Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance vs LiveAction LiveNX comparison

Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance vs. LiveAction LiveNX

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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

Cisco Provider Connectivity...

Ranking in Network Monitoring Software

42nd

Average Rating

8.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (46th)

LiveAction LiveNX

Ranking in Network Monitoring Software

29th

Average Rating

7.2

Reviews Sentiment

5.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

IT Infrastructure Monitoring (30th)

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance is 0.8%, down from 1.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of LiveAction LiveNX is 0.7%, down from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Network Monitoring Software

Featured Reviews

Pifu Lin

Senior System Engineer at DYNASAFE TECHNOLOGIES PTE. LTD.

Addresses connectivity issues with real-time monitoring while offering good local support

I had prepared for COC and the client. I work as a vendor for a client using Flow Mount for network performance monitoring. I focus on resolving client-side issues related to Packy Performance and quality use. This involves addressing network device issues, specifically Cisco network devices One…

Read full review

Ashwani Bansal

Senior Solution Consultant at Orange

Network management and diagnostics improved through effective monitoring and reporting capabilities

The solution is handy. I have not used that particular feature. Maintenance is required for the system. If you want to use something on the endpoints or end-user devices, then using LiveAction LiveNX in place of other tools would be quite beneficial. The solution impacts operational costs and resources. On a scale of 1-10, I rate LiveAction LiveNX a nine.

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

"One valuable feature we have is real-time monitoring for connection issues."

"For us, the most valuable feature is something called TWAMP that allows for real-time traffic in a way that is 10 times lighter than things like SolarWinds. It's in the sub-milliseconds of accuracy, and you can divide tasks so that you can literally see things like the tagging for Quality of Service. That had been incorrect with the carrier, but there was no way on this planet you'd be able to tell a carrier that they're wrong. I have dozens of scenarios where we found "No, that's not right," and got it resolved instantly."

"The feature I used to like the most was its ability to decode layer seven protocols, although this is becoming less useful now that encryption is so widespread."

"Capturing traffic [is very interesting]. Currently, with our configuration, we don't capture the payload of the packets, just the header. But when we want the body, the payload of the packets, we can do a PCAP, and then analyze it within Wireshark."

"If [the problem] is something related to HTTP or VoIP, then I can have a quick look into the protocols, a process which gives me some good ideas..."

"It is about finding operational problems. When sites go down, we try to determine who is at fault. While there is not much finger-pointing, the solution is just trying to analyse when there is an outage and where do we start looking to fix it. The very nature of why organization chooses to use the solution is to accelerate the meantime to resolution and find where problems lie to get them rectified as quickly as possible."

"The response times, with the performance, are really interesting too, where you can see the packet loss."

More Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance pros

"On a scale of 1-10, I rate LiveAction LiveNX a nine."

"We provide a tool for our customers to manage their reports. It's an extremely highly featured platform capable of producing a lot of data. We spent quite a long time working with customers and LiveAction to create template reports, and they're very good and configurable. You get a lot of data if you don't configure them."

"One of the valuable features is the ability to create CLI scripts on the fly to fix any issues. We were using it for QoS modeling to ensure that we were properly modeling QoS, and it basically said here is what you need to fix to get this QoS done, whether it is ACL or something else. It would either push or recommend. If you have the right credentials, you could also push. It is very good if you are a Cisco shop. It gives you reporting, latency, and bandwidth utilization for your applications, so you can do good capacity management planning. There are a lot of pieces that LiveNX can give you. It is a total NPM solution for SD-WAN."

"We don't have any complaints about the software. According to my team, it's a very good tool that's very intuitive."

"Its analytical capability is really good."

"The intention and the idea of the filter is great."

"LiveAction LiveNX provides valuable real-time and historical network traffic visualization capabilities that help monitor and analyze network performance."

"The alerting feature is very good because it allows you to set MOS alerts at various network junctures or data points."

More LiveAction LiveNX pros

Cons

"Human resource costs can be high when dealing with connection issues."

"I would like to see some improvements in parts of their synthetic transactions, which includes all the latency, jitter, and throughput. I would like to see some Layer 7 analytics in there. I want to be able to do a DNS request, HTTP GET request, or even SIP call point-to-point or via registration."

"The Accedian Skylight user interface still has room for improvement."

"For the PVX, they are in the process of getting the results to export to cloud and SaaS for analytics. They told me that this will happen later this year. Right now, for the most part, I create that data myself."

"Human resource costs can be high when dealing with connection issues."

"This solution is expensive compared to some others."

"If you want a new version, you go to the website. The hardest part is finding the link, where is that .bin file? Sometimes it's pretty hidden in a document... it's hidden in the release notes or in another file somewhere. And it's usually not on the first page either."

"It's a bit slow. When I execute a query, something general with a short timeframe that covers one month, for instance, and I do not specify the IP source or IP destination, it can take ages because it has to query the whole database."

More Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance cons

"It is not as robust as other NPM solutions. For instance, there is a problem while labeling specific applications. It works well with well-known applications, but when you have to put in new applications that are not very known and set them up with names, ports, URLs, or some protocols, it is not as intuitive."

"The product is weak in multi-tenancy. We have to install multiple instances of LiveAction, whereas we would like to build it once for our customers."

"Improved documentation and more responsive customer support can help in addressing issues faster."

"They need to create a more simplified UI."

"The customer service and technical support of LiveAction LiveNX are rated at 4 out of 10."

"This is a horrible solution and I think everything needs to be improved."

"The only downside to this software is the price."

"The tool crashes sometimes when we try to pull reports simultaneously."

More LiveAction LiveNX cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing of Accedian Skylight is really good. The sensors are low cost. Their model to analytics for sensors is by license, endpoint, or session. With the probes for their analytics, if they get deployed virtually, they are free. The licensing is only based on flows. So, you can effectively deploy probes everywhere in your network. Then, if you want to look at a specific type of traffic, you can enter into it with a very low cost license. You can just use things like spam ports, mirrors, TAPs, and aggregators to optimize what sort of traffic you send to these analysis tools. Then, if you want to start looking at more, you can up your licensed as you go. You are not getting forced into expensive appliances or subscription models."

"We understand there's a significant cost difference, but have yet to investigate fully."

"If you look into Riverbed, it's a licensing nightmare. You need to pay for every type of analysis... If you don't look into licensing, Riverbed and SolarWinds are pretty comparable. But if you look into licensing it would not be smart to go for either of them. On the pure, bare-metal basis, it's the same. But when you get the bare metal and a few basic licenses, then you need all those other licenses just to be sure that there's no issue... One of the great things about Skylight is you have them all, and you actually need them all."

"The pricing is cheaper than other competing products, which is better for our budgets."

"It's not for free, clearly. But on the other hand, it offers very interesting functionality. We pay around €100,000."

"The price is competitive overall, depending on the type of customer."

"It provides value and the cost is not huge."

"The solution was previously well-regarded, but after being acquired by Accedian, the prices have significantly increased. This has made it challenging to sell the product due to its high cost. It is an expensive solution."

More Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance pricing and cost advice

"It's very expensive."

"The solution is fairly expensive compared to other products."

"We use the free version."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

37%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

13%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Accedian Skylight?

Human resource costs can be high when dealing with connection issues. I require more tools to file and resolve these issues efficiently.

What is your primary use case for Accedian Skylight?

What advice do you have for others considering Accedian Skylight?

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

What do you like most about LiveAction LiveNX?

The product has a very good graphical interface.

What needs improvement with LiveAction LiveNX?

In my use cases, I do not see any improvements needed. The solution could potentially integrate with Azure, AWS, and multi-cloud networks.

What is your primary use case for LiveAction LiveNX?

For observability, I use ThousandEyes, LiveSP, and LiveAction LiveNX for service provider networks. I am actually a service provider, and I use it for my SD-WAN clients. I usually use it with my en...

ThousandEyes vs Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance

Comparisons

Compared 45% of the time

Dynatrace vs Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance

Compared 14% of the time

SolarWinds NPM vs Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance

Compared 12% of the time

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE vs Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance

Compared 10% of the time

Zabbix vs Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance

Compared 8% of the time

More Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance Competitors

ThousandEyes vs LiveAction LiveNX

Compared 22% of the time

SolarWinds NPM vs LiveAction LiveNX

Compared 18% of the time

NETSCOUT nGeniusONE vs LiveAction LiveNX

Compared 12% of the time

NetBrain vs LiveAction LiveNX

Compared 10% of the time

Nmap vs LiveAction LiveNX

Compared 8% of the time

More LiveAction LiveNX Competitors

Product Reports

Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance

Download Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance product report

Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance report

LiveAction LiveNX

Download LiveAction LiveNX product report

Also Known As

Accedian Skylight, Accedian SkyLIGHT PVX, SkyLIGHT PVX, SecurActive, Performance Vision

LiveNX

Overview

Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance offers real-time application and network performance monitoring, VPN management, and network diagnostics across multiple sites.

Organizations use Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance for active and passive monitoring, stress testing, and troubleshooting performance issues. Deployed both on-premise and in the cloud, it supports IT infrastructure, security, and analytics with end-to-end performance measurement across cloud data centers. The modern, intuitive interface features TWAMP for real-time traffic accuracy and standardized reports, along with insightful dashboards for circuit performance, latency, jitter, and throughput monitoring.

What are the most important features?

TWAMP: Provides real-time traffic accuracy and standardized reporting.
Insightful Dashboards: Monitor circuit performance, latency, jitter, and throughput.
Security Integration: Compatible with tools like Splunk for enhanced security.
Application Support: Facilitates comprehensive network performance analysis.

What benefits or ROI should users look for in reviews?

Quick Corrective Actions: Immediate response capabilities for performance issues.
Easy Navigation: User-friendly layouts simplify monitoring and troubleshooting.
Comprehensive Analytics: Advanced tools for in-depth network performance insights.
Cloud and On-Premise Options: Flexible deployment to meet different needs.

In industries like finance and healthcare, Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance ensures robust performance monitoring and quick diagnostics for VPNs and internet lines. It aids in maintaining the integrity and security of data transference, facilitating active and passive monitoring, stress testing, and performance troubleshooting across geographically dispersed locations, ensuring seamless operation and compliance with industry standards.

Cisco

LiveAction develops IT visibility solutions designed to simplify network management. Initially developed to aid the US Department of Defense in the operation of its networks, LiveNX (Network Experience) features an innovative visual display, real-time big data analytics and deep control of routers and switches for unparalleled network administration. LiveNX accelerates troubleshooting with its QoS control, application-aware, and WAN functionality developed through engineering partnerships with Cisco Systems.

BlueCat

Sample Customers

T-Systems, Thomson Reuters, Bordeaux Metropole, CGI, Citadelle Regional Hospital Center, Lorraine Institute of Oncology, Luxembourg Institute of Health, Groupe BPCE, Group S, Splitpoint, Horus-Net, Audatex, Indexis, Province de Liège, EASI, Spie Batignolles, Faymonville

Tampa Electric, Digital First Media, Allscripts, Boxwood Technology

Cisco Provider Connectivity Assurance vs. LiveAction LiveNX