We use Zerto for disaster recovery and DR testing.
Virtualization Manager at Teknor Apex Company
It gives us peace of mind that we can recover our systems in minutes or hours instead of days
Pros and Cons
- "Zerto has improved our restoration time and made it easier to test software upgrades. It has simplified tasks like decommissioning a site and replicating virtual machines from one location to another."
- "Zerto is too reliant on VMware's vCenter. It's tough to upgrade, move, or do anything related to virtual servers with vCenter."
What is our primary use case?
How has it helped my organization?
Zerto has improved our restoration time and made it easier to test software upgrades. It has simplified tasks like decommissioning a site and replicating virtual machines from one location to another.
It gives us peace of mind that we can recover our systems in minutes or hours instead of days. Zerto is also helpful for insurance purposes. Our insurer wants to know how long we'll be down in a disaster. Of course, the company owners love Zerto because we won't lose business if something happens.
When we had a firmware failure, it saved us time performing a failover to our DR site. It isn't easy to calculate, but it saved us days and possibly weeks of downtime.
A firmware update on our SAN went wrong, crashing the entire device. We're in Rhode Island, and it failed over to our DR site in Tennessee within 18 hours. Our users didn't notice because it happened on a Sunday. They had all their data when they returned to the office, and we reverted the following weekend. Without Zerto, some applications would've been down for days, if not weeks.
Zerto has also improved our DR testing. In the past, we had to test over the weekend, but we can now do it during the work week without any outages. Our IT staff doesn't need to come in over the weekends, so it doesn't affect their personal lives. Zerto has reduced our DR testing time by about 50 hours.
What is most valuable?
The interface is easy to use. It's not intuitive per se, but the average IT expert will have no problems using it. A non-IT person might have a little difficulty at the beginning.
I love Zerto's near synchronous replication because I can get up-to-the-minute data back in a disaster. This capability is essential because a disaster could cost the company money and even cause it to go out of business. We can sleep better at night knowing we can restore our systems in minutes.
Surgical blocking of unknown threats is a feature that's available on the cloud, but we're on-premises. However, it's certainly a feature I'd like to have, especially with all the malware and vulnerabilities. It's great to know that Zerto offers this capability, but we don't take advantage of it because we're an on-prem customer.
What needs improvement?
Zerto is too reliant on VMware's vCenter. It's tough to upgrade, move, or do anything related to virtual servers with vCenter.
Buyer's Guide
HPE Zerto Software
May 2026
Learn what your peers think about HPE Zerto Software. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2026.
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Zerto is highly stable. We haven't experienced any noticeable bugs. We're sometimes too stable. Sometimes I want to upgrade my VMware ESX host, and I can't because they have not approved it on their matrix. They usually take about a month or two to accept it as a supported system, which is probably the industry norm or better, but I want it faster.
How are customer service and support?
I rate Zerto support 10 out of 10. Zerto's support team is knowledgeable and goes out of its way to help. Instead of just throwing KB articles at you, Zerto support walks you through the solution.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We previously restored everything from scratch using tape backups, but we had no software disaster recovery solution. It hasn't replaced our legacy backup solutions because we do not use Zerto as a backup. Our hardware backups are still online and working.
We do not use Zerto as a backup solution. It is mainly for recovery. However, we use Zerto/Keepit for Office 365 backups. We still back up to tape and restore using Zerto. It has made the recovery around 20 times faster.
How was the initial setup?
Deploying Zerto was straightforward, and I did the job by myself.
What was our ROI?
We've seen a solid return with Zerto
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Zerto costs more than most, but we negotiated a fair price.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We have Veeam Backup and Replication, but we don't use it for disaster recovery. We also tried another solution for Office 365 backup. We prefer Zerto replication for the speed and support.
What other advice do I have?
I rate Zerto 10 out of 10. When implementing Zerto, you should consider your internet speed and the difference between the WAN connections at the sites you want to replicate. You need enough bandwidth to handle the volume.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
Technical Analyst at Niagara Health System
Makes it much easier to test functions as we can get reports on the test runs
Pros and Cons
- "Zerto's ability to test failovers with a record of how long it takes to fail the motor is beneficial, as it allows us to know the timing in the event we have to do it live."
- "With secure boot enabled, which is the case for newer systems, it is not easy to rotate passwords and we would have to reinstall the DRAs."
What is our primary use case?
We primarily use Zerto for disaster recovery and business continuity. We have also used it significantly for transferring workloads between different environments.
How has it helped my organization?
Zerto's Near-Synchronous Replication is very important and was one of the main factors that drew us toward the solution. Some of the other solutions now have a similar feature that wasn't available before or doesn't support RDMs that we use. Fortunately, we haven't been hit by ransomware, but if we ever were, Zerto would be a great help. The fact that we would be able to easily pick a point with minimal data loss compared to having to go to a backup is a major advantage.
We have definitely been able to do some functions that we wouldn't have known how to do without Zerto. For example, we get hardware refreshes every so often. We are still using Dell VxRail, but for some of our clinical workloads, we created a new cluster for PACs and radiation oncology. We had to move many workloads from Dell VxRail to this dedicated cluster, which was traditional SAN. Zerto saved us in this situation, as we were able to start a VPG and move the workloads. Additionally, we have different data centers, and if someone decided they wanted the workflow to run in a different data center, Zerto saved us a lot of time by not having to rebuild the system. Lastly, it gave us the ability to test failovers with staff to prove that it would work before we had to trigger a live migration.
We primarily use Zerto to protect our virtual machines.
Before we found Zerto, our backup environment was so slow that it could take multiple days to recover certain servers. This was not practical, so we looked for a better solution. Zerto has had a much greater effect on our Recovery Point Objectives than we could have achieved with any other solution before it. We could have potentially lost a day's worth of data, whereas with Zerto it is only a matter of a few seconds. Therefore, for any critical workload, Zerto is the best choice.
Our only other option was to recover from a backup. We found that for larger VMs, it would take days to do that compared to using Zerto. Zerto would spin up in a matter of minutes, and with the recording running through testing, we had the actual times recorded that we could accomplish all the tasks. It was drastically different.
Zerto has helped us reduce our DR testing. Before Zerto, we never had a DR test plan. It is still a work in progress, but Zerto makes it much easier to test functions as we can get reports on the test runs. This makes it easy to hand over to someone explaining the details of how long it took. Whenever we have done testing, it has been easy to perform and not very time-consuming.
What is most valuable?
Zerto's ability to test failovers with a record of how long it takes to fail them over is beneficial, as it allows us to know the timing in the event we have to do it live. Additionally, the support and RDMs, which many products do not have for this type of workload, are useful. Furthermore, the ability to easily move something between different sites and the general ease of Zerto is great.
Zerto's ease of use is the best I've seen. We initially looked at different options such as Veeam Backup & Replication and VMware SRM, but Zerto appeared to be the most straightforward. We have had other options come up since then, but they are not nearly as user-friendly as Zerto. Zerto is quite straightforward.
What needs improvement?
The only challenge we have encountered is with rotating passwords on our VMware nodes. With secure boot enabled, which is the case for newer systems, it is not easy to rotate passwords and we would have to reinstall the VRAs. This is not ideal, especially when our security team wants to rotate them weekly. Aside from that, everything has gone smoothly. The updates are easy and it does not hinder us when updating the VMware. The only issue is that we have to wait three months after a major release. This lessens the complexity of the update of the software itself. Other than that, there is no issue and it does not hinder us from running different versions of VMware.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using the solution for over five years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Zerto is stable and we have never had any issues.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We have not increased our original purchase, but Zerto would scale if we needed it to. As new projects came along, we were supposed to identify if Zerto would be a use case. We have enough licenses for everything that has been added so far. We do eventually want to go into the cloud and potentially add more workloads, and Zerto seems to be sufficient for that.
How are customer service and support?
I always find the technical support to be quick in responding to us, and the issue seems to be resolved almost instantly. It has been nothing but positive with support. They are definitely one of the better companies to deal with in terms of support.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was straightforward. We had someone from Zerto come down and set up the system in just a few hours. They provided us with knowledge transfer on how to create VPGs and other items and gave us an overview of the architecture of the whole solution so that we were confident in managing it ourselves. We have done all the updates ourselves.
The full deployment including the planning phase took a couple of weeks and required a few people.
What about the implementation team?
The implementation was completed in-house with the help of a Zerto specialist.
What was our ROI?
Zerto has been more of an insurance policy. We haven't had to use it yet, but if that day ever comes, it will be invaluable. Zerto has already helped us in other areas, such as moving workloads, which has saved us a lot of time that would have been spent rebuilding and decommissioning. more of a safety net.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
We do renewals and haven't added any additional licensing yet. When we purchased Zerto, we felt it was worth the cost as it would protect us from any potential problems and give us peace of mind knowing that any critical items could be recovered quickly.
What other advice do I have?
I give the solution a ten out of ten.
When we bought Zerto, our goal was to be able to failover to the cloud. However, we have not yet fully adopted the cloud, so we have not yet upgraded our license or paid any connection fees. Our goal is to upgrade the license once we are ready, but that has not happened yet.
Zerto's ease of use, and straightforward use, is the reason we chose it over other solutions. We don't want to be in a situation where, during a crisis, we have to hunt around and try to figure out how to use something. It's nice to have something that is straightforward and easy to use, instead of adding stress to an already stressful situation.
We are still using other products for backups. We have not really ever used Zerto for backups. I know Zerto has changed its licensing model, but when we initially started using Zerto, we had to license every VM for basic protection, which was more costly than other backup solutions. I know Zerto has changed and we can now buy a backup license for VMs. However, due to the time, we are locked into a certain backup product, we will look at other potential solutions when the contract expires.
We have Zerto deployed across two of our data centers.
We have one person that maintains and monitors Zerto with an additional person who acts as a backup.
The maintenance consists of updates and tweaking of journals for VPGs.
If we have any specific use cases that we want to discuss with the Zerto team, they will often arrange a peer meeting with organizations. Zerto did that for us when we were using Meditech MAGIC so that we could make sure that anyone else with experience running it could help us. We were able to do a trial run with Zerto to get confident. I suggest taking advantage of doing a trial to make sure Zerto meets our needs, and if we have any unique workloads, then talk to the Zerto account team to try to arrange a conversation with someone else who is doing the same thing.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Buyer's Guide
HPE Zerto Software
May 2026
Learn what your peers think about HPE Zerto Software. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2026.
893,311 professionals have used our research since 2012.
IT Analyst at a wholesaler/distributor with 5,001-10,000 employees
We have seen significant reduction in RPOs and are now able to position our DR in the cloud
Pros and Cons
- "The near-synchronous replication is one of the primary reasons we're using Zerto because we have recovery intervals of sub-five seconds. On a scale of 10, where 10 is "very important", this feature is a 10."
- "Zerto's connectivity with automation platforms could be improved. For example, vCenter can use a VMware-developed tool called Site Recovery Manager. That can be integrated with automation platforms such as Terraform, Ansible, Chef, or Puppet, to perform automated, self-sufficient recoveries to essentially avoid any downtime. To my knowledge, Zerto does not have integration with those platforms."
What is our primary use case?
Our biggest use case is real-time replication to a secondary site in case of the need for a disaster failover. We also use it for file-level protection and restore, but the main purpose is to help add another layer of protection in the event of a disaster.
How has it helped my organization?
The biggest improvement we have seen is that Zerto has taken our anticipated recovery time from between hours and days down to seconds or a minute. Zerto has also helped us to protect VMs, and the effect on our RPOs has been incredible. Pre-Zerto, it was days if not weeks. Now it's six seconds. I don't even know if you could compare it to the RPO of our old solution. It's 100x. If we were to recover using our old system, we would lose between a day and a week's worth of data. With this, we lose virtually none.
And in terms of our RTO, recovering and validating the system has gone from between hours and days, to now happening in a matter of 30 minutes to a few hours. It has helped reduce downtime by days. Similarly, our DR testing has gone from being a multi-day process to a multi-hour process, and we use almost all of that time we save for bolstering value in other projects.
As for the number of staff involved in our backup and DR management operations, Zerto has helped us decrease it.
It has also allowed us to locate our DR in the cloud. We currently use Azure, and this ability is incredibly important as it has enabled us to reposition our resources in an environment that is separate from our main environment.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable features for us are the analytics and reporting. Being able to see a snapshot of our environment, and knowing where we stand in our recovery atmosphere using Zerto, are really valuable aspects.
The near-synchronous replication is one of the primary reasons we're using Zerto because we have recovery intervals of sub-five seconds. On a scale of 10, where 10 is "very important", this feature is a 10.
We also use Zerto for immutable data copies. We have two recovery locations and both of them are immutable, both for short-term and long-term recovery. Using this component has essentially enabled implementation of the 3-2-1 rule for us. Zerto has been pivotal in that process. Before that, the process hadn't changed in about a decade and a half. This enabled us to take a leap into the 21st century in that facet.
What needs improvement?
Zerto's connectivity with automation platforms could be improved. For example, vCenter can use a VMware-developed tool called Site Recovery Manager. That can be integrated with automation platforms such as Terraform, Ansible, Chef, or Puppet, to perform automated, self-sufficient recoveries to essentially avoid any downtime. To my knowledge, Zerto does not have integration with those platforms. Zerto does have an API, but a lot of those automation platforms have prebuilt runbooks to enable that process, whereas Zerto does not.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Zerto for about five years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's incredibly stable, to the point that we don't have to second-guess whether it is functioning properly.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Its scalability is infinite. We have yet to run into an issue of resource allocation or scalability.
How are customer service and support?
Their support is very good. Debatably, it's the best support we have seen out of all of our vendors.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
One of our previous solutions was VMware Site Recovery Manager. We switched because we have some servers that have a lot of transactions and we weren't able to afford to lose even an hour's worth of data. Zerto takes that potential data loss down to seconds.
And Zerto is much easier to use.
How was the initial setup?
Our deployment is both on-prem and, for replication, in Azure. The initial setup was straightforward. There was a learning curve in transitioning from our old environment, but it didn't take very long to learn.
It took us about a month to fully deploy.
Outside of updates, it doesn't require any maintenance.
What about the implementation team?
We did it in-house with support from Zerto when needed. On our side there were two or three people involved, but it was primarily done by me.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
It's expensive, for sure, but for us, it comes down to the fact that we do not replicate our entire environment using Zerto. We replicate the mission-critical servers and services, so the yearly cost of Zerto is heavily outweighed by the potential cost of an outage. It's expensive but worth it.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We very briefly looked at solutions such as Veeam and the option of continuing to use VMware SRM. The biggest difference was the de-snapshotting of the environment into journals with extremely low RPOs, versus scheduling a snap at a certain time.
What other advice do I have?
Overall, Zerto is pricey and it fulfills a very specific need, but it is incredibly worth the investment if uptime and recoverability are priorities.
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
IT Linux System Engineer at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
Enables us to recover virtual machines to a specific point in time, and test recovery for more machines with less staff
Pros and Cons
- "The replication and recovery features are the most valuable... On two occasions, other departments in our organization reported issues with specific virtual machines. We used the checkpoint feature of the Zerto to enable the recovery of those machines to a point that was a few minutes prior to the problem."
- "On two occasions when we used Zerto for recovery, we reduced the downtime by about 80 percent."
- "We had some issues with replication, especially on Linux, but we have already resolved them."
- "We had some issues with replication, especially on Linux, but we have already resolved them."
What is our primary use case?
We use it for storage and replication. In our organization, our team is responsible for the disaster recovery process.
How has it helped my organization?
Before, we were able to test about 16 virtual machines in production. Now, we can do the same exercise with 180 virtual machines, in less time. And previously, we needed our whole team to execute the manual process with Hitachi. Now, we use half that number of personnel in this exercise.
The speed of recovery is definitely better with Zerto versus the previous mechanisms we had. It has helped to reduce downtime without a doubt. On two occasions when we used Zerto for recovery, we reduced the downtime by about 80 percent.
We had an issue with change configurations in a database and we couldn't roll back those changes. We used Zerto to recover the state of the virtual machines to 10 minutes before the changes.
It has also exceeded our expectations when it comes to RTO.
What is most valuable?
The replication and recovery features are the most valuable. We have been able to recover files with Zerto. First, we enable the virtual machines on the recovery site and then we navigate to find the file that we need. On two occasions, other departments in our organization reported issues with specific virtual machines. We used the checkpoint feature of the Zerto to enable the recovery of those machines to a point that was a few minutes prior to the problem.
It's an excellent tool for the replication of VMs.
What needs improvement?
We had some issues with replication, especially on Linux, but we have already resolved them.
I would like them to enable more backup configuration features. I'm not sure if Zerto can give us immutable files for ransomware protection. That could improve the backup.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Zerto for about two years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability gets a high grade from me. I don't recall any issues.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Our principal site is located in one city and the recovery site is in another city. They are connected by an extended LAN.
In terms of scalability, it is good because, on the two occasions that we have done the upgrade process, they were "hot," meaning we didn't need to turn off our servers and that's very important for us. We always have our tools available.
How are customer service and support?
We have opened cases on several occasions for update processes and for issues that we had at a moment when we were doing an exercise and replicating a VM to the recovery site. Their response was immediate and they were very efficient in coming up with resolutions.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We didn't have any previous backup solution.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing is a little more expensive in comparison to other tools.
Knowing the backup options that Zerto has, we could be using it to back up our entire company's virtual machines, but we are just using its replication and backup for some virtual machines, but not all of them. That's because we are limited in terms of our license. We are only replicating about 30 percent of our virtual machines, those that have been identified as the most important for the organization.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We checked out Veritas Risk Advisor and Veeam.
What other advice do I have?
It is meeting our RPO expectations and we are happy with the RPO.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
ISD Engineer at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Powerful and reliable
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature is Zerto's ability to precopy data to a remote destination prior to the actual live migration period. That saves us a lot of time and has been very helpful. For example, if we had migrations occurring in waves over a period of several weeks with a VPG or VPG setup of approximately 50 VMs, that is multiple gigabytes of data, even terabytes in many cases. Having that data already copied on the evening of the migration saves considerable hours of time. It easily saves us four to six hours a night."
- "We have had great success with the product; it is one of the very few products that we have recently used that literally had no issues and worked exactly as designed."
- "The VPG model causes us a bit of concern. We are considering using Zerto to replace Site Recovery Manager. Site Recovery Manager is very easy when we have entire data scores being replicated. We don't have to make any decisions when it comes to groupings. It is all covered. If we move to Zerto, which we are considering, we will have to work much closer with the applications teams to develop the VPG configuration and determine how the VMs will be grouped. It will be a lot more overhead for us to go that route."
- "The VPG model causes us a bit of concern."
What is our primary use case?
We have previously used Zerto for data center migration projects. We have another data center migration coming up within the next year where we will be using Zerto as well.
How has it helped my organization?
We had pretty strict requirements when it came to cross data center migration capabilities. We wanted to ensure that no plugins or drivers were needed. We also wanted a simple deployment. Zerto very easily fit that bill.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature is Zerto's ability to synchronize data to the remote destination prior to the actual live migration date. This saves a massive amount of time during the actual migrations, and has been extremely beneficial. Having the data already synchronized on the evening of the migrations makes the final moves fast, easy, and seamless.
The interface is very easy to use. The product is easy to understand. We have had great success in using it for migrations. The benefit for us has primarily been the ease of use and stability of the product.
What needs improvement?
The VPG model has caused a bit of a concern. We are considering using Zerto to replace Site Recovery Manager. SRM is very easy when we have entire data stores being replicated. We don't have to make any decisions when it comes to groupings of VMs. If we move to Zerto, which we are considering, we will have to work closely with our applications teams to create VPGs and determine how the VMs will be grouped. This will probably be beneficial in the long term, but short term it will create more work for our team.
I spoke to a Zerto engineer who mentioned that we could do a VPG at the cluster level and a VPG at the datastore level. However, the one issue we've seen with VPGs is if the synchronization fails the entire VPG has to be recreated. Even though we can cover our environment at the cluster level or datastore level, that wouldn't be ideal. We really need a simpler solution for DR that will cover all of our VMs at once, instead of spending a considerable amount of time on VPG creation.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using Zerto for about three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability is very good. All of the components that we set up for Zerto have been very stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Scalability has met our needs.
How are customer service and support?
Support has been excellent. We had a couple of issues initially with a VPG that wasn't functioning properly. Support was very quick to respond. They were able to assist us and resolve the issue very quickly. We have only had to call support one time.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We also use Site Recovery Manager. SRM does not have the same feature set for migrations that Zerto has.
How was the initial setup?
The product was easy to deploy. At the time, the only thing that we wanted to improve was to have an appliance for the ZVM, instead of a Windows server. I understand an appliance is available now. This will be very beneficial in the future.
The deployment was straightforward. We basically went through the documentation and then had a planning meeting with Zerto. Once we understood all of the requirements we were able to deploy very quickly with really no issues at all. We deployed Zerto in less than a week.
What about the implementation team?
We implemented the product ourselves. Zerto's expertise has always been very good.
What was our ROI?
Our migrations were all successful. We had no issues at any point during the project. That is what really sold us on Zerto.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The licensing costs are not cheap. It is an expensive product. However, you do get what you pay for.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
There was really no other product that compared to Zerto. Zerto had exactly what we were looking for in a data center migration product. It had the ease of use and interface that we were looking for, that is, very simple and straightforward.
Zerto's ability to copy the data first, then synchronize just prior to the migrations made it much faster and easier for us to use than other solutions.
What other advice do I have?
Understand the VPG configuration. Understand that you will need to make some decisions as to how to cover your VMs. We eventually went with one VPG per VM for our migrations. This is because we discovered if the VPG has a problem, then you need start over and recreate the VPG. If you choose to cover 50 VMs on a VPG, and if that VPG fails for some reason, then you need to restart the whole process. So you need to consider your VPG design and how you are grouping your VMs.
We haven't used it yet for disaster recovery, but that is something that we will be looking at over the next year.
We have had great success with the product. It is one of the very few products that we have recently used that literally had no issues and worked exactly as designed. At every single point in our migration, it was successful. We had multiple migration waves that occurred over a period of a year and a half. We literally had no failures during that entire time, which is of rare in the industry and made us very happy. Now that we have another data center migration project coming up, we decided we were just going to go straight back to Zerto.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Sr Infrastructure Engineer at Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP
A disaster recovery solution with RTO and RPO features that allow us to restore data with six second intervals
Pros and Cons
- "We have had many instances where VMs were corrupted by an application owner, where they were installing something and did not create a snapshot in VMware for it. Instead of tapping into our backups, with just two clicks, we were able to restore the VM back to its original state. It helps a lot in the day-to-day running of our business."
- "We have had many instances where VMs were corrupted by an application owner, where they were installing something and did not create a snapshot in VMware for it, and instead of tapping into our backups, with just two clicks, we were able to restore the VM back to its original state, which helps a lot in the day-to-day running of our business."
- "The overall management plan could improve. If something happens with the VM on the vSphere side, the error codes are pretty weak. If there was a way to click on something within the UI that takes us to a support page or article, that would be very beneficial."
- "The overall management plan could improve. If something happens with the VM on the vSphere side, the error codes are pretty weak."
What is our primary use case?
We purchased Zerto for our business continuity and DR approach to make sure that workloads are available. We have 1,000 servers but are only protecting 250 of them because they are our core servers. The ones we don't currently protect are Tier three applications.
How has it helped my organization?
We have had many instances where VMs were corrupted by an application owner, where they were installing something and did not create a snapshot in VMware for it. Instead of tapping into our backups, with just two clicks, we were able to restore the VM back to its original state. It helps a lot in the day-to-day running of our business.
In some instances, there is data within transactions that I need to recover that might be lost. When using Zerto, I might be losing five seconds worth of data instead of losing ten minutes. That helps a lot. Zerto also helped us reduce downtime and we have been able to recover VMs fairly quickly by just clicking two buttons. Within a minute I would have a VM up and running and ready to go with no issues at all.
What is most valuable?
The RTO and RPO are the most valuable features. I get six-second snapshots for every single time that data gets replicated. I can go back six seconds past whatever happened. The frequency of the snapshots depends on your latency. It could be as frequent as every two seconds.
What needs improvement?
The overall management plan could improve. If something happens with the VM on the vSphere side, the error codes are pretty weak. If there was a way to click on something within the UI that takes us to a support page or article, that would be very beneficial.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using Zerto for six years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
This is a stable solution. Most of the time, the issues that we have had with our ZVM going down are caused by us.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
This is a scalable solution. We deployed it in eight different locations.
How are customer service and support?
The support could be better. Overall they do have the answers for me when I need them but it takes them some time. The Level 1 support team that I contact first when I call in could be more knowledgeable about products and be able to resolve an issue instead of having to wait for a Level 2 or Level 3 person to assist.
I rate their support an eight out of ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I've seen and looked into the VMware SRM. We also use another company, Cohesity, for our backups. They also have a solution for replication. When comparing these solutions, the RTO and RPO times are fairly reduced when using Zerto to get to a point where we need to be functional right away in an event of disaster recovery.
What was our ROI?
We have experienced ROI using this solution. It helps a lot when we use Zerto to test out certain applications. It offers a lot of value for our upper management to see how this product helps us in the event of a DR.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing for this solution could be cheaper. They have two licensing tiers. When we purchased it, they didn't have a license for the cloud model. Certain things that I used to get with the basic licensing are no longer available. They are only available in the Cloud. Overall, the licensing model could be simplified.
What other advice do I have?
I would advise others to test drive the solution themselves. They should play with it, see how it works themselves and try to break it.
I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
System Engineer at Total Quality Logistics
Is easy to use and makes migrations seamless
Pros and Cons
- "The feature I've found most valuable so far has been the ability to migrate the VMs from Hyper-V and Citrix Hypervisor. It's made our migration seamless. In the beginning, we were looking at freeware tools, and it was just a massive headache. Zerto solved a lot of the roadblocks that we'd run into in the past."
- "Zerto improved our organization by giving us flexibility back with migrating VMs, and I look forward to the future when we utilize it more for DR situations."
- "I had to have my colleague contact technical support because we had an issue where VMs in VMware were getting blocked, and we weren't able to delete them."
- "I had to have my colleague contact technical support because we had an issue where VMs in VMware were getting blocked, and we weren't able to delete them."
What is our primary use case?
In the past, we were predominantly using Citrix Hypervisor in the Hyper-V shop. Now that we've moved to VMware, we utilize Zerto to move those VMs from Hyper-V and Citrix Hypervisor over to VMware.
We're also looking at utilizing it for our DR site to be able to push up those VMs to the remote site in the case of a DR situation.
How has it helped my organization?
Zerto improved our organization by giving us flexibility back with migrating VMs, and I look forward to the future when we utilize it more for DR situations.
What is most valuable?
The feature I've found most valuable so far has been the ability to migrate the VMs from Hyper-V and Citrix Hypervisor. It's made our migration seamless. In the beginning, we were looking at freeware tools, and it was just a massive headache. Zerto solved a lot of the roadblocks that we'd run into in the past.
We've been able to set up a set schedule of moving certain VMs on certain dates, and we've been pretty confident that it's going to go smoothly without interruptions.
When you compare the ease of use of Zerto with those of other solutions, Zerto is much easier to use. It's idiot-proof. You don't have to be super technical to be able to be successful with the product. This is nice because you can delegate some of the tasks to the service desk. For example, you could have them handle the migrations, which would free up your engineering team to be able to spend time on more important projects.
Zerto helped reduce downtime every week. We have VMs that run in Hyper-V every week, and at night, we shut them down and migrate them over to VMware. The whole process takes under an hour, so these VMs are only offline for maybe an hour at the absolute most, which has been really helpful.
I believe 15 minutes of downtime is equivalent to a million in cost. So, it would probably cost our organization four to five million per hour of downtime.
What needs improvement?
I had to have my colleague contact technical support because we had an issue where VMs in VMware were getting blocked, and we weren't able to delete them.
For how long have I used the solution?
The company as a whole has been using it for about six months now, and I've been using it for three months since I joined the company.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I've been pretty impressed with Zerto's stability. I haven't had any weird issues with the UI or with the migration aspect of it. It's been pretty rock solid.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Since I started, we've more than doubled our server capacity, and Zerto has been able to keep up just fine. So, it's definitely scalable, and we're looking to increase capacity by another 25% or 50%. I'm pretty confident that Zerto will be able to keep up with it.
How are customer service and support?
I had to have my colleague contact technical support because we had an issue where VMs in VMware were getting blocked, and we weren't able to delete them. The whole issue was resolved in less than three days, which means that the technical support is probably pretty good to be able to get the issue sorted out so quickly.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I've tried to use Veeam for migration, and it's not really built for that. There was also a freeware solution. It worked okay, but we tended to run into some weird issues, specifically with EFI and regular BIOS VMs; these VMs weren't really translating properly to VMware.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I've been told that when they originally got the quote, it was a little bit of a sticker shock. However, now that we've actually been using it for six months, I've been told that the investment was well worth it.
What other advice do I have?
On a scale from one to ten, I would give Zerto a ten.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Cloud Architect at State of California
Helps reduce downtime and has a simple user interface
Pros and Cons
- "When we use our VMware environment, sometimes the HP hardware is not compatible, and we start to lose data. I like that we can restore our whole application and public-facing system through Zerto."
- "It's the easiest way to do disaster recovery."
- "Zerto can improve the dashboard by making it even more simple. Right now, there's a lot on the dashboard, and it can be overwhelming. If you're an experienced user, then you'll find it easy to use, but if you're a beginner, it will take you some time."
- "Zerto can improve the dashboard by making it even more simple. Right now, there's a lot on the dashboard, and it can be overwhelming."
What is our primary use case?
We primarily use Zerto for disaster recovery and backups.
What is most valuable?
When we use our VMware environment, sometimes the HP hardware is not compatible, and we start to lose data. I like that we can restore our whole application and public-facing system through Zerto.
It's the easiest way to do disaster recovery. It's less complicated than VMware.
Compared to the ease of use of other DR or backup solutions, Zerto's dashboard is the easiest. The user interface is much simpler, and maybe, that's what makes it easier.
Zerto helped reduce downtime when our data is corrupted. We're able to restore it relatively fast. There may be downtime of about half an hour for us, but the users don't see it; it's transparent.
The speed of recovery with Zerto versus the speed of recovery with other DR solutions is about the same.
Zerto reduced the number of staff involved in DR situations. We went from ten people to two for the whole organization.
It also reduced our organization's DR testing by about 30%. We've actually been able to move a lot of our resources (people) to AWS Innovation.
What needs improvement?
Zerto can improve the dashboard by making it even more simple. Right now, there's a lot on the dashboard, and it can be overwhelming. If you're an experienced user, then you'll find it easy to use, but if you're a beginner, it will take you some time.
For how long have I used the solution?
We've been using it for seven years now.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Zertos' stability is very good.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It's very easy to scale, but the only problem is that there are additional costs associated with it.
How are customer service and support?
Zerto's technical support is excellent. When you open a ticket, they get back to you right away. If you mark it as a priority, then you have instantaneous access to support. I would give technical support a nine out of ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We have VMware products and tried to implement VMware Site Recovery Manager. However, it was just a little too difficult for our environment.
How was the initial setup?
At first, the initial deployment was complex, but now it's relatively easy. For someone experienced, it is not a problem.
We have five data centers, and we started with one and deployed it in phases. Because there are lots of firewalls and access, we picked one data center and then built the next one.
What about the implementation team?
We implemented it ourselves, and it took about a year to deploy it across the whole system.
What was our ROI?
For a long time, we needed disaster recovery that was more than IBM's, which is in Colorado. We needed something on-premises that was instantaneous. That's what Zerto offers, and that's the ROI we have with Zerto.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The last time I looked at pricing, it was very good. It's much cheaper than VMware by far.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We looked at VMware Site Recovery Manager and IBM, but they didn't work well.
What other advice do I have?
The best way to look at it is from an ease-of-use standpoint because when you look at VMware's version, it's a little bit more complex even though it is native to where we use it. That's why we went with Zerto.
Considering what we use Zerto for, I'd give it a ten out of ten because it is our primary solution.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Buyer's Guide
Download our free HPE Zerto Software Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros
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Updated: May 2026
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