Honeycomb Enterprise vs Instana Dynamic APM comparison

Honeycomb.io and Instana are both solutions in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category. Honeycomb.io is ranked #27 with an average rating of 8.0, while Instana is ranked #30 with an average rating of 8.0. Honeycomb.io holds a 1.3% mindshare in APM, compared to Instana’s 1.0% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Honeycomb.io users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 84% of Instana users who would recommend it.

Honeycomb Enterprise

Read 3 Honeycomb Enterprise reviews

2,750 Views
2,393 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Instana Dynamic APM

Read 14 Instana Dynamic APM reviews

1,942 Views
1,884 Comparison Views

84% willing to recommend

Honeycomb Enterprise

Instana Dynamic APM

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 2, 2025

Instana Dynamic APM and Honeycomb Enterprise compete in advanced application performance management. Instana appears to have an advantage in pricing and ease of deployment, whereas Honeycomb shines with its robust features.

Features: Instana Dynamic APM offers automatic service discovery, real-time diagnostics, and user-friendly analytics. Honeycomb Enterprise provides deep observability, advanced querying, and enhanced insights, suiting complex environments.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Instana Dynamic APM features straightforward deployment and comprehensive support, ensuring swift adoption. Honeycomb Enterprise, equipped with detailed documentation and effective support, requires a more intricate setup process, allowing for in-depth customization.

Pricing and ROI: Instana Dynamic APM presents competitive pricing with quick ROI, appealing to budget-sensitive buyers. Honeycomb Enterprise, though involving higher initial costs, offers substantial long-term value with its extensive capabilities. Instana's strength lies in affordability, while Honeycomb's is in strategic investments.

To learn more, read our detailed Honeycomb Enterprise vs. Instana Dynamic APM Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Honeycomb Enterprise vs. Instana Dynamic APM

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

Honeycomb Enterprise

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

27th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

5.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

AI Code Assistants (11th), AI Observability (75th)

Instana Dynamic APM

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

30th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Honeycomb Enterprise is 1.3%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Instana Dynamic APM is 1.0%, down from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Honeycomb Enterprise	1.3%
Instana Dynamic APM	1.0%
Other	97.7%

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

Featured Reviews

meetharoon

CEO at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees

Its pattern-matching and code transformation capabilities can be adapted for mass identification and remediation of vulnerable libraries

I asked very specific questions to Mr. Pell about consideration of code security scenarios in pattern design and rules, specifically that tuned with OWASP Top 10. I believe addition of code security focus can be a value-add, though the way Grit architecture is designed and how it works, it is and may not become an alternative choice of code security solutions. Rather, it must be treated as a powerful supplementary tool that augments the existing code security solutions (such as Snyk or Checkmarx) in a DevSecOps or Secure DevOps environment. Anyone interested in learning more on this front or have queries, can get in touch with me for a consulting.

Read full review

Muhammad Jawwad Hassan

IT Consultant at Arcana Info

A really good GUI that is easy for non-technical users to understand

Our company uses the solution for one of our bank clients. We use App Connect middleware to monitor services and applications such as Docker, Kubernetes, MongoDB, and MS SQL Server. We also monitor the bottleneck for all servers. We currently have 20 users at one of our branches. We plan to expand…

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

"The approach offers significant benefits in terms of efficiency, consistency, and proactive security management, particularly valuable for organizations with large, distributed development teams."

"The solution's initial setup process was straightforward since we were getting enough support from Honeycomb.io's team."

"The solution's most valuable features are the queries for the OpenTelemetry events and all the tracing."

"The primary selling point of this product is its unparalleled transparency into the infrastructure."

"The platform’s most valuable feature is the ability to monitor the performance of containers for request and response analysis."

"Instana is very fast to implement and deploy because the dashboards are automated and don't need configuration."

"Visually, it's very good. It provides everything needed for dynamic detection, which is very useful."

"We can easily perform root cause analysis using the tool."

"With Instana, the interface and the UI are very simple to use."

"With auto-discovery, we didn't need to consider much. We just installed the agent on the host and it was able to detect everything from the host level up to the service level, for whatever stack was installed, and that includes containers and dockers."

"It is user-friendly, but we encounter issues processing input and understanding the graphics, such as seeing a flatline without knowing the cause. When these problems occur, I have to contact my support team to address and fix them. Also, monitoring processing is good."

More Instana Dynamic APM pros

Cons

"The way Grit architecture is designed and how it works, it is and may not become an alternative choice of code security solutions."

"The process of log scraping gets delayed on Honeycomb.io. At times, it gives false alerts to the application team."

"We can make alerts based on static numbers, which may block us from building alerts that could be generic enough or could be serviced."

"The integration could be improved with more plugins or open API."

"We'd always like to see additional functionalities."

"The auto-remediation features must be improved."

"Its SLI and SLA features need improvement in setting up alerts."

"The App Connect middleware does not integrate with or show corresponding sub nodes."

"Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring."

"They could improve the product’s dashboards and provide more dashboard options."

"Many managers, as well as our customers, used to ask for reports, such as "top X number of queries that are slow," or "top pages that have the highest number of issues." This is something that can be improved by Instana. Currently, they don't have that kind of reporting available out-of-the-box."

More Instana Dynamic APM cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"The solution's pricing is comparable to other products."

"The solution is less expensive than one of its competitors."

"The pricing is $1,200 per year which is a bit high compared to other vendors."

"Pricing is quite competitive. Dynatrace, AppDynamics, and New Relic were all several times more expensive than Instana, both the on-prem and the SaaS versions. Price-wise they are a lot more competitive than anyone else out there."

"It's reasonably priced and manageable, especially for individuals who grasp the significance of application monitoring."

"Instana Dynamic APM is more affordable for small and medium-sized companies compared to other vendors."

"Its pricing isn't a big pain point. Its pricing seems to be better than some of the other competing products in the market, but they also have some of the features and functionalities that are better than Instana."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

17%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

25%

Manufacturing Company

12%

Computer Software Company

Retailer

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	3
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	5

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Honeycomb.io?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Honeycomb.io?

Although Grit is a tool code code migration and management of technical debt for large chunks of work, we reviewed Grit from the use case of assisting in faster remediation of vulnerable libraries....

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Honeycomb.io?

We set up Honeycomb.io on all the services so that we can have all the set traces of the communication between all the services inside the company. This helps us understand where it could be failin...

See all answers

What do you like most about Instana Dynamic APM?

The platform’s most valuable feature is the ability to monitor the performance of containers for request and response analysis.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Instana Dynamic APM?

I rate the pricing a seven out of ten. There are no additional costs associated with the product.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Instana Dynamic APM?

Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring.

See all answers

Comparisons

Sentry vs Honeycomb Enterprise

Compared 15% of the time

Grafana vs Honeycomb Enterprise

Compared 9% of the time

Splunk Observability Cloud vs Honeycomb Enterprise

Compared 7% of the time

New Relic vs Honeycomb Enterprise

Compared 6% of the time

Datadog vs Honeycomb Enterprise

Compared 6% of the time

More Honeycomb Enterprise Competitors

Dynatrace vs Instana Dynamic APM

Compared 29% of the time

Splunk AppDynamics vs Instana Dynamic APM

Compared 13% of the time

New Relic vs Instana Dynamic APM

Compared 7% of the time

Datadog vs Instana Dynamic APM

Compared 6% of the time

OpenText Business Process Monitoring vs Instana Dynamic APM

Compared 2% of the time

More Instana Dynamic APM Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

January 2026

Download Honeycomb Enterprise product report

Buyer's Guide

Instana Dynamic APM

January 2026

Download Instana Dynamic APM product report

Also Known As

Grit

No data available

Overview

Honeycomb Enterprise is designed to optimize performance visibility, offering a robust platform for distributed system observability. It provides insights for complex data and aids in faster issue resolution, making it a valuable tool for IT professionals.

This tool is tailored for real-time data tracking and improving system performance efficiency. Enterprises benefit from its capacity to handle large-scale data, ensuring seamless operations and continuity. Honeycomb Enterprise helps teams to tackle data challenges head-on by delivering comprehensive analytics that enhance infrastructure reliability and performance metrics.

What Features Make Honeycomb Enterprise Stand Out?

High-Resolution Visibility: Enables detailed system monitoring to identify issues quickly.
Trace Analysis: Offers powerful tracing of distributed systems for in-depth insights.
Data Scalability: Manages extensive data sets effortlessly for better decision-making.
Real-Time Alerts: Provides instant alerts to preempt potential disruptions.
Collaboration Tools: Facilitates teamwork with integrated tools enhancing productivity.

What Benefits and ROI Can Users Expect?

Reduced Downtime: Faster detection and resolution of issues minimizes operational interruptions.
Cost Efficiency: Optimizes resources leading to lower operational costs.
Improved Decision Making: Enhanced data analytics lead to smarter business strategies.
Enhanced Productivity: Streamlined processes improve team efficiency and output quality.

In industries like finance, e-commerce, and technology, Honeycomb Enterprise implementations demonstrate its utility in managing complex data flows and optimizing system reliability. Businesses in these sectors leverage its capabilities to maintain high service standards and operational efficiency.

Honeycomb.io

Instana’s Enterprise Observability Platform, powered by automated Application Performance Monitoring, discovers and maps all services, infrastructure, and their inter-dependencies automatically. Instana ingests all observability metrics, traces each request, profiles every process, and updates application dependency maps in real-time to deliver the context and actionable feedback needed by Dev+Ops to optimize application performance, enable innovation, and mitigate risk to help them add value and efficiency to the pipeline. Learn more at https://instana.com.

Instana

Sample Customers

Clover Health, Eaze, Intercom, Fender

Daxko Lifts Fitness Studios Through COVID Regulations with Quick Engineering PivotsAltissia Meets SLAs to Support Student DeadlinesImmocloud Unlocks Observability to Modernize Real EstateEnento Group Boosts Service Reliability with Real-Time Visibility into Application Performance Instana’s Observability for Amazon EKS Helps Yara Deliver Digital Farming Solutions

Buyer's Guide

Honeycomb Enterprise vs. Instana Dynamic APM

December 2025

Free Report: Honeycomb Enterprise vs. Instana Dynamic APM

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