NETGEAR Switches vs Ubiquiti UniFi Switches comparison

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Netgear Logo
19,652 views|14,066 comparisons
86% willing to recommend
Ubiquiti Networks Logo
24,066 views|11,542 comparisons
94% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary
Updated on Mar 29, 2022

We performed a comparison between Netgear Switches and Ubiquiti Unifi Switches based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.

  • Ease of Deployment: Users of Netgear Switches unanimously agree that the initial setup is straightforward and easy. The majority of Ubiquiti Unifi Switches users mentioned that deployment was easy. However, some reviewers said it was fairly complex.
  • Features: Reviewers say that both Netgear Switches and Ubiquiti Unifi Switches offer good stability, ease of use, solid performance, and scalability. Valuable features of Netgear Switches include flexibility, fast speed, good web interface, high-bandwidth AV over IP functionality, expandability, stacking, support for SDVoE, 10GbE port speed, 96X version modular switch, IGMP Plus, SFP, and easy integration with other Netgear products. Some users say a REST API to programmatically interface with multiple switches would be a nice feature to have, while others say it would be good to have audio video bridging (AVB). Reviewers also feel that their how-to guides could be better and their cloud services could use some improvement.

    Valuable features of Ubiquiti Unifi Switches include a fantastic GUI, VPN, high access speeds, remote access user, side-to-side connection. Some improvements users would like to see include better reporting, more security features, better network visibility, easier VPN technology, and more documentation for command lines.
  • Pricing: Users of both Netgear Switches and Ubiquiti Unifi Switches say pricing is affordable and fair.
  • Service and Support: Users of Netgear Switches mention that service and support are excellent. In contrast, reviewers of Ubiquiti Unifi Switches feel disappointed with the service they receive, claiming it's hard to get help from technical support and they are only responsive via email.
  • ROI: Users of Netgear Switches mention they have definitely seen an ROI, while users of Ubiquiti Unifi Switches did not have anything to report in this category.

Comparison Results: Based on the parameters we compared, Netgear Switches received better ratings from users. With an easy deployment, a great collection of features, an affordable price point, and excellent technical support, it is clear why users prefer Netgear over Ubiquiti switches.

To learn more, read our detailed NETGEAR Switches vs. Ubiquiti UniFi Switches Report (Updated: March 2024).
768,578 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 remote troubleshooting features provide a single pane of glass where I can see my all my clients' equipment. If they're reporting a problem, I can go to the Insight Pro interface online and I can bring up that client and I can see all their devices and the status of all their devices.""The big winner for NETGEAR is their modular switch: the 96X version. That is something that you don't see in the market anywhere else, except for Cisco who has it at a high level for a high expense. The ability to customize your own switch with their modules is a big plus for what we do in the market right now. Instead of having to piece together standardized switches, trying to make something work, or fitting the design into the mold, the modular switches are aware that you can make a mark in the industry because you purchased one switch and design with different modules added and removed later on for functionality.""The remote management tools are fantastic. The combination of the webpage as well as the app makes life so much easier. I don't need to go and visit sites to do upgrades or any sorts of changes. The firmware can all be deployed remotely. I can see the traffic on each of the switch ports remotely as well, so I can see if we've got problems, down to an individual port. It's very granular.""The solution is very powerful and versatile.""The remote troubleshooting is pretty easy. You can turn off a port that might have a network loop created, or where there might be a bad NIC card that is creating issues. Being able to turn off that port remotely is fantastic, instead of having to replace the whole switch. Remote management is really easy.""Technical support is helpful and quick to respond.""The most valuable feature is the fact that Insight is cloud-managed. The whole reason behind it is that there is one central place to manage it. You can pre-configure everything and you can get access to it without having to get onto the client's network. That makes it easy to use and deploy.""SFP, speed, and 10-Gigabit are the most valuable aspects of this solution. We're an architecture firm and we sometimes deal with large files. Anything we can do to eke out even a fraction of a second less time to get something done over the course of a year adds up. If I can get 10-Gigabit running in my server room, which I am right now, even though we're only gigabit to the desktop, due to the client computers we have, I can get more performance from everybody. I'm ready to start bringing in 10-Gigabit Ethernet to the desktop once I get the hardware to do that."

More NETGEAR Switches Pros →

"I like the control one has with this solution.""The value here with using the Ubiquiti products across the board is that they're almost all single-pane management and the single-pane management is included. It's a huge benefit.""The most valuable feature of Ubiquiti UniFi Switches is the graphic user interface for monitoring, where you can see the status of the device in real-time. I use those features across the campus. I use the APs as my beacons to tell me whether the area of the school of the network is down or not. Those will be the first to alert me that there is a problem with the network or a device. They provide me with more than only monitoring themselves, I use them in order to monitor all the devices.""The tool's most valuable feature is port security, which allows blocking/disabling ports. The ports also have PoE capability.""It is a very scalable solution. Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.""The product's initial setup phase is very straightforward.""It's been working fine, it's been stable, and there are no interruptions.""Because it's a managed switch, I have the ability to set controls and configure traffic priorities, VLAN ports, etc."

More Ubiquiti UniFi Switches Pros →

Cons
"What I'd like to see is more compatibility with virtual stacking, so that 4300-series switches and 3300-series switches will actually stack together and that virtual switch stacks, themselves, are not limited to just six devices, so that they can create larger loops with more bandwidth and more redundancy.""NETGEAR Switches could be more secure. Scalability could also be better. This infrastructure is a bit old, and we need something that will be more secure. Something that will introduce WLAN, and we will need the knowledge to go with that. Some of the switches were used for more than seven years. I think it was just their lifespan that was exhausted. But other than that, there haven't been any issues that required us to complain or get concerned.""I'd like to see a little bit of slowdown on the firmware updates. They've been doing a lot of them. I don't know if that's just because it's such a new product line, but the firmware updates have been a little annoying because they've been coming once a week. For a switch, that's a little extreme.""I would like an email notification in case of errors or failures. If it was possible for the switch to email out an error log or notification note, especially in cases where we have the switches offsite (on the other side of town), then if something was to go wrong, it would be great to know about it before our client goes to use it for a big event, and it doesn't work. While I know that it does do SNMP, which is sort of standard, in the AV world, that is not always an option for us. We are usually running our own little network box and don't always have access to an SNMP server. We may just have simple Internet access or something similar.""The management of them, itself, is not so good. You have to go between many different browsers, even some super-old browsers, to be able to do it. That is a super pain.""One area that has room for improvement, and I know NETGEAR is working on it, is adding more features to the products lines in terms of what we can manage through the Insight portal... not all Layer 2 or Layer 3 settings are there yet.""The main negative thing is the speed. When you use the portal, if you have a lot of customers and locations in the portal, and you need to scroll through those clients or those locations, it takes a pretty long time to load those pages and to select the client. That's the problem in the portal on the laptop, and it's the same problem in the portal on the app.""There is a technical problem they can't seem to solve. It doesn't support multicast packets. In layman's terms, Mac computers can't print over the network."

More NETGEAR Switches Cons →

"Ubiquiti tends to end-of-life things faster than other companies do. Cisco tends to be in the 8-, 10-, 12-year time frame, and Ubiquiti tends to be in the 4- or 5-year time frame.""The management of this product needs to be improved.""I had some initial problems with the configuration that necessitated contacting technical support.""The solution needs to improve its documentation because it is quite poor.""The stability and installation could be improved.""I'd like there to be better reporting for the solution.""New products don't integrate well with their management platform. Sometimes you have to go directly to the box or the switch to do the management.""The VPN technology in Ubiquiti products is really difficult for beginners who do not have the right skills."

More Ubiquiti UniFi Switches Cons →

Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "The pricing for what you get with the Insight product line is very fair and the value is there, including the annual licensing fees for the Insight Pro for each device... the Insight Pro level, which is their highest level, where you get a lot of features with the Insight, is a bargain. You get a lot of good features for what you're paying there annually."
  • "We used HPE previously. The reason I switched to NETGEAR was because of pricing differences, which are huge, when you go into 10GB networking... The pricing is quite good... The total cost of the deployment was about 11,000 euros or so. If I had gone with HPE it would have been at least twice as much."
  • "It's a great price-to-performance solution. I think it's singularly the best price-per-performance we can find, if not just straight performance to begin with... The cost of hardware and additional services is lower, absolutely. I wouldn't say "low," but we found it to be lower than other options, and that helps us resell this back to customers who are looking at other things like a Cisco Meraki..."
  • "Insight pricing is okay. It's very competitive. The costs of the hardware and additional services weren't low because Unify is much cheaper, but the costs conformed to the market. When you look at the hardware specs, the price and the warranty, the complete package was much better than any other vendor. If you consider those three main aspects of Netgear Insight and Netgear Insight devices, and you put them next to Ubiquity or Cisco Meraki, or even TP-Link, in our opinion, it's better hardware, it has a better warranty, and for the price you have to pay, it's a pretty good product."
  • "NETGEAR pricing is the best on the market by far. I was shocked when I saw what their price came out as for their subscription. It's extremely reasonable."
  • "The great thing about the Insight product is that the renewable subscription is much cheaper than the competitors in the market. It is not over $50, per year, so customers buy the equipment and don't have to worry so much about the renewable fees that go along with having such access into their switch, with a cloud-managed solution. There are some other manufacturers where you'll essentially pay the same in hardware as you do in software, just for the cloud solution that supports it; just to keep getting the firmware updates and all of that information. With NETGEAR, you can do multi-year and that is something like 90 percent cheaper than if you're looking at Meraki, for example. It is extremely competitive. It's one of the main reasons we liked it so much."
  • "The price to performance of this solution is very good. When it comes to pricing, as far as I'm concerned, they're very comparable with Ubiquity. NETGEAR has pricing that is as good as it gets. That's why I use them."
  • "There are two parts to the pricing. There's the pricing of the device itself, which is good. Their licensing model needs work, though. The licensing model doesn't fit the way MSPs do business."
  • More NETGEAR Switches Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "Ubiquiti switches are quite affordable and you don't have to pay extra for support."
  • "I feel that the price of this solution is definitely reasonable compared to all of the others."
  • "The price is very low and a good approach for a smaller company, with 10 to 15 people."
  • "The price of Ubiquiti UniFi Switches is really good. We have deployed a few Ubiquiti UniFi Switches in New Zealand, and they are a value for money. They are cheaper and stable, but if you have the budget, I would recommend Meraki switches."
  • "The price is reasonable."
  • "The price of this product is cheap."
  • "The price of the solution is fair compared to others. However, it is expensive."
  • "The price is good, and it doesn't require additional licenses."
  • More Ubiquiti UniFi Switches Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:NetGear switches have a lot to offer. They have high availability, zero-downtime stacking, L2 and L3 functionality, and are AV-over-IP ready. NetGear switches also have a command line interface and… more »
    Top Answer:Ubiquiti Unifi offers a great set of features. For starters, it is easy to configure and implement, and also doesn’t require a learning curve because it is easy to use. It is also simple to… more »
    Top Answer:The tool is very easy to deploy as it is a very basic switch.
    Top Answer:Ubiquiti Unifi is a great solution. For starters, it is easy to configure and implement, and doesn’t require a learning curve because it is easy to use. It is also simple to reconfigure an AP or… more »
    Top Answer:It is very easy to deploy. The deployment time for a single device is a near instant.
    Top Answer:Ubiquiti is very reasonable. However, they don't position themselves as an enterprise solution, but rather as a professional solution. They offer something like a network layer switches. They're not… more »
    Ranking
    4th
    out of 34 in Ethernet Switches
    Views
    19,652
    Comparisons
    14,066
    Reviews
    18
    Average Words per Review
    409
    Rating
    8.0
    3rd
    out of 34 in Ethernet Switches
    Views
    24,066
    Comparisons
    11,542
    Reviews
    18
    Average Words per Review
    512
    Rating
    8.3
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    NETGEAR Insight Managed Switches, NETGEAR GC Series, NETGEAR M Series
    UniFi Switches
    Learn More
    Ubiquiti Networks
    Video Not Available
    Overview

    NETGEAR Ethernet Switches is an Ethernet solution that offers businesses of all sizes the ability to easily set up secure and highly scalable networks. Small to medium-sized companies have the option to choose from three different switching options. The three options that are most appropriate for businesses of this size are the NETGEAR Unmanaged, Plus, and Smart Switch solutions. If you're managing a large enterprise network or a campus network, then NETGEAR Fully Managed Infrastructures is the solution for you. All the NETGEAR Ethernet Switches and solutions are innovative, easy to install and use, reliable, and very cost-effective.

    NETGEAR Ethernet Switches have many features that make them a most effective product. Included in these is the ability to virtually stack IP addresses in such a way that users can scale their network up with ease. These IP addresses are grouped together. Once additional data ports are connected, you have only a single switch to manage and you gain both a much higher level availability of data and a greater level of network resilience.

    Benefits of NETGEAR Ethernet Switches

    Some of the benefits of using NETGEAR Ethernet Switches include:

    • The ability to control and track the performance of your network from a single centralized location. NETGEAR Ethernet Switches has a “single pane of glass” interface that enables administrators to track their network’s data in real time, allowing them to manage everything from one place. If a problem is detected, this management interface will alert the appropriate administrator.

    • A wide array of security features allows you to manage user access, filter incoming traffic for potential threats, and monitor your network for unauthorized traffic. The switches have security capabilities built in in an effort to maximize network protection, while at the same time allowing you to minimize the expenditure of resources required to keep you secure.

    Reviews from Real Users

    There are a number of characteristics that make NETGEAR Ethernet Switches extremely effective. Two major ones are its inherent flexibility and its user-friendly nature. 

    PeerSpot user Kevin W., a network delivery architect at a tech-services company, notes that NETGEAR Ethernet Switches gives users the ability to tailor the switches to fit their needs. He writes, "The big winner for NETGEAR is their modular switch: the 96X version. That is something that you don't see in the market anywhere else, except for Cisco who has it at a high level for a high expense. The ability to customize your own switch with their modules is a big plus for what we do in the market right now. Instead of having to piece together standardized switches, trying to make something work, or fitting the design into the mold, the modular switches are aware that you can make a mark in the industry because you purchased one switch and design with different modules added and removed later on for functionality."

    PeerSpot user Chris W., a system engineer at Diversified, notes just how easy they are to use when he writes, "The ease of use of these switches is very good because of the Cisco CLI. If you are familiar with CLI, then you can configure the switch that way. It also has a relatively straightforward web interface. Using the web interface is good for beginners or people who aren't familiar with Cisco CLI. However, having a common command line interface method is great for some of our more advanced guys who are familiar with it."

    Ubiquiti UniFi Switches are managed Gigabit switches (Available with 24 or 48 RJ45 Gigabit ports) designed to meet all your network needs while delivering excellent performance. The switches’ excellent network performance is combined with fiber connectivity that includes two SFP ports and the ability to process traffic without putting packet loss at risk.

    Ubiquiti UniFi Switches Are:

    • Easy to deploy
    • Simple to use
    • Affordable
    • Reliable and stable

    Ubiquiti UniFi Switches Support These Three Output Modes:

    • PoE: Uses IEEE 802.3af standard to deliver up to 15.4W.
    • PoE+: Uses IEEE 802.3at standard to deliver up to 30W.
    • PoE++: Uses IEEE 802.3bt standard to deliver up to 60W.

    Ubiquiti UniFi Switches Support These Three Input Modes:

    • US-8 (PoE, PoE+)
    • USW-Flex (PoE, PoE+, PoE++)
    • USW-Flex Mini (PoE, PoE+)

    Ubiquiti UniFi Switches Features:

    • Scalability
    • Stability
    • Reliable hardware
    • Alarm alerting system
    • Dual-band
    • PoE+ flexibility
    • Fiber connectivity
    • User-friendly GUI
    • Mesh networking
    • Secure management
    • High speed
    • Excellent dashboards
    • Reporting and detailed analytics
    • Multi-site management
    • Deep packet inspection

    Benefits of Ubiquiti UniFi Switches:

    • Ubiquiti UniFi Switches are silent because they are designed without a fan.
    • They help simplify your network infrastructure and cabling.
    • Ubiquiti UniFi Switches offer 24 to 48 port switch versions to work with.
    • Ubiquiti UniFi Switches provide redundant power if the internal power supply fails.
    • Ubiquiti UniFi Switches include the forwarding capacity to simultaneously process traffic on all ports at line rate without any packet loss.
    • Ubiquiti UniFi Switches are rated as affordable when compared with competitors.
    • Available with 24 or 48 RJ45 Gigabit ports
    • Configuration with Ubiquiti UniFi is easy; It's simple to configure or reconfigure an AP or gateway quickly.
    • By having a mobile app, Unifi makes it easy to check on sites and to configure APs individually if necessary.
    • With Ubiquiti UniFi Switches, you can operate your IP cameras and phones through a single network cable.


    Reviews from Real Users

    A PeerSpot user who is a Director of Technical Operations/CTO at a consultancy says "The ability to deploy quickly and then having one central location for all the settings are its most valuable aspects."

    "The integration with the controller is one of the most valuable features of these switches. They are also very stable. For example, we have some equipment that we haven't touched for four years that is still reliable," says Doru I., Senior solutions architect at Aplix Technologies

    Murali S., Management Consultant at a consultancy, explains that “For the world where you have to balance traffic and traffic loads and bandwidth, their GUI makes it really easy because the switches, though they are enterprise grade level two or level three switches, the GUI is designed so that it's easy to set up VLANs where you need to control your traffic so that your phones don't break up and get choppy because of other people loading the network down too heavily."

    Sample Customers
    Blaze Networks
    Staypineapple
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Manufacturing Company18%
    Construction Company18%
    Computer Software Company18%
    Agriculture6%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company13%
    Comms Service Provider7%
    Manufacturing Company7%
    Educational Organization7%
    REVIEWERS
    Manufacturing Company17%
    Comms Service Provider17%
    Computer Software Company9%
    Religious Institution9%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company12%
    Comms Service Provider9%
    Retailer6%
    Government6%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business75%
    Midsize Enterprise8%
    Large Enterprise18%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business33%
    Midsize Enterprise15%
    Large Enterprise52%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business80%
    Midsize Enterprise20%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business39%
    Midsize Enterprise18%
    Large Enterprise43%
    Buyer's Guide
    NETGEAR Switches vs. Ubiquiti UniFi Switches
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about NETGEAR Switches vs. Ubiquiti UniFi Switches and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    768,578 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    NETGEAR Switches is ranked 4th in Ethernet Switches with 50 reviews while Ubiquiti UniFi Switches is ranked 3rd in Ethernet Switches with 43 reviews. NETGEAR Switches is rated 8.2, while Ubiquiti UniFi Switches is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of NETGEAR Switches writes "You can stack different models of switches which makes the scalability great". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Ubiquiti UniFi Switches writes "Rock solid stability with adjustable voltage configuration for PoE". NETGEAR Switches is most compared with D-Link Ethernet Switches, Cisco Linksys Ethernet Switches, Cisco Ethernet Switches, MikroTik Routers and Switches and Aruba Switches, whereas Ubiquiti UniFi Switches is most compared with Cisco Ethernet Switches, Aruba Switches, MikroTik Routers and Switches, Meraki MS Switches and Luxul Switches. See our NETGEAR Switches vs. Ubiquiti UniFi Switches report.

    See our list of best Ethernet Switches vendors.

    We monitor all Ethernet Switches 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.