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ManageEngine ADAudit Plus vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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

ManageEngine ADAudit Plus
Ranking in Active Directory Management
5th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Active Directory Management
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (19th), Server Monitoring (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Active Directory Management category, the mindshare of ManageEngine ADAudit Plus is 7.4%, down from 11.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 3.2%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Active Directory Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
ManageEngine ADAudit Plus7.4%
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor3.2%
Other89.4%
Active Directory Management
 

Featured Reviews

Karthik G - PeerSpot reviewer
Enterprise Pre-sales Specialist at a manufacturing company with 51-200 employees
Has enabled detailed auditing of sensitive changes across directory and file systems
The key functionalities of ManageEngine ADAudit Plus are primarily Active Directory reporting, where we create the whole user life cycle management, such as when users are created, who created them, when users are deleted, what group memberships changed, and not just for users, but for all Active Directory objects, users, computers, groups, and group policies. All changes are recorded immediately in real-time and reported for forensic analysis of incidents including who created them, what exactly changed, and what were the old and new values for the attributes. In case of a ransomware attack on a particular server, we can check what process created the files and what files have changed, even with features such as attack surface analyzer that help administrators see what's happening in their local Active Directory regarding password attacks. ManageEngine ADAudit Plus provides real-time tracking capabilities through agent installation, which works in real-time to collect information and immediately alerts if anything matches the defined conditions in the application.
NikhilKalwint - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Specialist at ServiceIO
Monitoring over a thousand systems has improved decision making and operational visibility
From an advantage perspective, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is comparatively cheaper from a commercial point of view. It is easy to install and configure, very user-friendly, and quick to get up and running, allowing you to see the early value adds in your organization. It is compatible with most technologies for monitoring with very few chances of incompatibility. Configuration also allows us to monitor all the technical parameters we are looking for, making it a very good experience for us. The alerting feature in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is a main advantage, as it alerts based on threshold breaches and can raise tickets to the ticketing system, send SMS, and email notifications, allowing engineers to work on those tickets to resolve issues and avoid further impact. The visibility into server health is a beneficial feature that I am utilizing. We widely use various application performance metrics in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor such as database monitoring and server monitoring, which are quite good enough for any monitoring solution. We utilize the customizable dashboards in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The documentation for this solution is good."
"The product's initial setup phase is very easy."
"ADAudit saves you the expense of hiring an outside auditor for compliance with regulations like PCI DSS or PCA."
"The most valuable feature of ManageEngine ADAudit Plus is its reports."
"It is not saving me money, but it is making me compliant."
"ManageEngine ADAudit Plus provides real-time tracking capabilities through agent installation, which works in real-time to collect information and immediately alerts if anything matches the defined conditions in the application."
"It assists in managing the active directory and modifying the reintegrated GPOs."
"I rate this ten out of ten."
"The product integrates with Remedy."
"I am impressed with the tool's AppStack feature which mainly helps us in the identification process. This feature can give an overview of the fault and help us identify the issues for performance degradation. Instead of looking at multiple places, we can look at a single place to identify the issues."
"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."
"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."
"I adore the NTA module that provides deep details on ingress/egress traffic for any interface. With a few clicks, you can correlate who is accessing what and when, beside the bandwidth consuming applications/users."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its interface, which is used for monitoring."
"Extremely user friendly: Any IT professional can learn how to admin NPM in a short time."
"This product can monitor application environments no matter where they reside and provides capabilities for deep insight into infrastructure."
 

Cons

"Some features require more external integration."
"The return on investment for ManageEngine ADAudit Plus is very hard to measure."
"There are so many reports that it sometimes makes it difficult to navigate to what you need."
"The solution should include more details on file creation and modification. It also needs to have a quick message for troubleshooting problems which needs to be detailed and generic."
"ADAudit could have a more sophisticated interface design. They are using a plain UI, which is decent. However, customers have said that it looks a little flat compared to other vendors. It's not fancy."
"From the complexity part, I have some challenges with editing the Group Policy."
"One problem with ADAudit is that it has too many configurations to apply to the active directory server, which makes it difficult to use."
"The solution's managing file server activity could be improved."
"The major concern in the product revolves around application performance monitoring since end-to-end application monitoring is not possible with the tool."
"PerfStack can be made more effective."
"Reporting is the only thing with which we currently have challenges."
"SolarWinds' interface is slow, and this is a global concern."
"The setup was complex. We had local support to assist us."
"Currently SolarWinds SAM offers AppInsight for modern versions of: IIS, Exchange, SQL Server. They have shown to be powerful and insightful tools. However, AppInsight needs to be offered for more applications: Citrix, SharePoint, AX, etc."
"In terms of the dashboards on offer, they should work to improve them. The types of dashboards that you get in terms of the graphs on offer aren't ideal right now."
"Mapping interactions between systems."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Adding features and other functionality it costs you more. Also, the first installation costs an additional amount."
"My guess is that it was around $4,000 or $5,000 a year, and we bought a license, and then we have maintenance fees. I'm not 100% sure how that worked out."
"ADAudit Plus's pricing is affordable and flexible, with very low prices in the market."
"The tool is affordable, and our company is very happy with it. If ten is the most expensive and one is the least expensive, I rate the tool a three or four."
"It's a medium-priced solution."
"The solution's pricing is acceptable."
"Price can always be lower. It is neither on the expensive side nor on the cheap side. We have worked with them for a lot of years, so we get a discount due to the size of the installation."
"Nagios XI, WhatsUpGold, Uptime Software, PRTG, Manage Engine, and SpiceWorks are the other tools that have lower pricing and licensing costs. However, they can't compete with SolarWinds when it comes to the features and functionality that SolarWinds can provide."
"Its licensing is on a yearly basis. It is just the standard price, but it can vary depending on the current rate of the dollar."
"The price is too high."
"I like the pricing for this SolarWinds product."
"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."
"The product might cost you $30,000 USD to buy, but scaling this solution requires the purchase of additional polling engines at $20,000 USD each."
"The tool is available for my company at a good price point."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Healthcare Company
7%
Educational Organization
13%
University
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with ManageEngine ADAudit Plus?
An area of improvement for ManageEngine ADAudit Plus could be in graphical reporting, as currently, it's limited with old school bar charts, and having more interactive reports with a better graphi...
What is your primary use case for ManageEngine ADAudit Plus?
The main use case for ManageEngine ADAudit Plus is primarily focused on auditing, so any changes related to Active Directory or Azure Intra ID or even file servers, such as file monitoring, are imm...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
There is definitely room for improvement besides simplifying its setup. As a non-technical person, I believe the dashboards could be improved. Everything we use appears on video walls, and we need ...
What is your primary use case for SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
I am doing research as we currently have both solutions, and I am looking to see if we need both or can manage with one. Currently, the outcome indicates that we need both. The focus point is diffe...
 

Also Known As

No data available
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Warsaw City Hall, Acument Global Technologies, Inc., Cosma International, Bank of South Pacific, Life Management Center, Central Bank, UncleBob's Self Storage, Leeds Building Society, California Transplant Donor Network, First Response, Blessing Hospital, Northern Land Council, RMK Marine
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about ManageEngine ADAudit Plus vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
909,563 professionals have used our research since 2012.