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Graylog Enterprise vs IBM Security QRadar comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 8, 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

Graylog Enterprise
Ranking in Log Management
15th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
IBM Security QRadar
Ranking in Log Management
6th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
210
Ranking in other categories
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (4th), User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (1st), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (17th), Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (4th), Managed Detection and Response (MDR) (8th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (11th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Graylog Enterprise is 6.2%, up from 6.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Security QRadar is 3.8%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Log Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM Security QRadar3.8%
Graylog6.2%
Other90.0%
Log Management
 

Featured Reviews

Ivan Kokalovic - PeerSpot reviewer
Facilitates backend service monitoring with efficient log retrieval and API flexibility
Graylog is valuable because it bridges technical knowledge to non-technical teams, presenting complex backend processes in a simple timeline. It boosts the knowledge of sales and customer support teams by allowing them to see the backend operations without needing to read the code. Its API is flexible for visualization, and its powerful search engine efficiently handles large volumes of log data. Moreover, its stability, fast search capabilities, and compatibility with languages like ANSI SQL enhance its utility in IT infrastructure.
Mahmoud Younes - PeerSpot reviewer
Reliable installation and diverse use cases provide strong value
IBM Security QRadar has some areas for improvement. We have missed some DSM components. We need to customize logs where there is no DSM or connector for certain products. We can integrate but we have missed the DSM, which is the connector to pass logs coming from different applications. For example, with a university customer, we tried onboarding Canvas service. IBM Security QRadar does not support Canvas, so we had to create custom scripts and workarounds to pull logs from Canvas.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Graylog's search functionality, alerting functionality, user management, and dashboards are useful."
"The ability to write custom alerts is key to information security and compliance."
"I like the correlation and the alerting."
"This had increased productivity for the dev and support teams, because we are directly notifying them."
"Everything stands out as valuable, including the fact that I can quantify and qualify the logs, create pipelines and process the logs in any way I like, and create charts or data maps."
"Open source and user friendly."
"UDP is a fast and lightweight protocol, perfect for sending large volumes of logs with minimal overhead."
"We're using the Community edition, but I know that it has really good dashboarding and alerts."
"We've found the solution to be scalable."
"The detection rate is good and the false positive rate is low."
"Most of our clients are interested in automation. The automation part is good because they are able to detect threats and vulnerabilities in real time. It's very fast."
"Vulnerability data, network data and the like, are part of correlation and detection."
"This is a distributed application, meaning that a customer can stack small and then scale it so that they can expand pretty effectively. You can use, basically, the same product in an SMB or a large enterprise."
"Most valuable features include the granularity of information."
"It is incredibly easy to deploy. All the appliances are flexible in the roles that they serve and are all managed the in the same way."
"Blocks of predefined conditions can be used to configure detection rules without having to write complicated script."
 

Cons

"Since container orchestration systems are popular and Graylog fits the niche well, perhaps they could officially support running in docker containers on Kubernetes as a StatefulSet as a use case. That way, the declarative nature of Kubernetes config files would document their best case deployment scenario-"
"Graylog could improve the process of creating rules. We have to create them manually by doing parses and applying them. Other SIEM solutions have basic rules and you can create and get more events of interest."
"When it comes to configuring the processing pipeline, writing the rules can be very tedious, especially since the documentation isn't extensive on how the functions provided for these rules work."
"I would like to see a default dashboard widget that shows the topology of the clusters defined for the graylog install."
"With technical support, you are on your own without an enterprise license."
"Dashboards, stream alerts and parsing could be improved."
"Its scalability gets complicated when we have to update or edit multiple nodes."
"I would like to see a date and time in the Graylog Grok patterns so that I can save time when searching for a log. I like how the streams and the search query work, but adding a date and time will allow me to pull out a log in a milli-second."
"I think QRadar is very complex. It's a distributed system and IBM QRadar has an all-in-one solution which is not like that distributed solution but it's a good product. IBM needs to consider the user interface because if we compare it with AlienVault, the AlienVault user interface is fantastic but the IBM QRadar user interface is very complex. They should focus on how to make it easier for the client."
"I would suggest QRadar release any documentation or give an online demo, like videos on YouTube. It would increase publicity and public appeal."
"The solution should include remote action capabilities."
"IBM Security QRadar’s GUI could be improved."
"The price of IBM Security QRadar is an area of concern where improvements are required."
"Right now, if you look at the compatibility, if you need to deploy QRadar in a physical appliance you have only two choices of server, their own or a Lenovo server. In today's world, you cannot keep something tied to such a big brand. Clients want to be able to use whatever type of server they want."
"Dashboards and reports could provide better visualization of SIEM activity."
"In terms of additional features, a mobile app would be nice. Also, the reporting is definitely okay, but you have to make sure that everybody with different roles can understand it. There is room for improvement in the reporting."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We're using the Community edition."
"​You get a lot out-of-the-box with the non-enterprise version, so give it a try first."
"Having paid official support is wise for projects."
"We are using the free version of the product. However, the paid version is expensive."
"It's open source and free. They have a paid version, but we never looked into that because we never needed the features of the paid version."
"Consider Enterprise support if you have atypical needs or setup requirements.​"
"I use the free version of Graylog."
"It's an open-source solution that can be used free of charge."
"The cost of this product is expensive."
"Our licensing costs for this solution is on a yearly basis."
"The tool's on-premise version is expensive. However, it is cheaper than Splunk. The hybrid model offers shared instances for customers, which is not expensive. Customers with a limited budget can opt for it. You can get premium support with licenses. However, if you need customized integration, you need to buy it."
"The price of this solution is a little high."
"The solution comes with a high price tag, while some of the competitors provide identical functionality in their offerings at no extra cost."
"Pricing and licensing are competitive. Their new licensing options allow logs to bypass the correlation engine for a flat rate, which is also appealing for log data that is compliance-driven for a small amount of money."
"Customers have to purchase a license based on the number of users, devices, and applications they want to protect. It allows you to take a license on a subscription basis for three years or five years."
"The product is expensive. We have purchased the perpetual license, but we pay for the support."
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Comparison Review

VS
Jun 28, 2015
Qradar vs. ArcSight
Continuing with the SIEM posts we have done at Infosecnirvana, this post is a Head to head comparison of the two Industry leading SIEM products in the market – HP ArcSight and IBM QRadar Both the products have consistently been in the Gartner Leaders Quadrant. Both HP and IBM took over niche SIEM…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Government
8%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business88
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise102
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Graylog?
The product is scalable. The solution is stable.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Graylog?
I am not familiar with the pricing details of Graylog, as I was not responsible for that aspect. It was determined that we didn't need an enterprise plan, which is more suited for clients with less...
What needs improvement with Graylog?
An improvement I would suggest is in Graylog's user interface, such as allowing for font size adjustments. A potential enhancement could be the integration with Ollama to run large language models ...
What are the biggest differences between Securonix UEBA, Exabeam, and IBM QRadar?
It mostly depends on your use-cases and environment. Exabeam and Securonix have a stronger UEBA feature set, friendlier GUI and are not licensed based on capacity (amount of logs and information in...
What SOC product do you recommend?
For tools I’d recommend: -SIEM- LogRhythm -SOAR- Palo Alto XSOAR Doing commercial w/o both (or at least an XDR) is asking to miss details that are critical, and ending up a statistic. Also, rememb...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Security QRadar?
When comparing with Splunk, IBM Security QRadar's cost is reasonable. Splunk is more expensive than IBM Security QRadar.
 

Also Known As

Graylog2
IBM QRadar, QRadar SIEM, QRadar UBA, QRadar on Cloud, IBM QRadar Advisor with Watson
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Blue Cross Blue Shield, eBay, Cisco, LinkedIn, SAP, King.com, Twilio, Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Clients across multiple industries, such as energy, financial, retail, healthcare, government, communications, and education use QRadar.
Find out what your peers are saying about Graylog Enterprise vs. IBM Security QRadar and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
867,299 professionals have used our research since 2012.