We performed a comparison between Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN and Cisco Wireless based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: While Cisco users across the board feel that both products are very expensive and provide very good customer service and support, users reported a better ROI from Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN.
"The solution is stable."
"Overall, we've been very pleased with the performance."
"Juniper Mist offers valuable features like comprehensive network insight, granular policy control, fast device setup, strong security, and efficient SSL traffic management."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is Marvis, the AI-driven network management system."
"With Mist, every Wednesday they roll out new features."
"The simplicity is great."
"The most useful feature of Juniper Wireless AP is the reporting Marvis."
"The solution is very secure."
"I like the record that is being kept and multiple SSDs."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten...The solution's initial setup process was straightforward."
"The tool's most valuable feature is report generation. Its dashboard helps me a lot with user analytics."
"I have found the scalability to be very good."
"Integrating with the router, firewall, and Wireless Controller is advantageous."
"The solution is easy to install."
"The most valuable aspect of this solution is the single pane of glass management and reliability."
"Its ease of use and flexibility are most valuable. It is cloud-based software."
"I'm very satisfied with Cisco's technical support."
"The technical support from Cisco is good."
"The support offered by Cisco is excellent. They are very responsive and knowledgeable."
"Cisco Wireless is quite convenient for mobile and laptop access."
"I like that Cisco Wireless is easy to implement. If you get stuck with any issues, they have ample documentation on the internet. It's easy to implement, and Cisco documentation is easily accessible."
"The CleanAir features and the fast transition."
"Cisco Wireless is scalable."
"The solution offers central management, reliability, and signal, ensures the bandwidth, and segregates the network. It also maintains the authentication process in the compass solution, which is good regarding multiple software."
"Enrolling into the tool is a tedious process."
"Juniper Mist Wireless Access Points’ support services need improvement."
"The price could be better."
"There is room for improvement in terms of support and installation."
"The pricing should be made cheaper."
"I need a bit more time with it before criticizing the features."
"It would be helpful to have even stronger security features to help protect against interference from other nearby access points that aren't part of our network."
"Improving third-party integration is key for Juniper Mist's next release."
"Documentation could be improved, but everything else has been spot-on."
"In some cases, they could include enhanced features in the product, such as a firewall console and traffic analysis."
"The solution could be cheaper."
"The solution’s pricing could be improved."
"if there is a better feature, they write it as beta so you have to be careful."
"It is not a budget-friendly solution."
"We have used technical support for some issues but not many times."
"When it comes to switching, Meraki lacks categories of features."
"The pricing could be reduced."
"The configuration interface could be easier. They should make roaming easier and should fix it so that when you cross a building you can keep the signal."
"The product could be improved with interference reduction. Because wireless frequency interferes with microwave or Bluetooth technologies, this causes issues. A lot of users still use legacy wireless adapters and black box and they do not experience the speed that they could get using the latest technologies. The number of devices on the market makes wireless communications complex. If the problem of interference could be resolved it would further improve utility and ease of system design."
"The biggest reason why we could no longer continue with Cisco Wireless was because of the high cost to upgrade everything. It was disappointing that Cisco treated us as just another big company, and did not offer any leeway on their pricing given that we are an educational institute. And although the system we had in place from Cisco Wireless was good enough over the last ten years, it started to show its age when pushed to its limit during the pandemic."
"The new licensing has no added value and seems to be Cisco's effort to take advantage of customers."
"Older versions used to be hard to deploy. The latest OS, however, has made things a lot easier. While deployment is much better, it could always be even easier."
"Cisco Wireless needs to improve compatibility with Apple devices. Its deployment should also be made easier. It should also reduce the complexity around security."
"If needs to provide more visibility. It can detect and do it, but as technicians we don't have a lot of visibility into seeing exactly what's happening. It doesn't give us a lot of log information for us to troubleshoot. They probably have additional software you need to purchase to get that kind of information. But I think not all companies can afford additional software to see those kinds of details. So if the wireless controller already had, built-in, those types of things for the technician or wireless engineer, it would be more attractive for the end-user."
More Juniper Mist Wireless Access Points Pricing and Cost Advice →
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is ranked 4th in Wireless LAN with 115 reviews while Cisco Wireless is ranked 2nd in Wireless LAN with 147 reviews. Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is rated 8.2, while Cisco Wireless is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN writes "Offers good mobility, stability and scalability ". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Cisco Wireless writes "Allows us to deploy a wide range of wireless products with stable WiFi". Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is most compared with Aruba Wireless, Ruckus Wireless, Ubiquiti Wireless, Mist AI and Cloud and Huawei Wireless, whereas Cisco Wireless is most compared with Aruba Wireless, Ruckus Wireless, Ubiquiti WLAN, Mist AI and Cloud and Omada Access Points. See our Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN vs. Cisco Wireless report.
See our list of best Wireless LAN vendors.
We monitor all Wireless LAN reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.
Cisco Wireless is very robust, very rugged, and can handle indoor and outdoor coverage extremely well. We found it to be very reliable and to consistently run very efficiently. Cisco Wireless helped us get more network access to more people wirelessly across some very large spaces.
It is expensive, though. The Cisco Wireless portal, like many Cisco products, can be very complex. The flexibility of the controllers needs fixing and Cisco Wireless requires a bit of tweaking to get the stability right. We would also like to see the reporting improved - this would help make troubleshooting easier.
Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is very user-friendly. You don’t have to be a wireless engineer to set it up. Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is cloud-based, which is very convenient as you don’t have to have a physical controller, saving valuable space, power, and redundancy. This solution offers advanced configurations that are a great fit for small to medium-sized businesses that can’t employ an advanced tech team. Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is high-performance, stable, scalable, and very easy to deploy, and offers a dashboard that makes managing the solution very easy.
Some of the built-in capabilities and filtering with Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN needs to be made easier to use. Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN needs to better identify devices, and the TAC reading and interpretation capabilities are not always accurate. There are also some processing limitations when you have multiple SSIDs.
Conclusion
As these are both Cisco products, they offer brand recognition you can trust, great quality, and good durability.
We found that Cisco Wireless offered slightly better access points and improved coverage, allowing the creation of better networks. Cisco Wireless takes a one-time payment for the hardware, and then annual payments. If you employ Cisco’s knowledgeable team members, this will be a good fit for you.
The huge selling point for Cisco Meraki Wireless LAN is its ease of use. You don’t need to have a lot of knowledge to deploy or manage processes, which makes this a great product for smaller businesses with a less tech-savvy team.
The standard answer to such a question is: it depends.
The pricing for both solutions is very similar: per-AP, Meraki is more expensive than Cisco Wireless. Cisco APs are cheaper, but the controller raises the solution price to be almost equal to Meraki.
Meraki is subscription-based and requires constant internet access to manage the system. If the annual license expires, the APs will work, but you can't manage them or read reports of the Meraki portal.
Cisco Wireless is a one-time payment for the hardware with annual support payments. if you have a small office with only a few APs needed, you can use the Cisco Mobility Express Controller (which uses one of the APs or a Catalyst Switch as the controller) but that has a limit of 100 APs.