to write XSnapCourier to address it. The sad thing is that even after the newest release, which includes a native scheduler, most customers using XSnapCourier chose to stick with it due to a more feature-rich experience."

"Management and reporting need improvement."

"I would like to see the ease of deployment and built-in Metro clustering."

"Scaling this product is not easy."

More Dell XtremIO cons

"I would like to have the ability to replicate data between All Flash and other NetApp storage systems."

"Better support technicians for CAPP."

"The solution's technical support is not as good as it is supposed to be since you have to push them to get support."

"When it's a software-related issue, it is difficult to find an engineer that can help you."

"Monitoring and management handling in enterprise environments could be improved."

"As far as the manageability, being able to port between the two and have to do less training in-house from a customer point of view, that would be the part to improve."

"Better integration with other brands is important so we would like to see it easier to integrate."

"The pricing could be cheaper and it should have documentation in more languages, specifically, Russian."

More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"With VMware, we pay $300,000 annually."

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

"Our licensing fees are $500,000+ USD."

"We pay approximately $50,000 USD per year in licensing fees."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"The licensing is on a yearly basis."

More Everpure FlashArray X NVMe pricing and cost advice

"There are costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."

"It is great when a product can deliver high-end performance capabilities while offering a very competitive price point."

"Don’t buy this array. You’re paying for loads of magic beans, since it’s mediocre at best for a platform in a rapidly growing field. Look instead at Pure Storage or something with variable block deduplication. You’ll end up spending less and getting a better product with actual support."

"The price of the solution should be reduced. The price matches the price of a VMAX service but it does not have the capability of a VMAX service. However, the prices of Dell EMC XtremIO can be reduceable."

"XtremIO is an all-flash array, which means it's a costly solution. When compared with general mid-range storage solutions, this is more expensive. As far as I know, there are no additional costs besides the license."

"The licensing cost is on a yearly subscription basis, which can be expensive but is necessary for ongoing support and services. The pricing could be improved to make it more accessible."

"Pricing and licensing are in line with other products from other manufacturers. You get what you pay for."

"Licensing is approximately $200,000 per year."

More Dell XtremIO pricing and cost advice

"Its cost-effectiveness is a major selling point. Compared to other storage vendors, the EF-Series offers excellent value for its price. It's truly a leading product in the industry."

"It's a lot cheaper than what the other vendors have for the same type of environment. It saves us money."

"Adding more capacity will increase the cost."

"Cheaper pricing is always good. NetApp has been doing everything the right way. They've been figuring out things really well, going in the right direction."

"NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is an expensive product."

"The pricing of this solution is competitive with other vendors here in Egypt."

"This solution is not available to many users because the cost is very expensive."

"The cost of our license is approximately $200,000 over three years for NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays. There can be additional costs for storage. For example, if you want to have eight terabytes."

More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

it_user182013

Federal Civ/Intel Engineering Lead at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees

May 1, 2015

Measuring Up: EMC XtremIO and HP 3PAR

Leading up to EMC World 2015, IT Central Station asked how I would compare EMC XtremIO and HP 3PAR. Until recently, the flash storage conversation in my organization and many others has centered on XtremIO and Pure Storage, the leaders of the all-flash array (AFA) space. To that end, I've written a…

What do you like most about Pure FlashArray X NVMe?

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Government

Financial Services Firm

14%

Construction Company

10%

Marketing Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Construction Company

14%

Performing Arts

Computer Software Company

Marketing Services Firm

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	16
Midsize Enterprise	14
Large Enterprise	29

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	12
Midsize Enterprise	10
Large Enterprise	18

Questions from the Community

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

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...

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 ...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Dell XtremIO?

Pricing is hard to determine as it depends on the given configuration. XtremIO offers features that justify a potenti...

What needs improvement with Dell XtremIO?

There are some areas that could be improved with Dell XtremIO. The API to connect with command line or to see perform...

What is your primary use case for Dell XtremIO?

I was using Dell XtremIO as a storage admin and system storage admin internally within my company. My major use case ...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays?

One has to opt for a perpetual-based licensing model for one year or three years. After three years, you need to rene...

What needs improvement with NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays?

The support of the product is an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required. I want NetApp's supp...

What is your primary use case for NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays?

There are so many things to talk about around the use cases associated with the tool. There are so many reasons why I...

Dell PowerStore vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Comparisons

Compared 11% of the time

Dell PowerMax vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 10% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 10% of the time

NetApp AFF vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 8% of the time

TrueNAS R-Series vs Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Compared 7% of the time

More Everpure FlashArray X NVMe Competitors

NetApp AFF vs Dell XtremIO

Compared 9% of the time

Everpure FlashArray vs Dell XtremIO

Compared 8% of the time

IBM FlashSystem vs Dell XtremIO

Compared 8% of the time

Dell Unity XT vs Dell XtremIO

Compared 7% of the time

Oracle FS1 Flash Storage System vs Dell XtremIO

Compared 4% of the time

More Dell XtremIO Competitors

NetApp AFF vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 10% of the time

Dell PowerStore vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 9% of the time

Dell Unity XT vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 8% of the time

HPE Alletra Storage vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 7% of the time

Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Compared 7% of the time

More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays Competitors

Product Reports

Everpure FlashArray X NVMe

Download Everpure FlashArray X NVMe product report

Dell XtremIO

Download Dell XtremIO product report

NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays

Download NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays product report

NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays report

Also Known As

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

Dell EMC XtremIO Flash, Dell EMC XtremIO X2, XtremIO, XtremIO X2

NetApp EF540, NetApp EF-Series

Overview

Everpure FlashArray X NVMe delivers high performance, reliability, and low latency, making it ideal for block storage in private cloud infrastructures and mission-critical applications.

Boasting robust data reduction, high availability, and seamless scalability, Everpure FlashArray X NVMe supports databases, VMware environments, and machine learning analytics. Known for its intuitive interface, superior support, volume snapshots, and AI-powered analytics, it efficiently manages storage needs, often deployed to replace outdated systems. Users highlight its simplistic management and easy configuration, although opportunities exist to enhance pricing, replication features, VNC integration, and storage capabilities.

What are the key features?

Data Reduction: Effective compression and deduplication improve storage efficiency.
Seamless Scalability: Easily scales to meet growing demands without downtime.
Volume Snapshots: Quickly create snapshots for data protection and recovery.
VMware Compatibility: Integrates smoothly with VMware environments for optimal performance.
AI-Powered Analytics: Provides insights for enhanced storage management and efficiency.

What benefits and ROI should be considered?

Low Latency and High Availability: Ensures rapid data access and uninterrupted service.
Easy Management: Intuitive interface simplifies configuration and monitoring.
Evergreen Model: Continuous upgrades without disruptive migrations.
Enhanced Support: Reliable service and support for critical applications.

Organizations in industries such as finance and healthcare implement Everpure FlashArray X NVMe to bolster data performance and reliability. They leverage its integration capabilities with Oracle databases and SQL workloads, supporting machine learning and virtualization. It's often chosen to upgrade legacy storage systems, ensuring high availability and speed for demanding environments.

Everpure (formerly Pure Storage)

Bring all-flash, scale-out storage to your enterprise applications with EMC XtremIO. Purpose-built for flash, XtremIO storage arrays are amazingly fast. Delivering high IOPS at less than 1 millisecond latency is just the start. EMC XtremIO helps you harness the power of flash storage by building in innovations like content-based data placement and dual-stage metadata.

Dell Technologies

The NetApp EF560 all-flash array is an all-SSD storage system for applications that demand extremely high levels of performance and reliability. Requiring just 2U of rack space, the EF560 all-flash array combines extreme IOPS, microsecond response times, and up to 12GBps of bandwidth with leading, enterprise-proven availability features.

NetApp

Sample Customers

Fremont Bank, Judson ISD, The Nielsen Company

Raiffeisen Bank Bulgaria, Wentworth-Douglas Hospital

RP Data, Western Oregon University, Toei Animation

Dell XtremIO vs. NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays