Amazon CloudWatch vs syslog-ng comparison

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and One Identity are both solutions in the Log Management category. Amazon Web Services (AWS) is ranked #15 with an average rating of 8.1, while One Identity is ranked #17 with an average rating of 10.0. Amazon Web Services (AWS) holds a 1.9% mindshare in Log Management, compared to One Identity’s 2.0% mindshare. Additionally, 90% of Amazon Web Services (AWS) users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of One Identity users who would recommend it.

Amazon CloudWatch

Read 48 Amazon CloudWatch reviews

4,548 Views
2,683 Comparison Views

90% willing to recommend

syslog-ng

Read 7 syslog-ng reviews

3,537 Views
3,537 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Amazon CloudWatch

syslog-ng

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 9, 2024

Amazon CloudWatch and syslog-ng are two prominent tools in the log management and monitoring category. Amazon CloudWatch holds an upper hand in integration with AWS, whereas syslog-ng offers greater flexibility and supports diverse logging protocols.

Features: Amazon CloudWatch offers seamless integration with AWS services, making it ideal for users deeply embedded in the AWS ecosystem. Its real-time monitoring capabilities allow for immediate insights and actions on data. Additionally, Amazon CloudWatch provides a wide range of metrics, supporting various AWS services. Syslog-ng, on the other hand, provides flexibility through its support for numerous log formats and protocols, catering to complex and diverse logging requirements. It allows customization and scalability to fit various organizational needs. Its open-source nature and adaptability also stand out as significant advantages.

Room for Improvement: Feedback on Amazon CloudWatch points to the need for enhanced dashboard customization for better user experience and a simpler pricing model to avoid unexpected costs. Further, improvements in handling non-AWS logs could expand its use. Syslog-ng users, while praising its flexibility, suggest improvements in the comprehensiveness of its documentation to aid new users. Enhancements in user interface design can lead to a more intuitive experience, and broader community support can be beneficial for better user interaction.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Amazon CloudWatch provides streamlined deployment for users within AWS, though those unfamiliar with AWS may face challenges. Its customer service is usually prompt and helpful for resolving issues. Syslog-ng, known for its versatility, can be deployed across various systems but often demands more significant initial setup time and expertise. Customer service experiences with syslog-ng vary, with many users relying on community forums for support.

Pricing and ROI: Amazon CloudWatch follows AWS's pricing structure, which, while straightforward, often leads to unpredictable costs due to usage variables. Despite this, it provides solid ROI for businesses fully integrated into AWS. Syslog-ng is perceived as cost-effective, with a pricing model that aligns with budget-conscious environments seeking high versatility. Its ROI is enhanced by the flexibility and range of features it offers.

To learn more, read our detailed Amazon CloudWatch vs. syslog-ng Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Amazon CloudWatch vs. syslog-ng

December 2025

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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

Amazon CloudWatch

Ranking in Log Management

15th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (13th), Cloud Monitoring Software (11th)

syslog-ng

Ranking in Log Management

17th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

3.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Amazon CloudWatch is 1.9%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of syslog-ng is 2.0%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Log Management Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Amazon CloudWatch	1.9%
syslog-ng	2.0%
Other	96.1%

Log Management

Featured Reviews

Azam S M

Infrastructure Lead at Danat Fz LLC

Has provided reliable monitoring and alerting through extensive metric tracking and dashboard configuration

Amazon CloudWatch itself provides a lot of data. However, for visualization, we need to use third-party tools. We are in a process of integrating Grafana, Loki, and Prometheus to have better visualization on Amazon CloudWatch. We are also integrating Grafana with the application itself to get the application data and logs. Alternatively, there is AWS Kinesis and Glue where you can scrape the logs and have visualization, but a more easy option is Grafana. If you want to get a proper visual representation to see what is happening, then you need to integrate a third-party tool. Amazon CloudWatch has all the data, but to see what is happening, you need some third-party tool.

Read full review

Oliver Castellucchio

IT Infrastructure & Cloud Security Manager at Thux

Has ensured compliance by centralizing log data and supporting secure connections

We currently do not use that feature. We currently have just an open-source release, not a premium release. My boss has indicated that he wants to buy a premium syslog-ng version next month. I think we can use other features of this tool in the future. In syslog-ng, I think a GUI would be beneficial. I am unsure if the premium module has a GUI to administer it.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is a stable solution...I rate the technical support a ten out of ten."

"We can create events and alerts. We use the information to dive down into the infrastructure performance."

"The solution is easy to use."

"We use Amazon CloudWatch for logging."

"The alarms are one thing I love about AWS CloudWatch. It has alerts that notify us when resource use is approaching the limit."

"It's a very simple logging system."

"The tool's UI is good. One can scroll through the logs very easily."

"The monitoring features are valuable."

More Amazon CloudWatch pros

"We chose syslog-ng because it is easy to install, easy to maintain, easy to update, and due to the fact that all data arrive in raw format, we can manipulate it as we want."

"Syslog-ng has built-in features that we can use to create alerts for a SIEM solution. It isn't a true SIEM solution, but it's sufficient for the time being."

"The ability to extract and store the logs is the most valuable feature of syslog-ng."

"For us, the most valuable feature is the use of compound search for searching logs at a specific time, by a specific user, or specific behavior."

"What I appreciate most about syslog-ng is its configuration; its C-style config is much easier to understand, read, and write than other popular solutions such as syslog or rsyslog."

"Syslog-ng provides easy access to all my logs. It helps me show managers and other clients precisely where an incident occurred. I also like it because you can integrate syslog-ng with multiple solutions to allow real-time monitoring."

"Syslog-ng has a separate config file in addition to the core configuration."

Cons

"I found several areas for improvement in Amazon CloudWatch. First is that it's tough to track issues and find out where it's going wrong. The process takes longer. For example, if I get an exception error, I read the logs, search, go to AWS Cloud, then to the groups to find the keyword to determine what's wrong. Another area for improvement in Amazon CloudWatch is that it's slow in terms of log streaming. It requires an entire twenty-four hours for scanning, rather than just one hour. This issue can be solved with Elasticsearch streaming with Kibana, but it requires a lot of development effort and integration with Kibana or Splunk, and this also means I need a separate developer and software technical stack to do the indexing and streaming to Kibana. It's a manual effort that you need to do properly, so log streaming should be improved in Amazon CloudWatch. The AWS support person should also have a better understanding of the logs in Amazon CloudWatch. What I'd like added to the solution is a more advanced search function, particularly one that can tell you more information or special information. Right now, the search function is difficult to use because it only gives you limited data. For example, I got an error message saying that the policy wasn't created. I only know the amount the customer paid for the policy, the mobile number, and the customer name, but if I use those details, the information won't show up on the logs. I need to enter more details, so that's the type of fuzzy matching Amazon CloudWatch won't provide. If this type of search functionality is provided, it will be very helpful for businesses and companies that provide professional services to customers, like ours."

"There is room for improvement in the pricing, because they have a premium version, but it's not really a premium version. It's just an enhanced monitoring version, and it can be a bit expensive depending on your usage."

"There is some delay in logging that they need to improve on."

"We'd like the interface to be as easy as Datadog."

"Right now, in relation to monitoring services, there are too many services and too many metrics per service."

"The solution could benefit from a price decrease."

"The monitoring part and GUI are areas in Amazon CloudWatch that have shortcomings currently and can be considered for improvements in the future."

"The technical support must be improved."

More Amazon CloudWatch cons

"The filtering has room for improvement."

"Syslog-ng has built-in features that we can use to create alerts for a SIEM solution. It isn't a true SIEM solution, but it's sufficient for the time being."

"There is room for improvement in terms of observability."

"In syslog-ng, I think a GUI would be beneficial. I am unsure if the premium module has a GUI to administer it."

"It's hard to find people who know how to use syslog-ng. I often find problems with configurations, and solutions aren't integrated correctly with syslog-ng. For example, there might be data with extra decimals, or the collector agents are incorrectly named. It isn't a problem with the solution; it's a lack of professionals."

"There is always the potential for additional integration and protocol extensions."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is a free-of-charge service."

"What's were using is the free service of Amazon CloudWatch, so they're not charging us. As for hidden fees, we're not aware of them because we're using what our clients provided us."

"We have monthly licensing costs. The licenses are probably in the vicinity of about $300 - $350/month."

"I consider it as a medium-priced solution."

"The tool is not expensive."

"It’s an open-source solution."

"Its pricing is reasonable. It is sometimes tricky, but it is reasonable as compared to others."

"The pricing can be considered reasonable, especially when already operating on a cloud platform."

More Amazon CloudWatch pricing and cost advice

"Syslog-ng is open-source."

"Syslog-ng is a free open-source solution."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

15%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Transportation Company

Government

12%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	17
Midsize Enterprise	9
Large Enterprise	24

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	3
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	3

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Amazon CloudWatch?

The monitoring features are valuable.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Amazon CloudWatch?

No specific setup costs were mentioned.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Amazon CloudWatch?

See all answers

What needs improvement with syslog-ng?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for syslog-ng?

In Italy, we have to be compliant with the Garante for privacy. We have to log every login, logout, or login failure made by a system administrator. We store all syslog data of the infrastructure. ...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering syslog-ng?

When it comes to parsing, I can parse both structured and unstructured data, though our data are only structured. Currently, we collect all data we receive as raw data. Each file is stored for each...

See all answers

Comparisons

Grafana Loki vs Amazon CloudWatch

Compared 16% of the time

Amazon OpenSearch Service vs Amazon CloudWatch

Compared 8% of the time

Zabbix vs Amazon CloudWatch

Compared 6% of the time

Dynatrace vs Amazon CloudWatch

Compared 5% of the time

Datadog vs Amazon CloudWatch

Compared 4% of the time

More Amazon CloudWatch Competitors

Graylog Enterprise vs syslog-ng

Compared 26% of the time

SolarWinds Kiwi Syslog Server vs syslog-ng

Compared 20% of the time

Grafana Loki vs syslog-ng

Compared 7% of the time

Cribl vs syslog-ng

Compared 7% of the time

Elastic Security vs syslog-ng

Compared 2% of the time

More syslog-ng Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Amazon CloudWatch

January 2026

Download Amazon CloudWatch product report

Buyer's Guide

syslog-ng

January 2026

Download syslog-ng product report

Overview

Amazon CloudWatch integrates seamlessly with AWS, providing real-time monitoring and alerting features. Its interface supports task automation, enhancing troubleshooting and analytics capabilities, while offering strong security and scalability at a cost-effective rate.

Amazon CloudWatch is an impactful platform for monitoring AWS resources and managing application performance. It simplifies infrastructure performance monitoring by providing comprehensive analytics capabilities, including application insights and event scheduling. Users appreciate CloudWatch for its detailed metrics, dashboards, and support in issuing alerts to detect anomalies. It efficiently tracks performance, optimizes resource utilization, and ensures service availability. CloudWatch is recognized for its robust alerting features and integration with other AWS services, further supporting its resource monitoring capabilities. However, there is room for improvement in dashboard customization, log streaming speed, and integration with non-AWS services. Enhancements in API integration, machine learning features, and support for third-party tools are also desired.

What features does Amazon CloudWatch offer?

Seamless Integration: Works effortlessly with AWS for cohesive service management.
Advanced Metrics: Provides detailed monitoring of CPU, memory, and more.
Real-time Monitoring: Offers up-to-the-minute alerts on infrastructure status.
Dashboards: User-friendly and informative for quick insights.
Automation: Supports task automation for efficient troubleshooting.

What benefits does Amazon CloudWatch provide?

Cost-effectiveness: Efficient resource monitoring without high costs.
Scalability: Easily adapts to growing infrastructure needs.
Security: Strong protocols for safe monitoring activities.
Improved Performance: Enhances application insights and operational efficiency.
Operational Insights: Provides comprehensive logging and performance analysis.

Industries implementing Amazon CloudWatch often focus on optimizing IT infrastructure. Companies in sectors like finance and e-commerce rely on its monitoring and alerting capabilities to ensure service uptime and performance. The platform's automation and analytics features empower teams to proactively manage performance and detect potential issues promptly.

Amazon Web Services (AWS)

Optimizing SIEM
syslog-ng is the log management solution that improves the performance of your SIEM solution by reducing the amount and improving the quality of data feeding your SIEM.

Rapid search and troubleshooting
With syslog-ng Store Box, you can find the answer. Search billions of logs in seconds using full text queries with Boolean operators to pinpoint critical logs.

Meeting compliance requirements
syslog-ng Store Box provides secure, tamper-proof storage and custom reporting to demonstrate compliance.

Big data ingestion
syslog-ng can deliver data from a wide variety of sources to Hadoop, Elasticsearch, MongoDB, and Kafka as well as many others.

Universal log collection and routing
syslog-ng flexibly routes log data from X sources to Y destinations. Instead of deploying multiple agents on hosts, organizations can unify their log data collection and management.

Secure data archive
syslog-ng Store Box provides automated archiving, tamper-proof encrypted storage, granular access controls to protect log data. The largest appliance can store up to 10TB of raw logs.

One Identity

Sample Customers

AirAsia, Airbnb, Aircel, APUS, Avazu, Casa & Video, Futbol Club Barcelona (FCBarcelona), National Taiwan University, redBus

Tecnocom, University of Victoria, University of Exeter, Datapath

Buyer's Guide

Amazon CloudWatch vs. syslog-ng

December 2025

Free Report: Amazon CloudWatch vs. syslog-ng

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