Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

AlienVault OSSIM vs Elastic Security comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

AlienVault OSSIM
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
12th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Elastic Security
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
5th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (11th), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (17th), Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (7th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (9th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of AlienVault OSSIM is 2.6%, down from 4.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Elastic Security is 4.9%, down from 8.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Elastic Security4.9%
AlienVault OSSIM2.6%
Other92.5%
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

HarshBhardiya - PeerSpot reviewer
An open-source solution that provide good detection and more visibility
The solution is not scalable. It impacts so hard. In the initial stages, AlienVault OSSIM can be suitable for small environments. There may be limitations if the customer expresses a desire to expand and add more devices. In such cases, we would need to either explore additional solutions or work within the constraints of the existing setup. We have set up alerts and configured everything in AlienVault OSSIM. It actively monitors for any security incidents. It provides us with regular updates and notifications about any ongoing activities. Only one person is using the solution. It is the perfect solution for small businesses. I rate the solution’s scalability a three out of ten.
SyedAli17 - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized monitoring improves security posture through rapid data processing
The processing part of Elastic Security is very interesting for us since we handle almost 7,000 to 8,000 alerts per minute. We require rapid processing speed for alerts and event data, and Elastic Security is very efficient at handling this level of data. Additionally, Elastic Security helps improve the security posture of Pakistan through centralized visibility and real-time processing.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"With AlienVault you get everything in one box."
"Better than other SIEM solutions because almost everything can be integrated."
"Asset discovery is good."
"The threat policies of the solution are always very advanced and the best in the market. They are very persistent in terms of keeping up with security protocols."
"The dashboard is the solution's most valuable aspect. It brings everything into one central point where I can actually look at it and go, "Okay, I understand what's going on.""
"The paid version of the solution has reporting and better scalability options."
"I recommend it due to the experience of the people running it."
"AlienVault OSSIM is an enterprise solution that sells easily. It is rated highly by organizations."
"It is the best open-source product for people working in SO, managing and analyzing logs."
"It can handle millions of loads at a time, and you can always use the filters to find exactly what you are looking for and detect errors in every log message you are searching for, basically."
"Elastic Security is cost-effective compared to Defender and CrowdStrike."
"I like that it's a SIEM platform. I like that I can sell Elastic Security quickly. Elastic Security has a large community that can support users."
"I like the indexing of the logs."
"The scalability is good. It can be scaled easily in the production environment."
"It is scalable."
"The most valuable feature of Elastic Security is that you can install agents, and they are not separately licensed."
 

Cons

"AlienVault OSSIM should improve the deployment and make it unified like the USM."
"AlienVault OSSIM is costly."
"AlienVault OSSIM gives unwanted notifications."
"The initial setup was a bit complex. You've got to do a lot of reading. It's not an intuitive implementation."
"Lacking in depth of reporting."
"It takes some time. It does not give me a prompt response for any such [malicious] traffic. It takes time to get that alert from the AlienVault system."
"AlienVault OSSIM’s configuration and integration could be a little easier."
"The documentation could be improved."
"We set up a cron job to delete old logs so that we wouldn't hit a disk space issue. Such a feature should be available in the UI, where old logs can be deleted automatically. (Don’t know if this feature is already there)."
"I want to find an automatic security system in the tool, like a SOAR solution. I am looking forward to seeing a SOAR system in the tool."
"I think because we are a cybersecurity company, the thing that can be improved is the prebuilt tools, especially quality. Compared to its competitor, they still have fewer prebuilt security rules. Elastic Security, in terms of generating alerts, cannot group the same products into one another. Even though the alerts are the same, they still generate them one by one. So, it is very noisy in our dashboard. I would like the Elastic Security admin to group all the same alarms into one alarm so that our dashboard is not noisy."
"Elastic Security has a steep learning curve, so it takes some time to tune it and set it up for your environment. There are some costs associated with logging things that don't have value. So you need to be cautious to only log things that make sense and keep them around for as long as you need. You shouldn't hold onto things just because you think you might need them."
"An area for improvement in Elastic Security is the pricing. It could be better. Right now, when you increase the volume of logs to be collected, the price also increases a lot."
"Installation is a little bit overwhelming, so improvements on the installation site could make it easier."
"The tool should improve its scalability."
"There isn't really a very good user experience. You need a lot of training."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We are using the community version, which can be used for free."
"AlienVault pricing is the best. Whatever cost you are paying, you are getting a return on every penny... It's not like your IBM, your QRadar, or Splunk, where the cost is too high."
"I used the paid version of the tool and found it to be expensive. It has been a while since I changed to Securonix. I will have to check whether AlienVault charges per device, user, or log."
"AlienVault OSSIM is free."
"The licensing fees for the non-community edition are paid on an annual basis, and there are no costs in addition to this."
"We are using a free version of the solution. If you purchase a license there are more features available but the price is a little high. The solution should be cheaper to allow more customers to be able to afford it."
"OSSIM is free."
"When comparing AlienVault OSSIM to Microsoft Sentinel, AlienVault OSSIM incurs additional costs due to its licensing price structure. If you are using AlienVault for security purposes at a certain level it can have a higher price point than the current pricing of Microsoft Sentinel."
"The pricing is in the middle. I think it is not an expensive experience if we compare it with big names, for example, QRadar, and also Oxide. I think Elastic Security is quite cheap. I would rate the pricing of this solution a five out of ten."
"I can say that the product is cheaply priced."
"Compared to other products such as Dynatrace, this is one of the cheaper options."
"The solution is not expensive and costs around ten dollars a month."
"The licensing cost of Elastic Security is based on the daily ingestion rate. I can't recall the exact figure, but for 10GB of log action daily, it would cost around $20,000."
"The product offers an amazing pricing structure. Price-wise, the product is very competitive."
"We use the open-source version, so there is no charge for this solution."
"Elastic Stack is an open-source tool. You don't have to pay anything for the components."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) solutions are best for your needs.
868,759 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
12%
University
8%
Educational Organization
8%
Computer Software Company
15%
Government
10%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business40
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AlienVault OSSIM?
It depends. I would need to review their cost models, but generally, they are on a scaled basis based on throughput usage. Because it's a software as a service solution for their core product for U...
What needs improvement with AlienVault OSSIM?
Scaling for USM is always challenging for any product unless it is purpose-built or overbuilt at the front end. They will use Palo Alto and its competitors, and LevelBlue will manage that implement...
Datadog vs ELK: which one is good in terms of performance, cost and efficiency?
With Datadog, we have near-live visibility across our entire platform. We have seen APM metrics impacted several times lately using the dashboards we have created with Datadog; they are very good c...
What do you like most about Elastic Security?
Elastic provides the capability to index quickly due to the reverse indexes it offers. This data is crucial as it contains critical information. The reverse index allows fast data indexing because ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Elastic Security?
I am satisfied with the pricing, setup cost, and licensing cost. It is a pure 10.
 

Also Known As

OSSIM
Elastic SIEM, ELK Logstash
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Council Rock School District
Texas A&M, U.S. Air Force, NuScale Power, Martin's Point Health Care
Find out what your peers are saying about AlienVault OSSIM vs. Elastic Security and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
868,759 professionals have used our research since 2012.