Honeycomb Enterprise vs New Relic comparison

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Honeycomb Enterprise

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 8, 2026

New Relic and Honeycomb Enterprise compete in application performance management. Honeycomb Enterprise often appears to have the upper hand due to its sophisticated analytics features, despite New Relic's strong support and integrations.

Features: New Relic offers comprehensive monitoring and broad integrations, which appeal to large teams. Its custom dashboards, robust alerting systems, and real-time application performance reporting are highly valued. Honeycomb Enterprise, meanwhile, provides profound query capabilities and event-driven insights, ideal for teams conducting granular analysis. It stands out with its advanced analytics capabilities, addressing complex analysis requirements effectively.

Room for Improvement: New Relic may benefit from enhancing its analytics depth and reducing the learning curve for new users. Increasing flexibility in its query language and expanding AI-driven insights could add significant value. Honeycomb Enterprise can improve by refining its user interface to compete better with New Relic's ease of use. Enhancing AI integrations and expanding the range of out-of-the-box analytics might attract a broader audience.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: New Relic is easy to deploy and is praised for its robust customer support, offering a smooth user experience from start to finish. Honeycomb Enterprise, though having a steeper learning curve, enables efficient deployment for teams accustomed to its model. It provides responsive customer service, ensuring user queries are addressed promptly, albeit with a need for some familiarization time compared to New Relic.

Pricing and ROI: New Relic is perceived as cost-effective, providing a fair pricing model complemented by quick setup, thus enhancing return on investment. Its pricing is simple, with charges based on data ingestion, making it accessible. Honeycomb Enterprise, despite higher initial costs, is seen as delivering significant returns due to its analytics depth. Its pricing is justified by the value derived from its potent analytical features over time.

To learn more, read our detailed Honeycomb Enterprise vs. New Relic Report (Updated: February 2026).

Honeycomb Enterprise vs. New Relic

February 2026

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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

7.2

Reviews Sentiment

5.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

AI Code Assistants (11th), AI Observability (73rd)

New Relic

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

4th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

172

Ranking in other categories

Network Monitoring Software (8th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (9th), IT Operations Analytics (3rd), Mobile APM (3rd), Cloud Monitoring Software (5th), AIOps (4th)

Mindshare comparison

As of February 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 New Relic is 4.0%, down from 7.6% 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 (%)
New Relic	4.0%
Honeycomb Enterprise	1.3%
Other	94.7%

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

BasilJiji

System Engineer at a retailer with 10,001+ employees

Real-time alerts have reduced server outage impact and support fast incident response

In the dashboard, if they could show a little more metrics regarding the application and related things, that would be how New Relic could be improved. Currently, there are things showing from the server level and application level, but it can be improved. That is what I felt. Regarding user interface, I do not feel much concern, but for some kind of issues when we are trying to get support from the New Relic team, their SLA seems to be long. They are taking seven to ten working days for resolving some kind of scenario or issue. That is a bit difficult for us. If they could improve the customer support by reducing their SLA within three to five days, if they could remediate everything, that will be so much helpful. When it comes to the customer support part, I felt they need to be a little more improved on that part. The support overall is good, but they can improve. That is the reason I have given it eight out of ten.

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

"It's very scalable since we used it for a really big organization and it worked."

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

"Honeycomb Enterprise has positively impacted our organization by providing live alerts."

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

"New Relic has positively impacted my organization regarding my main area of interest, which is performance tests, and by using New Relic, I received a lot of information to improve my systems."

"The API functionality allows us to get hit counts from external sources, such as APIs or databases, and everything is mapped very clearly."

"The most valuable feature is the ability to manage the application flow."

"The stability of New Relic APM is very good."

"The most valuable features of New Relic are the reports and ease of use."

"We like the performance of the product."

"The VPN is one of the solution's most valuable features for us."

"The breakdown of the response time of different components and getting in-depth details of the slow component are the most valuable features. It is easy to use, and it gets the job done."

More New Relic pros

Cons

"I rate Honeycomb Enterprise a seven out of ten because I feel a lot of the journeys could be made cleaner."

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

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

"However, the reason it's only five is because it's lagging behind in terms of AI-compatible features."

"The older view is much better than the new view that they have. We'd like to go back to that previous version. The user interface just isn't as nice as it used to be."

"Data Dog captures the entire session and then provides it as a video player path, which gives more insight into what the user was doing. It's pretty impressive. New Relic does that, yet it only captures using a couple of screenshots, which is not very detailed since you are unable to see the entire user flow."

"New Relic APM could improve error debugging and the correlation with the logs. We are receiving some alerts or alarms but we need to correlate with the error log, but it is difficult if it is more than seven months retention period, it is hard to trace. We need this especially for getting historical information."

"It is very difficult to award the service level cycles at an endpoint level."

"However, there could be problems or hiccups with the integration with Java-based services and microservices."

"I would like to have storage monitoring. E.g., being able to monitor SANS, specifically protocols, like NFS and CIFS metrics."

"New Relic can be improved in a few areas. I noticed that some things can be easily done through Splunk but not through New Relic."

"They could improve the education process and how people understand that these tools are very technical. Right now, if someone was to pick it up from day one, it is a very steep learning curve."

More New Relic cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"The solution is quite expensive. It costs around $5,000 a month. There aren't any additional costs above that."

"The new licensing model is great, as we pay for what we use (in computational units). However, the pricing is expensive compared to other tools."

"If I remember it correctly, the pricing was based on the core, and the monthly subscription used to cost us $1,500 or $2,000. We had pre-prod and production services. Costing was different for pre-prod and production. For pre-prod, it was 40% less than the production service cost. It was a combined package."

"I think the pricing is reasonable."

"I recommend using the free version of New Relic. If you like the free version and understand its importance for your company, you can move to the trial. Then, you can migrate to the paid version."

"The price of New Relic APM could be less expensive. We are using the New Relic APM pro account and it is more costly. When compared to competitors the solution's pricing should be much more realistic."

"We're paying for the New Relic APM license annually."

"Cost is significant with a lot of extras."

More New Relic pricing and cost advice

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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability solutions are best for your needs.

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

16%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	65
Midsize Enterprise	50
Large Enterprise	76

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Honeycomb.io?

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....

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...

Any advice about APM solutions?

There are many factors and we know little about your requirements (size of org, technology stack, management systems, the scope of implementation). Our goal was to consolidate APM and infra monitor...

What do you like most about New Relic Insights?

The product's initial setup phase was very easy.

What needs improvement with New Relic Insights?

When considering how New Relic can be improved, the only thing that could be a bit confusing is that there are many things in New Relic, and sometimes I need to know where to find some visualizatio...

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Product Reports

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

February 2026

Download Honeycomb Enterprise product report

Download New Relic product report

January 2026

Also Known As

Grit

New Relic Browser, New Relic Applied Intelligence, New Relic Insights, New Relic Synthetics, New Relic Servers, New Relic APM

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

New Relic offers real-time application monitoring and insight into performance bottlenecks. Its customizable dashboards and APM integration provide efficient operational support, while server performance alerts ensure quick issue detection.

New Relic provides comprehensive monitoring of application performance, tracking bottlenecks across databases and front-end components. Users employ it for server and infrastructure monitoring, as well as analyzing key metrics such as CPU and memory usage. The solution's ability to integrate with tools like PagerDuty enhances incident management capabilities. However, users have expressed a need for improvements in query language simplicity, more detailed historical insights, and better mobile app monitoring support.

What are New Relic's most important features?

Real-Time Monitoring: Provides instant visibility into application performance.
Detailed Transaction Tracing: Identifies specific transaction issues quickly.
Error Rate Tracking: Monitors and reports on error occurrences efficiently.
Customizable Dashboards: Tailors dashboard views for specific needs.
APM Integration: Seamlessly integrates with application performance management tools.

What benefits and ROI should be considered?

Operational Efficiency: Quick issue detection reduces downtime.
Improved Debugging: Enhanced error analysis supports rapid problem resolution.
Comprehensive Monitoring: Offers a holistic view of application performance and user behavior.
Incident Management: Integration with incident tools helps streamline responses.
Efficient Alerts: Rapid alert systems ensure timely notifications of issues.

In industries like e-commerce and financial services, New Relic supports application performance monitoring to enhance user experience and system reliability. Organizations leverage its insights for optimizing performance, particularly in server operations and infrastructure management. Its ability to monitor API failures through synthetic monitoring is crucial for maintaining high service levels.

Sample Customers

Clover Health, Eaze, Intercom, Fender

World Fuel Services, Verizon, FootLocker, McDonald's, Trainline, Mondia Media, Confused, Costa Coffee, Ryanair, Marks & Spencer, William Hill, Delivery Hero, Skyscanner, BASF, DAZN, Veygo, Virtuo, movingimage, talabat, Australia Post, Tokopedia, Seven Network, Virgin Australia, Zomato, BigBasket, Mercado Libre, Lending Club