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ExtremeCloud IQ vs IBM Tivoli NetCool comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 2, 2025

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

ExtremeCloud IQ
Ranking in Network Management Applications
12th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
77
Ranking in other categories
Network Access Control (NAC) (10th), Intrusion Detection and Prevention Software (IDPS) (17th)
IBM Tivoli NetCool
Ranking in Network Management Applications
11th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Network Management Applications category, the mindshare of ExtremeCloud IQ is 2.9%, up from 2.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Tivoli NetCool is 3.5%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Management Applications Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM Tivoli NetCool3.5%
ExtremeCloud IQ2.9%
Other93.6%
Network Management Applications
 

Featured Reviews

José Roldan - PeerSpot reviewer
Ingeniero De Preventa at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Has improved network monitoring with AI-driven insights and centralized device management
The best features of ExtremeCloud IQ include the integration of different vendors in one dashboard, the evolution of the manager, and any devices in networking. The impact of ExtremeCloud IQ on my organization is positive as the deployment is for a hybrid solution, using third-party vendors and cloud solutions for Extreme devices, switches, IP, and access points or SD-WAN solution devices. My IT team is occupied with other jobs, and ExtremeCloud IQ helps with monitoring networking at low costs. For networking and access points, it acts as a controller in a cloud environment, eliminating the need for an appliance controller or wireless LAN controller, thus saving on investment and reducing TCO costs.
Petar Ganev - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Enterprise Monitoring Engineer at Commerzbank
Reliable for enterprise monitoring but no longer actively developed
There are problems with the latest security requirements because many things have changed in recent years, and now the security audits are very strict. And we need to switch to something else. We need to patch it constantly. Moreover, it is a very old tool and a little bit difficult to support. Otherwise, they work okay.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I’ve used both Cisco and Meraki extensively and have found Aerohive to offer the best mix between stable hardware and software and ease of setup, deployment, and management."
"It is a scalable solution."
"The main reason why a lot of customers choose this solution is because of how scalable it is."
"The dashboards are great and the user interface is quite intuitive."
"Aerohive's Hive Manager allows you to control all aspects of your WiFi network, from anywhere."
"What's most valuable for me in ExtremeCloud IQ is easy management. It also has centralized administration, so you don't have to go to the customer site to program it. It can be programmed remotely."
"The Aerohive solution appeared to be price competitive, however lack of training and support in the region has made it more expensive than other solutions."
"Customer Service: Our VAR/customer service is very responsive and always goes the extra mile."
"The scalability of monitoring, the breadth of supported network components, the scale of the number of monitoring events, and the flexibility in customization make this a well-rounded product."
"It improves customer satisfaction, deploy-ability, adaptability, flexibility, scalability, and reduces cost of operation."
"Tivoli NetCool allows us to grasp a lot of data that can be applied toward predictive analytics and auto-remediation."
"The feature I have found most valuable with NetCool is how it collaborates all the alarms, and then it does a predictive analysis, providing a consolidated alarm view and management."
"It's very easy to use."
"The solution has very good integration capabilities."
"NetCool has a huge database that can collect and process about one million alarms a day."
"The solution is a complete package; it has various useful elements including inventory management and incident management packaged inside it, and anything is possible with Tivoli since it is quite a robust system that offers a lot of useful integration capabilities."
 

Cons

"There can be an improvement by incorporating two-factor authentication or multi-factor authentication for security. Advanced network access control features and application control features should be added to manage applications. Many customers are interested in managing data, such as setting data quotas for individual users."
"The licensing model could be improved."
"Its price could be lower. It is a simplified solution, but it has price challenges. It is costly as compared to other solutions. It has almost everything. The only thing is that MAC is not possible on the cloud, and it has to be on-premises."
"Need port aggregation on the 2384 switches to take full advantage of ac on the APs."
"When we installed the latest firmware versions on these APs, sometimes we encountered major or minor bugs that would force us to roll back until an appropriate patch was released."
"I have never really felt their mounting system for the APs is all that good. The plastic plates are a bit flimsy and not well designed."
"Need port aggregation on the 2384 switches to take full advantage of ac on the APs. I understand that is on their product road map."
"Browser load time for the cloud is long and needs improvement."
"Tivoli NetCool is based on a Linux platform, it would be beneficial if they moved it to Windows because not everyone is acquainted with Linux."
"The solution is not user-friendly."
"IBM's technical support takes a long time to do root cause analysis, and we have to go through several levels of help before getting a solution."
"The installation could be simplified, and technical support could be faster."
"This is another one of those suites glued together from a myriad of acquisitions and it shows once you get under the hood."
"In terms of improvement, I would like to see more AIOps, Artificial Intelligent Operations in the next release."
"UI is outdated, very old legacy."
"From a customer perspective, it is quite an expensive solution to initially implement and then support."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"ExtremeCloud IQ's pricing is high."
"The price was okay."
"There are probably cheaper solutions but we invest for stability and performance for the longer haul."
"Extreme is twice as cheap compared to Cisco due to the currency exchange. Normally, I think Cisco would be a little bit more expensive, but there wouldn't be that much of a difference."
"Extreme licensing is based on the number of access points. When you buy the license for the first year, everything is included, such as access to mapping, etc. If you don't renew your software assurance for the second year, the access points will still work, but you can't use the cloud management tools."
"This solution offers annual licensing that is middle of the range in terms of cost."
"I would advise that you be sure to compare apples with apples. Many customers just look at the price per AP and licences, and compare that against other solutions. But, they do not look at the complete picture such as: TCO - how much the equipment will cost you over, say, seven years? Will the customer need to change complete infrastructure when they want to buy the newest hardware? Does support include a lifetime warranty and RMA?"
"Bring the cost down."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
"Customers are required to pay a licensing fee."
"The price of the product is too expensive."
"It costs around 100k for every ten servers, which is lower than similar products from other vendors."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Construction Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Educational Organization
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business45
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise24
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

What are pros and cons of Aruba 515 Series AP vs. Cisco Meraki or Extreme Networks?
Depends. I have personally used both Cisco and Aruba so I am familiar with them. Extreme I am not, so unless they have some feature that I need or want, I wouldn't consider them. Do you have expe...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ExtremeCloud IQ?
The licensing was a challenge due to budget constraints, and I used ExtremeCloud IQ without a license for a period. The documentation and training courses were also costly, impacting how easily I c...
What advice do you have for others considering ExtremeCloud IQ?
I use ExtremeCloud IQ's real-time analytics. In the cloud solution, I get reports, and it works together with machine learning and artificial intelligence for those reports. This tool permits the c...
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
I have worked from 1973 with all kind of systems in large enterprises across the world. And have experience with all kind of software in monitoring from infra to end to end, it depends on the funct...
What needs improvement with IBM Tivoli NetCool?
The main challenge is its licensing model, which is very complicated.
What is your primary use case for IBM Tivoli NetCool?
NetCool is the manager of managers in the stack. It basically combines the devices of the whole network. We are the mobile network operator, so we use it to assist us in cross-domain correlations a...
 

Also Known As

Aerohive Networks, Aerohive HiveManager, HiveManager, ExtremeCloud , ExtremeSecurity
Tivoli NetCool
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Henry Ford Health System, Baltimore Ravens, Brandili, Federal University of Alagoas, CEDAE, Caxias do Sul, UNISC Concurrency, CenturyLink Field, Louisiana College, Cricket Tasmania Stadium, Moscow Internet Exchange
Claranet, Consolidated Communications, Telus, €sterreichische Bundesbahnen (€BB), Telekom Srbija, Bendigo Community Telco, Capgemini, Schweizerische Bundesbahnen (SBB)
Find out what your peers are saying about ExtremeCloud IQ vs. IBM Tivoli NetCool and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,164 professionals have used our research since 2012.