VMware vSAN Pros and Cons

It is easy to configure and manage from the same vCenter, without the need for additional hardware or software. It saves you space and costs, as you do not need to purchase external storage arrays or licenses from other manufacturers. It allows you to take advantage of VMware technologies, such as vMotion, HA, DRS, etc., and the specific functionalities of vSAN, such as deduplication, compression, encryption, etc. It gives you the option to choose between different types of disks (SSD, HDD, NVMe, etc.) and to configure the level of data protection according to the number of failures you want to tolerate. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

It requires quite demanding minimum hardware and software requirements, such as having at least three ESXi hosts, a 10 Gbps network card, a compatible version of vSphere, etc.

It can generate high network traffic between cluster nodes, especially if there are many write operations or data resynchronizations.

It can have compatibility issues with some devices or drivers that are not certified by VMware, which can affect the operation or technical support of vSAN.

It can be difficult to monitor and diagnose in case there is a failure or incident, as many vSAN logs and parameters need to be reviewed. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I like the ability to manage compute, memory, and storage in a single interface. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I have had challenges with identifying issues as being a VMware support concern or a concern of the hardware vendor, and the support teams would sometimes point to the other vendor. Also, early on I would get bad advice from the hardware vendor on troubleshooting vSAN issues, e.g. 'just hot swap the failed (cache) disk'. Fortunately I was well-read on how vSAN functioned and didn't heed that directive. But in the last few years it seems vendors' support teams are more aware of the nature of vSAN. I would like to be able to split a vSAN datastore into separate partitions in order to do functions like rename VMs and their folders/files via storage vMotion, without having to stand up a separate datastore. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

What you will love most about VMware vSAN is its ease of use. With just small amount of effort both time and knowledge wise, you are able to get a very powerful distributed storage system that simply works. It uses your standard network and delivers distributed system that is able to support even the most demanding workload. It is very easy to implement and as most capabilities are tied to software defined approach, you are able to get more features with regular product updates. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

There can be some tricky corner cases that may trigger for certain workloads in combination with certain vSAN cluster configs. I especially advise to read all design materials with ephasis on one large vSAN cluster versus more smaller VSAN clusters. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

We use vSAN with Dell VxRail HCI systems and have found the following use cases to be extremely useful in our environment:

1. Deduplication and Compression - Huge storage cost savings by checking these boxes

2. vSAN Encryption - We use Cloudlink as a key provider for our encryption and it integrates well with vSAN

3. Skyline Health - Self diagnostics and alerting built in to vSAN that monitors every component and makes it simple to find KBs for common issues

4. High Availability - Between HA, DRS, and vSAN Disk Group management, a lot can go wrong in your cluster before it affects VM uptime Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The only major difference I've noticed between vSAN and traditional SAN is ESXi maintenance. With SAN, we could easily put any ESXi host into maintenance mode without affecting the storage whatsoever. With vSAN, an ESXi host must first evacuate data or stay under the faults to tolerate before doing any maintenance which can lead to much longer cluster maintenance windows. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

One of the aspects I appreciate most about VMware vSAN is its seamless integration with VMware's virtualization platform. The tight integration allows for easy deployment and management within existing VMware environments, reducing complexity and streamlining operations. Additionally, vSAN's software-defined storage approach eliminates the need for dedicated storage hardware, enabling cost savings and flexibility in scaling storage capacity. The ability to leverage server-side flash and SSDs for caching enhances performance, while features such as data deduplication and compression optimize storage efficiency. Overall, VMware vSAN offers a comprehensive solution for hyper-converged infrastructure, providing a simplified and efficient storage solution for virtualized environments. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

while VMware vSAN offers significant benefits in terms of storage efficiency, scalability, and integration with VMware's virtualization platform, organizations should carefully evaluate their specific requirements and considerations before deploying vSAN to ensure it aligns with their objectives and infrastructure capabilities. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

we were an early adopter and selected vSan as out preffered stoarge technology about 5 years ago Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

More drive compatability would be good!!! Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I was really impressed with how vSAN performed and simplified the storage usage of the prototype cluster I initially deployed. We used the same approach then to develop a prototype and final solution, which is where the budget-friendly part comes in. I was able to leverage lessons-learned, as well as upgrade licenses to quickly deploy a tested solution that allowed me to take full advantage of the hardware solutions on-hand - basically maximising our storage utilization. It also helped that when we had to run a full-stack upgrade that vSAN continued to perform flawlessly as we did rolling updates during a maintenance cycle. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

The initial set-up at the time was a challenge and we needed to bring in a vSphere tech to help us identify some unique configurations to help us get going - While that may not be the case every time, it did slow us down initially which was unfortunate at the time.

Recent licencing changes do have us concerned, but we're still assessing impacts. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

ability to have shared cluster storage across the datacenter Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

I have not had any issues with our vsan clusters Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

It is very simple to enable and manage in the same vSphere client! Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

HCL sometimes quite difficult to fulfill in existing equipment Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Ease of Use, Feature set, stability, performance Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Licensing cost is the only issue i can think of Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.