No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Rackspace OpenStack vs VMware vSAN comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Rackspace OpenStack
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.0
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Converged Infrastructure (3rd)
VMware vSAN
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
234
Ranking in other categories
HCI (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Storage Solutions solutions, they serve different purposes. Rackspace OpenStack is designed for Converged Infrastructure and holds a mindshare of 7.4%, up 4.6% compared to last year.
VMware vSAN, on the other hand, focuses on HCI, holds 7.9% mindshare, down 14.4% since last year.
Converged Infrastructure Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Rackspace OpenStack7.4%
FlexPod XCS12.8%
HPE ConvergedSystem11.2%
Other68.6%
Converged Infrastructure
HCI Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware vSAN7.9%
VxRail9.9%
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)9.0%
Other73.2%
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

SS
Manager Dev Ops at MSD
Private cloud control has deepened my DevOps automation and strengthened security practices
For improvement, I feel the documentation available for setting up and creating infrastructure using Rackspace OpenStack could be enhanced, as I personally find the existing documents are not sufficient for new learners or beginners. We can also work on improving the user interface; the Horizon dashboard is functional, but compared to AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud, the UI feels somewhat dated. A more modern, intuitive interface with better navigation would enhance the overall user experience, especially for new users. Improving the documentation, including more real-world deployment examples, troubleshooting guides, and architecture best practices, would make onboarding much easier. Faster upgrades would also help; Rackspace OpenStack upgrades can sometimes be complex, so simplifying the upgrade process and minimizing downtime would assist organizations in maintaining their environments more easily. Additionally, improving monitoring capabilities would be beneficial, with advanced monitoring and analytics dashboards providing administrators deeper visibility into performance, capacity, and potential issues without relying heavily on third-party tools. Adding more managed services, similar to what public cloud providers offer, could reduce operational overhead while still allowing customers to retain the flexibility of a private cloud. Lastly, integrating AI could be valuable, with AI-driven recommendations for capacity planning, security monitoring, and automated troubleshooting improving platform management.
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

"Administrators are very comfortable with the functionality and services OpenStack offers."
"There are many services that can be directly used which are not available in VMware."
"OpenStack allowed for mass uploading of images to Akamai cloud services."
"The solution is stable."
"Rackspace OpenStack is stable and reliable, often compared favorably against other solutions."
"It created a reusable library with OpenStack features."
"It was a very flexible and scalable solution. It was very useful because we were not dependent on a single vendor's solution. Increasing the number of machines or changing the hardware configuration was very easy."
"The documentation was plentiful and very helpful.​"
"The solution is very stable."
"Today, we are comfortable running any of our mission critical apps on it."
"vSAN is a very cost-effective solution for just about any data center, as it is very easy to deploy, scale and manage while being built on commodity hardware so customers do not have to break the bank to invest in this technology compared to a much more costly centralized storage array."
"One of the most valuable features of this solution is that it is stable."
"The installation is very easy."
"With the snapshot feature, we are able to keep our system in a specific status, including application parameters and network settings, which has totally reduced our valuable time."
"Previously, we couldn’t consolidate more workloads on different types of storage, and now with VSAN, we have the ability to virtualize across multiple data centers."
"It is easy to use. It is easy to implement for us, and it is also easy to maintain for the customers. It is not necessary to buy some extra devices and talk with other vendors."
 

Cons

"It could use more examples in different languages (API use cases).​"
"The line migration is a problem."
"The deployment process could be easy."
"In terms of what needs to be improved, I would say the support. Rackspace might have some good support but the open source OpenStack doesn't have support because there are too many versions coming and too many people are customizing it."
"The pricing of Rackspace is quite high in the Vietnam market."
"Rackspace OpenStack can be improved because it wasn't clear that you have to cancel 30 days before; otherwise they charge you for the month."
"As a beginner, I find some difficulties in understanding Rackspace OpenStack, as it can be complex without a foundational grasp of cloud and networking concepts."
"We are moving from Rackspace OpenStack to CloudStack due to the requirement of human resources and technicality. There are lots of moving parts in Rackspace OpenStack."
"While I like the replication and compression features, there is a problem with them running too slowly."
"I would like to see more support for applications. I think currently it only supports applications between two vSAN clusters."
"Although the product is very scalable, it is not scalable in a way that the different host sizes can effectively be added to an existing cluster."
"The customer service is good but there is a cost for it. It does not come free."
"It's not quite there yet. We've had a few outages that were addressed."
"I'd like to see improvement in the troubleshooting tools, specifically the troubleshooting mechanism."
"Areas of improvement could be the UIs. The UIs are kind of cumbersome."
"I would have liked it to have been more scalable. It's scalable but not as much as, for example, the ScaleIO systems were or the Kaminario."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is low."
"I use it as an open-source tool."
"VMware vSAN is an expensive platform. We purchase its yearly license."
"It is not that expensive, and it is not even cheap. If it is designed in a proper way, it has good pricing, but if you do oversizing, the price will be high. There are different licensing models."
"The cost is expensive. I purchased two servers. The hardware cost was $19,000. The software cost for these two servers, including the vSAN, was $30,000, which is $11,000 more than the hardware. Then I had to pay another $5,000 for installation and implementation for professional services. In total, it was $54,000 for two vSAN Servers."
"It is cheap. It is $0.02 a gig."
"Enterprise customers can customize their licenses according to their own needs and budget."
"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."
"This solution requires the purchase of a license."
"The first 1-2 years of purchasing vSAN will be expensive. Thereafter, the longer you are running it, the more cost savings you will have."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Converged Infrastructure solutions are best for your needs.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
7%
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 Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business101
Midsize Enterprise58
Large Enterprise135
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Rackspace OpenStack?
I cannot comment comprehensively on how Rackspace OpenStack can be improved, as I do not find that much difference; however, some areas can be improved, such as support for OEMs deploying highly sp...
What is your primary use case for Rackspace OpenStack?
My main use case for Rackspace OpenStack is that we are particularly using it for our OpenStack applications, where we are putting our applications on Rackspace OpenStack software day-to-day. A spe...
What advice do you have for others considering Rackspace OpenStack?
I rate Rackspace OpenStack an 8 on a scale of 1 to 10. I chose 8 out of 10 for Rackspace OpenStack because every product has some space to improve. Regarding Rackspace OpenStack's AI capabilities, ...
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

OpenStack
vSAN
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

X.commerce
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 Dell Technologies, NetApp, Rackspace Technology and others in Converged Infrastructure. Updated: July 2026.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.