Graylog Enterprise vs syslog-ng comparison

Graylog and One Identity are both solutions in the Log Management category. Graylog is ranked #9 with an average rating of 7.4, while One Identity is ranked #17 with an average rating of 10.0. Graylog holds a 5.0% mindshare in Log Management, compared to One Identity’s 2.0% mindshare. Additionally, 95% of Graylog users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of One Identity users who would recommend it.

Graylog Enterprise

Read 24 Graylog Enterprise reviews

7,823 Views
7,823 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

syslog-ng

Read 7 syslog-ng reviews

3,537 Views
3,537 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Graylog Enterprise

syslog-ng

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 14, 2025

Graylog Enterprise and syslog-ng compete in the log management domain. Graylog Enterprise seems to have the upper hand with its powerful search capabilities, whereas syslog-ng stands out in high-volume data environments.

Features: Graylog Enterprise provides a feature-rich platform with intuitive dashboards, sophisticated alerting capabilities, and powerful log management. Syslog-ng offers unmatched flexibility in data parsing and filtering, ideal for complex environments, along with superior customization and real-time monitoring capabilities.

Room for Improvement: Graylog Enterprise could improve in areas related to deeper integration with other platforms, enhanced real-time data analytics, and scalability for extremely high data volumes. Syslog-ng would benefit from simplifying initial configurations, enhancing user documentation, and availability of easier integration options with cloud platforms.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Graylog Enterprise offers straightforward deployment with comprehensive customer support, contributing to higher user satisfaction. Syslog-ng requires more manual configuration but is reliable for tailored infrastructure deployments, though it could improve with simpler onboarding processes.

Pricing and ROI: Graylog Enterprise is recognized for its competitive pricing with a reasonable setup cost, making it cost-effective due to its feature-rich platform. Syslog-ng might involve higher initial expenses, but it presents solid ROI in complex environments needing scalability and in-depth customization for handling extensive data volumes.

To learn more, read our detailed Graylog Enterprise vs. syslog-ng Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Graylog Enterprise vs. syslog-ng

December 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

Graylog Enterprise

Ranking in Log Management

9th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

5.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

syslog-ng

Ranking in Log Management

17th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

3.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Graylog Enterprise is 5.0%, down from 6.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of syslog-ng is 2.0%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Log Management Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Graylog Enterprise	5.0%
syslog-ng	2.0%
Other	93.0%

Log Management

Featured Reviews

NicolaeCIornii

Security Officer at JSC "Moldtelecom" S.A.

Log analysis has become clearer and faster but visualization and extensibility still need work

The problem was with the complexity and the cost to add extensions. We found this very expensive to buy another version with additional features. I think that Graylog Enterprise does not have customizable dashboards. I did not see them in Graylog Enterprise because most of the time we used the open source free version, which is limited. I think Graylog Enterprise should improve some things that they have in the paid version and perhaps provide users with a menu that gives examples of parsing logs and draws graphics so that people do not need to improve another system such as Grafana. This would be interesting. When it comes to functionalities, I found the log management in Graylog Enterprise acceptable. It is very simple to use and to collect logs. It has support for different protocols and different ports, and the sidecar is easy to use. However, in visualization, I think it needs to be much better.

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Oliver Castellucchio

IT Infrastructure & Cloud Security Manager at Thux

Has ensured compliance by centralizing log data and supporting secure connections

We currently do not use that feature. We currently have just an open-source release, not a premium release. My boss has indicated that he wants to buy a premium syslog-ng version next month. I think we can use other features of this tool in the future. In syslog-ng, I think a GUI would be beneficial. I am unsure if the premium module has a GUI to administer it.

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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

"The Graylog features that have proven to be most beneficial for our data analysis in particular are that we tend to use it as a big data store, so we have the correlation rules that, if something matches under certain conditions, it raises an alarm."

"Graylog is valuable because it bridges technical knowledge to non-technical teams, presenting complex backend processes in a simple timeline."

"We're using the Community edition, but I know that it has really good dashboarding and alerts."

"Allowing us to set up alerts and integrate with platforms we already use, such as Slack and OpsGenie to alert users of these errors proactively, is also a very useful feature."

"The product is scalable. The solution is stable."

"The build is stable and requires little maintenance, even compared to some extremely expensive products."

"Graylog Enterprise has positively impacted my organization by significantly minimizing our workload and making it easier to identify any issues in a service."

"I like the correlation and the alerting."

More Graylog Enterprise pros

"Syslog-ng has built-in features that we can use to create alerts for a SIEM solution. It isn't a true SIEM solution, but it's sufficient for the time being."

"The ability to extract and store the logs is the most valuable feature of syslog-ng."

"For us, the most valuable feature is the use of compound search for searching logs at a specific time, by a specific user, or specific behavior."

"Syslog-ng provides easy access to all my logs. It helps me show managers and other clients precisely where an incident occurred. I also like it because you can integrate syslog-ng with multiple solutions to allow real-time monitoring."

"Syslog-ng has a separate config file in addition to the core configuration."

"What I appreciate most about syslog-ng is its configuration; its C-style config is much easier to understand, read, and write than other popular solutions such as syslog or rsyslog."

"We chose syslog-ng because it is easy to install, easy to maintain, easy to update, and due to the fact that all data arrive in raw format, we can manipulate it as we want."

Cons

"Graylog needs to improve their authentication. Also, the fact that Graylog displays logs from the top down is just ridiculous."

"Dashboards, stream alerts and parsing could be improved."

"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."

"Elasticsearch recommendations for tuning could be better. Graylog doesn't have direct support for running the system inside of Kubernetes, so it can be challenging to fill in the gaps and set up containers in a way that is both performant and stable."

"We ran into problems with Elasticsearch throwing a circuit-breaking exception due to field data size being too large. It turned out that the heap size directly impacted this size in a high-throughput environment, causing unexplained instability in Graylog. We were able to troubleshoot on the Elasticsearch size, but we should have been able to reference some minimum requirements for Graylog to know that our settings weren't sufficient."

"I would like to see a default dashboard widget that shows the topology of the clusters defined for the graylog install."

"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."

"More complex visualizations and the ability to execute custom Elasticsearch queries would be great."

More Graylog Enterprise cons

"There is always the potential for additional integration and protocol extensions."

"In syslog-ng, I think a GUI would be beneficial. I am unsure if the premium module has a GUI to administer it."

"The filtering has room for improvement."

"There is room for improvement in terms of observability."

"It's hard to find people who know how to use syslog-ng. I often find problems with configurations, and solutions aren't integrated correctly with syslog-ng. For example, there might be data with extra decimals, or the collector agents are incorrectly named. It isn't a problem with the solution; it's a lack of professionals."

"Syslog-ng has built-in features that we can use to create alerts for a SIEM solution. It isn't a true SIEM solution, but it's sufficient for the time being."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's an open-source solution that can be used free of charge."

"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."

"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."

"Graylog is a free open-source solution. The free version has a capacity limitation of 2 GB daily, if you want to go above this you have to purchase a license."

"I am using a community edition. I have not looked at the enterprise offering from Graylog."

"If you want something that works and do not have the money for Splunk or QRadar, take Graylog."

More Graylog Enterprise pricing and cost advice

"Syslog-ng is a free open-source solution."

"Syslog-ng is open-source."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

11%

University

Government

12%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	10
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	9

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	3
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	3

Questions from the Community

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...

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What needs improvement with Graylog?

I do not have any specific examples or numbers, such as time saved or incidents to share. Currently, I have no suggestions for how Graylog Enterprise can be improved, as there are no pain points or...

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What is your primary use case for Graylog?

Graylog Enterprise is the logging and management tool we initially used, but later we stopped using it and switched to Loki, Grafana Loki for the logs. Eventually, we moved back to Graylog Enterpri...

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What needs improvement with syslog-ng?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for syslog-ng?

In Italy, we have to be compliant with the Garante for privacy. We have to log every login, logout, or login failure made by a system administrator. We store all syslog data of the infrastructure. ...

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What advice do you have for others considering syslog-ng?

When it comes to parsing, I can parse both structured and unstructured data, though our data are only structured. Currently, we collect all data we receive as raw data. Each file is stored for each...

See all answers

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Fortinet FortiAnalyzer vs Graylog Enterprise

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Compared 7% of the time

Cribl vs syslog-ng

Compared 7% of the time

Elastic Stack vs syslog-ng

Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 4% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Graylog Enterprise

January 2026

Download Graylog Enterprise product report

Buyer's Guide

syslog-ng

January 2026

Download syslog-ng product report

Also Known As

Graylog2

No data available

Overview

Graylog Enterprise, recognized for log collection, real-time search, and enriched data handling, offers an open-source framework that integrates seamlessly with Elasticsearch. Its user-centric interface streamlines data correlation and log aggregation, supporting both backend services and comprehensive monitoring needs.

Graylog Enterprise stands out for its stability and powerful log management capabilities, facilitating efficient log aggregation, real-time updates, and data analytics. Users benefit from its plugin-based alerting, user-friendly interface, and support for microservices, including Docker integration. The ability to search in detail, flexible API integration, and data enrichment features are highly valued. Challenges include collector application issues, desired visualization enhancements, and authentication integration improvements. Users seek advancements in UI customization, backup functions, and easier rule creation.

What are Graylog Enterprise's most important features?

Log Collection: Efficiently aggregates and handles diverse logs.
Real-Time Search: Provides immediate log data access.
Custom Alerts: Plugin-based alerting for tailored notifications.
Dashboard Enhancements: Improved visualization for data insights.
Data Enrichment: Adds value through detailed log analysis.

What benefits and ROI can users expect?

Audit Trail Support: Essential for compliance in financial sectors.
Security Event Correlation: Enables incident analysis and response.
Faster Issue Identification: Speeds up troubleshooting with detailed visualization.
API Flexibility: Seamless integration across systems and environments.
Comprehensive Monitoring: Centralized log management enhances oversight.

In industrial use, Graylog Enterprise is crucial for audit trailing in financial sectors, facilitating security event identification and error monitoring. Backend teams leverage real-time analytics for swift issue resolution, while developers appreciate the comprehensive log visualization enabled by Docker integration for microservice management.

Graylog

Optimizing SIEM
syslog-ng is the log management solution that improves the performance of your SIEM solution by reducing the amount and improving the quality of data feeding your SIEM.

Rapid search and troubleshooting
With syslog-ng Store Box, you can find the answer. Search billions of logs in seconds using full text queries with Boolean operators to pinpoint critical logs.

Meeting compliance requirements
syslog-ng Store Box provides secure, tamper-proof storage and custom reporting to demonstrate compliance.

Big data ingestion
syslog-ng can deliver data from a wide variety of sources to Hadoop, Elasticsearch, MongoDB, and Kafka as well as many others.

Universal log collection and routing
syslog-ng flexibly routes log data from X sources to Y destinations. Instead of deploying multiple agents on hosts, organizations can unify their log data collection and management.

Secure data archive
syslog-ng Store Box provides automated archiving, tamper-proof encrypted storage, granular access controls to protect log data. The largest appliance can store up to 10TB of raw logs.

One Identity

Sample Customers

Blue Cross Blue Shield, eBay, Cisco, LinkedIn, SAP, King.com, Twilio, Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Tecnocom, University of Victoria, University of Exeter, Datapath

Buyer's Guide

Graylog Enterprise vs. syslog-ng

December 2025

Free Report: Graylog Enterprise vs. syslog-ng

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