Foglight for Databases vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server comparison

Quest Software and IDERA are both solutions in the Database Development and Management category. Quest Software is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.2, while IDERA is ranked #12 with an average rating of 7.0. Quest Software holds a 7.6% mindshare in DDM, compared to IDERA’s 4.3% mindshare. Additionally, 93% of Quest Software users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of IDERA users who would recommend it.

Foglight for Databases

Read 14 Foglight for Databases reviews

1,842 Views
1,824 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manage...

Read 9 IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server reviews

822 Views
608 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

Foglight for Databases

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manage...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 19, 2025

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager and Foglight for Databases compete in database management and performance monitoring. IDERA is preferred for cost-effectiveness and customer service, while Foglight is favored for its advanced features and long-term ROI.

Features: IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager provides real-time monitoring, customizable alerts, and performance diagnostics. Its ease of use is a significant advantage. Foglight for Databases offers cross-platform support, predictive analytics, and comprehensive performance insights, making it suitable for detailed performance analysis.

Room for Improvement: IDERA could enhance its depth of performance insights and increase cross-platform compatibility. Expanding predictive analytics capabilities would be beneficial. Foglight could improve its deployment complexity and streamline the user interface for better usability. Reducing the learning curve required for full feature utilization is another area for development.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager is recognized for its swift deployment and robust customer support during setup. Its straightforward configuration process is appreciated by users. Foglight requires a more complex deployment with extensive configuration, but this is balanced by thorough documentation and efficient customer service that addresses detailed inquiries effectively.

Pricing and ROI: IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager is valued for competitive setup costs and high ROI, being a cost-effective solution with comprehensive management tools. Foglight, despite its higher initial cost, delivers a compelling long-term ROI through its advanced analytics and in-depth database management. IDERA appeals to budget-focused buyers, while Foglight attracts those needing sophisticated performance insights.

To learn more, read our detailed Foglight for Databases vs. IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Foglight for Databases vs. IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

July 2025

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Helped 865,295 peers since 2012

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

Foglight for Databases

Ranking in Database Development and Management

2nd

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manage...

Ranking in Database Development and Management

12th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Event Monitoring (11th)

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Database Development and Management category, the mindshare of Foglight for Databases is 7.6%, up from 7.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server is 4.3%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Database Development and Management

Featured Reviews

Stuart Dairiki

Senior IT Manager at a wholesaler/distributor with 1,001-5,000 employees

Empowers efficient database monitoring and performance troubleshooting with powerful workload analysis

I find it extremely helpful to use Foglight to triage any database issues, specifically performance issues using what Foglight calls PI investigator. It is a very powerful workload analysis tool that helps me understand where bottlenecks are. It allows me to see performance issues as end users report them. It can save time and effort when doing root cause analysis. It enables me to obtain information quicker and easier compared to manually compiling it. Foglight provides us with a near-real-time activity database. It's not 100% real-time. It has less than a minute latency. It allows us to see performance issues as end-users report them. We started seeing benefits pretty much immediately. We use Foglight to display intensive databases. However, it's not something we monitor regularly. It's only something we kind of dig into as we troubleshoot and triage issues. It does help us determine potential IT help issues. When we use Foglight, we find it helps drill down holistically into potential bottlenecks. It helps us to see what is going on in the database. Foglight allows us to monitor multiple database platforms. We use, for example, Oracle, SQL Server, Postgres, Amazon Redshift, and SAP HANA. It gives us insight into our entire landscape of production workloads in near real-time. The solution saves costs when performing root cause analysis. It can save time and effort when doing root cause analysis. It allows us to obtain information quicker and easier than by manually compiling information.

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reviewer2317098

Assistant at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Offers effective monitoring of resources but lacks the ability to connect to an AWS instance and write custom queries.

We use it mainly for monitoring, including CPU, memory, and disk space, and for troubleshooting purposes We've set up alerts to notify us when performance deviates from the baseline we've configured for each resource. So, whenever that happens, we get an alert and can investigate immediately. So,…

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The PI module allows [my colleague] to identify which new indexes or modified indexes are going to make the biggest impact."

"The most valuable feature is the in-depth capability SQL Performance Investigator provides. It allows you to drill down to the smallest detail that occurs on our platform. It does a highly detailed and atomic follow-up of what one wants to look for in relation to time and our different instances."

"We went from basically 30% coverage of our production environment to 100% coverage."

"What I really like is the SQL PI feature, which allows us to drill down into queries and identify what is causing contention in the database. Using the SQL PI feature, I am able to drill down into the queries, see what is blocking, and try to improve it."

"It can save time and effort when doing root cause analysis. It enables me to obtain information quicker and easier compared to manually compiling it."

"The alarms alert proactively if there are any potential or ongoing issues with the databases that we support. That means we can take preventive or corrective action before the issue becomes a big issue. And the SQL PI features enable us to drill down into performance issues in our databases so that we can improve performance, which is important."

"Its reporting capabilities are immense."

"We can visualize all the different types of DB servers that we are monitoring in a single pane of glass. It uses a 360-degree overview of the database, for each of those databases that we are monitoring. That includes what kind of resource utilization is happening and what kind of DB parameters are getting monitored, as well as the different types of DB parameters that are being offered for each database type."

More Foglight for Databases pros

"Memory and CPU utilization features are good."

"We're able to diagnose issues prior to their actually becoming issues. Without the alerting, we wouldn't have a clue as to what was going to happen. With the alerting, it gives us a heads-up that a specific threshold has been met, and we need to take specific action."

"The ability to go back and look at historical data is the most valuable feature."

"The best part of SQL DM is the ability to customize alerts and counters. This allows our team to find an issue then alert on the issue at a granular level."

"Monitors and alerts on our mission critical instances in real-time on a 24/7 basis."

"SQL DM made troubleshooting much easier and allowed multiple people to look into an issue with confidence."

"The most valuable features are disk space projections for planning, and also the Snapshotting ability, to look back in time, to see what was going on the server at a particular time. It's basically the output of an sp_who2."

Cons

"The data model needs improvement when it comes to creating custom reports. That is an area where it needs a bit of improvement. Foglight gathers a lot of information around our databases as part of its monitoring. While I know all this information is in there, trying to pull the metric we want out for custom reports is sometimes hard to find. One nice thing about Foglight is that you can create custom dashboards, which you can easily convert to reports. We would be doing a lot more of that if it weren't for the challenging data model."

"I get a lot of alerts that, while important, are not critical. Then I have to dig in and figure out how to turn alerts off, but not the logging. I want to be able to go back, once we get the other big issues out of the way, and start fine-tuning some of those other areas, but I don't necessarily want to receive an email for all of them."

"I would like the rule development code to be made available so we don't always have to be referred to professional services for custom solutions. For example, if we want to exclude certain databases from a particular rule, we shouldn't have to go to support and to professional services for that solution. If the code and syntax were available, we have resources that could quickly turn something like that around."

"The version that I'm using is not the latest version, so there might have been some improvement, but the OS monitoring is a bit lacking, and the high-availability option is a bit complicated to set up and it doesn't work all the time."

"The system is not that stable. We have been facing a lot of issues. We built a new store environment of Foglight, an environment for monitoring the Lowe's store servers, which are all Db2 servers. The objective is to monitor 800 Db2 servers in each Foglight instance. Up to 150 Db2 servers, the environment was working fine. The moment it crossed 150 or 160, we started having a lot of stability issues."

"The monitoring capabilities for Postgres should be at par with SQL Server. This is the area where we push back on our Quest representative."

"It would be amazing if they could enable the "Performance Investigator" functionality across all database platforms."

"Better communication and alerts regarding the transaction logs getting full would also be beneficial. What I have noticed is that if the log files on the SQL server are full, we cannot log in and have to do some cleanup on the Foglight DB. It would be good if they could monitor that and alert us when it is getting too full."

More Foglight for Databases cons

"I would absolutely love to create customized dashboards but, unfortunately, they don't provide me the information that I need to create the report. The report I need is the detail or the transaction detail that's happening on those Snapshots. I'd like to be able to go back through time and search for things. I don't have that functionality, which is very disappointing. That's pretty bad and frustrating because I could query it and find out so much information about what's hitting my environment and when, but instead, they want control over it and to not give me that information. So it's encrypted. I can't pull it out and that is really bothersome."

"We don't find that it helps us with performance monitoring and diagnostics. We find that SentryOne does that better. Also, in terms of alerts, we had to customize them dramatically so that we didn't get alerted on every little thing."

"I'm going to do an upgrade which may resolve my issues, but one area for improvement is its ability to handle the amount of data that we collect with it. We're likely one of the largest installations, with over 300 servers being collected with this product, and sometimes there are gaps. That would really be my only concern, in terms of how the data is collected and stored, for consistency."

"The initial setup gives too many user rights to the server, so you have to put a user that is part administrator's group - that's the preferred way - on each server, which is kind of a risk. You want to do least privilege and you're not doing that."

"It would helpful if SQL DM could mark when changes are made within the program."

"They can improve checking the status of the CPU, memory, and IO utilization from each task."

"One thing I'd like to see is the ability to view the execution plan and have the system automatically recommend potential query optimizations, especially at the query level."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of Foglight could be a little more competitive in Chile, and it should be lowered for long-time customers— at least by 20 percent. Sometimes the price is a limitation. We have seven instances and nearly 5 million users. If Quest Foglight could reduce its prices for the clients that have been with it for a long time, we would be able to have more instances."

"It is cost-effective. With our EA, it is really based on the scale of our database environment. We found the Quest team to be reasonable and flexible when it comes to pricing and scaling of licenses."

"The price is worth it, if you have the time to go through the information."

"This is like the "Cadillac" of performance monitoring software. It's not cheap... I am currently with a company that I was able to convince that the product is worth the cost."

"Pricing is very reasonable. We were able to construct a pretty easy contract with Quest, who were very easy to work with and very amenable to what we are trying to do. It worked out well for us."

"Compared to the other tools on the market, Foglight is okay in terms of pricing and licensing."

"We were upgraded to Premium Support without their actually asking us, when we were quoted. Then I asked for Standard Support and that they had to re-quote us that. But they don't do that by default. They upcharge you by default, which I didn't think was very nice, without even asking."

"The pricing is reasonable, it's comparable with the competitors."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

13%

Government

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

11%

Comms Service Provider

Insurance Company

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Quest Foglight for Databases?

The pricing is palatable. We've already done one renewal and we are in our second contract. We're happy thus far.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Quest Foglight for Databases?

It would be amazing if they could enable the "Performance Investigator" functionality across all database platforms. I've been talking to their product development team about enhancements that I wo...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Quest Foglight for Databases?

I primarily use the solution for database monitoring, specifically for Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, Postgres, SAP HANA, and AWS Redshift.

See all answers

What do you like most about IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server?

The ability to go back and look at historical data is the most valuable feature.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server?

One thing I'd like to see is the ability to view the execution plan and have the system automatically recommend potential query optimizations, especially at the query level. In future releases, I w...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server?

We use it mainly for monitoring, including CPU, memory, and disk space, and for troubleshooting purposes.

See all answers

Comparisons

Spotlight vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 36% of the time

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 26% of the time

Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 9% of the time

Oracle Enterprise Manager vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 8% of the time

SQL Sentry vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 7% of the time

More Foglight for Databases Competitors

Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 34% of the time

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 26% of the time

SCOM vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 15% of the time

SQL Sentry vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 13% of the time

Spotlight vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 12% of the time

More IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Foglight for Databases

August 2025

Download Foglight for Databases product report

Buyer's Guide

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

August 2025

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server report

Download IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server product report

Also Known As

No data available

IDERA SQL DM, IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager

Overview

Foglight for Databases offers comprehensive monitoring with real-time activity screens and adaptive baselines. It provides a 360-degree overview and efficient UI, requiring no custom scripts, aiding in proactive issue identification and resolution before impacting end users.

Foglight for Databases is a robust tool for monitoring across multiple platforms, including SQL and Oracle. It provides features like the "Morning Coffee" dashboard and SQL Performance Investigator, enabling effective workload analysis and historical investigation. Despite some challenges with sluggish performance on large data volumes and excessive non-critical alerts, it remains a preferred choice for its ability to support proactive management and resource planning. Users appreciate its centralized view of extensive database systems, enabling swift detection and resolution of issues in real-time.

What are the key features?

Comprehensive Monitoring: Provides cross-platform real-time monitoring, ensuring effective database management.
Adaptive Baselines: Adjusts to various workloads, enhancing monitoring accuracy.
SQL Performance Investigator: Offers detailed workload analysis without server impact.
Proactive Alerts: Delivers timely notifications, aiding in immediate issue resolution.
Efficient UI: Streamlines user interaction, minimizing the need for custom scripts.

What benefits and ROI should be considered?

Time Saving: Reduces time in root cause analysis, enhancing productivity.
Proactive Management: Detects issues before they affect end users, minimizing downtime.
Resource Planning: Aids in effective allocation planning for enterprise and cloud platforms.

Foglight is extensively implemented in industries managing extensive database systems, handling numerous servers to ensure availability and performance. It assists businesses in resolving blocking and locking deadlocks, crucial for maintaining smooth operations in production and development environments.

Quest Software

SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server helps database administrators to find and fix SQL Server performance problems in physical, virtual, and cloud environments. Unlike its competition, it provides effective scalability, advanced SQL query analysis and optimization, prescriptive analysis with corrective SQL scripts, powerful automated alert responses, broad PowerShell integration, complete customization, and extensive support for current and legacy SQL Server and Windows.

IDERA

Sample Customers

CommitDBA

Padnos, University of Notre Dame, D4, Infeon Technologies, Chevron, LC Waikiki, Sisters of Saint Francis Health Services, Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, CVE, Colorado State University, St. Charles, Chaucer PLC, 1-800-Flowers, Ancoris, Money Management, National Opinion Research Center, California Department of Health, Plexus; Aviva, Burlington Northern Santa Fe, CBS, Comcast, Google, Merck, Regions Financial, Schneider Electric, Tata Consultancy Services, Verizon Communications, Zurich Financial Services

Buyer's Guide

Foglight for Databases vs. IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

July 2025

Free Report: Foglight for Databases vs. IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

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