Cisco DNA Center vs NetBrain comparison

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4,213 views|2,398 comparisons
88% willing to recommend
NetBrain Logo
1,402 views|897 comparisons
75% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Cisco DNA Center and NetBrain based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Red Hat, SolarWinds and others in Network Automation.
To learn more, read our detailed Network Automation Report (Updated: April 2024).
770,141 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"The monitoring features are very useful for network engineers.""The automation features are significant, reducing configuration time. This means outstanding functionality. By deploying the controller automatically, the rest becomes automated""Application Assurance works very well.""Has a good processing feature with a high level of accuracy.""The most valuable feature of Cisco DNA Center is the AI (Artificial Intelligence) that provides us with valuable information.""I like the visibility, instant build, network, policies, and the ability to control access. I also like that you can visualize your whole network.""The solution helps with the management and orchestration of campaigns. It helps with visibility and analytics. I also like its SDA configuration.""I like that we can easily configure any new hardware. It's also easy to deploy and easy to troubleshoot."

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"This product has good network monitoring and troubleshooting capabilities.""Chain management is a good feature. I don't get it on other solutions.""NetBrain is a very simple tool.""Enables maps to be drawn out.""A reliable, time-saving tool for providing accurate layer 2 and layer 3 network mappings."

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Cons
"The features of Cisco DNA Center and Cisco Prime could have more parity.""There should be an option for automation of template deployment by using the stored data. It is not easy to save configuration information for lots of devices without using other tools. There should be a tighter, better repository of information that can be merged with the templates.""From the recent DNA point of view, there are some stability challenges with Cisco, but very minor.""The product has many features that do not work properly.""The task failure reporting or provisioning failure reporting could be a little bit better in the UI, with more information given to the user.""We encountered issues with their response times, which had a big impact on our workflow.""It seems to be a little bit more centered toward wireless than wired. You've got more options you can do wirelessly than you can with the wired switches, but it works for what we need it to do. We would like to see a little bit more about the traffic, and we're looking at what's out there to see about that. We are looking at something that might give us a bit more insight into the actual traffic. If they had the full functionality on the wired side, as they do on the wireless side in terms of being able to view traffic and everything, it would be good.""They can improve the network visibility. Licensing and its maintenance are also needed."

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"It would be nice if the setup was a little simpler. Also, if the solution could provide more training materials for new people coming into our company so they can quickly learn how to use the functionalities.""The IP interface brief isn't consistent.""Support needs to improve for the installed product and some of the reporting could be more flexible to provide more complete cataloging.""Each device needs to be configured to allow NetBrain to poll for the information it needs, which can be very time-consuming for a large network.""The solution could integrate more automation."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "Our licensing agreement is for three years."
  • "I do know that Cisco does offer some really good promotions for DNA Center to bring the costs down."
  • "The licensing cost for Cisco DNA Center is not more than that of other solutions."
  • "Licensing for Cisco DNA Center is a little bit expensive, just like any Cisco solution. Its cost could still be improved."
  • "We have a three-year license with them."
  • "Cisco DNA Center is a licensed product with multiple levels of licensing available such as basic, advanced, and essential. I don't have the exact figure, but Cisco DNA Center is costly. For example, the box has information about the essential license and costs a considerable amount of money. You need to pay extra to use advanced features in Cisco DNA Center. My company sees Cisco DNA Center as a solution that's worth the money, which is why it invested in the solution. If you want centralized management for your network, especially when upgrading it, Cisco DNA Center is perfect, but it's more suitable for a large-scale rather than a small-scale network."
  • "The price could be better. It's a very expensive tool."
  • "It is an expensive solution."
  • More Cisco DNA Center Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "The product is expensive, but less expensive than some of the competition and worth the price."
  • "Licensing is based on a per-device basis, which means that it can get very expensive if you have a large number of devices."
  • More NetBrain Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:The automation features are significant, reducing configuration time. This means outstanding functionality. By deploying the controller automatically, the rest becomes automated
    Top Answer:When it comes to deploying wireless fields, integrating defaults into the DNS interface can be challenging.
    Top Answer:NetBrain is a very simple tool.
    Top Answer:The solution is licensing and on-premises. You need to download the software and enable the license on any X86 machine server. We pay a yearly subscription fee. It's economical. It was not very… more »
    Top Answer:NetBrain is a very simple tool, however, it's not an NDR. It doesn't have the capabilities to run PCAPs and so on. The solution could integrate more automation. If the product has to be evolved, it… more »
    Ranking
    1st
    out of 22 in Network Automation
    Views
    4,213
    Comparisons
    2,398
    Reviews
    26
    Average Words per Review
    465
    Rating
    7.8
    5th
    out of 22 in Network Automation
    Views
    1,402
    Comparisons
    897
    Reviews
    0
    Average Words per Review
    0
    Rating
    N/A
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    DNA Center
    Learn More
    Overview

    Cisco DNA Center is a robust, intuitive network controller and management platform that provides secure, safe access to applications and networks. Cisco DNA Center allows you to take control of your network to increase the effectiveness of your Cisco products, lower your TCO, and improve your ROI.

    Your organization’s network is an integral part of your business’s success. In today’s aggressive marketplace, organizations need a network management system in place that can effectively automate deployments and connectivity, and manage the health of their infrastructure. Additionally, management systems also need to be able to strategically maintain the quality and safety of their systems so that the organization can direct valuable IT resources to concentrate on projects that can improve the overall effectiveness of the organization. An intent-based network controller such as Cisco DNA center will help your organization do that.

    Cisco DNA Center is a group of software solutions that will automate all your virtual devices, provide secure administration of your network, and ensure the best network experience for all users on the network. Cisco DNA Center does away with all the tedious, mundane tasks and simplifies workflow device installations, upgrading from hours to minutes using Plug-and-Play (PnP) and Software Image Management (SWIM).

    Cisco DNA Center’s intuitive, robust assurance feature makes every network point a sensor, continually communicating user connectivity and application performance in real time. This ensures all issues are resolved immediately.

    Cisco DNA Center integrates with Cisco security solutions, Cisco Umbrella, and Cisco Secure Network Analytics, which provide an extra level of extensive security protection against threats. The entire solution can be easily managed from one single dashboard, making Cisco DNA Center a very robust, secure, complete solution.

    Benefits of Cisco DNA Center

    • Cost-effectiveness: Policy automation and remediation minimizes the amount of time IT staff spend managing mundane network tasks.
    • Improved performance: AI/ML automation improves workflow and overall user experience. A clean, crisp dashboard makes management easy.
    • Enhance your network: Cisco DNA Center delivers the latest, most intuitive cloud services and applications to optimize your network.

    • Improved security: Cisco DNA Center utilizes the most robust zero-trust policies based on overall endpoint user behavior to keep networks secure.

    Features of Cisco DNA Center

    • Easy automation: Cisco DNA Center offers zero-touch device deployment, automated quality of service (QoS), automated device discovery, and drag-and-drop policy creation.

    • Clear analytics: Cisco DNA Center offers more than 150 workable insights, such as guided remediation, endpoint tracking, context-guided analytics, and more.

    • Simplified management: Users have complete control from a user-friendly single dashboard that provides a completely transparent view of the network, devices, applications, and services. Additionally, there is integration with Cisco Prime or APIC-EM for the importation of maps or other configurations as needed.

    • Security: Cisco DNA Center provides a highly secure segmentation, encrypted traffic analytics, and robust threat detection and response, and also uses Stealthwatch and ISE integration.

    Reviews from Real Users

    Mostafa G., Network and Data Center Supervisor at a hospitality company, says, “Since using the solution, three or four people can do what 10 people could previously. It has been a benefit to the organization. We have many people from the team who manage a lot of devices. By using Cisco DNA Center, it has taken some of that burden away, we are impressed with it.”

    Nihar K., Managing Director at Allot Group, relates, “In day-to-day operations, especially post-pandemic, the majority of our customers have to work from anywhere. It's not just work from home, it's work from anywhere. Due to this work from anywhere concept, the traditional silos of a network for the data center architecture, managing everything from anywhere, and having that single integrated dashboard for each and every activity while being able to correlate those activities in line with a business objective, has been very well addressed by Cisco DNA. The solution's most valuable aspect is its simplicity and the complete automation of the network workflow, which we can use that correlate with the business. It's not only limited to STXs or a data center. It completes everything, which really helps us.

    Managing today’s networks with yesterday’s manual processes is no longer a viable solution. NetBrain’s network automation platform provides actionable insights into your network to help you make better and faster decisions - particularly when you’re troubleshooting, securing, and making changes to the network.

    Sample Customers
    Information Not Available
    CompuCon, TD Ameritrade, Move Inc.
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Comms Service Provider19%
    Financial Services Firm14%
    Hospitality Company10%
    University10%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company20%
    Government9%
    Manufacturing Company9%
    Healthcare Company6%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company14%
    Government11%
    Financial Services Firm10%
    Manufacturing Company9%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business24%
    Midsize Enterprise16%
    Large Enterprise61%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business18%
    Midsize Enterprise12%
    Large Enterprise70%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business20%
    Midsize Enterprise10%
    Large Enterprise70%
    Buyer's Guide
    Network Automation
    April 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco, Red Hat, SolarWinds and others in Network Automation. Updated: April 2024.
    770,141 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Cisco DNA Center is ranked 1st in Network Automation with 37 reviews while NetBrain is ranked 5th in Network Automation. Cisco DNA Center is rated 7.8, while NetBrain is rated 7.2. The top reviewer of Cisco DNA Center writes "Practical implementation of VXLAN is good and provides centralized control". On the other hand, the top reviewer of NetBrain writes "Good monitoring and troubleshoot capabilities, improves overall network traffic visibility". Cisco DNA Center is most compared with Cisco Prime, Aruba Airwave, SolarWinds Network Configuration Manager, Huawei eSight and Junos Space Network Director, whereas NetBrain is most compared with ThousandEyes, Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform, SolarWinds Network Automation Manager, Forward Enterprise and ScienceLogic.

    See our list of best Network Automation vendors.

    We monitor all Network Automation reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.