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Elastic Security vs SolarWinds Security Event Manager 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

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) (8th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (10th)
SolarWinds Security Event M...
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
33rd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
26
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of Elastic Security is 5.6%, down from 8.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is 0.7%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

SyedAli17 - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized monitoring improves security posture through rapid data processing
The processing part of Elastic Security ( /products/elastic-security-reviews ) 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.
Rafal-Stas - PeerSpot reviewer
Helpful in areas like event management, log viewing, and information management
The product's initial setup phase on the cloud is pretty easy but on an on-premises version, I think it is of a moderate level. The solution is deployed on the cloud and on an on-premises model. The time required to deploy the solution depends on the customers' infrastructure, and it may range from a couple of weeks to a couple of months, as it depends on how many additional custom configurations are required. Around two to three engineers are usually involved in the tool's installation process.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Elastic Security is cost-effective compared to Defender and CrowdStrike."
"The stability of the solution is good."
"Elastic is straightforward, easy to integrate, and highly customizable."
"The most valuable feature of Elastic Security is that you can install agents, and they are not separately licensed."
"It is an extremely stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"I use the stack every morning to check the errors and it's just so clear. I don't see any disadvantage to using Logstash."
"The most valuable thing is that this solution is widely used for work management and research. It's easy to jump into the security use case with the same technology."
"The solution is compatible with the cloud-native environment and they can adapt to it faster."
"The graphical user interface is very user-friendly. SolarWinds is a hybrid solution so you can use it across many platforms."
"This tool is simple to use."
"SolarWinds is easy to configure, and it provides timely alerts."
"We did previously use a different solution, but SolarWinds is much better. It's easy to interact with SolarWinds. It's easy to operate, easy to configure and is generally easier compared to what we were working with before."
"The solution helps me to go back in time and search for different events. For example, if you wanted to know who activated an account; you could go back in time and find out."
"Some of the rules are most valuable because you can be notified about various things, such as spyware or things that are going on in the internal network."
"We had to integrate with other teams, and the infrastructure deployment didn't take long. The integration involves learning with different teams, networking, and configuring various network devices and servers. Infrastructure deployment only took one or two days."
"It's easy to build rules and actions based on the logs and event types we collect with the software."
 

Cons

"Elastic Security could improve the documentation. It would help if they were more simple and clean."
"The price of this product could be improved, especially the additional costs. I would also like to see better-quality graphics."
"The interface could be more user friendly because it is sometimes hard to deal with."
"With Elastic, you have to build the use cases for the specific requirement. Other products have a simple integration and more use cases to integrate out-of-the-box solutions for SIEM."
"We're using the open-source edition, for now, I think maybe they can allow their OLED plugin to be open source, as at the moment it is commercialised."
"This type of monitoring is not very mature just yet. We need more real-time information in a way that's easier to manage."
"The solution does not have a UI and this is one of the reasons we are looking for another solution."
"The solution should generate an automatic product that integrates with ELK Stack to use artificial intelligence."
"SolarWinds should improve its correlation capabilities. The correlation does not automatically detect and reduce the events fast enough. You have to manually do a correlation report, which means the tool is not scalable in many ways."
"Training for this solution needs to be improved, as new employees are sometimes unfamiliar with the product."
"Under the new system, it is not upgradable the way they say. When you try to do an upgrade, it doesn't really work unless you dump everything and start from scratch. You lose a lot of your nodes. Whenever you set your nodes up and everything else, they don't want to bring those nodes back in, so you have to really go back and restructure all your nodes. I went from version 6.5 to version 6.6 and then to version 6.7. I then went to version 2019, and now it is version 2020. It would be good if we can upgrade without having to delete everything and start from scratch. They can maybe build more KPIs and other things for the dashboard. Some of the other systems already have built-in KPIs. SolarWinds is starting to catch up, but it is not there yet. They can include some of the business or industry standards for tracking the time, that is, the meantime to detect (MTTD) and the meantime to resolve (MTTR). They can also find a way to build a KPI that measures the number of instances of port scans experienced in a week or a month."
"The only issue is the pricetag. SolarWinds is a costly solution."
"We used the support from SolarWinds Security Event Manager and they are knowledgeable but challenging to get in contact with them."
"It won't tell you when your backups are failing, but it will give you hints when your database is running on full recovery."
"We'd like more customization capabilities."
"I think the customization area in the tool can be considered as an area of concern where improvements are required."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"When compared to other products, the price is average or on the low side."
"Compared to other tools, Elastic Security is a cheaper solution."
"The price is reasonable. It probably costs the same as ArcSight and LogRhythm SIEM. FortiSIEM might cost less than Elastic Security. There are no hidden or additional costs."
"Compared to other products such as Dynatrace, this is one of the cheaper options."
"Its price is fine. Its licensing works on a yearly basis. We have to renew the license every year. I also have a good experience with Darktrace. When we buy Darktrace, we get training free of cost, which is not there in Elastic. We have to pay extra for training. There is certainly room for improvement."
"There is no charge for using the open-source version."
"The solution is free."
"Elastic Stack is an open-source tool. You don't have to pay anything for the components."
"Licenses can only be purchased in blocks of fifty at a time."
"It is in the appropriate mid-range. It is not as expensive as some of the other solutions. It is also not cheap."
"The pricing model would benefit from having package deals with other SolarWinds products."
"Licensing is on devices, so if you have many, then this may be high."
"The price of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is reasonable."
"We do a yearly license renewal. For a year, the solution costs roughly $500,000 USD. There are no costs beyond this yearly fee."
"The tool is available at a good price for customers compared to other solutions in the market. I rate the product's price as an eight out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Government
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Educational Organization
44%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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?
Since Elastic Security is community-based, it does not require significant costs. This is beneficial for SMEs as they do not need extensive budgets for security solutions.
What do you like most about SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
The solution helps you monitor database instances, application instances, other customer application things, Linux servers, IBM servers, and Oracle servers.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
The tool is available at a good price for customers compared to other solutions in the market. I rate the product's price as an eight out of ten.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
I think the customization area in the tool can be considered as an area of concern where improvements are required In the future, I want to see the tool have better customization abilities with som...
 

Also Known As

Elastic SIEM, ELK Logstash
SolarWinds LEM, Solarwinds SIEM, TriGeo, Log and Event Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Texas A&M, U.S. Air Force, NuScale Power, Martin's Point Health Care
NetSuite, EasyStreet, Legacy Texas Bank, and Energy Federal Credit Union, to name a few.
Find out what your peers are saying about Elastic Security vs. SolarWinds Security Event Manager and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
860,592 professionals have used our research since 2012.