Commvault vs. Zerto: How do their DR products compare?

Commvault vs. Zerto: Which workloads does each support?

Commvault is known for its incredibly diverse support of data types, applications and hypervisors. Besides supporting nearly all of the mainstream hypervisors and business applications, Commvault Disaster Recovery works with Windows, Linux and Unix OSes. This includes HP-UX, IBM AIX and Oracle Solaris.

Zerto works with a variety of clouds, including Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, AWS, IBM Cloud and Oracle Cloud. It also supports Azure, Amazon and Google Kubernetes, as well as hypervisors from VMware and Microsoft.

Feature-rich DR software

Commvault built its DR product around an intuitive, web-based user interface that supports one-click failover and failback. Commvault designs its software to keep data secure with built-in encryption for data both at rest and in flight. Additionally, Commvault Disaster Recovery performs security scans of the data replicas stored at the DR site to ensure ransomware protection.

Commvault uses automation extensively, particularly when it comes to DR scripts, compliance reporting and outage discovery. Commvault's offering is also built to be scalable to accommodate data growth, and it allows for flexible recovery point objectives and recovery time objectives.

Before choosing a DR product, the organization must ensure it will work with the applications it uses.

Zerto markets its platform as a continuous data protection offering that uses both continuous backup and DR capabilities. This platform is built around four key features. The first feature is long-term retention for situations in which compliance or regulatory requirements mandate that certain data be stored for months or years.

Zerto's second area of focus is data mobility and migration. The software is designed to be scalable, and it allows admins to move workloads and data to any desired location, on premises or in the cloud.

Zerto also provides test and development capabilities that enable organizations to create isolated sandboxed environments for development or testing purposes. It has specifically built these sandboxes so organizations can use them without having to worry about causing performance issues in the production environment.

The company also focuses on security and compliance. Not surprisingly, this includes the ability to rapidly recover from various types of cyberattacks. Additionally, however, Zerto enables automated reporting for DR tests. These reports can help organizations better adhere to their compliance requirements.

Commvault vs. Zerto: How each DR tool addresses integration

One major issue with backup and DR software is that not every data protection application supports every line-of-business application. Before choosing a DR product, the organization must ensure it will work with the applications it uses.

Commvault provides an API that enables virtually any data source to work with its software. It has specifically designed its API to be easy to use, even for those with minimal development experience.

Like Commvault, Zerto also provides its own API that admins can use to automate the protection of applications and VMs, as well as to integrate Zerto software with orchestration packages. Organizations that operate multisite or multi-cloud environments can also use the API to tie those environments into Zerto analytics, as a way to gain deeper insight into what's happening.

License types

The licensing terms for Commvault Disaster Recovery are based on whether or not the environment is virtualized. For virtual environments, licenses are based on the number of VMs, with licenses being applied in increments of 10 VMs. For non-virtualized environments, licensing requirements are based on the number of terabytes of data the organization needs to protect.

Zerto licenses its Enterprise Cloud Edition per protected VM and offers both subscriptions and perpetual licenses. It offers three different license types, which vary based on capabilities. For example, the Migration license includes only migration capabilities, not DR capabilities.

The second license type, Zerto Data Protection, includes local backup, long-term retention to disk, cloud or object storage, and Zerto analytics. The Zerto Enterprise Cloud Edition license is the only license that includes all of Zerto's capabilities. Among these capabilities are DR to on premises, DR to cloud, DR to a managed service provider, one-to-many replication, failover, failback, testing, re-IP, boot order, local backup, long-term retention, Zerto analytics and migration.

Product support and resources

Commvault Standard and Premium support includes access to the Maintenance Advantage Customer Support Portal, which provides self-help resources such as interactive troubleshooting guides. The main difference between Standard and Premium support is that Standard support is available Monday through Friday between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m., whereas Premium support is available 24/7.

Zerto provides users with a support portal that provides access to the Zerto knowledge base and enables them to download the latest version of Zerto Virtual Replication. Admins can also use the support portal to connect with the Zerto community in an online forum and check on the status of open cases.

In addition to its self-help portal, Zerto provides on-demand support, including immediate assistance for urgent, severity level-one issues.

Commvault vs. Zerto: Approaches to training

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, Commvault offered various instructor-led courses. However, all of these courses have been rolled into the company's on-demand learning platform.

Commvault currently offers three on-demand learning packages: Essentials, Professional and Professional Plus. The Essentials package includes the Commvault Essentials Course and product feature review sessions, as well as basic access to the on-demand learning library. The Professional package provides access to the on-demand learning library, as well as everything in the Essentials package and extras, including expert sessions and access to the Commvault virtual lab. The Professional Plus package includes everything that's in the Professional package but also adds three days of instructor-led training. This training is useful for those who are seeking to complete Commvault's certification program.

Zerto offers partners and customers complimentary training and certification. In addition to the educational resources, which Zerto calls myZerto University, the company also provides hands-on labs to help customers become better acquainted with its software.