Oracle Data Guard vs Zerto comparison

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Oracle Data Guard

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 11, 2024

Zerto and Oracle Data Guard compete in the field of data protection and disaster recovery. Zerto's pricing and ease of use seem to give it an edge, while Oracle Data Guard stands out for its robust features.

Features: Zerto users value its simplicity in disaster recovery operations, quick data replication to virtual environments, and overall efficiency. Oracle Data Guard is praised for comprehensive data protection features, robust failover capabilities, and seamless integration with Oracle databases.

Room for Improvement: Zerto users often mention the need for enhanced reporting features, better support for non-virtual environments, and improved versatility. Oracle Data Guard users would like to see improvements in ease of management, a more intuitive setup process, and enhanced user experience.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Zerto is commended for its straightforward deployment process and responsive customer service. Oracle Data Guard, while often seen as complex to deploy, benefits from reliable customer support but could improve in reducing deployment complexity.

Pricing and ROI: Zerto is noted for its competitive pricing and quick ROI due to its ease of use and reduced operational overhead. Oracle Data Guard, despite its higher cost, is seen as delivering strong ROI through its extensive feature set and reliability in critical environments.

To learn more, read our detailed Oracle Data Guard vs. Zerto Report (Updated: April 2025).

Oracle Data Guard vs. Zerto

April 2025

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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

Oracle Data Guard

Ranking in Backup and Recovery

15th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Zerto

Ranking in Backup and Recovery

2nd

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

309

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Migration (2nd), Cloud Backup (3rd), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (2nd)

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Backup and Recovery category, the mindshare of Oracle Data Guard is 0.9%, down from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zerto is 3.0%, down from 3.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Backup and Recovery

Featured Reviews

IfeoluwaOshinowo

Senior Oracle Database Administrator at Computer Information Systems (CIS)

Makes data protection and network management much easier

The initial setup is straightforward, provided you know the source, target, data version and format. You need to consider all those things. First and foremost, when deploying Oracle Data Guard, the number one priority is to ensure all parameters are correctly set. Two primary methods exist: using backups or recovering from services if the network is reliable. If the network is robust, backups from the source to the target may not be necessary. You must ensure that NIS names are correctly configured on both sides and that the failover and switchover processes are tested successfully from both production and standby environments. Once these steps are completed, the deployment process becomes straightforward. There's no need to copy the entire parameter file; only specific configurations, such as the SID or file structure, must be adjusted if necessary. Ensuring proper DNS name resolution, SID configurations, parameter settings, and understanding whether to convert the Data Guard are essential. Once these aspects are identified, the deployment process becomes more straightforward. I have implemented numerous Data Guard setups. Setting up Oracle Data Guard is performed within the Oracle CRS. Challenges may arise in establishing connectivity between the standby and production databases, necessitating troubleshooting. Apart from that, once configured within CRS, the setup is complete. The challenge with Oracle Data Guard is that it often takes some time for us to identify whether the issues stem from the disk or the network. If we report issues to the network or storage teams from the database end, we may not perceive any apparent problems, which can lead to confusion. We can convince the storage teams to investigate further until we delve into the disk I/O Guard and determine if specific disks operate at total capacity. When disks are operating at total capacity, it can significantly impact application processes. These difficulties in pinpointing the source of issues contribute to the challenges of maintaining and managing Oracle Data Guard.

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Sachin Vinay

Assistant Manager-Networks at Amrita

Leverage disaster recovery with reliable support and cost-effective future-proof features

Zerto is straightforward to implement because it only requires the installation of an agent on the VMs designated for migration. A service, typically a VM, must also be deployed at the disaster recovery location. This entire process is simple and can be completed within three days. Zerto's near-synchronous replication occurs every minute, allowing for highly granular recovery points. This means that even if interruptions or malware disruptions occur within that minute, Zerto can restore to the last known good state, effectively recovering the entire setup to the latest backup. This capability ensures high data security and minimizes potential data loss. One of the main benefits of implementing Zerto is its data compression, which significantly reduces the load on our IPsec VPN. Zerto compresses data by 80 percent before transmitting it across the VPN, minimizing the data transferred between geographically dispersed locations. This compression and subsequent decompression at the destination alleviate the strain on the VPN, preventing overload and ensuring efficient data synchronization. Zerto simplifies malware protection by integrating it into its disaster recovery and synchronization features. This comprehensive approach eliminates the need for separate antivirus setups in virtual machines and applications. It streamlines our security measures and removes the need for additional software or solutions, resulting in an excellent return on investment. Zerto's single-click recovery solution offers exceptional recovery speed. Through the user interface, a single click allows for a complete restoration from the most recent backup within two to three minutes, enabling rapid recovery and minimal downtime. Zerto's Recovery Time Objective is excellent. In the past, if a virtual machine crashed, we would recover it from a snapshot, which could take one to two hours. With Zerto, the recovery process takes only five minutes, and users are typically unaware of any disruption. This allows us to restore everything quickly and efficiently. Zerto has significantly reduced our downtime. When malware affects our data, Zerto immediately notifies us and helps us protect other applications, even those not yet implemented with Zerto. By monitoring these applications, we can quickly identify and address any potential malware spread, minimizing downtime across our systems. Zerto significantly reduces downtime and associated costs during disruptions. Our services are unified, so in the event of a disruption without Zerto, even a half-day disruption would necessitate offline procedures. This would lead to increased manpower, service delays, and substantial financial losses due to interrupted admissions and other critical processes. By unifying service processes, Zerto minimizes the impact of outages. Zerto streamlines our disaster recovery testing across multiple locations by enabling efficient failover testing without disrupting live services. Traditionally, DR testing required downtime of critical systems, but Zerto's replication and failover capabilities allow us to test in parallel with live operations. This non-disruptive approach ensures continuous service availability while validating our DR plan, even in scenarios like malware attacks, by creating a separate testing environment that mirrors the live setup. This comprehensive testing provides confidence in our ability to handle real-world incidents effectively. This saves us over 60 percent of the time. Zerto streamlines system administration tasks by automating many processes, thereby reducing the workload for multiple administrators. This allows them to focus on other university services that require attention and effectively reallocate support resources from automated tasks to those requiring more dedicated management. Zerto is used exclusively for our critical services, providing up to a 70 percent improvement in our IT resilience.

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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

"Snapshot and Data Guard Manager are awesome features."

"It's a very good solution if you want to protect your data across two data centers, or you have a middle man or many administrators who use these solutions for protecting their data. It's very reliable compared to other solutions that are most often not storage-based."

"Data Guard also improved because customers with an active Data Guard license want to reduce the I/O in a production environment. Some application complaints to it for Oracle reporting purposes. It has a production environment that needs to be enhanced."

"Oracle Data Guard has a nice feature called the DataGuard snapshot to open the solution in the read-write mode and make some changes to the database."

"The most valuable aspect for me is undoubtedly the failover capability and the assurance of data safety provided by Oracle Data Guard."

"Backup and application continuity are most valuable."

"One of the most valuable features is real-time replication. The version we're using is reliable and easy to deploy."

"If you have a problem with your primary site and can't access your primary database, you can continue working with the database that you have as standby on the other site, by changing its role to primary."

More Oracle Data Guard pros

"The quickness and efficiency of creating snapshots, on a real-time basis, is one of the most valuable features. Whenever changes are made on a server, Zerto starts taking snapshots right away and replicating them to the DR site. It's very effective and very quick."

"In terms of RTO and RPO, Zerto improves them to seconds."

"The low SLA times are valuable. It is very easy to use with a straightforward user setup."

"Its ease of use and scalability are valuable."

"Overall, I would give Zerto a ten out of ten."

"The most valuable feature of Zerto is the quick recovery time."

"It is cost-effective and stable. It protects virtual machines, and there is a fast recovery time."

"Zerto ensures a smooth transition during a disaster when we need to automatically switch from our primary environment to our recovery one."

More Zerto pros

Cons

"The initial setup is complex."

"The implementation is complex for anyone who's jumping into it without any experience. It's all command-line driven implementations. For some, that's a turn-off."

"Overall, there are some operational issues that need to be dealt with."

"The deployment cost is expensive."

"Oracle could be improved by the ability to manage it on the cloud. This on-premises version is secure and reliable, but I'm sure that they will soon provide a cloud solution that will be even better. In one to two years, we will probably move to the cloud—we have already moved to the cloud with Microsoft Exchange, but our databases are still on-premises. I would prefer managing a cloud version of Oracle."

"When the data replicates into the standby database there is a possibility of having a microsecond amount of data loss. The data loss occurs when there is a network disconnection between the primary and secondary standby database located in the data centers or if there is a crash in the primary database."

"Sometimes, the technical support team takes time to respond."

"For Italian medium-sized companies, the main challenge lies in the cost associated with licenses."

More Oracle Data Guard cons

"I would like to see a couple of details regarding awareness of VM events coming outside of ZVR."

"I don't like the evacuation process. The host evacuation process could be a little simpler too. It takes our maintenance a bit longer, when we are doing host maintenance, because we still need to evacuate the vRAs manually. I know they tried to make it more automatic, but it is not quite there yet."

"Long-term retention of files is a function that isn't available yet that I'm looking forward to them providing. The long-term retention is the only other thing that I think needs improvement."

"You have to start with 25 VMs which is too much for SMB clients. It would be better if they had the option to start with 10."

"Its initial setup can be better. It looks easy, but if you do not have things in the right place, it is not as easy as it looks. Some of the instructions were not clear. They were a little bit confusing. For example, while setting up SSH initially, it was a little bit unclear if I needed to use a regular credential or some other credential. This was one of the things that was a little fuzzy, and we had to get somebody else involved to help us out."

"I would suggest improving automatic updates. Their software requires updating level by level to keep it current. I was unaware that I was several versions behind, so I needed assistance to guide me to the current version."

"Zerto should add the capability to replicate the same VM to multiple sites."

"Certain areas were designed and work fine for VMware but are under development for Hyper-V. Eventually, all features will work for both platforms."

More Zerto cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost is expensive."

"If you want to have everything automated and done smoothly, you have to add additional licenses."

"It is not a cheap product, but if you look at the price, features, availability, scalability, and maturity, it is a very good product."

"The pricing is on the higher side."

"This is the best solution if you want something similar that's less expensive than Oracle Grid."

"The cost of the Oracle license will depend on the negotiations with Oracle."

"Oracle Data Guard is a feature available only in Oracle Database Enterprise Edition, and is available for extra cost."

"It's a cost-effective solution."

More Oracle Data Guard pricing and cost advice

"Pricing is one area where there could be some improvement. We would like to see a consumption model that would charge in a DR scenario, where you're failing over and consuming those resources, instead of a per-protected-node model. Or it could be a model based on the amount of storage space you're protecting."

"Zerto is like a Ferrari. It's very fast but not the cheapest solution. You're paying a high price for quality and the assurance that you will have the environment up and steady."

"It's a little bit expensive."

"Licensing is VM based so you can buy packages or single VM. Price is not low but the power of application is high, so you will get your money back."

"As far as I know, the pricing is around $1,000 per VM, but Zerto is changing the pricing model to more of an enterprise-class license. I don't know if there are any additional costs or fees."

"The licensing model is good. The price is a little bit expensive, but for what customers get on it, it tends to pay for itself. However, if more and more companies start to improve, then Zerto may need to look at their pricing and make it a little better."

"If it were easier to license, and to scale it out a little bit more economically, that'd be a godsend. At the end of the day, my druthers would be to have all 200 of our servers protected by this platform. But for a company our size, that stretches our IT budget and it just doesn't make economic sense."

"Staffing may be a little thin at times, but as far as budgeting what we buy, the price for this solution has not been so outrageous that we don't buy it."

More Zerto pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

it_user159711

Architect at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Nov 9, 2014

VMware SRM vs. Veeam vs. Zerto

Disaster recovery planning is something that seems challenging for all businesses. Virtualization in addition to its operational flexibility, and cost reduction benefits, has helped companies improve their DR posture. Virtualization has made it easier to move machines from production to…

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

21%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Computer Software Company

23%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Data Guard?

Ik fluister:VM Host Oracle en DataGuard hebben we per toeval vervangen door Zerto :-) tijdens de Zerto implementatie en VPG werden de Host Data in write-ack Block-Level gerepliceerd. Qua licentie 1...

What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Data Guard?

It is a very useful administrative IT tool. It saves on costs. I strongly recommend Data Guard. I've been using it for eight years and I would strongly recommend it. I'd rate Oracle Data Guard a se...

What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Data Guard?

We're Oracle partners. We've worked with databases 11G and 12C. If a company is planning to implement Oracle solutions, I would suggest they also implement Data Guard. I'd rate the solution nine ou...

What do you like most about Zerto?

Its ability to roll back if the VM or the server that you are recovering does not come up right is also valuable. You have the ability to roll back a few seconds or a few minutes. The rollback feat...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zerto?

I ballpark Zerto's pricing at about $1,000 per VM, which I find fair for what it does, but the cost of entry was tough initially due to the minimum number needed to start. I really needed to prove ...

What needs improvement with Zerto?

I run a very dense VM-to-host ratio in my environment. Whenever maintenance is being performed on a host, all the VMs on that host have to be powered down and/or moved off to complete that maintena...

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Product Reports

Download Oracle Data Guard product report

Oracle Data Guard

May 2025

Download Zerto product report

April 2025

Also Known As

Active Data Guard

Zerto Virtual Replication

Overview

Oracle Data Guard ensures high availability, data protection, and disaster recovery for enterprise data. Data Guard provides a comprehensive set of services that create, maintain, manage, and monitor one or more standby databases to enable production Oracle databases to survive disasters and data corruptions. Data Guard can be used with traditional backup, restoration, and cluster techniques to provide a high level of data protection and data availability.

Oracle

Zerto is used for disaster recovery, business continuity, data migration, and ransomware recovery, providing continuous data protection and near real-time replication. Valued for ease of use, efficient failover processes, and versatile integration, it enhances organizational efficiency, reduces errors, and boosts productivity.

Sample Customers

Athenahealth, Discover Financial Services

United Airlines, HCA, XPO Logistics, TaxSlayer, McKesson, Insight Global, American Airlines, Tencate, Aaron’s, Grey’s County, Kingston Technologies