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Azure Network Watcher vs PRTG Network Monitor comparison

Microsoft and Paessler GmbH are both solutions in the Network Monitoring Software category. Microsoft is ranked #51 with an average rating of 8.3, while Paessler GmbH is ranked #5 with an average rating of 7.7. Microsoft holds a 0.4% mindshare in NMS, compared to Paessler GmbH’s 4.2% mindshare. Additionally, 91% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 91% of Paessler GmbH users who would recommend it.
Azure Network Watcher
Read 12 Azure Network Watcher reviews
  • 743 Views
  • 698 Comparison Views
91% willing to recommend
PRTG Network Monitor
Read 103 PRTG Network Monitor reviews
  • 8,261 Views
  • 5,700 Comparison Views
91% willing to recommend
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 15, 2025

PRTG Network Monitor and Azure Network Watcher compete in the network monitoring and management category. Based on the comparison, PRTG has the upper hand with its broad feature set and ease of use.

Features: PRTG Network Monitor impresses with rapid deployment, scalability, and an intuitive setup. It offers proactive alerting, diverse sensors, and easy integration. Azure Network Watcher shines with cloud-native capabilities, such as packet capture and network diagnostics, beneficial for managing complex cloud environments.

Room for Improvement: PRTG could enhance intuitive template management, map design, and application monitoring. It needs improvements in SLA reports and customized dashboards. Azure Network Watcher requires better log clarity, simplified setup, and comprehensive traffic analysis. Its users also seek enhanced integration with open-source tools.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: PRTG offers straightforward deployment for on-premises and hybrid clouds but has room for enhancing technical support responsiveness. Azure Network Watcher is optimized for public cloud deployment with seamless integration but faces challenges with initial setup and advanced log availability.

Pricing and ROI: PRTG is competitively priced, offering sensor bundles that are cost-effective but can increase with additional sensors. It is budget-friendly for smaller firms. Azure Network Watcher is pricier, catering to enterprises with its specialized cloud features, offering significant value for detailed cloud insights in larger environments.

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To learn more, read our detailed Azure Network Watcher vs. PRTG Network Monitor Report (Updated: July 2025).
Buyer's Guide
Azure Network Watcher vs. PRTG Network Monitor
July 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

Azure Network Watcher
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
51st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
PRTG Network Monitor
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
5th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
103
Ranking in other categories
IT Infrastructure Monitoring (6th), Cloud Monitoring Software (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Azure Network Watcher is 0.4%, down from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of PRTG Network Monitor is 4.2%, down from 4.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Bijoyendra Roychowdhury - PeerSpot reviewer
Network monitoring provides comprehensive analytics while the interface requires further development
The quality of Azure Network Watcher is quite good in terms of the in-depth analysis you can create from these matrices. There are other monitoring tools such as New Relic, AppDynamics, and Dynatrace which provide very detailed network tracing. Cloud providers such as Azure or AWS do not have that kind of GUI-based capability at this point, but using PowerShell or Python, you can develop it yourself. From the GUI perspective, it still needs to evolve in terms of quality and standard, though overall, it is quite good for troubleshooting. Regarding areas for improvement, when comparing to other network tools beyond Azure Monitor or Azure Network Watcher, those tools can identify single failed packets. This level of granularity is not currently possible with cloud providers as they only go to a certain level rather than the granular level needed for deep troubleshooting, though they do provide hints with available matrices.
Read full review
Noman-Saleem - PeerSpot reviewer
Detects suden changes but significant pricing concerns affect the effectiveness of network traffic troubleshooting
We use PRTG Network Monitor for monitoring traffic on interfaces and the behavior of network traffic. If there are sudden changes in traffic or any configuration issues, we can sort them out using PRTG. It's very helpful for troubleshooting and monitoring traffic utilization on our interfaces…
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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I like the visibility."
"The solution is good for monitoring device behavior."
"The most valuable features I have found are typology, visualization, and capture."
"The most valuable feature of Azure Network Watcher is using the gateways with the connections. The monitoring is useful for the logs and application insights into the data. The traffic filtering issues when it comes to deploying those applications are helpful."
"We use the solution to monitor network services. It helps to capture any network issues."
"The solution is stable."
"The stability is very good. I rate it a ten out of ten."
"It provides good visibility."
More Azure Network Watcher pros
"The alerting system is very stable, and it's helpful whenever any sensor is down."
"What I've found most valuable is the custom sensor, which allows you to write scripts or code to monitor a specific metric in your environment."
"The most valuable features of PRTG Network Monitor are bandwidth utilization, user-friendliness, all past report simple retrievals, and timeout features. Additionally, if the solution does go down it is simple to bring it back."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to span multiple technologies and multiple vendors."
"It is very flexible, and we can monitor many aspects of IT as well as ERP and CRM services. It has a very powerful interface and APIs for customization."
"One of the valuable features is the diversity of metrics available to us to monitor. It's all there, it's all in the box. It's all made very easy, by virtue of it being pre-configured."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"Speed of deployment is one of the most valuable features."
More PRTG Network Monitor pros
 

Cons

"I would like to see in the future if we can troubleshoot as a firewall because it is equipment as a network player and some diagnostics."
"The initial setup and deployment could be improved to be simplified."
"User experience could be improved."
"I still use Wireshark and Azure Network Watcher to get the required data. My team captures the traffic from Azure Network Watcher, downloads it, then imports that traffic into Wireshark to get more details on the number of hits and replies, for example. If you can do that on Azure Network Watcher and have Wireshark built-in, that would make Azure Network Watcher better. If Azure Network Watcher has that functionality where you won't need a third-party tool to get what you need, that would be helpful. I'm also expecting more from Azure Network Watcher. It's more complex than knowing how the IP flows from its source to the destination. The tool also needs more open-source features, such as having some built-in Wireshark that improves monitoring for customers. Sometimes, you encounter a VPN tunnel, network, or routing issue, but finding out more about the blockage is challenging. Is it one hundred percent an Azure issue? Is it a peer issue? You don't get complete information from Azure Network Watcher, so you must use other tools and depend on your strategies to resolve a specific issue. If more features could be added in the next release of Azure Network Watcher, specifically ones you can find on open-source tools, then that would be a plus point for the tool."
"Azure Network Watcher needs to have better documentation and it needs to capture information accurately."
"Azure is good, however, the Fortinet GUI is more intuitive and I like it more than anything else."
"Lacks sufficient security features."
"The initial setup and initial learning curve could be improved to be easier."
More Azure Network Watcher cons
"Technical support is an area with concerns in PRTG Network Monitor, where improvements are required."
"While the desktop app is good, they could slightly improve it. We would like it to be a single pane of glass. At the moment, you can only see certain portions of information. You have to scroll through to make it more granular. We want them to develop the desktop app to be more user-friendly."
"A room for improvement in PRTG Network Monitor is its sensors. Its application technology sensor, such as the IAS, .NET, etc., needs some improvement because it doesn't work as expected. For example, the IAS sensor doesn't give immediate information, and the information you get from it isn't of good value. The web GUI of PRTG Network Monitor also needs improvement because errors keep popping up if it's not been updated to the latest version. What I'd like to see in the next release of the tool is end-to-end topology mapping for the business model, and that should be required. There has to be a technical map. Technical mapping and topological creation are missing in PRTG Network Monitor, so I would like to see those in the future."
"PRTG would be improved if it required less memory to run."
"Can be slow in the way it polls the different engines."
"The technical support service should be improved."
"The solution could be better and faster when it comes to performance."
"When you email the support team, they take three to seven days to respond and resolve simple issues."
More PRTG Network Monitor cons
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Azure Network Watcher is a little bit expensive."
"The price of the solution is reasonable."
"Price-wise, I have no information on how much Azure Network Watcher costs."
"The pricing is good. It's not too expensive."
"I rate the price of PRTG Network Monitor an eight on a scale of one to ten, where one is a high price, and ten is a low price."
"When you have a lot of devices, PRTG Network Monitor can be costly."
"We are licensed for 2500 endpoints."
"One thing I like is that when you buy sensors, it's a perpetual license, so once you buy 2,000 sensors, you've got 2,000 sensors; it's not a recurring cost."
"It's an annual license that is based on the number of endpoints that we're tracking and using."
"We bought a license for 4000 sensors."
"The price is actually on the cheaper side. If you're going with the unlimited license code, it's very cheap compared to competitors unless you're going for something free, like Zabbix. But you get what you pay for, and it doesn't have the full suite of products or tools like SolarWinds or a ScienceLogic."
"It is about £4,500 for the first year, then about another 15 to 20 percent annually after that. So, we are looking at about £1000 running costs a year. When you think about how much an outage costs per minute, it's negligible."
More PRTG Network Monitor pricing and cost advice
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Comparison Review

it_user174738 - PeerSpot reviewer
May 31, 2015
Nagios vs. Zabbix vs. PRTG vs. Spiceworks vs. Solarwinds Network Performance Monitor
I have researched a quite a few network monitoring tools which can be used for various monitoring purposes of not only the servers, but the intermediate routers as well. There are majorly three types of these softwares. Ones which are completely open-source, you can do almost anything you want…
Read full review
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
11%
University
5%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Azure Network Watcher?
I like the visibility.
See all answers
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Network Watcher?
It is affordable.
See all answers
What needs improvement with Azure Network Watcher?
User experience could be improved.
See all answers
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
PRTG network monitor is one of the best tool i have ever used for the monitoring. It have auto discovery option. it avoid the configuring the device in PRTG. It automatically discover the device an...
See all answers
What do you like most about PRTG Network Monitor?
The tool is integrated with our email for the alerts.
See all answers
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PRTG Network Monitor?
The pricing is in the middle. It's not too high, nor too low, but it's reasonable.
See all answers
 

Comparisons

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ThousandEyes vs Azure Network Watcher
Compared 23% of the time
SolarWinds NPM vs Azure Network Watcher Logo
SolarWinds NPM vs Azure Network Watcher
Compared 18% of the time
Nmap vs Azure Network Watcher Logo
Nmap vs Azure Network Watcher
Compared 18% of the time
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Zabbix vs PRTG Network Monitor Logo
Zabbix vs PRTG Network Monitor
Compared 8% of the time
PRTG Enterprise Monitor vs PRTG Network Monitor Logo
PRTG Enterprise Monitor vs PRTG Network Monitor
Compared 6% of the time
SolarWinds NPM vs PRTG Network Monitor Logo
SolarWinds NPM vs PRTG Network Monitor
Compared 5% of the time
Centreon vs PRTG Network Monitor Logo
Centreon vs PRTG Network Monitor
Compared 5% of the time
LibreNMS vs PRTG Network Monitor Logo
LibreNMS vs PRTG Network Monitor
Compared 5% of the time
More PRTG Network Monitor Competitors
 

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide
Azure Network Watcher
August 2025
Azure Network Watcher reportDownload Azure Network Watcher product report
Buyer's Guide
PRTG Network Monitor
August 2025
PRTG Network Monitor reportDownload PRTG Network Monitor product report
 

Overview

Azure Network Watcher is a comprehensive network monitoring and diagnostic service offered by Microsoft Azure. It provides a range of tools and capabilities to help users monitor, diagnose, and gain insights into their Azure network infrastructure. With Network Watcher, users can capture and analyze network traffic, monitor network performance, troubleshoot connectivity issues, and gain visibility into network topology. It also offers features like packet capture, flow logs, connection monitoring, and VPN diagnostics to ensure the smooth operation of Azure networks. Network Watcher enables users to proactively identify and resolve network issues, optimize network performance, and enhance the overall reliability and security of their Azure network environment.

Microsoft

PRTG Network Monitor runs on a Windows machine within your network, collecting various statistics from the machines, software, and devices which you designate. PRTG comes with an easy-to-use web interface with point-and-click configuration. You can easily share data from it with non-technical colleagues and customers, including via live graphs and custom reports. This will let you plan for network expansion, see what applications are using most of your connection, and make sure that no one is hogging the entire network just to torrent videos.

To monitor a large IT environment, it's important to be able to scale PRTG up. Paessler PRTG Enterprise Monitor includes all the proven capabilities of PRTG Network Monitor, which are enhanced by exclusive ITOps Board for a service-oriented, central overview of multiple PRTG servers.

Paessler GmbH
 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Jameson Bank, Sidnix, RungeICT, MedicalAnimal, Truck-lite, GamingGrids, The Covell Group, Forsythn County Schools, NetMass, Musgrove Park Hospital, Lanes Health, Columbia Southern University, Vodafone, Intrust Bank
Buyer's Guide
Azure Network Watcher vs. PRTG Network Monitor
July 2025
Free Report: Azure Network Watcher vs. PRTG Network Monitor
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