Aruba Networks Wireless WAN vs Ubiquiti Networks UniFi

Likelihood to Recommend

Aruba Networks Wireless WAN is an excellent solution for small to medium-sized implementation, especially on-premise. The ability to centrally manage all policy-based access requirements for both registered users as well as guests using the portal is effortless. This is backed up by good documentation which is available and excellent vendor support (HP).

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Verified User

Team Lead in Information Technology

Information Technology & Services Company, 501-1000 employees

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In the past few months we purchased thousands of dollars in brand new networking equipment from Ubiquiti. IT DOES NOT WORK CORRECTLYWe bought 2 sets of hardware. 1 for home office and 1 for work. They both have the same issue (internet stops working). We have emailed literally dozens of times with customer service and they have not been able to resolve the issue. We have requested escalation to more trained technicians and have asked them to log into our system to assess. None of this has happened and our internet continues to intermittently work.

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Verified User

C-Level Executive in Other

Education Management Company, 1-10 employees

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Pros

It has cloud management for administration of access points remotely.
Automatic replication of custom settings to access points.
Solution with WIFI 5 and WIFI 6 hotspots.
They are powered by POE or power injector.
Compact access points.

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Verified User

Analyst in Information Technology

Information Technology & Services Company, 51-200 employees

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AP's are very affordable.
Most of the AP's are highly reliable and can be used indoors or in covered outdoor spaces.
Outdoor Mesh AP's with an external directional antenna can effectively cover outdoor spaces with dual band wifi better than much more expensive APs.
Unifi Protect via the Cloud Key Gen2+ is probably the slickest, most affordable IP camera system on the market right now.
Unifi controller is powerful yet simple to administrate.
Remote management of entire networks through a single pane of glass is easy to accomplish with the Unifi controller.
Cloud Key Gen2 solves problems with the first Cloud Key wiht a built-in battery backup.
When you are "full stack" Unifi with wifi, network switches and gateways, the control you can wield over a network in just a few clicks and the amount of data you can glean from a quick glance in the controller is incredibly impressive. It makes an IT guy wish every product/service could be so tightly and well-integrated.
Community support is excellent, Unifi staff monitors their official forums and responds to almost every thread.

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Patrick Plaisance

CTO (Chief Technical Officer)

Pachyderm ConsultingInformation Technology and Services, 1-10 employees

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Cons

Licensing is slightly complicated and not bundled, separate costs for cloud controller is a no-no.
UI needs an uplift.
Coverage is good but can be better.

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Verified User

Team Lead in Information Technology

Information Technology & Services Company, 501-1000 employees

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VLANs: They can make these work more smoothly. Setup can be more intuitive.
Cloud Key: These need to be stabilized; they lose their programming a little too easily.
Stop selling the Gen-1 cloud key: No battery means you need an external power source or you must be onsite to power it off before updating.
Portal can be modernized.

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Vin Campbell

IT Director

Sahadi Fine FoodsWholesale, 11-50 employees

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Pricing Details

General

Free Trial

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Free/Freemium Version

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Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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Entry-level set up fee?

No

Starting Price

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General

Free Trial

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Free/Freemium Version

—

Premium Consulting/Integration Services

—

Entry-level set up fee?

No

Starting Price

—

Usability

No score

No answers yet

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Ubiquiti Networks UniFi 9.5

Based on 3 answers

UniFi's system is intuitive in how options are placed and explained throughout the interface. What is not directly explainable within the interface, Ubiquiti does provide several knowledgebase documents explaining best practices and methods of troubleshooting when things don't go exactly right. We've been using them for over three years, and the benefits vastly outweigh any negatives we could come up with on the equipment and system.

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Brandon Patton

Manager, Information Technology

Engineering InnovationIndustrial Automation, 51-200 employees

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Support Rating

Aruba Networks Wireless WAN 10.0

Based on 2 answers

In the least concern we have, the support team has always been available and responds very quickly.

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Verified User

Professional in Information Technology

Primary/Secondary Education Company, 1001-5000 employees

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Ubiquiti Networks UniFi 7.4

Based on 10 answers

Support tickets can be proactively created within the dashboard with full detailed documentation. The Ubiquiti website provides detailed documentation on support. Forum and user groups also provide the interested community with information that covers all aspects of issues or questions users can encounter with the latest and most updated information.

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Tiago Mokwa

IT Senior System Network Administrator

Revise Clothing IncApparel & Fashion, 51-200 employees

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Alternatives Considered

We used Xirrus wifi before we moved to Aruba. Xirrus is a great niche brand that has been sold to other companies a few times in the life we used the products. This negatively impacted the product availability in our country, local support, and amount of implementation partners. Due to Aruba their broad product range, availability in the market, and knowledge with implementation partners we feel that we can build upon their products not only for a product cycle but for the decade to come.

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Verified User

Advisor in Information Technology

Government Administration Company, 201-500 employees

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Ubiquiti is overall easier to work with. There is no special training needed to accomplish many of the things required with a Cisco product. Since my time is stretched thin, I need something that I can manage without being weighed down by command-line communications. Also, I am able to use my wireless devices to maintain every Ubiquiti device on my network.

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Verified User

Manager in Information Technology

Religious Institutions Company, 11-50 employees

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Return on Investment

We have better coverage for our visitors and during trainings
We have enough bandwidth to accommodate everyone
No more dead spots in the building that effects our users.

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Matthew Guzzi

Information Systems Administrator

South Carolina State LibraryLibraries, 11-50 employees

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The access points and switch were extremely affordable and we've had minimal downtime over the life of the products.
The switch was in our main rack and there was a bug in the firmware that would reboot the switch if you made a change to one of the switch ports (that was not in use at the time). This caused our entire organization to have a network outage, in the middle of the day. Fortunately we didn't have any customer refunds to issue. We've had to purchase different switches for the main racks, and place the UniFi switch in a better suited place.

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Aaron Smith

Information Technology Manager

TimeTrak Systems, Inc.Computer Software, 11-50 employees

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Aruba Networks Wireless WAN vs Ubiquiti Networks UniFi