Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Icinga vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 6, 2024

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

Icinga
Ranking in Server Monitoring
13th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (20th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (28th), Cloud Monitoring Software (22nd)
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Server Monitoring
11th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.0
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (20th), Active Directory Management (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of Icinga is 8.6%, up from 7.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 2.5%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

Harrison Bulley - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable, scalable and cost-effective solution that helps with inbuilt scripts for easy modification
I think the software is quite good, but we have had problems with getting it to recognize certain areas and amend certain checks, where we needed so we would have to create backend scripts for those checks. Though, being open source, it has the support to create backend scripts, it would be better to have these scripts in-built.
VIVEK PATHAK - PeerSpot reviewer
Offering reasonably good dashboarding features but needs to improve the application performance monitoring
My company uses Riverbed for application performance monitoring. I was doing research so that I could understand if SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor provide APM capabilities similar to Riverbed, which allows our company to get a packet capture of an entire session, and on the basis of it, we look at the application performance monitoring part. With SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor, my company does SNMP polling, so it can drag an entire session, but it focuses more on availability, CPU memory, and server connection status. In Riverbed, my company catches an entire system, so when we deal with two applications, we have end-to-end app visibility. All the application monitoring happens through Riverbed. Our company's main problem is that, as of now, we have two different products in our organization, and we don't want to continue with the multiple products currently. I wanted to understand if SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor already have capabilities like Riverbed, and if they do, then I wanted to figure out why our company should not go with SolarWinds and why we are using products from multiple vendors. My company needs to continue with either Riverbed or SolarWinds. I wanted to see which products are good for the organization and how much I want to continue with Riverbed.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"An affordable solution for small organizations to do basic network monitoring."
"The ability to customize scripts and build your own queries to request information from the infrastructure elements you want to monitor. This level of personalization and customization is highly appreciated."
"Icinga has multiple automation and integration features. There is an API for everything and a web UI for configurations. The APIs enable you to automate tasks in Icinga. We can also use plugins to talk to the API. The Icinga Director talks to a database in the background, and you can import settings from the CMDB to all systems in Icinga."
"There's a module called Icinga Director, which helps us configure the product using an intuitive interface through clicks instead of creating a text configuration. It's very helpful for us."
"I like the ability to amend and adjust things really easily, which is useful in a case where you could make it auto-discover and then set a template to say all of these applications or servers under this template have an automatic threshold set that you’d set up manually."
"We have found the solution to be stable."
"The apply rules feature saves a lot of time."
"The value of Icinga is that it has hundreds of plugins, so it's really easy to monitor pretty much anything."
"One of the most valuable features are the reports. They're pretty good. Also, the ease of installation and customization for the client is another feature that we value. SolarWinds has a lot of features but these are the ones I like the most. We also like that the KPIs have the ability to be preset."
"SolarWinds SAM has significantly improved our workflow by allowing us to develop a comprehensive knowledge base of known errors and automate responses to specific alerts."
"The more valuable feature of this solution is the Exchange feature."
"The component and cable monitoring are good. SolarWinds is more intuitive and user-friendly than AppDynamics. The AppDynamics console is more complex because it's a more feature-rich solution, so it's not easy for somebody to pick it up."
"I'd rate technical support at eight out of ten. They are helpful and fast."
"The product integrates with Remedy."
"Hardware health: It allows for proactive monitoring of the hardware health and is a game changer."
"This product can monitor application environments no matter where they reside and provides capabilities for deep insight into infrastructure."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvement in multi-tenancy. It's not perfect, not even really good. It's average, but it should be improved."
"The user interface should be improved."
"The installation and configuration are very complex."
"I think the software is quite good, but we have had problems with getting it to recognize certain areas and amend certain checks, where we needed so we would have to create backend scripts for those checks. Though, being open source, it has the support to create backend scripts, it would be better to have these scripts in-built."
"We have found some problems with Nagios, and support isn't very responsive."
"At this time, the layout of the website is a bit difficult. It should be more user-friendly for changing the background and logos."
"It needs Trap SNMP. I saw the documentation for Zabbix, that it has its own built-in product which handles SNMP traps, and there's nothing similar in Icinga or Nagios. I think this feature is most important for me."
"Icinga’s automation could be improved."
"For each poller, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor can only monitor up to ten thousand components, which restricts scalability."
"Reporting is the only thing with which we currently have challenges. They have this in two ways. There is the report writer, which is the backend, and we also have web reports, which are on the console. So, they have removed the report writer for the backend reports, and we are making use of the web console, but most of the users are not finding it very interesting to use the frontend reports. I would like them to bring back the report writer. That's the key area within it to improve on the reporting. If they can bring back the report writer, then most users will actually be comfortable. I have some customers who are trying to export their report to an Excel format, but it is not possible because they said any report that has been done from the web console cannot be exported to Excel, but most of the customers need to export their reports to Excel. That's one area they need to work on."
"Nodes in Azure are able to be monitored with the use of agents, but this does not apply to cloud service offerings that are not node based."
"It lacks a user experience for measuring things like the end-to-end time for which a user waits for a specific response in the system. In the application layer, it has some very basic stuff. You have to build your own with manuscripts and things like that."
"I think they need to make reporting easier and more simple & dynamic."
"Solarwinds should come up the same monitoring system for other certificate expiration alert apart from SSL."
"It needs time-based functions for monitoring. Some things need to be polled on a specific schedule or only during a specific window."
"One area that could benefit from improvement is its performance"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's an open-source solution."
"The product is inexpensive compared to other DBM products."
"This is an open-source solution with paid support."
"The solution is free to use."
"Even though Icinga's financial cost is low, it is an expensive product regarding the resources required to maintain and operate it."
"It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low."
"The solution is cheap."
"We're using the free version of Icinga."
"Understanding the counts of objects to monitor will determine the licensing need. In terms of pricing, it’s not cheap but it’s not expensive as larger vendors whose products don’t have all the features or integrations."
"I would rate the pricing for this solution a three out of five."
"I would advise potential buyers to wait until the end of the quarter, end of year, or other time to place orders. There are actually great deals to be had at those times if your budget cycle can match up."
"I think SolarWinds' pricing is very decent compared to other competitors in the market."
"Pricing is inexpensive, starting at 2440 euros. For that, you get the ability to monitor a couple of nodes and one year of maintenance and support."
"The tool is available for my company at a good price point."
"The solution is overpriced in terms of application management."
"We are on an annual license to use the solution. The price of the solution is expensive. The price is based on a bunch of factors, such as the number of engines and elements."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Server Monitoring solutions are best for your needs.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Icinga?
The best thing about the solution is how it highlights errors, the issues, and what needs my attention. The solution directs me to areas that I should look for first.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Icinga?
It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low. If you want to include this product in the services you offer to your customers, the return on i...
What needs improvement with Icinga?
There is room for improvement in multi-tenancy. It's not perfect, not even really good. It's average, but it should be improved. For instance, multi-tenancy for monitoring the virtual infrastructur...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
There are no specific features or functionality I would like to see improved or enhanced in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor at this time. I have not encountered any missing features or fu...
 

Also Known As

Icinga Cloud Monitoring
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Puppet Labs, Audi, Spacex, Debian, Snapdeal, McGill, RIPE Network Coordination Centre
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about Icinga vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.