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HPE Hyper Converged vs VMware vSAN comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 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

HPE Hyper Converged
Ranking in HCI
13th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMware vSAN
Ranking in HCI
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
234
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the HCI category, the mindshare of HPE Hyper Converged is 2.4%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware vSAN is 7.9%, down from 14.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware vSAN7.9%
HPE Hyper Converged2.4%
Other89.7%
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

PD
IT Project Manager at Intesa Sanpaolo
Has enabled me to simplify complex infrastructures and support virtualization projects with efficiency
In HP, I have been on board on a project study until 2018 and we studied the server rack model that supports HPE Hyper Converged board and Windows configuration. HPE Hyper Converged is excellent because it can avoid the usage of storage area network. For example, if you have three servers in parallel in a battery, a cluster, you can share the local storage for each server in a hyper-converged virtual storage without the storage area network. The architecture here has a simple physical structure. The logical configuration is complex, but the physical infrastructure is simpler than the old legacy cluster with the storage area network. The possibility of issues is minor. There is a very high level of redundancy and very high level of performance distribution and parallel usage of resources. It functions as a grid configuration. HPE Hyper Converged can be improved by replacing the old infrastructure based on legacy clusters and old servers. It can replace and dispose of legacy storage that is very expensive to maintain and has great dimensions to manage. You can dispose of big storage to have a battery of local servers with local storage in a hyper-converged architecture. This is not the future, it is the new technology. It is probably the best solution for cloud service and also for companies that require several virtualized environments. The foundation for using the hyper-converged solution is virtualization. First, every company must switch from physical setup to virtual configuration. Second, HPE Hyper Converged is a technology upgraded to avoid local big storage, storage area network, and complex fiber cabling from server to storage. You can eliminate everything and just manage the battery of servers in hyper-converged configuration as they share and are able to share the local storage as main big storage area network.
ShyamikaThamel - PeerSpot reviewer
Associate Tech Specialists at Seatrium
Managing mixed RAID workloads has improved data protection and delivers strong performance
VMware vSAN can be improved in certain areas. In cases involving our large data stores with large VMs, we experience some latency, not during normal operation, but during database backup operations. We observed latency due to buffer issues from the top-of-the-rack switches. These issues are mostly network-related because all storage data traffic travels through the network. I have recently used Nutanix, and I observed that Nutanix provides better performance than VMware vSAN due to its data locality features. VMware vSAN is now providing data locality, but we did not use that option. If VMware vSAN provides additional features in the next release, such as the VM balancing feature called DRS on the cluster that VMware previously had, it would be beneficial. With DRS, VMs can move easily from one node to another within the same cluster. Nutanix does not provide that flexibility. When placing a VM on a cluster in Nutanix, the placement uses a balancing component. After that, the VM remains on the same host. If any contention occurs on the CPU or memory side, the VM stays in place until contention happens. If issues occur, the VM migrates to another host while transferring all objects to the same host. This is how their data locality is maintained. When a VM moves to any host, it moves with all VM objects. VMware vSAN does not currently offer this option. If a VM moves to another host, it accesses the disk object through the network, which increases latency. VMware vSAN now offers an option to select data locality, but it does not function like Nutanix. This is why some latency remains. If VMware vSAN can improve this feature, it would be very helpful and VMware would regain its top position.

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 is the in-built backup system. The backup speed is also excellent."
"The HA, which means I have a copy of the VMs always available, and the moment a VM is down, the system tries to power it on again."
"The HPE Hyper Converged solution is used in a hybrid cloud configuration. We assess the disk space and partition additional capacity."
"The features I've found most valuable are manageability, integrated backup solution SimpliVity, and deep integration."
"If you were comparing this solution to VMware, it has more features, and it's very fast on the recovery."
"The customers we have think it's a valuable product because of its ease of management, and its ability to work over different locations, and so on."
"The most valuable feature was its time to delivery."
"The most valuable features are the ease of use, resiliency of solution and data protection."
"Ease of use and the cost, compared to some of the alternatives, were pretty compelling."
"The solution is quite stable."
"I like the reliability of this product because we can lose more than one host, more than one disk, and everything still works okay."
"We probably reduced our hardware footprint by 50 percent, which is a lot."
"Instead of going for SAN storage, customers can use the scale-up and scale-out features of VMware vSAN."
"The scalability is very good and the solution is stable and reliable."
"It easily integrates with all types of storage."
"The ability to have a disaster recovery option for our end-users by being able to use VDI and the vSANs, and the ability to do replication across multiple data centers, are valuable to us."
 

Cons

"I would like to see more deduplication."
"The downside of the solution is the scalability because they grow using nodes, but it's not desegregate."
"The solution is not very stable."
"In the Hyper Converged environment, some of the brands only support the OS VMware and not Hyper-V from Microsoft or even Red Hat or KVM."
"Data protection and optimization is really weak; they do not offer deduplication or compression, and we do not have a real backup solution beyond snapshots, which is forcing us to do automatic backups of the extremely important data on different servers."
"Its technical support services could be faster."
"I would like to see price points when there are larger solutions."
"Currently, the HPE HCI is based on the VMware solution, and many clients are skipping VMware due to its changed licensing method."
"The integration could be improved. I would like to see integration with other platforms."
"It would be ideal if the solution offered some intelligent monitoring."
"Licensing costs are a little too high for smaller sized companies."
"I would rate the stability a seven out of ten."
"I am not satisfied with VMware support, particularly with the reaction times, SLAs, and those kinds of issues."
"I see room for improvement with vSAN in particularly in the reporting realm. Now, with vSAN 6.7, they're starting to include vRealize Operations components in the vSphere Client, even if you're not a vRealize Operations customer. So, that's really good. It exposes some really low-level reporting. I would like to see more of that. However, you have to be a vRealize Operations customer to obtain that. I would like to see more include of this included in the vSAN licensing."
"We have encountered some scalability issues and got a couple of performance tickets."
"If not for that feature, I wouldn't touch VMware."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is too expensive for our customers. The pricing should be lower."
"There are costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."
"HPE Hyper Converged is an affordable solution."
"The price per value compared to other solutions, like Nutanix and SimpliVity. (We made the deal before approval of HPE SimpliVity deal)."
"The product's pricing is very competitive because HPE provides a buyback policy to users...Users can make either monthly or yearly payments towards the licensing cause of the solution."
"With this solution, I buy everything together, pre-packaged, pre-installed, and in just 15 minutes, it's installed."
"I would rate the price at seven out of ten. There are no additional licensing fees, but it would be cheaper to go with a dHCI solution."
"If I'm comparing with Dell, HPE Hyper Converged is definitely cheaper in my experience."
"Perhaps a bundle, like Essentials, would allow more businesses to make the leap to the product."
"vSAN has many versions with standard and advanced including Enterprise and Enterprise Plus. Regarding the Enterprise and the Advanced, it could be lower."
"It is expensive. It should be cheaper. It has a perpetual license as well as a subscription-based license, but they are moving towards subscription-based licenses."
"The solution is relatively expensive compared to similar products."
"The cost of the solution is high and if it could be reduced the customers would be very happy."
"This solution is expensive. Nutanix provides us with Acropolis Operating System (AOS) along with its hardware, while VMware provides vSAN, vCenter, and vSphere which all have separate licenses and costs."
"The product's price has been increasing lately...VMware vSAN is expensive."
"VMware vSAN is a little bit expensive and we pay annually. We have an educational institute where we receive discount prices from VMware. We do receive a reasonable discount but it's still expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Construction Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise19
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business101
Midsize Enterprise58
Large Enterprise135
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE Hyper Converged?
The product is intermediate in price, neither expensive nor cheap. We are talking about an on-premises solution without licensing for years. Currently, licensing is required for VMs and CPU cores. ...
What needs improvement with HPE Hyper Converged?
The initial setup of HPE Hyper Converged requires study and a comprehensive understanding of virtualization. The second step is to follow instructions step by step, as it can be complex to understa...
What is your primary use case for HPE Hyper Converged?
I have several years of experience in storage area network and IT infrastructure, working with Pure Secure, Pure Secure Storage, EMC Square, HP, and Lenovo storage and other brands, several other b...
What Is The Biggest Difference Between vSAN And VxRail?
While both run on the vSAN technology from VMware, vSAN needs to be deployed on vSAN ready nodes while VxRail is an engineered system. The choice to choose which technology depends on two major fac...
How does HPE Simplivity compare with VMware vSAN?
HPE SimpliVity is a hyper-converged infrastructure solution that is primarily geared to mid-sized companies. We researched VMware vSAN but found HPE was a better option for us. HPE SimpliVity has ...
How does VMware vSAN compare with Microsoft Storage Spaces Direct?
We found VMware’s vSAN was easy to set up, configure, and manage compared to other solutions we considered. It is best suited for small- to medium-sized organizations. It is easy to create load bal...
 

Also Known As

HPE Hyper Converged 380, HPE Hyper Converged 250, HPE Hyper Converged 250 for Microsoft CPS
vSAN
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

North Lindsey College, FireWhat?, HudsonAlpha
Read Some Case Studies At Home Cloud CaribCINgroupDiscovery Check out the Rest of our Customer Stories Here
Find out what your peers are saying about HPE Hyper Converged vs. VMware vSAN and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
908,858 professionals have used our research since 2012.