Zerto DR (ZVM)

HPE Zerto Software ’s near-real-time replication capability is a critical part of how we deliver disaster recovery to our clients. Operating in The Bahamas, we are in a hurricane-prone region, so geographic resilience is a major concern. Many of our clients value the assurance that, in the event of a natural disaster, loss of power, or even the complete destruction of a local data center, their environments can be brought online in a different jurisdiction and continue operating exactly as they would on-premises. This level of protection and peace of mind is one of the primary reasons we deploy Zerto for our customers.

In addition to disaster recovery, some clients use HPE Zerto Software  for testing and validation purposes. The platform allows us to run disaster recovery tests in an isolated environment that mirrors production, enabling clients to validate real-world failure scenarios during business hours without disrupting live systems. This has been especially valuable for organizations that want confidence in their recovery plans but cannot afford downtime.

HPE Zerto Software also enables us to deliver disaster recovery in the cloud rather than relying solely on physical data centers. We typically provide clients with a virtual data center where their replicated environments reside, allowing for faster deployment and greater flexibility. One of Zerto’s strongest advantages is that it is hypervisor-agnostic, supporting platforms such as VMware, Hyper-V , and public cloud environments. While some customers still prefer dedicated physical infrastructure for private deployments, the majority of our clients are comfortable with a cloud-based approach. For them, Zerto has proven to be an efficient, reliable, and scalable solution that accelerates recovery readiness while simplifying overall operations.

One of HPE Zerto Software’s best features for us is its built-in ransomware resilience. Zerto continuously journals data changes and uses anomaly detection to identify unusual write behavior that may indicate a ransomware or cyberattack. This gives us early visibility into potential threats and allows us to respond quickly.

A key strength of the platform is its immutable journaling and recovery checkpoints. Zerto maintains frequent, immutable restore points that cannot be altered or encrypted by ransomware. This allows customers to roll environments back to a point just before an incident occurred, with confidence that the data has not been compromised. From a customer perspective, this provides a high level of assurance that their data remains protected and recoverable even in the event of a successful attack

While Zerto is hypervisor-agnostic and reliably replicates data, newer VM hardware versions, particularly in VMware environments, may not be immediately supported when customers update aggressively. This can create challenges in shared or cloud-based Zerto platforms, where upgrading the Zerto infrastructure to support a single customer’s newer version may impact other tenants.

It would be beneficial to see more flexibility around supporting older and newer platform versions simultaneously, or enhanced tooling to better manage version mismatches in multi-tenant environments. This would help service providers accommodate customers who move quickly with upgrades without forcing platform-wide changes that affect other clients.

I have been working with HPE Zerto Software for about the last eight years.

Zerto scales really well as environments grow. We’ve used it in smaller deployments and in larger, more complex environments, and the overall management doesn’t change much as you add more workloads. Once the core setup and networking are in place, protecting additional VMs or expanding to another site is fairly straightforward.

One of the things that helps with scalability is that Zerto is consistent across different platforms. Whether workloads are on-prem, in a secondary data center, or in the cloud, the replication process works the same way. That makes it easier to scale without having to learn or manage different tools for different environments.

We have been exposed to other solutions in the market, such as Veeam and some of VMware’s native replication options, but we did not extensively deploy them for disaster recovery. While Veeam does offer replication capabilities, our organization standardized early on HPE Zerto Software, and it has remained our primary disaster recovery platform.

We chose to stay with HPE Zerto Software because it consistently met our recovery objectives and aligned well with our operational model. As a result, we have continued to build our disaster recovery services around Zerto rather than switching between multiple tools. This focus has allowed us to develop deep expertise with the platform and deliver a consistent, reliable disaster recovery experience for our customers.

The initial setup with HPE Zerto Software is very straightforward. Deploying the platform itself is a breeze, and getting replication up and running does not take much effort. The only part that can become more complex is configuring the environment to match the customer’s specific needs, which can vary depending on networking, security requirements, and how the target environment is designed.

Overall, the core setup is simple, and any added complexity usually comes from tailoring the solution to fit the customer’s environment rather than from the product itself.

From a pricing perspective, HPE Zerto Software is more expensive than many competing solutions on the market. However, in our experience, the value becomes clear very quickly once customers see the product in action. Zerto is relatively easy to set up, and its ability to demonstrate near real-time replication and recovery in a live demo makes it much easier to justify the cost.

While pricing can initially be a concern, running a proof of concept typically shifts the conversation. Once customers understand the benefits, particularly around recovery speed, minimal data loss, and operational simplicity, they tend to focus less on price and more on how to adopt the solution within their environment. From that point, licensing discussions become more straightforward, as the product effectively sells itself based on performance and reliability.

I have seen and been around certain applications such as Veeam. Veeam has a replication option, but I have never fully explored it. We bought into HPE Zerto Software, and it has always been HPE Zerto Software as our number one go-to for disaster recovery. I know that VMware has some built-in replication options as well, but we have really and truly stayed in the same lane of disaster recovery with HPE Zerto Software.

HPE Zerto Software is what we often describe as the Ferrari of disaster recovery. It is a very refined platform with strong built-in safeguards, near-real-time replication, and a clean, intuitive management interface through Zerto Virtual Manager. The ability to manage access through Active Directory or independent logins, combined with immutable journaling and ransomware anomaly detection, gives us a high level of confidence in both security and recoverability.

Zerto excels in fast recovery and low disruption. We can restore workloads to just before an incident occurs, significantly reducing downtime and data loss. We have successfully used it to recover from a real ransomware incident, restoring clean environments quickly and keeping business impact to a minimum. Its migration capabilities are equally strong, allowing us to move workloads with minimal interruption while continuously capturing incremental changes until cutover.

Disaster recovery testing is another major strength. Zerto allows us to perform full DR tests during business hours in an isolated environment without impacting production, which has led to more frequent and more effective testing for our clients. The platform is also easy to operate, reducing the number of staff required during recovery scenarios and simplifying ongoing management.

My advice to organizations considering HPE Zerto Software is to clearly understand their recovery objectives. If you require very low RPOs, fast recovery times, and confidence against ransomware or major outages, Zerto is an excellent choice. While it may be more expensive than some alternatives, its performance, reliability, and ease of use justify the cost—particularly for medium to large enterprises.

The purpose was for cloud migration, as it's for cloud DR as a service. It's for DR purposes on the cloud and also on-prem to different sites. The main challenge is that I'm not working with one customer but I'm working with multiple customers. My role is I'm an architect that provides DR solutions and cloud solutions to the customers in Israel, but not only in Israel. Most of the use cases are for DR as a service. The challenge is to provide a disaster recovery solution for big organizations, and they are not limited to their on-prem sites.

The most liked feature in HPE Zerto Software  is that it uses CDP, Continuous Data Protection. It's a protocol that provides a very low RPO, which is Recovery Point Objective . This means how much data you lose when a disaster occurs. This is the main feature of the product. It's called CDP, and until two years ago, it was the only product able to provide that. Today, there are competitors, but they are not as mature as HPE.

The near-synchronous replication is the CDP I just mentioned. The near-zero replication is possible due to the CDP usage, and this is a game changer. DR in the cloud is much cheaper, and the ROI is absolutely in favor of cloud DR because we do not need to purchase any hardware. As a customer, I do not need to purchase hardware, rent a physical data center, or bring all my equipment to locate in the DR site.

It's not only in the cloud; it's DR as a service, which means that the recovery operations are performed by a dedicated team specializing in this area. Organizations don't need to have the expertise to manage and know HPE Zerto Software  platform because a dedicated team of the cloud provider is actually operating all the necessary steps to recover the systems. Comparing to a regular backup solution, it reduces downtime by 95%. The recovery time objective reduction comes from the fact that it's CDP. Additionally, HPE Zerto Software comes out of the box with an orchestration tool, which means you can automate the recovery process and don't need to perform tasks manually for the recovery operations. The recovery process with HPE Zerto Software is better compared to other DR solutions. However, it's equivalent for some products or methods.

There are few areas for improvement that are mostly technical. It has limited support mostly for VMware environments; they are trying to reduce support for Hyper-V  and now bring it back, but it's not working as easy with VMWARE. There is a problem where you need to perform a full sweep to back up and sync a VM from the beginning, which occurs in some scenrios. There are times you need to restart synchronization from the start, which is a heavy operation without clear reasoning, consuming a lot of resources.

I have been architecting soluitions with this product for four years.

I rate the stability of HPE Zerto Software at nine.

Scalability is rated at 10, but it is limited mostly to VMware.

The deployment, whether cloud or on-prem, is easy. The deployment process takes about one to four hours, specifically the deployment of the HPE Zerto Software footprint.

in DRaaS , maintenance is easy because it's cloud-based; everything happens behind the scenes for the customers and end users.

DR in the cloud is much cheaper, and the ROI is absolutely in favor of cloud DR because we do not need to purchase any hardware. As a customer, I do not need to purchase hardware, rent a physical data center, or bring all my equipment to locate in the DR site. Having it in the cloud is very beneficial for customers and organizations. It's not only in the cloud; it's DR as a service, which means that the recovery operations are performed by a dedicated team specializing in this area. Organizations don't need to have the expertise to manage and know HPE Zerto Software platform because a dedicated team of the cloud provider is actually operating all the necessary steps to recover the systems.

I would say the pricing is expensive, rated at 10.

For now, HPE Zerto Software is the best with CDP, although other vendors are catching up. In two years, it's not guaranteed they will be the leaders.

HPE Zerto Software is not the only recovery tool needed for ransomware recovery. It provides the ability to deploy systems for review and cleanup, it's beneficial to use it to reduce the time for bringing back the system for ransomware investigation. It reduces time by about 50% in a ransomware case. I absolutely recommend HPE Zerto Software, but my first advice is to ensure proper sizing and validate that applications are supported by a tool that supports CDP. There's a possibility that a VM, which is hosting an application, may not always be considered by HPE Zerto Software when copying VM data, so checking application support with CDP systems is crucial.

I use HPE Zerto Software  for planning disaster recovery and for provisioning the CIs, especially during the exercise phase. We use HPE Zerto Software  to protect VMs in our environment. Regarding HPE Zerto Software for disaster recovery, minor challenges exist, but it meets the requirement at approximately 80%. We do not look into HPE Zerto Software for incident downtimes; we only use it for crisis situations. HPE Zerto Software is saving time, especially with RTOs and RPOs being reduced for business-level applications, which has brought down recovery time. Most often, support issues are handled internally; if we require anything, we raise a case, and the operational team follows up.

One advantage of HPE Zerto Software is that it helps in provisioning, becomes easy, much faster, and it also stores historical information. It's good; I won't say it's excellent, but it's meeting some requirements, though for other requirements, I have to rely on other software as well.

There has been a significant impact from using HPE Zerto Software because our provisioning times have reduced drastically. The time to complete the exercises has come down, and we were able to identify and cross-check the RTO and RPO values as well. Using HPE Zerto Software has helped us in reducing the RTO and RPO values.

Overall, it still requires reliance on other software for manual work such as cross-checking and validations, which takes additional time, but the runbook execution is quicker. The 20% challenges relate to reliance on other software for cross-checking the logs. After implementation, the recovery times have improved by approximately 50% to 60%.

The main improvements needed are related to historical data comparison and analytics, and the challenges involve reliance on other software and cross-checking logs. If we could have an end-to-end DR solution in one environment, it would be much easier without relying on multiple tools. The biggest area for improvement in HPE Zerto Software is probably in historical data comparison and enhanced analytics. Future features should reduce reliance on cross-checking logs and other solutions.

I have been using HPE Zerto Software for three years now.

I find HPE Zerto Software relatively stable.

HPE Zerto Software is also scalable.

I haven't checked the technical support part for HPE Zerto Software; I need to talk to my team about it. Most often, support issues are handled internally; if we require anything, we raise a case, and the operational team follows up.

Regarding ease of use and recovery speed, I recall IBM being used previously, but I wasn't there then, so I didn't get a chance to compare HPE Zerto Software with that. I think HPE Zerto Software was better compared to IBM, as the RTOs and RPOs are improving continuously, with the ability to execute exercises becoming quicker.

I haven't looked into options apart from HPE Zerto Software yet, but before the license renewal, we shall start that activity within six months. We typically refer to Gartner's quadrant to identify market leaders for comparison, focusing on the leaders part. There are no specific security examples that made me decide to switch solutions; my main concerns are around costing and compatibility with different environments.

Currently, our team has implemented another solution because HPE Zerto Software couldn't be expanded to that environment, so capability is a restricting factor. A unified solution would be a good bet for future comparisons.

HPE Zerto Software helps in provisioning, making it easy and faster, and it also stores historical information. It's good but not excellent, as it meets some requirements while requiring other software for additional functionalities. I use a solution for disaster recovery in the cloud, but that's specific to the cloud environment. I don't get into the pricing layer for HPE Zerto Software and haven't gathered much information from the vendor. I would rate HPE Zerto Software as 8 out of 10.

My main use case for HPE Zerto Software  is to move VMs from one place to another. We implemented HPE Zerto Software  to solve the challenge of moving workloads from on-premises to the cloud.

I would assess the ease of use of HPE Zerto Software as straightforward. It is easy to use, and the user interface is excellent. When using HPE Zerto Software for VM migrations from on-premises to the cloud, it provides valuable features and transfers them quickly, so users do not need to spend much time on it.

My impressions of HPE Zerto Software's near-synchronous replication are that it is seamless. Near-synchronous replication is important to my organization because it takes less time to migrate the workload, which is what we are looking for, along with it being faster and having no complexity, making the migration 100% successful.

HPE Zerto Software has improved our RPO and RTO. Earlier, our RPO and RTO were based on the application tier, but now they have been reduced significantly, so we appreciate this product.

I think HPE Zerto Software is excellent, and I don't see any issues with it, so I don't know if anything needs to be improved. I don't have any suggestions for additional features I would to see included in the next release of HPE Zerto Software.

I have been using HPE Zerto Software for almost five years now.

I would assess the stability and reliability of HPE Zerto Software as good, and I cannot say anything negative about it. I have not experienced any downtime, crashes, or performance issues with HPE Zerto Software, as we have high availability.

HPE Zerto Software scales with the growing needs of my organization effectively, and I cannot complain about anything. We have expanded usage of HPE Zerto Software, and the process was smooth, as we have a descriptive runbook on how to use it, so the team uses it efficiently.

I evaluate customer service and technical support for HPE Zerto Software as excellent, as whenever we have any issues, we reach out to customer support, and they provide the support we need.

On a scale from one to 10, I would rate customer service for HPE Zerto Software as nine because the response time is quick, and the technical knowledge of the associates is excellent.

Prior to adopting HPE Zerto Software, I was not using another solution to address similar needs. Before selecting HPE Zerto Software, we were doing it manually, so there was no other product we evaluated.

HPE Zerto Software helped to reduce our organization's DR testing.

I have seen a return on investment with HPE Zerto Software.

Regarding my experience with pricing, setup costs, and licensing, I think on the pricing side, I don't generally deal with it, but from what I hear from my finance team, it's somewhat on the higher side. If licensing could be reduced, that would be beneficial.

My advice to other organizations considering HPE Zerto Software is that they should try it first and evaluate it based on the feature set before making a decision, as I think they will appreciate HPE Zerto Software. I rate HPE Zerto Software 10 out of 10.

Currently, my main use case for HPE Zerto Software  is for failover. We have a site in Salt Lake City and another data center in Oregon. We fail over from this site to that site, verify, and fail things back. This is its main purpose as of today.

The feature of HPE Zerto Software  that I appreciate the most is the ability to pick and choose what to fail over and when to failover. It is really easy to build a new zone and add servers, as well as remove them.

An example of how the features of HPE Zerto Software have benefited my organization was when we lost a circuit. We have a primary circuit from Salt Lake over to Portland and a backup one that runs through several different sites. We actually lost the main one and had to failover. Because most of the servers are in Salt Lake City, we had to replicate those back over to Portland because that is where they make the money. I had a few minor hiccups, but it was not our fault. It was just bandwidth, but we now have a larger pipe. That was a happy accident when we discovered why it was not going any faster - we were maxed out.

I find HPE Zerto Software to be pretty intuitive as it is, and I have nothing to suggest for improvement.

I have been using HPE Zerto Software for about four years now.

On a scale of 1 to 10, I would rate the stability and reliability of HPE Zerto Software at about 20. It just works.

HPE Zerto Software scales with the growing needs of my organization. The only issue I have ever encountered was when our developers grew busy and expanded their applications too quickly for licensing. That was resolved with a simple phone call. We received the new key by end of day after discussing how many additional licenses were needed.

I would evaluate customer service and technical support for HPE Zerto Software as exceptional. They listen first, then ensure they understand the problem before providing multiple solution alternatives. Having been in computing for almost 35 years, they are one of probably two or three companies that truly listen first.

I was using another solution to address similar needs prior to adopting HPE Zerto Software, but I am not sure what it was.

My experience with pricing, setup, costs, and licensing for HPE Zerto Software has been positive. The installers were knowledgeable and completed the installation correctly the first time. When we upgraded from VMware 6 to version 7, we needed to install a new agent. When it did not work initially, technical support quickly resolved the issue with specific instructions in just one call.

I have seen an ROI with HPE Zerto Software through faster recovery. We are getting closer to the five nines. Having the confidence that if something happens, our documented steps will work is invaluable.

I have personally used Veeam before selecting HPE Zerto Software, but having only been with the company for five years, I am not sure what solutions were used before that.

HPE Zerto Software is important to my organization because when performing replication, both systems remain functional during failover until the final switch. This results in virtually no downtime.

HPE Zerto Software has helped reduce downtime by at least 25% through faster recovery. For instance, if we lose an image, we can quickly recover it and power the VM back on, which is much better than retrieving a golden image that could take hours.

The solution has impacted my RTOs and RPOs significantly, saving me approximately two hours per day. It has also reduced our DR testing frequency from every other month to twice a year.

Regarding Cyber Vault solutions, the most important capability would be the ability to isolate a server immediately after a ransomware attack to investigate the incident.

My advice to other organizations considering HPE Zerto Software is to consider its ease of integration. It integrates seamlessly with various networks and works especially with HP infrastructure. The support from both HP and HPE Zerto Software teams is excellent.

I rate HPE Zerto Software 10 out of 10.