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Citrix DaaS

Citrix DaaS
Formerly Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops / XenDesktop & XenApp

Overview

What is Citrix DaaS?

Citrix DaaS (formerly Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops, or XenDesktop) is a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and application virtualization solution from Citrix.

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Recent Reviews

TrustRadius Insights

Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops, previously known as XenApp and XenDesktop, have been widely adopted by organizations for a variety of …
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Honest Review

10 out of 10
July 12, 2022
Incentivized
We use Citrix as our preferred VDI solution to provide managed desktop to end users. With CItrix you get a complete siolution from Citrix …
Continue reading
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

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Pricing

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Virtual Apps

$375

Cloud

Entry-level set up fee?

  • No setup fee

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services
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Product Demos

Service continuity support for Android devices

YouTube

Service continuity support for browsers (Workspace for Web)

YouTube

Instructional Demo - Steps to cloud migration

YouTube
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Product Details

What is Citrix DaaS?

To meet the needs of an increasingly flexible workforce, organizations are turning to desktop as aservice (DaaS) and VDI solutions to provide high-performing, adaptive workspaces. Citrix DaaS modernizes IT with a secure cloud solution to quickly deliver apps or desktops from any cloud or datacenter worldwide.

With Citrix DaaS, IT can seamlessly deploy and manage hybrid work environments to increase business agility and deliver an enhanced user experience at scale. Built-in Citrix high-definition HDX technologies increase productivity, providing real-time network and performance optimization for even the most demanding 3D, voice, or video applications. Enhanced security and policy controls protect sensitive data to securely deliver vital resources anywhere to any device.

Citrix DaaS Technical Details

Deployment TypesSoftware as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsUnspecified
Mobile ApplicationNo

Frequently Asked Questions

Citrix DaaS (formerly Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops, or XenDesktop) is a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and application virtualization solution from Citrix.

V2 Cloud, VMware Horizon, and Amazon WorkSpaces are common alternatives for Citrix DaaS.

Reviewers rate Implementation Rating highest, with a score of 9.

The most common users of Citrix DaaS are from Mid-sized Companies (51-1,000 employees).
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(155)

Community Insights

TrustRadius Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, 3rd-party data sources. Have feedback on this content? Let us know!

Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops, previously known as XenApp and XenDesktop, have been widely adopted by organizations for a variety of use cases. Users have found that this software provides seamless access to virtualized desktops and applications across multiple satellite locations, enabling teams to work collaboratively and efficiently. It has also been deployed in data centers, supporting various clients and applications including published desktops and development applications.

One of the key benefits of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops is its ability to facilitate remote work. Many organizations have relied on this software to provide their employees with secure access to desktops and applications from anywhere, ensuring business continuity even in challenging circumstances such as during the Covid-19 pandemic. Call center agents, testing teams, and general remote workers have leveraged this solution to maintain a strong security posture while enjoying a good user experience. Contractors, consultants, and remote workers have also found secure remote access through Citrix Virtual Apps valuable for their specific needs.

Another noteworthy use case of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops is its ability to provide remote desktop access to applications and servers, reducing infrastructure costs and eliminating the need for a dedicated data center. By giving users the flexibility to connect to business applications, utilities, and production servers remotely, the software streamlines IT operations while cutting down on maintenance efforts. Moreover, it has proven beneficial for organizations handling sensitive data or those seeking to provide offshore developers with secure access to internal company resources.

Overall, Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops have addressed the diverse needs of businesses across industries. From ensuring seamless collaboration between distributed teams to enabling secure remote access to critical resources, this software has become an integral part of many organizations' IT infrastructure. Its ability to provide fast connections, improve efficiency, reduce costs, and enhance productivity has made it a preferred solution for various use cases within enterprises globally.

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-8 of 8)
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July 12, 2022

Honest Review

Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use Citrix as our preferred VDI solution to provide managed desktop to end users. With CItrix you get a complete siolution from Citrix gateways to the Application publishing which makes it easier to manage rather than having seperate thirdpary products, which can be quite challenging to manage and update from time to time.
  • Virtual Apps
  • VDI Solution
  • Printing
  • A single console to manage the environment.
  • The configuration is a bit complicated and we have hired Citrix administrators. But it's a good solution.
  • User profiles need improvement. They could use more stability and more functionality as well as user profile redirection.
Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops are secure and way better than using built-in Microsoft terminal services. I have used other products as well like VMware Horizon View and Hyper-V to provide VDI solutions to the end-user but they lack one thing or the other, whereas Citrix Apps and Desktops solutions cover almost everything as a complete VDI solution.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Usage of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops (CVAD) is across the organization. Our call center agents leverage virtual desktops to complete their role with our customers and many internal teams leverage the flexibility for testing and general remote access for themselves and vendors/consultants as we are allowed to secure the workspace across a number of boundaries to ensure a strong posture while delivering a good user experience.
  • Enables remote access anywhere, to any device which eliminates managing the endpoints how traditional VPN would require.
  • Integrates well with modern applications to offer optimized user experiences similar to native applications which increases user acceptance.
  • Extremely flexible in how policies are applied to different use cases to ensure the appropriate security mitigations are in place with minimal effort.
  • Easy to maintain and expand environments to fit business needs.
  • There isn't much automation built-in beyond Machine Creation Services, so you must develop a lot of your own code - though their PowerShell module is excellent.
  • General monitoring is decent and has the ability to send email alerts, but the scope is very limited to mostly user experience components or requires the most expensive license level to get some additional support - though that also requires other software to be owned.
  • Allowing more customizations to the "Director" support web tool would really allow for ease of use by management and help desk users in ways that simplify there workflows.
Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops (CVAD) is well suited for any internal workspace or remote access environment where flexibility and reliability is of interest. Whether you need to delivery a bunch of similar desktops or an application for a training session or fully empower a team or department to work remotely while maintaining the highest security mitigations the platform will allow you to deploy workspaces as you need, and wherever you desire with the hypervisor or cloud of your choosing.
Score 1 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Citrix XenDesktop is utilized at our Datacenter to provide our third-party offshore developers access to internal company resources while maintaining a good security standing. XenDesktop prevents customer data and/or proprietary code from being downloaded external to the company and leaked to competitors or our customer's competitors.
  • All Management resources can now be installed on a single server. Reducing the overhead required to maintain a citrix environment.
  • Granularity of the Delivery groups allow you to define allowing a remote user to connect to a random XenDesktop VM or individually assigning VMs to users.
  • HDX RealTime Optimization Pack has stabilized some of the issues of utilizing all of the features of Skype for Business in a ZenDesktop VM.
  • Product documentation is bloated with information and lacks documentation on assisting with first time setup.
  • Customer service offers very little assistance when it comes to using your support contract.
  • Default Policy, out of the box, allows Clipboard, File Share, Printer Sharing, Drive redirection, and others security risks that should be disabled by default.
  • Screenshots are not prevented, other products blank a screenshot or sniping tool image. Watermarks are the only security citrix offers and are disabled by default.
  • Renewal cost of support contract is 80% of initial purchase price. Other companies renewal cost is significantly less.
  • End users who do not properly log off can leave a hung connection, and requires manual deletion of the connection for users to re-connect.
Citrix XenDesktop is useful when your company utilizes third party offshore developers that need to access internal resources with restrictions. And useful when you need to provide contractor or support technician temporary access to resolve an issue.

It can prevent customer data and/or proprietary code from the unsanctioned removal of company premise.
External auditors have been quicker to approve (and sometimes mandate) the use of Citrix as a trusted tool for external access.
February 28, 2017

Citrix VDI

Khanh Thai | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 7 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use XenDesktop for the whole organization. The business problem it address is that we are in the process of using XenDesktop for remote access with NetScaler Access Gateway so we can shutdown our VPN. The reason [for this] is so we don't have to open a hole into our network with a VPN. Since XenDesktop is just a screen refresh it solves the security issue on that front. We also use XenDesktop for fast roll out since upgrading and patching is done on one master image. On the client side we use Wyse Zero client. Using all these technologies helps streamline IT as a whole to cut costs in the long run. We can focus on backend projects instead of fixing physical computer issues.
  • Remote access. Even with high latency, HDX helps with working no not so ideal situations
  • PVS server lower IOPS and faster image management
  • USB redirection is a nice for remote users
  • Technical support is lacking.
  • Flash or HTML Videos lag with Zero clients.
  • Support cost is expensive when their support is really poor.
I gave it a 7 because support is lacking.
John Pasqualicchio | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We utilize XenDesktop to provide seamless access to virtualized desktops and applications across our 16 satellite locations.
  • Ease of Management
  • Scalability
  • Ease of Use
  • Integration with third party server and storage vendors
From a small business to an enterprise, XenDesktop's flexibility lends itself to a broad audience for adoption.
Denis Peach | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 6 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We use XenDesktop (XenApp) in published desktop mode to facilitate users at remote rehabilitation clinics to perform their clinical work with patients on wireless laptops and desktops at the clinics. Typically the clinic will only have a T1 WAN connectivity back to the datacenter on a MPLS network and bandwidth is a real concern. It is also used for remote workers and as a work from home method.
  • XenDesktop 7 provides two effective methods of managing session host updates and keeping them consistent within a machine group. In prior versions of XenApp/Metaframe, each host had to be updated individually resulting in inconsistencies across the resource pool.
  • XenDesktop 7 provides several efficient methods to maximizing session performance while minimizing bandwidth utilization. We can effectively facilitate an average of 8-10 clinicians at a remote site across a 1.5MB WAN link, working in multiple applications, printing, scanning and streaming video.
  • XenDesktop 7 enables user mobility by using a common interface across multiple platforms - Windows/Linux/IOS and OS X.
  • Monitoring and troubleshooting tools are lacking. Unless you can afford the costly step up to Platinum licensing, there is little native visibility into the Inner workings of the system, or into the ICA tunnel protocols. there are third party tools available, but because ICA is licensed by Citrix, there are only a few vendors who have the ability to really see what is occurring under the covers.
  • Profile management is very sloppy. Once again, a third party tool is required to effectively manage roaming profiles and keep login times down to a manageable level. UPM allows profiles to grow dramatically and requires careful monitoring and frequent intervention.
  • The Citrix Receiver client (Windows) is quirky and often causes end user performance and UX issues. Installing and upgrading the client is not straightforward or easy, although Citrix has been improving this weakness in recent releases.
XenDesktop is an effective all around VDI/Published App system, but lacks the native manageability that would be expected of an enterprise product. While a basic deployment can be performed easily using the deployment wizard, significant planning and expertise is needed to fully maximize the capabilities and effectiveness of the product in an enterprise. An in-house Citrix expert is essential to manage any mid to large scale deployment. The product has gained an poor reputation among end users, which is somewhat unfair, due to its reliance on a number of external platforms and ecosystems in order to work efficiently.
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
XenDesktop is used to manage internet bandwidth at our remote locations as well as creating a standard set of applications, which are centrally managed and maintained. Our remote locations generally have T-1 or less connections, so bandwidth has to be carefully used. By keeping their applications and desktops on our data center end, it has lowered the amount of bandwidth used at the locations.
  • XenDesktop does a very great job at load balancing our applications and desktops across servers. It uses a load evaluator index to gauge the load on the server and sends new connections to the server in the group with the lowers LEI.
  • The integration into our VMware environment has been critical. Using Machine Creation Services, I am able to create an image and all machines created from that image are reset to it upon reboot. No more worrying about a user corrupting one server and having to rebuild it or deploy again from a VMware template. Creating a new server in a group is easy and fast.
  • Management of user sessions within XenDesktop's Director is simple and straight forward. Finding and managing a user's session is without complication.
  • The Director leaves a lot to be desired. I have had to resort to scripts and a custom page to get the information I need to properly manage our environment. The previous EdgeSight had detailed information that this just seems to leave out. There is no way to customize views, add or remove content, or otherwise customize for our brand.
  • One thing left out from this version that was in previous versions, was the ability deploy applications from all servers, not just those in a delivery group. As it is set up now, you can only deploy an app to a specific set of servers in a delivery group. If I have Group A running SAP and Group B running Office, only Group B can host Office for the users, even if Group A has Office installed. It would make better use of my servers if I could have on application run from both groups and still load balance properly. It is possible to have it run from both delivery groups, but the load balancing functionality appears to not work correctly.
  • A new functionality in the Feature Packs (1 and 2) was session recording. The functionality is useful, but is still clunky and uses a large amount of storage space. I have yet to see a way to auto purge old recordings without manually deleting them. Storage may be cheap now, but it still needs to be managed and used wisely. Being able to purge old recordings would go a long way.
A key question in the selection process is whether this product will have enough return on investment. For a large company, such as ours, the ROI is quite good. We have a lot of remote sites, a large amount of users, and a large VM environment to handle the loads. Smaller environments can run editions lower than Platinum, but you do lose functionality within the EdgeSight component of the Director. If you have a group of users where maintaining desktop applications is time consuming, this is definitely a product for you. The cost will be less than hiring additional staff to keep up with applications and desktops, as well as keeping the overall bandwidth needs down. If you have remote sites and applications hosted in a data center, this is the product for you.
Brad Eley | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
XenDesktop serves as our platform for delivering virtual desktops to doctors and nurses throughout the hospital. It improves productivity by allowing users to easily move between patient rooms and other areas of the hospital without having to repeat the login process and application startup each time. Coupled with proximity card authentication and single-sign on, password reset requests and login times are considerably reduced.
  • Minimizes new desktop provisioning time.
  • Allows for a standard desktop image which increases stability, decreases downtime, and simplifies updating.
  • Increases user productivity while moving between devices.
  • For 2008 R2 Hyper-V environments, if VMM goes offline no new connections to desktops can be made. VMM cannot be clustered making it a single point of failure.
  • Desktop Director could be more robust.
The best-case scenario is when you can standardize on one to three "master" images. Personalizing desktops should be a layer and is best done by using a third party product. It is also not suited for applications that are graphic intensive unless considerable investment is made installing robust GPUs in the virtualization hosts. Users who have lots of "one-off" applications, and those who are constantly uninstalling/installing different applications also would not be well suited for VDI.
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