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IBM Tivoli Composite Application Manager vs Splunk AppDynamics comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 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 Tivoli Composite Applic...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
55th
Average Rating
6.6
Reviews Sentiment
4.3
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Splunk AppDynamics
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
245
Ranking in other categories
IT Infrastructure Monitoring (4th), IT Operations Analytics (2nd), Mobile APM (2nd), Container Monitoring (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of IBM Tivoli Composite Application Manager is 0.2%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk AppDynamics is 4.8%, down from 6.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

CC
Integrates well with IBM technologies, but it's outdated and lacks essential features
Implementing synthetic monitoring for our Internet banking site has been challenging. The installation process is difficult, requiring continuous support and specialist expertise due to our limited knowledge of managing it effectively. I have concerns about the complexity of the tool and the challenges in managing it effectively. The support provided is not satisfactory, and the specialists available lack sufficient training and expertise in using the tool.
Muhammad Zeeshan Siddiqui - PeerSpot reviewer
Dynamic mapping enhances workflows that are user-friendly
One aspect that requires improvement is the agent. Without an agent, gathering sufficient information on applications is challenging. Additionally, the agent sometimes creates performance issues in production environments. If AppDynamics could develop a means to monitor without an agent, it could significantly improve application performance and reduce potential problems. Moving to an agentless solution, like what some competitors are doing, would be beneficial.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"IBM's main value lies in its integration with its own technologies, which can be seen as a benefit in environments where IBM products are extensively used."
"The solution is very stable. We never had any issues with stability."
"We are able to correlate performance between tiers."
"You have a live view of what happens when something goes wrong on the production or support side. You don't have to scramble and do guesswork. We can identify the query that creates the bottleneck or slows the performance of the database system. It can give you points on how to debug and fix the system."
"This solution gives us quite good insights that we might otherwise overlook, or it might take a really long time to debug those issues."
"The best features of AppDynamics would be the code application monitoring capabilities."
"The flow map is very valuable to us. Before we installed APM, we had no idea how our application looked."
"The most valuable aspect of the solution is the ability to discover and track transactions."
"The ability to check parameters for microservice applications is most valuable. It is important for me. I can manually create new business transactions for applications and individually monitor business transactions. I can also use a lot of extensions. It has a lot of extensions to monitor other third-party applications, such as NoSQL applications, memory cache applications, Kafka applications, and Couchbase applications. It is very useful. We are also using the end-user monitoring site to follow all end-user activities. It is important for us to check the errors on the customer site."
"We were able to correct problems, which led to an increase in availability, time savings, and performance for our solutions."
 

Cons

"The user interface was not good."
"The installation process is difficult, requiring continuous support and specialist expertise due to our limited knowledge of managing it effectively."
"I could not find a user-friendly interface for querying, and analytics sometimes gives the wrong results...I feel that analytics could have been better in searching and running the analytical queries."
"I have found it sometimes a bit difficult to trace the transaction all the way through to the application. I'm not sure if that problem is on the database side or on the application side, but that would be something that I would like to be improved. The traceability from the application to the database, sometimes, is a bit of a challenge. If you're using AppDynamics, with the Java agent, for instance, you need to be able to trace it through."
"AppDynamics Database Monitoring would be improved with more support for microservices architecture."
"I believe they need to increase their level of visibility in the infrastructure, particularly in the infrastructure monitoring section, which currently lacks visibility."
"Based on the user experience feedback that we have had, I think that the most important thing to improve is the availability of the SaaS, the cloud environment."
"SQL statement monitoring"
"An improvement could be if the monitoring was able to be summarized into something more clear and simple for people who don't have the technical skills on the database side."
"Their support should be improved. Clusters and monitoring can also be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I would rate the pricing a nine to ten. It is very expensive."
"My understanding is that the price of this solution is quite high, compared to other products."
"It could be a bit lower, but looking at the scalability, functionality, and other things, you can understand why AppDynamics is so expensive as compared to some of the cheaper products that don't have that full single pane of glass they've got. Dynatrace has got three different elements that you need to log into just to get a full view, which is not so good, and because of that, it is a bit cheaper."
"AppDynamics Browser Real-User Monitoring does have licensing cost associated with it."
"We have two different licensing models for this solution. One of them is the agent based model, which requires payment per agent. The other is an infrastructure based model, where the price is based on the CPU core. For the infrastructure model wholesale level pricing applies. All of the up to date licensing prices for this product are available on the manufacturers website."
"AppDynamics offers a yearly basis license."
"AppDynamics is what I would consider an enterprise-level solution. This means that it's a solution that is intended for use by larger organizations, while small or medium-sized businesses may find it difficult to afford. The number of agents required will also impact the pricing, and smaller companies may only be able to afford a limited number of agents. Essentially, the cost of the solution is not within the reach of every organization, and only some may be able to afford it."
"AppDynamics Server Monitoring is an expensive solution."
"The pricing for AppDynamics Server Monitoring in Africa and the Middle East is too expensive, so it's very hard to sell it to customers. If there could be different pricing or package for the region, that would be great. My company pays for the license of AppDynamics Server Monitoring on a per-agent, per-server basis. It's $700 to $1000 per server, and it's paid annually. My company is on a subscription model for the solution. On a scale of one to five, where one is expensive and five is cheap, my rating for the price of AppDynamics Server Monitoring is a two."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
41%
Computer Software Company
8%
Healthcare Company
7%
Government
7%
Educational Organization
49%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Tivoli Composite Application Manager?
IBM's main value lies in its integration with its own technologies, which can be seen as a benefit in environments where IBM products are extensively used.
What needs improvement with IBM Tivoli Composite Application Manager?
Implementing synthetic monitoring for our Internet banking site has been challenging. The installation process is difficult, requiring continuous support and specialist expertise due to our limited...
What advice do you have for others considering IBM Tivoli Composite Application Manager?
I would rate IBM Tivoli Composite Application Manager a six out of ten. The monitoring tool we currently use is outdated and lacks essential features for monitoring customer experience. We face lim...
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...
APM tools for a Managed Service Provider - Dynatrace vs. AppDynamics vs. Aternity vs. Ruxit
Hi Avi! It's great to see your thorough approach to selecting an APM package for your MSP company. Considering your focus on SMBs and enterprises in Israel, Dynatrace seems like a solid choice with...
 

Also Known As

Tivoli Composite Application Manager
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Michelin Tire Corp
Cisco, Sony, Nasdaq, Reserve Bank of New Zealand, Edmunds.com, Puma, Fox News, DirecTV, Pizza Hut, T-Systems, Cornell University, OpenTable, BITMARCK, Green Mountain Power, Care.com, Overstock, Paddy Power, eHarmony, Kraft, The Motley Fool, The Container Store, and more See more customers
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Tivoli Composite Application Manager vs. Splunk AppDynamics and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.