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IBM Security QRadar vs Security Onion comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 6, 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

IBM Security QRadar
Ranking in Log Management
5th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
209
Ranking in other categories
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (4th), User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (1st), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (15th), Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (4th), Managed Detection and Response (MDR) (9th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (13th)
Security Onion
Ranking in Log Management
21st
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.5
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
AWS Marketplace (13th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of IBM Security QRadar is 3.6%, down from 4.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Security Onion is 5.0%, up from 4.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Log Management
 

Featured Reviews

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.
Jörg Kippe - PeerSpot reviewer
A mature and affordable solution that is easy to install and easy to update
The product takes time to learn, it's not that easy. In the beginning we had a lot of questions. If you want to use such a tool in an real (industrial) environment, you have to ask how to get the network data. Can we do a full packet capture? Can we provide agents to our end systems? There are no simple solutions to these questions. It's a general problem when running such systems in an industrial environment.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The threat protection network is the most valuable feature, because when you get an offense, you can actually trace it back to where it originated from, how it originated, and why."
"The feature that I have found most valuable is its artificial intelligence component, Watson. Its contribution is pretty good from a machine-learning artificial intelligence perspective. This compliments the orchestration automation component, as well."
"The interface is good."
"The threat hunting capabilities in general are great."
"The rule engine is very easy to use — very flexible."
"This solution has excellent security analytics."
"It is a very optimized engine."
"I am generally satisfied with the product."
"The most valuable feature of Security Onion for security monitoring is its ability to find infected ports."
"We use Security Onion for internal vulnerability assessment."
"Security Onion is the most mature solution in the market."
 

Cons

"The technical support can be improved a little bit, and the price could be cheaper."
"The pricing of the solution is a bit high. If they could lower it, that would be ideal."
"The solution is difficult to understand in the beginning and has complex management configurations that can be improved."
"The product needs to improve its GUI."
"For future updates, I'd like to see more advanced threat intelligence features integrated with AI. This would help with analyzing traffic patterns and improving protection. QRadar currently doesn't integrate with AI for threat analysis. However, AI could enhance its capabilities by learning traffic patterns and automatically blocking or quarantining suspicious traffic. This would be especially useful when administrators are not actively monitoring. AI could help by analyzing incoming and outgoing traffic and adjusting policies accordingly."
"The custom rules could be simplified more or it should be possible to use a different language, other than the ones that the solution is already using. They should add other languages into the mix."
"They should provide more manual examples online so that I can learn it myself."
"QVM is another instance where they need to revise the vulnerability scoring and the proper remediation details."
"Security Onion's user interface could be improved."
"The initial setup of the solution is a little bit difficult."
"The product is not easy to learn."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"IBM QRadar is a little bit expensive compared to other products."
"The license is not subscription-based."
"There are different types of subscriptions available. We were on an annual subscription, but our customers typically choose the two years subscription option."
"Licensing can be costly depending on your architecture."
"They can give us some scalability and flexibility on pricing. If its pricing can be reduced, it would help a lot of customers in bringing in a new SIEM environment and grow business in the market. If I start a license today and take around 10,000 EPS, and after a month, there is an increase in the number of clients on my platform, I can increase the number of licenses. I can add 5,000 EPS on a yearly basis."
"It is costlier as compared to the other alternatives available in the market."
"It would be great if this product were cheaper."
"The licensing is also overly complex, as there is a need to buy the work load performance monitoring separately."
"Security Onion is an open-source solution."
"Security Onion is a free solution."
"It is an open-source solution."
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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Log Management solutions are best for your needs.
860,592 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

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%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
11%
University
11%
Government
11%
Comms Service Provider
11%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

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.
What do you like most about Security Onion?
The most valuable feature of Security Onion for security monitoring is its ability to find infected ports.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Security Onion?
Security Onion is an open-source solution. On a scale from one to ten, where ten is expensive and one is cheap, I rate the solution's pricing a six out of ten.
What needs improvement with Security Onion?
The initial setup of the solution is a little bit difficult.
 

Also Known As

IBM QRadar, QRadar SIEM, QRadar UBA, QRadar on Cloud, IBM QRadar Advisor with Watson
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Clients across multiple industries, such as energy, financial, retail, healthcare, government, communications, and education use QRadar.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Security QRadar vs. Security Onion and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
860,592 professionals have used our research since 2012.