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

Auvik Network Management (ANM) vs Wireshark comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 11, 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

Auvik Network Management (ANM)
Ranking in Network Troubleshooting
2nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
186
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (2nd), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (3rd), Cloud Monitoring Software (3rd), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (2nd)
Wireshark
Ranking in Network Troubleshooting
3rd
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Network Troubleshooting category, the mindshare of Auvik Network Management (ANM) is 3.4%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Wireshark is 13.2%, up from 12.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Troubleshooting
 

Featured Reviews

Jeremy Campbell - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables us to get on top of issues before they become an outage
When I change IP addresses on a device or on a server, I have to wait for Auvik to figure out that change. It will tell me the device is offline until Auvik scans the whole subnet again and finds it. If I change 25 devices, I'll get 50 emails in a short time because they've gone offline. I'd love the ability to change that where I can update that device with the IP address without it going offline. That goes against the idea of a system that dynamically scans. It's information overload sometimes when you need to change a bunch of factors. You get inundated with emails. I would almost love a button whenever you first log in that says maintenance window, and then it would maybe take some of those alerts away. It's fairly intuitive but sometimes you have to search for things because it's hidden in the user interface, so I think that could be improved a little bit. The search could be better because they have these strange search terms. Instead of being able to look for what you want, you have to lay out the query in a specific way to get results. We've also been dealing with some weird bugs lately. We get alerts on miscellaneous items that go offline and online all the time. I've reached out to support, and they said that they've got a fix that they rolled out. However, we're still experiencing the issue, so I've got to work with them to fix that. They seem to be on top of the support.
DonniUgalde - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides visibility into the network, and the GUI is easy to use
I wish the filters were a little bit more prepopulated. It would have been easy to hit a drop-down and select a filter. If I only wanted to look at DCP, UDP, or IP, it would be easy to filter it out. Advanced network knowledge is required to get a lot out of the tool. However, it's very easy to install and deploy. It would be nice if there were some handheld Android devices with a Wireshark-specialized application that would allow us to mirror a Cisco port. Then, we can just plug into the port and click the green start button, and it will start ingesting the packet capture. Then, we won’t be using a laptop. The only downside is that we must have a laptop and connect a network cable. Some new laptops don't have network ports, so we have to get another adapter. Having an all-in-one device, like NetAlly or Fluke, and some of their network devices would be cool.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The network management piece has been the most advantageous. First, it alerts us about network devices that are under duress or having issues. Second, it has historical data. That allows us to go back, if, for instance, a switch is having problems, and see if it is something that trends at a certain time of the day, or a certain day of the week."
"All of the features are valuable, but the ability to remote into anything, whether it's a terminal or a browser, is really big for us. It makes things a lot easier day-to-day."
"I love the ability to remote into network gear such as switches and firewalls directly from the Auvik dashboard. We do not have to get into a jump box or VPN to a client. We can get a nice, secure terminal session straight to any network that we are monitoring and managing through Auvik. I can access that directly from the Auvik dashboard."
"The fact that it provides a single, integrated platform for our organization is important as well. Having 50 different accounts to log into would make things difficult at times."
"Auvik has improved our monitoring of contracts for service outside of normal business hours. If anything goes offline after hours, we can alert our engineers immediately, so they can get it working as fast as possible."
"It's hard to say that one feature is my favorite, but I like Auvik's ability to map networks using SNMP. It maps the network, so I can look at all the devices and set them to provide alerts or automatically create tickets when outages occur. If clients need it, I can export all of the data into an Excel spreadsheet."
"Auvik's reporting is pretty useful. It helps us conduct traffic analysis. I like how you can integrate your firewall systems and incorporate devices in different parts of the country."
"Shadow IT monitoring is huge for us since so many of our customers are highly regulated."
"Setup is very easy. It's also possible to change source code and compile if you want to change something in the code, because it's free."
"It's easy to troubleshoot issues because there's a large online community."
"Wireshark is very user-friendly; even someone with basic IT knowledge can use it."
"Packet-capture files can be hard to use due to their size. Wireshark has a tool called tshark that can parse the files with out opening them so that you can take large captures, say 2-10GB, and return only relevant information."
"The filter option provided by Wireshark is its most valuable feature...Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Wireshark helps us to understand network traffic."
"Wireshark saves a lot of time, especially with network troubleshooting."
"I find Wireshark a very useful tool. Its best feature is that it allows me to deeply understand what's going on at the packet level, as well as any adverse signatures that I can analyze. When I need to create an IPS rule, I need to check the traffic deeply to get more insights about the actual traffic, what's the name of certain flags, etc., and I'm able to do all that through Wireshark. The tool is also user-friendly."
 

Cons

"Configuring alerts is pretty tedious. It would be nice if they had a wizard who walked you through instead of having everything turned on or off from the start."
"When it comes to monitoring, Auvik provides a single integrated platform, but I feel it could do more things. If it could facilitate device upgrades, that would be great."
"Tying in with the IP address and the network mapping could be improved."
"The automation side needs improvement... A really important one was about a SonicWall firewall that needs to be rebooted every single month. You can do that in the SonicWall GUI, but you can't do it in Auvik. Hundreds of people have endorsed the idea of having an automated command line interface command run on any device that supports it."
"I would like firmware/software updates for hardware, for at least switches and routers. I already have the feature request in, and it is on their list of things to try and do. Cisco stuff has been notoriously and historically kind of a pain to do, and that is what we use primarily. So, that would be a wonderful thing to get, as it is a device-by-device process. It would be nice to be able to get through that at least in a less fiddly way. It is a pretty manual process now."
"It would be cool if they came out with an app, but running the browser isn't bad."
"The customer service and support are rated as six out of ten. Although the support is good, resolving time takes longer than expected, especially for major issues that require escalation."
"I'd like to be able to deep dive more into the reporting. The reporting is still being scaled and built out and I would love to see some additional products being added to the stack. For example, Auvik covers certain types of firewalls, but I would like to see more enterprise stuff added to the stack."
"The only thing that I don't like is sometimes there is an update, and something that I was using is either no longer there or it has changed."
"It would be better if they offered a hybrid version like My Cloud Control."
"I would like better control of bandwidth from the service provider."
"Wireshark's UI isn't easy to handle and doesn't have as nice a view as Omnipeek."
"It is difficult to scale this solution."
"You need good network connectivity to download during the setup, otherwise, it might take a while."
"Wireshark is similar to an OS defense tool, meaning that it runs on an OS such as Ubuntu and Fedora, but I'm unsure if it's compatible with Windows or if it's a straightforward process to run it on Windows. Right now, my team needs to run Wireshark from a dongle to use it, so it's an OS-dependable tool, and that's an area for improvement. I was unable to use Wireshark on Windows, and I couldn't capture it, as I'm unsure how to configure the wireless card into monitoring mode on Windows. The process was straightforward on Linux, but it wasn't the case on Windows OS. It seems Wireshark isn't compatible with all OS. For example, you can analyze the log, and you can analyze it on the Windows server, but you can't do a capture in Windows. Configuring Wireshark for Windows isn't as easy as configuring it for Linux."
"Wireshark could be improved by adding more monitoring features."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Compared to other products, Auvik's pricing is more feasible since you get all its features. You pay for licenses on a per network device basis. It monitors hypervisors, but does not bill for that. There are no additional costs, which is something that I like."
"Auvik is affordable. The license was under $4,000 annually for our setup. That covers a lot of switches, firewalls, and integration. It was well worth the price. I think it's around $20 per device per quarter."
"The pricing is fair; it's just the right price for what the solution provides."
"Auvik is fairly priced. The cost is what we expected considering network management. The benefits outweigh the cost for us."
"Auvik is billed by network device. They bill our firewalls and networks. However, there are devices that are not subject to billing in our environment, such as PCs, phones, and printers."
"It is a little more on the expensive side, but I feel that it is a premium product. It is good."
"The price is a little high, and the product could be more cost-friendly. We work with many small and medium-sized businesses, so the cost can be hard to justify. We try to work around that, but it would be nice if Auvik were more cost-effective. Most enterprise-level businesses we work with have their own internal monitoring solutions, whether Nagios or SolarWinds."
"Auvik's pricing falls within an acceptable range for us."
"Wireshark is free software, so you don't have to pay any licensing fee. Individual people can use it and then donate to Wireshark."
"The tool is free."
"We are using a freeware version of this solution, so there are no licence costs involved."
"Wireshark is open-source and free of charge."
"I am using the free version of this solution."
"Wireshark is free software, so you can download it and use it for free with no licensing fees."
"It's a stand-alone tool. If there is a commercial license for it I am unaware of it."
"It is an open-source solution."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Network Troubleshooting solutions are best for your needs.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
20%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Financial Services Firm
7%
University
11%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Auvik?
The most valuable feature for us in Auvik is the network topology.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Auvik?
Auvik is pricey, and we were paying a lot for it, especially when compared to SolarWinds.
What needs improvement with Auvik?
The network maps can be confusing due to the wide scope of the network, making it difficult to find specific details. Improvements in the network exclusions part would be helpful, as well as enhanc...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Wireshark?
Wireshark is priced at a medium range, not too high, not too low. The pricing could be more flexible, and they might make it more expensive. That said, compared to other products, it is competitive.
What needs improvement with Wireshark?
The speed of the Internet could be improved, especially its performance. Performance can sometimes be a challenge due to numerous factors.
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Comversion, ADP, Talbots
Find out what your peers are saying about Auvik Network Management (ANM) vs. Wireshark and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.