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FreeNAS vs NetApp FAS Series comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 7, 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

FreeNAS
Ranking in NAS
15th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp FAS Series
Ranking in NAS
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
109
Ranking in other categories
Deduplication Software (3rd), Modular SAN (Storage Area Network) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the NAS category, the mindshare of FreeNAS is 2.7%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp FAS Series is 9.9%, down from 12.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
NAS Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
NetApp FAS Series9.9%
FreeNAS2.7%
Other87.4%
NAS
 

Featured Reviews

Vincenzo D'Aniello - PeerSpot reviewer
Software developer at TREXON S.R.L.
Open-source with great disk management and task synchronization
The system itself allows you to add any feature. The only bad thing is that this maybe depends on FreeBSD, and sometimes finding documentation is difficult. For example, we knew that previous versions automatically enabled the Linux kernel, yet with the recent version, this was no longer the case. Now, there was the possibility of being able to create Debian-based jails, and finding the documentation was not easy or fast. That said, in the end, we succeeded. If you find the documentation, it is always incomplete and fragmented.
Srikanth Purushothaman - PeerSpot reviewer
DIRECTOR at Vellore Online Systems
Has supported long-term data protection and backup while requiring better part availability and pricing options
For monitoring purposes, we normally use flash access storage exclusively. We utilize a hybrid system because we need performance, combining NL-SAS for the volume and SAS flash to use as a fast cache system that provides more IOPS. We normally implement RAID 10, which we prefer over RAID 6's n plus 2 combinations. We utilize it for data redundancy, even with write intensity on. Regarding the unified storage architecture for NetApp FAS Series, we normally opt for exclusivity unless budget constraints exist. Our IOPS are very high, reaching somewhere about 50k to 150k or 1.150k. The high performance ensures minimal latency. An advantage we've seen with NetApp FAS Series is that snapshots provide very rapid backup and fast recovery. We basically use snapshots for data protection as first-level protection, with deduplication between the two storages serving as second-level protection.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Its stability is the most valuable. It is reliable, and we don't have to worry too much about it."
"FreeNAS is much simpler and easier to use than other solutions, but we don't have the complete range of features that come with the full version."
"It has the best storage capacity."
"What I like about it is that I can work on it from any computer or any device. The initial setup is very simple. The setup wizard is really helpful."
"The ease of use of the 'jail', the management of backups, and copies to easily create test and pre-production scenarios have speeded up the development and distribution of business apps."
"It integrates well into either Windows or Linux environments."
"The solution has been very stable so far."
"The most valuable features are the NAS features and NetApp's excellent support."
"Has rock solid reliability and is easy to use."
"The biggest advantage that makes NetApp FAS Series better is that we can use RAID technology on the storage."
"It's enabled us to allow admins across the IT organization to more easily manage their own subset of data within our organization."
"The file sharing feature is most valuable."
"End-users like that they can rely on the Snapshot technology so they can do their restores themselves."
"Better performance and lower costs."
"It allows our Windows and Unix teams to have a centralized point to share data between the two."
 

Cons

"The support for S3 needs to be improved."
"FreeNAS should be better prepared for clustering."
"They should include clustering for the solution."
"If you find the documentation, it is always incomplete and fragmented."
"They can improve the integration with PSA systems. This functionality could be better."
"The one thing that I find difficult to do which is very time-consuming is that I like to have a backup of the important files."
"The latest version of the dashboard doesn't work as good as the previous version."
"There was a bug when creating new custom roles that automatically gave volume deletion permission, which was a problem, but they finally fixed it."
"Needs more SAN support."
"Its licensing cost can be improved."
"As I see it, there could be more interfaces, more cache, etc."
"The high cost of the product is an area of concern, so from an improvement perspective, the tool needs to be made cheaper."
"It may need more flexibility to fight with other competing arrays."
"The product should include an audit log feature."
"One area that needs improvement is the hyper-converged solution. Although NetApp has a solution, compared to Nutanix, it falls short."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"For our configuration, we pay a little bit less than €10,000 ($12,000 USD) per year."
"Its licensing cost is based on the hardware capacity."
"Its price is okay. It suits our needs."
"We use the free version of the program."
"I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten, with ten being expensive. We pay a one-time purchase price."
"It's not cheap, but at the same time, it's also inexpensive. It's somewhere in between."
"The solution is more expensive than other vendors."
"If we want a ransomware solution with the product or other extended features, we need to pay an extra cost."
"The only area that could be improved is to lower prices for their All Flash FAS."
"In general, I find NetApp to be very expensive. That's the main issue I have with them. So it's a drawback in terms of pricing."
"The product is on the expensive side."
"NetApp FAS Series' pricing is competitive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
16%
Performing Arts
12%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Large Enterprise2
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise57
 

Questions from the Community

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Which SAN product would you choose: IBM FlashSystem (FS9500) vs PureFlash Array/X NVMe vs PureFlash Array/XL NVMe?
Have you considered a NetApp FAS Storage for your NAS needs? I am sure it fits very well.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetApp FAS Series?
The pricing of NetApp FAS Series is not cheap, but in comparison to other vendors, NetApp FAS Series is affordable because they also have deduplication, compression, and inline compression. They fo...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Morroni Technologies Inc., Creative Integrations
Children's Hospital Central California, Plex Systems, PDF PNI Digital Media, Denver Broncos, PDF KSM Legal, Clayton Companies, Virginia Community College
Find out what your peers are saying about FreeNAS vs. NetApp FAS Series and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.