IBM Spectrum Scale vs VMware Software Defined Storage comparison

IBM Spectrum Scale vs. VMware Software Defined Storage

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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

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Software Defined Storage (SDS) category, the mindshare of Pure Storage FlashBlade is 4.1%, down from 4.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Spectrum Scale is 3.9%, down from 4.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Software Defined Storage is 1.4%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Software Defined Storage (SDS) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Pure Storage FlashBlade	4.1%
IBM Spectrum Scale	3.9%
VMware Software Defined Storage	1.4%
Other	90.6%

Software Defined Storage (SDS)

Featured Reviews

Parul-Patel

Senior Network Engineer at Holy Redeemer Health System, Inc.

High performance and throughput enhance IT backup management

The multi-dimensional scale-out design feature of Pure Storage FlashBlade is not in use in our environment. Regarding data reduction technologies, we don't get much deduplication because the data is already deduplicated from our FlashArray before we get to backup, so there is no benefit of deduplication. Regarding the integration with cloud-native ecosystem tools, we are not on cloud; we are strictly an on-premises solution. Pure Storage FlashBlade is not used by any end-user; it's used only for IT backup, with only about four people in our group managing it. I cannot recommend Pure Storage FlashBlade to other users depending upon their financial situation because it's an expensive solution, and the cost is very high, including licensing and renewal every year. I rate Pure Storage FlashBlade an eight out of ten.

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Bernd Stroehle.

Enterprise Architect at kosakya

Deliver improved performance in data processing and foster extensive AI initiatives

I find IBM Spectrum Scale to be an excellent product known for its fast parallel file system. It achieved the best results when integrated with IBM hardware. Even though it is complex, it provided significant performance advantages in large-scale data management. Its fault tolerance mechanisms and integration capabilities make it popular for extensive AI initiatives and data processing tasks for organizations like Daimler Benz and Bosch.

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MohammadJundiah

Solutions Architect at Logicom Sales Inc

Data security and performance excel but integration and licensing need improvement

I used Nutanix for its hyper-converged infrastructure capabilities and VMware Site Recovery for disaster recovery. Additionally, I worked with VMware Software Defined Storage both internally and with partners to consolidate servers into one solution The most valuable features of VMware Software…

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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 made our backups more reliable."

"The initial setup is pretty easy and simple."

"The most valuable features of FlashBlade include its replication capabilities, reports, and easy allocation. Everything is user-friendly."

"I would rate Pure Storage FlashBlade a ten out of ten."

"The most valuable features of this solution are the rewrite speed and the nonstop services."

"It has also helped to simplify storage for us in the way that it's easy to manage. Their automatic monitoring really helps when things break or are about to break. They see a problem coming and alert us even before our own system does."

"I like its size. It is smaller than the other competitors. We can plug in many blades, and we can have data up to one terabyte."

"FlashBlade offers low latency, high throughput, and seamless scalability."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pros

"Technical support has been very helpful. They provide us with pretty good solutions that we can implement moving forward."

"Its great servicing high availability. That is what it is used for."

"The high performance of the solution is its most valuable aspect. If you compare it to other storage solutions, it's much better."

"I would rate my overall experience with IBM Spectrum Scale as nine out of ten."

"It is a scalable solution."

"I find IBM Spectrum Scale to be an excellent product known for its fast parallel file system."

"It is incredibly scalable and stable."

"It has been pretty reliable throughout the years. As far as capacity is concerned, it can handle most heavy loads."

More IBM Spectrum Scale pros

"The single management panel is the main feature that is wonderful for the customer."

"The most valuable features of the solution are that it is easy to deploy and the support is really good."

"The most valuable features of VMware Software Defined Storage are scalability, high availability, and performance."

"VMware Software Defined Storage gives higher availability against data corruption."

"This is an easy-to-use product for adding flexibility to your storage solution."

"The most valuable features of VMware Software Defined Storage are scalability, high availability, and performance."

"The solution is simple to configure and provides good performance and less footprint."

"The best part of the solution is that you can actually scale up to a large number of operating systems without additional hardware."

Cons

"It's on the expensive side, as expected for a niche product."

"They need better integration with public clouds along with a better hybrid solution."

"I would like to see more deduplication."

"We haven't been able to use much of the cloud area of Pure Storage. We have a storage server and it would be better if it could integrate with other cloud features of this solution."

"The technical support needs to improve. When we open a case, it is auto assigned to a support tech person. Nine out of ten times, we get an email right back saying that person is off until tomorrow. I cannot handle that. They just did this over the weekend to us, too. I had to call our rep and have them do something about it."

"There is some room for new features related to authentication and integration with Kubernetes, and other solution using S3 Bucket."

"In the realm of micro-services, I think that Pure Storage can do well if they start getting in there and making their arrays more micro-services ready."

"It would be nice if you could store file-based in the same box with the same technology."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade cons

"We do have some issues where Spectrum Scale does not work as expected. We have seen our Spectrum Scale servers go down unexpectedly, but because we have a cluster, it does not take out the entire organization."

"The solution's pricing could be better."

"I wish there were some graphical user interface to access the GPFS file system creation and monitoring."

"The main issue that we have now is with the encryption. They want to use more metrics in encryption, which is not working very well."

"Making it a little easier to add bad file sets would help. There is a transition to how you add storage and how you add a file set, so making that a little smoother would probably be my recommendation."

"The pricing and licensing model for this solution are complex and it is sometimes difficult to explain it to customers."

"They should probably simply the Red Hat implementation portion. This portion was not as straightforward as I would like it to be."

"This is probably the biggest challenge, getting everything upgraded, because it just takes time. We wish it was a faster solution to be able to do everything at once, but you have do each node individually. The more nodes, the longer it takes."

More IBM Spectrum Scale cons

"There is room for more integrations and plugins into more storages."

"VMware Software Defined Storage should include a shared database on a standard version."

"The license model of the product is an area of concern where improvements are required."

"The performance is not as good as some competing products and reporting can be improved."

"It doesn't have the ability to be deployed on any kind of hardware and network connectors."

"The solution has some limitations in terms of replication to remote sites or cloud infrastructure, which need improvement."

"Simplifying the licensing model and making it cheaper would improve the solution."

"I'd like to see improved hardware compatibility"

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pure Storage FlashBlade is a hardware appliance, and it's very expensive if you compare its price with other solutions. You can get the same features and benefits from its competitor, VAST Data, but for half the price of Pure Storage FlashBlade."

"Licensing fees are paid yearly."

"It is within reason for what you get. From what we have found comparing it to other vendors, it is in the same range as others. Given the choice, we would definitely redeploy it based on the cost."

"I feel that the price could always be lowered."

"The pricing is relatively expensive due to the FlashBlade technology. However, for companies needing quick and reliable data access, the cost is justified."

"The price of this solution could be made more affordable."

"I rate the tool's pricing a seven to eight out of ten."

"It's a costly solution, but Pure Storage FlashBlade doesn't require additional licenses. All of the software is combined into one bundle."

More Pure Storage FlashBlade pricing and cost advice

"The solution is costly but reliable."

"The licensing is based on the number of terabytes."

"The licensing model is complex and depends on factors such as the number of processing cores and the amount of storage."

"The solution is very expensive."

"I believe there is a yearly licensing fee of around $2000 - $5000. I don't think there are additional costs above that but it depends on the type of infrastructure you're booting."

"VMware Software Defined Storage is a slightly expensive solution."

"The product is quite expensive and is among the most expensive for this type of solution."

"A single socket costs you around US $6,000 for three years. At a minimum, you have a three load cluster for a medium or enterprise-scale company. It can get quite expensive because you're likely to need four to six sockets on the other side. It comes to around $30,000."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Financial Services Firm

18%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

No data available

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	11
Midsize Enterprise	11
Large Enterprise	20

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Large Enterprise	7

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	2
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	6

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The tool's most valuable feature is its fast performance, especially in handling snapshots. It helps during power out...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pure Storage FlashBlade?

The pricing of Pure Storage FlashBlade is expensive compared to other products I used from other companies in the pas...

What needs improvement with Pure Storage FlashBlade?

I believe there is not much improvement needed because they have everything we need, but the interface is a little bi...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Spectrum Scale?

IBM Spectrum Scale is very expensive with complex pricing models usually based on the amount of storage used or the n...

What needs improvement with IBM Spectrum Scale?

There is room for improvement in the web interface. There could be more information available, such as charts and gra...

What is your primary use case for IBM Spectrum Scale?

My personal use of this product is for parallel writing or reading files.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Software Defined Storage?

The price of VMware Software Defined Storage is on the pricey side, rated four out of five in cost. There is room for...

What needs improvement with VMware Software Defined Storage?

There is room for more integrations and plugins into more storages. More automation, such as using Playbook on Ansibl...

What is your primary use case for VMware Software Defined Storage?

I used Nutanix for its hyper-converged infrastructure capabilities and VMware Site Recovery for disaster recovery. Ad...

Dell PowerScale (Isilon) vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Comparisons

Compared 20% of the time

Pure Storage FlashArray vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 11% of the time

MinIO vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 10% of the time

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 9% of the time

VAST Data vs Pure Storage FlashBlade

Compared 8% of the time

More Pure Storage FlashBlade Competitors

Red Hat Ceph Storage vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 20% of the time

Portworx Enterprise vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 12% of the time

DDN IME vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 12% of the time

VMware vSAN vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 9% of the time

IBM Spectrum Accelerate vs IBM Spectrum Scale

Compared 7% of the time

More IBM Spectrum Scale Competitors

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs VMware Software Defined Storage

Compared 31% of the time

DataCore SANsymphony vs VMware Software Defined Storage

Compared 30% of the time

More VMware Software Defined Storage Competitors

Product Reports

Pure Storage FlashBlade

Download Pure Storage FlashBlade product report

IBM Spectrum Scale

Download IBM Spectrum Scale product report

VMware Software Defined Storage

Download VMware Software Defined Storage product report

Also Known As

No data available

VMware SDS

Overview

FlashBlade is the industry’s most advanced scale-out storage for unstructured data, powered by a modern, massively parallel architecture to consolidate complex data silos (like backup appliances and data lakes) and accelerate tomorrow’s discoveries and insights.

Pure Storage

IBM Spectrum Scale is a cluster file system that provides concurrent access to a single file system or set of file systems from multiple nodes. The nodes can be SAN attached, network attached, a mixture of SAN attached and network attached, or in a shared nothing cluster configuration. This enables access to this common set of data to support a scale-out solution or to provide a high availability platform. IBM Spectrum Scale has many features beyond common data access including data replication, policy based storage management, and multi-site operations. You can create a cluster of AIX nodes, Linux nodes, Windows server nodes, or a mix of all three. IBM Spectrum Scale can run on virtualized instances providing common data access in environments, leverage logical partitioning, or other hypervisors. Multiple IBM Spectrum Scale clusters can share data within a location or across wide area network (WAN) connections.

IBM

VMware software-defined storage is a simple, yet intelligent, storage data center architecture that aligns with business and application demands—eliminating static, purpose-built and inefficient hardware with dynamic, agile and automated solutions.

Broadcom

Sample Customers

ServiceNow, Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport, Dominos, Man AHL

Information Not Available

Helse Nord, Sky

IBM Spectrum Scale vs. VMware Software Defined Storage