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HPE Primera vs NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 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

Everpure FlashArray
Sponsored
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
3rd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
231
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
HPE Primera
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
18th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
5.6
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
NetApp EF-Series All Flash ...
Ranking in All-Flash Storage
29th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
39
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the All-Flash Storage category, the mindshare of Everpure FlashArray is 6.7%, up from 6.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of HPE Primera is 1.7%, down from 3.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is 1.4%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
All-Flash Storage Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Everpure FlashArray6.7%
HPE Primera1.7%
NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays1.4%
Other90.2%
All-Flash Storage
 

Featured Reviews

Sowjanya MV - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Lead at Wipro Limited
Has improved performance for mission-critical workloads and enabled seamless non-disruptive upgrades
The availability is 99.99%, which is the main factor any customer would need because their data should be available whenever they want to access it. This is one main critical thing. It is very easy to upgrade since Pure Storage FlashArray handles it well. Everything is non-disruptive now; previously, there were forklift shifts, but now that is not the case. Pure Storage FlashArray says no to forklift upgrades. Usually hardware requires downtime, but Pure Storage FlashArray has improved their footprint so that they are not asking for downtime; everything is just a non-disruptive activity, which is why customers are more inclined towards Pure Storage FlashArray. Customers want more of the models in their environment due to the performance they are giving, and everything is in one Pure1 Array console where we can view all the models on one page or just an orchestration tool. You don't miss anything; you have replication, notifications about replication, and details about which host groups replication is happening in and if that replication is successful or failed. On a daily basis, our purpose is to create volumes for infrastructure; our daily activities include creating volumes and mapping them to the host, doing any migrations from a VM, clearing the data stores, and carving the volumes to those VMs. One key factor is the data compression with a ratio of 5:1, focusing on space efficiency, inline deduplication, and the compression Pure Storage FlashArray works on; that is a major factor we can suggest to any customer. Analytical capabilities are crucial. Daily, we check the throughput and consumption, and Pure Storage FlashArray provides predictions for one year regarding usage. This prediction helps plan updates well ahead. For support, we just raise a case, and they follow up and get it done. There is also AI readiness, but with the model R2, we don't have much of that AI readiness. For others, we do have AI readiness that predicts capacity based on daily or monthly trends, enabling us to analyze how much space we need or if we need to expand the disk shelf. From an operational point of view, a good feature is that if you accidentally delete a volume, it will be retained in the destroyed state for the next twenty-four hours, which is not the same with any other vendor. I have worked in this storage domain for the past fifteen years, and this option is remarkable, benefiting any L1 or L2 engineer. Additionally, from a compliance perspective, Pure Storage FlashArray has REST APIs enabled. I have not explored automation much, but from a security standpoint, it is strong with encryption data. If you want to automate, you can easily integrate with all clouds and explore Pure Cloud for scheduling workloads, including volume creation. Customers find benefit in Pure Storage FlashArray's single management pane of glass due to the dual controller and active-active setup. If one of the controllers goes down, all workloads automatically shift to the other controller, ensuring their data is safe and accessible at all times. This is a highlighted feature that any customer desires because their data should always be accessible. For SAN workloads, we use Pure Storage FlashArray because for SAN FC fiber channel, we don't use it; we use NetApp for NAS activities. We have clearly split this, so SAN is for mission-critical applications, while network-attached storage handles file systems. This architecture helps us maximize the benefit from Pure Storage FlashArray due to the significant workloads from this giant retail client. From a footprint and energy consumption perspective, you can see energy consumption from the Pure1 storage portal on a daily basis, and it is very compact. The three models we use consume only three units, which is quite low. From a footprint and data center perspective, it doesn't occupy much space. As everything moves to cloud, there are requirements to avoid excess spending on data centers, and Pure Storage FlashArray is efficient in energy consumption and is environmentally friendly.
MR
Storage Architect at DXC Technology
Improved data compression has maximized storage capacity and simplifies daily operations
In terms of advantages, I don't see any improvements needed; however, when comparing HPE Primera with Hitachi and KvSP Harrison, it's not on the enterprise level, but we can go ahead with mid-level to enterprise cloud solutions. I don't have any specific ideas for additional features for HPE Primera in the next release; currently, all the features seem good, and I don't see any missing functionalities. I believe architecture could be scaled up to rate controllers, but I don't have any specific suggestions for improvements. Stability could be improved because maintenance-wise, issues with the controllers can sometimes be challenging; enhancements in high availability architecture could help.
Tayo Olubanke - PeerSpot reviewer
Managing Director at GCET
Offers flexibility and top-notch technology
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.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's extremely stable and has good performance."
"The first set up we had was really straight forward and simple."
"The stability is perfect, the reliability is 100%, and the latency is always lower than 1 millisecond."
"The features that are there now are really what we need."
"The seamless integration into the public cloud has improved my organization."
"Pure Storage is seen as a visionary company with leading edge technology."
"Everpure FlashArray has reduced downtime in some situations, reduces downtime considerably, and can help perform upgrades or replacements of certain hardware or its firmware without shutting the machine down."
"It comes with a large number of features out-of-the-box, which makes it easy for us to see problems and manage capacity."
"In terms of quality for block storage, it's one of the best on the planet, if not the best, in my view."
"The performance of the solution is good."
"All of the capabilities of the hardware such as replication, snapshot, and the specific features are all included from the start as opposed to being on another license."
"Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"One of the most valuable features is the ease of deployment."
"It is a stable solution...It is a scalable solution."
"It serves as the primary storage in my production environment."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to provide the IOPS ratio which is required by a lot of our customers."
"NetApp All Flash is a system that I recommend for a rapid storage solution."
"The speed is the most valuable feature."
"The management software is very good."
"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."
"This solution is dependable for us and our clients and that is what we needed to have."
"We found all of those things in NetApp."
"Being able to partition different virtual volumes of storage is really valuable for us."
"Compared to Dell Unity XT, what I see as an advantage in NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is the fact that it is more scalable...The performance of the product is good."
 

Cons

"What it needs to do is work a little closer with solutions, like VMware, so it understands the particular workloads that are on it. Today, it does not understand the applications which are running against it."
"FlashArray's capacity for forecasting should be improved because it needs to be a bit more current. I think it's bundled with the deduplication and other compression factors. We need more user interfaces for forecasting in this software and more interfaces need to be integrated with this array management tool."
"The price of the solution can improve."
"It's not so scalable. It's got moderate scaling capabilities right now. The clustering technology needs a bit of work, they need to improve that."
"The solution is not cheap."
"Pure Storage FlashArray has not helped to decrease the total cost of ownership, and I believe our total cost has probably gone up, but that's balanced by our increased amount of data and number of use cases."
"We would like to see more cloud support, which we know is coming, although it's not out yet. It's going to be released in the next versions. That would be the biggest win, if additional cloud support is built into the array."
"It would be beneficial to have a separate pricing point for environments with lower performance requirements or less workload."
"The IOPS and throughput could be better. That's the only drawback compared to other vendors."
"Recently, we had many issues with HPE Primera storage, mainly in the leveling process, which caused many problems for the customers."
"The interface needs to be more user-friendly in that sense that installation and management are still a bit on the high end."
"We used to receive hardware errors a lot of times. The ambient temperatures rise rate was approximately 35 to 55 degrees, but when it was approximately 27 or 28, we used to get errors a lot."
"This solution would be expensive for small business and it could be priced more competitively for that market."
"There are certain features that require engineering-level access, which should be accessible to storage admins as well."
"Stability could be improved because maintenance-wise, issues with the controllers can sometimes be challenging; enhancements in high availability architecture could help."
"The cost of HPE Primera could be lower."
"Its pricing should be better. Its price is competitive, but they need to improve the pricing. They have different licensing models, which they need to improve. My expectation was cloud integration, which they have, but it is a different license. Therefore, people cannot enjoy it. If I want to use it, I need to pay extra. There is a cost involved for everything, but it should reach everyone. It is similar to having a Rolls-Royce, but you need to pay extra for the key. If you want the key, you need to pay."
"Better support technicians for CAPP."
"A little more manageability, a simpler management interface. It's not necessarily that it's way overly complex. It's just that it's not as easy as the FAS series."
"For us, in our country, the solution is a bit expensive."
"They could improve the product’s tools."
"I would like to see higher-capacity drives, as they come out; I have heard that 15 TB are out on a different NetApp series. Getting those on the EFs would be nice."
"I’d like to see bigger, faster, better hardware, of course. I think that is the way the hardware is trending anyway; bigger, faster CPU, better software, fewer bugs, all that stuff. T"
"The solution should really build out a more hyper-converged product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Price is about the only thing that's wrong with it. A little bit better pricing would be great."
"The price is very reasonable when compared to other solutions."
"The cost has room for improvement."
"We are finding the TCO of flash to be lower than SSD implementations."
"We have a seen a reduction in TCO. It is definitely a cost-effective solution for us. We have seen ROI."
"There are no licensing fees or other costs."
"Pure Storage FlashArray is expensive."
"The Evergreen Storage subscription is great, because then I get new controllers every three years."
"The product is expensive."
"HPE Primera is less expensive than HPE Alletra."
"The price of this solution is good for medium-sized and large businesses."
"I rate the product price a seven on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"I rate the product's price a ten on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"Licensing fees are billed on a yearly basis and the cost of GreenLake service is included."
"Because it has high availability, the cost is above average. The cost depends upon the sizing, and every customer has a different size. It is slightly above average in terms of cost compared to its competitors, but the value add was that they could know what their maintenance cost was going to be going forward. They knew what their renewal or expansion costs would be."
"There is only a one-time license purchase needed and no additional costs. If HP could reduce the training cost, then that would be advantageous to the seller."
"NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is an expensive product."
"It's a way to get relatively low-cost, very high-performance, low-latency block storage as a point solution."
"The pricing of this solution is competitive with other vendors here in Egypt."
"One has to opt for a perpetual-based licensing model for one year or three years. After three years, you need to renew the license."
"They need to improve its pricing. The storage market is dying. So, they need to improve the price because it should reach all people. NetApp is one of the top ones, and they are charging a little bit of royalty as compared to other storage solutions."
"It's a lot cheaper than what the other vendors have for the same type of environment. It saves us money."
"This solution is not available to many users because the cost is very expensive."
"The price point for EF is considerably lower than the alternatives."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Construction Company
9%
Computer Software Company
11%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business71
Midsize Enterprise38
Large Enterprise159
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise17
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise10
Large Enterprise18
 

Questions from the Community

Which should I choose: HPE 3PAR StoreServ or Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform F Series?
Both are great platforms, but if you are considering all flash solutions, I would recommend you to consider Pure Stor...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashArray?
I find the pricing of Everpure FlashArray to be quite high compared to other storage solutions; however, the reliabil...
What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashArray?
I believe we have covered the most important features; the architecture of Pure Storage is essential, and features su...
Which would you choose - HPE Nimble Storage or HPE Primera?
HPE Nimble is a versatile synced WAN San solution. It is easy to use and doesn’t require much training for admins. Th...
What's the difference between HPE 3PAR StoreServ and HPE Primera?
HPE Primera has many great features but one of the best is that it is very easy to deploy. From an overall perspectiv...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for HPE Primera?
Regarding pricing, HPE Primera is moderate; it's neither cheap nor costly, but it's a reliable solution with reasonab...
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Also Known As

Pure Storage FlashArray
Primera
NetApp EF540, NetApp EF-Series
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nielsen, Lamar Advertising, LinkedIn, Betfair, UT-Dallas
Information Not Available
RP Data, Western Oregon University, Toei Animation
Find out what your peers are saying about HPE Primera vs. NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
914,109 professionals have used our research since 2012.