NAKIVO Backup & Replication Reviews

We are using Nakivo Backup & Replication to back up ten virtual machines from our Nutanix cluster with some 80 virtual machines. Our goal is to replace the existing backup solution completely with Nakivo Backup and Replication and to have an offsite backup of all important servers to one of our branch offices with a Synology NAS with Nakivo Transporter installed. Offices are connected with a 500 MB VPN; the Nakivo appliance is running on our Nutanix cluster. Currently, we are using an Enterprise Essentials license.

Veeam Backup and Replication is the main backup solution at our customer's site, but it stopped working while backing up our now 5TB file server - and after some weeks of investigating the whole issue with Veeam support, I had to decide to search for an alternative solution. Nakivo offered a free trial which was very easy to set up and immediately worked. To be totally honest, it has an affordable price. 

The bandwidth-optimized deduplicated offsite backup to a Synology NAS was another must-have, which would have been possible with Veeam, too, but we would have had to build a Windows-based server for that.

The first really good thing about Nakivo Backup and Replication was the fact that I could install and configure the trial version in maybe half an hour and had a successful backup of our file server on the same night. I used different repositories to test - a Synology NAS with Nakivo Transporter and a CIFS share on a Windows bases server. Both worked without any problems. Then there was another point, that was really important to me: having an offsite backup to a Synology NAS at an office branch. I had to take a look at some options to optimize data flow, but the backup copy job works like a charm.

At the moment, there are actually not many features I am missing. It would be good if I could have a remote upgrade of our Synology Transporters, but the manual upgrade is easy and no problem at all. 

Some SNMP features to configure our monitor software would be great since emails sent to me sometimes could be lost in all those other mails. 

Some customers from Germany might have a problem when contacting English speaking sales and support team, but that has never been a problem to me, although my English hasn't been used much in the last couple of years.

I've been using Nakivo Backup & Replication for Nutanix since 2020.

There have been no crashes and no unfixable errors (there is a good knowledge base, and self-explaining error messages).

Since I'm using Nakivo to backup only ten virtual machines at the moment, I will have to wait until I backup my whole Nutanix cluster to find out about the scalability.

The sales representatives are nice; we didn't need technical support.

I'm still using Veeam Backup and Replication, but since this solution had huge problems backing up our file server (5 TB), I switched to Nakivo for some servers and will be completely replacing replacing Veeam by the end of its maintenance.

Yes, if you just follow the steps outlined in the setup assistant, you get it going in less than half an hour.

I implemented the solution by myself.

After weeks of working with Veeam support without any success, I can say it was worth every Euro spent since I have a working solution and can sleep better.

Nakivo has way lower licensing costs than Veeam - at least in our environment, with Nutanix as the protected cluster. Talk to your sales representative; they sold me the right license.

I am using Veeam and tested only Nakivo as a possible replacement.

I do not have any other comments at this time. 

We did a manual backup of our VM's before. Nakivo was a cheap alternative to this, and we do it all for us now. 

Furthermore, we have used disaster recovery a few times, and it worked like a charm and saved us money and time. We have used the software so much that we became partners and certified. 

We use multi-tenancy very much as well, so we can manage multiple customers from one site. That makes it much easier to see if all backups have been run without errors and set up multiple jobs from one site so that we don't need VPNs and such for configuring customers' sites. 

All in all, Nakivo helped us save a lot of time.

If you don't want to waste a lot of money each year on backup software and just want something that works out of the box, and is easy to install, then choose Nakivo. 

Nakivo is easy to manage also - even if you are not in the IT department - and is a single company with its own data center. 

It is easy to manage your backups and restore. There are a lot of advanced features in Nakivo. All in all, you don't have to use them for single backups and restores. 

If you have problems, they also have a very good support staff that is not afraid to join a session with you, helping with backup or restoring a setup (or whatever the problem might be). 

We had some issues with snapshots on our VMware that Nakivo uses. Nakivo fixed it with a live session, even though they don't have anything to do with our VMware.

Nakivo is a backup and replication solution. Of course, the main best features are that it backs up, replicates, and restores. Nakivo also offers a lot more, like multi-tenancy. We use that a lot since we have a lot of customers we also backups for. With this product, we can control it all at one site. This means that we can do our job in much less time than before with manual backups.

Nakivo has a feature to recover files directly into VMs. We use this a lot, and it works flawlessly when set up.

In terms of features right now there isn't anything we want.

Of course, we want Nakivo to keep updating the product for errors and offer continuous support for old as well as the new VMware ESXi, and HyperV. 

For us, it would be best to improve the speed of the backup instead of adding new features. Nakivo is fast enough now, however, if it could be faster at encrypting or compressing, that would be ideal.

I've used the solution for five years.

We use the product for the backup of our VMs (Virtual Machines) which are located in a remote location. 

We have scheduled the backups for every day which is very convenient as it runs automatically. 

We can also run backup whenever we want according to our convenient time. The user interface is very easy to use and you can set it up in sometime without any issues. 

They also have cloud integration option for the backup to be stored on cloud platform such as Amazon and Wasabi.                               

We first used Nakivo Backup and Replication for our own HyperV Cluster. Then, we added a physical server.

Having used it for some time, we discovered all of its functionalities and have seen the power of the product.

The web interface is clear and simple to use and learning to use it is very quick.

The email reports are clear.

The support is quick and efficient.

Nakivo Backup and Replication has become an important part of our disaster and recovery strategy.

Our company, being a VAR, has decided to become a reseller of this product to help more and more customers discover it.

I appreciate the management. They really do respond quickly. They reply immediately to any query raised from us as a technician or consultant and they know the pulse of the market and keep updating the features in such a big way. Kudos to the team.

I appreciate the motivation and confidence. It helps to sell Nakivo products when outstanding support is provided and its well-performing software easily beats competitors.

The product license and support delivery have been great.

Updating VM tools on a replicated VM could be better. 

One of the most important things Nakivo can do is stop releasing a new version several times a year. It's important to "get it right" on a version release. Too many updates will cause an issue. 

Any version update should include the ESXi Host as well as the Center - not taking into consideration the vCenter version is a huge mistake and no updates should be released unless they also support the current vCenter version. That came up and I had several issues before I figured out it was a vCneter update compatibility issue.

We found an outside VMware software to perform critical operations. Since we started using Nakivo Backup and Replication, we can perform operations that would be very expensive using a VMware license. 

We use it on our QNAP devices. It covers up to 5 servers in the small environment we have. We can perform operations that were expensive/difficult with very high automation.

Since we started using Nakivo Backup and Replication, we can perform operations that would be very expensive using a VMware license, for a very very affordable price. Even if our infrastructure should increase in the short term, we can upgrade just the license to cover all the new devices we use. 

We use Nakivo Backup and Replication on QNAP devices, and it covers up to 5 servers in a small environment. We can now perform operations that were expensive and difficult with very high automation. We are very satisfied with its capabilities. 

Being able to back up without using VMware services is for sure the best opportunity we have when there is a disruption impacting VMware products. An additional feature that would be appreciated is disaster recovery automation. it could be improved using vCenter features.

Nakivo Backup and Replication does not have many other background areas where it can be improved, and we are satisfied.

Since we use Nakivo Backup and Replication, we can perform operations that would be very expensive using our VMware license. We are really satisfied.

I'd like to see backup and replication without using vCenter. That's a feature that would be appreciated. If the vCenter should go down, it would be very difficult to recover the infrastructure, so some solution is needed to avoid restoring vCenter first and then to later restore the virtual machine from Nakivo's Backup and Replication.

An additional feature that would be appreciated is disaster recovery automation. It could be improved using vCenter features.

Nakivo Backup and Replication does not have many other background areas where it can be improved, however, we are mostly satisfied.

We are a cloud provider and we use Nakivo for VMware Backup and Replications, including disaster recovery. 

The solution is stable; there is no need to retry any sort of jobs in daily operations.

The product is absolutely scalable. You scale according to the number of storage devices you add.

We did not use a different solution prior to implementing this product.

The costs of the product are justified according to the features provided.

We also evaluated Veeam Backup.

We use the solution as a VM backup from local servers and remote data centers. Nakivo is installed on a NAS device at the office, and it doesn't need any external servers to run. That makes it really easy to deploy, and in case of disaster for servers, the NAS device is totally separate from them, and backups can be restored quickly to another environment where ever is enough resources to run them.

The remote data center can also be backed up to a small repository on that data center and then copied over an internet link to the office, where I have more space to store backups.

Backups are working smoothly with Nakivo Backup. Deduplication and compression of backup repositories save lots of disk space, and I can keep many more restore points compared to situations where deduplication is not used.

Having a couple of the latest restore points saved in the repository at a remote data center allows restoration of them quickly without the need first to transfer them over the internet from the office. It also is nice to be able to copy backups to the office, where I have plenty of more disk space to save them compared to a remote data center.

There is no need to install agents on VMs. It is easy to deploy new VMs and get them backed up instantly.

It can be fully run from a NAS device. There is no need to have separate backups servers and be able to run a full Linux environment without Windows servers.

Deduplication and compression of backup repositories are easy. It saves lots of disk space and enables you to keep many more recovery points compared to a situation where all recovery points are saved as is without deduplication.

It's a lightweight solution built over Linux. It can be run directly from NAS devices and doesn't need separate backups servers installed on the network.

We'd like to see more cooperation with Synology. It can be enhanced to get updates published faster to Synology's store.

I don't have any other complaints about Nakivo Backup, and I like it as it is. I have used many other backups solutions like Veeam, Actifio, and Acronis, and Nakivo has done things better than those other backup solution providers. 

Of course, there can be some cases where others might perform better; however, for my use case, Nakivo Backup does just what is needed, and it is done properly without problems.

I've used the solution for about three years.

I have previously used VMPro, Veeam, and Actifio.

The solution is cheaper than many competitors.

I have previously evaluated Veeam.

We are a German reseller and have sold Veeam for a very long time. We never were very happy with that solution and searched for an alternative to Veeam 2 to 3 years ago. With Nakivo, we found a partner who is very cooperative, has a very interesting price point and is even more than an alternative!

Now, we likely use Nakivo for customers with virtual servers and who don't want to spend thousands of Euros for a backup solution. Nakivo is perfect for them. We never have heard of a customer who is not happy with it.

With Nakivo, we can increase our portfolio and have a partner with short response times. Nakivo takes the time to hear every customer's issues and needs.

They are always friendly and help the reseller and customer with a good support team.

With Nakivo, we can grant a backup solution for a lower price - which is perfect for smaller customers. 

The pre-configured virtual machine helps the IT team save time and is very easy to use. 

Email notifications make the ongoing monitoring of the system simplicity itself.

They offer a built-in link in the web console to request support. They also automatically include a support bundle with all the relevant configuration data for your system which makes requesting support easy, however, you really don't need it very often.

The transporter is one thing that we often use when we have installed a new server for our system. 

The ability to use a variety of cloud providers rather than being tied into one is a huge bonus.

For me, as a reseller, not only the product is important - it's also the people behind it and how they behave. This I can only praise. They have a great team.

The feature that has a backup repository, like QNAP + ext. HDD's could be improved. We sometimes have trouble with that and it would be nice if they had a solution on the way.

Updating VM Tools on a replicated VM could be better.

Support for the backup and replication of virtual machines is excellent, however, improved support for physical machine backups would be very welcome (I believe this is already on the way).

A mobile app for administration would be appreciated.

The user interface could use a bit of refreshing, however, on the other hand, it runs very smoothly, so if that would change how it runs I'd rather live with the user interface looking a bit dated.

I've been using the solution for two years.

We have never heard of any system fails.

The scalability is good.

They are always very fast and ready to help.

We used mainly Veeam previously and searched for a solution for smaller customers, where the price level was lower.

It's very easy to set up, thanks to the ready-to-install VM's.

We are the vendor.

The price level is low, however, you have to watch out if you want to backup workstations.

I don't remember evaluating other options.

Our primary use case of Nakivo is to backup a three-way vSphere cluster hosting approximately 50 virtual machines.

We changed backup solutions because our previous one became so top-heavy and cumbersome to use.

We are a large site and use Nakivo to back up to disc between buildings in a limited time window. It then moves backup sets to the cloud as required.

We also use the replication feature to snapshot some of our most critical VMs to a backup server, which could be used if we lost our main datacenter. 

It has enabled us to backup (and replicate) our virtual machines much more frequently than was previously possible. We can now backup our entire vSphere cluster to disc on-site and then move backups to the cloud later. This enables us to do quick granular file recovery as and when required but also to do whole-site relocation in the case of a total loss scenario.

The small footprint of the main software ("Director" ) and transporters is excellent, too. I've often wondered why some of the agents we have had to install for other backup solutions need so many resources. You don't need an agent for Nakivo either, just a "transporter" that can handle loads of VMs and jobs.

Also, the ability to use a variety of cloud providers rather than being tied into one is a huge bonus. 

Creating new jobs is quick and easy, with only a few clicks and you're done.  

The backup copy option is handy if you start running out of space. You can just move backup sets to alternate locations.

The ability to fire up replicated VMs and grab a screenshot of the running OS as proof the replication has worked is great for peace of mind!

The web-based GUI on Nakivo is rapid and the ongoing development of the product is steady and sensible. Not just a case of adding every option under the sun as some manufacturers try, and fail to do.

The simplicity of Nakivo is its best feature. It does exactly what it should, which is to create restorable backups!

My first thought was maybe the GUI could be improved, although it works.

We have been using Nakivo for the past four years.

It's not gone wrong in four years, so I'd say it's stable.

Nakivo is very scalable. You add more licenses for sockets if you need to; otherwise, deploy more transporters to cope with more simultaneous workloads.

We have only needed to use technical support twice. Once was a user error on our part and the other was a licensing issue. Both times, customer support was very good.

Our previous solution became too bloated and cumbersome to use. We got sick of waiting five seconds for screens to load.

The initial setup is very easy, with simple instructions to follow.

We deployed in-house.

The ROI is unmeasurable.

My advice is that you get the trial, as there is nothing to lose!

The licensing model is crystal clear on the website.

We looked at several others but it's that long ago, I can't remember which products.

I have serious reservations suggesting features for something which is spot on as it is. Over my many years working in IT I have seen good products ruined by overzealous "improvements". The software can quickly become bloated and go on to lose its long-term customers and then end up in a constant battle to be the most feature-rich product.

For now, our use case is to backup two Hyper-V Servers with a total of 11 VMs.

The servers are in the same location on two different machines (Fujitsu Servers).

The repository is on Qnap with a secondary repository on a different Qnap in another location.

We plan to expand our backup system to workstations that run on Windows 10/11 later this year.

Our organization was running on Windows Backup and Recovery - with a backup of all servers and VMs to a remote location from time to time.  

Now Nakivo gives us a reliable system that has more options - such as deduplication, replication, and disaster recovery.

Backup jobs are running smoothly every day with job reports sent to email after they finish each job. That gives us peace of mind. Nakivo was easy to deploy and configure in our environment.   

First of all, setting up Nakivo was fast and easy to do.

Configuration of the repositories is simple and the connection to our Hyper-V host was automated and completed in a few minutes.  

Setting up jobs to backup our VMs runs with no major problems.   

Support for some questions or minor issues is great. It is fast and they offer exact responses.

The interface is user-friendly and easy to read (the dashboard has all information needed).

There is always room for improvement statistics could be a little better (job compare, overall job performance), however, Nakivo is a complete product with a lot to offer. Adding new items to the configuration is simple. The backups run fast, and the recovery and replication options are also easy to use. Job reports are clear.

We plan to expand our backup system to workstations as we only backup Hyper-V.

More statistic options would be a great feature.

I've used the solution for a few months.

The solution is very stable with no major problems.

Customer service and support are on a very high level.

Positive

We previously used Windows Backup, however, we needed something more.

The initial setup was straightforward and easy.

We implemented it with the help of a vendor team.

I'd advise new users to make contact with Nakivo support for a few hours of training.

We did not previously evaluate other options.