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Meraki Dashboard vs SolarWinds NPM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 27, 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

Meraki Dashboard
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
19th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
56
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolarWinds NPM
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
159
Ranking in other categories
IT Infrastructure Monitoring (4th), Cloud Monitoring Software (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Meraki Dashboard is 1.1%, down from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds NPM is 4.4%, down from 5.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Bilal-Ahmed - PeerSpot reviewer
Seamless connectivity and comprehensive control over network devices
All of the features we are looking for are already in control. I think those features, which we are not currently utilizing, are already there. For example, the control for the cameras and everything else. The cameras are not connected through Meraki, but all other devices are on Meraki networks.
Masud Alam - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers alerting service to trigger alerts and easy to manage
For end-user performance monitoring, we like features such as availability of our all devices and device/interface monitoring. We have also used NCM (Network Configuration Manager) for our network. We use the alerting service to trigger alerts based on specific thresholds, like CPU or memory utilization exceeding a certain percentage. There are AI network initiatives in SolarWinds NPM for some lengthy issues. For example, it shows availability reports. But for bandwidth monitoring, it's not very clear how much bandwidth is being consumed. SolarWinds provide real-time bandwidth monitoring. It is not difficult to manage the network with SolarWinds. We have one customer with a satellite location. If we have a large network with, let's say, 43,000 elements, and our current SolarWinds license supports only 30,000, we would need to create another polling engine to accommodate the additional 13,000 elements. It's limited to the polling engine, so we can only support 30,000 elements per engine. So it's only for 30,000, but we have at least 40,000 elements in our network.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I like that Meraki Dashboard is a user-friendly product."
"The ability to view the entire project stack, including the camera, features, and routers, which I believe are the most important or relevant components."
"Everything is in a single pane and you can look at your network in one centralized place."
"The initial setup process is quite simple."
"The most valuable feature is the single pane of glass that gives you multisite visibility."
"The most valuable feature is knowing the wireless and switch are healthy."
"We like how Meraki Dashboard lets you manage all the devices in a single pane of glass. The dashboard is intuitive and easy to use. They are constantly updating the functionality. Switches from other vendors have the same features for the life of the device, but Meraki is always improving."
"For us, it serves as a single pane of glass."
"SolarWinds NPM has specific modules for monitoring different network capabilities, which provides rich features for carrying out specific tasks."
"The most valuable features in SolarWinds NPM are the network search and diagnostic tools."
"Monitoring capabilities are at a high level and it is easy to see utilization, access ports, and CPU memory in real time or through a lens for long-term visualization."
"Being able to easily, and quickly obtain disc space statistics from servers and determine how much was free or used on various volumes."
"The stability is fantastic."
"I like SolarWinds support because it's 24/7. You describe your issues, your situation and maybe two or three hours later you can discuss a solution with a technical engineer."
"The product is scalable."
"It did a good job of the collection and then an investigation of the net flow of information for understanding the applications that were being used at certain locations."
 

Cons

"It would be nicer if the dashboard was lighter."
"The price could be lower because the license for access points is expensive."
"It is not appropriate for large, enterprise businesses."
"One area that could use improvement in the Meraki Dashboard is user-friendliness when navigating to port configurations."
"You can't really clone or replicate a device, that sort of feature would be useful. You can clone the site but you cannot clone the device."
"In general, how I add firewall rules is not great. It is just a little bit too simple the way it is right now."
"The tool is useful for managing devices and monitoring their current state, but it falls short in troubleshooting network issues, particularly with access points. It does not provide a complete understanding of the root causes of the issues. As a result, network engineers have had to use additional tools to complement it and conduct assessments. The only way to improve the tool would be to enhance its capability to identify and resolve network issues effectively."
"Lacks an alert notification when there are IP or DNS issues."
"I would like to see integration with antivirus or other security endpoint solutions."
"The market is changing, and people are expecting automation. I think that's a disadvantage."
"The console could be more user-friendly. It would be better if SolarWinds updated the user interface."
"The product is scalable, but at a cost. Extra modules have to be purchased for each extra server. The initial set up isn't complex, but will require someone who is experienced with the network monitoring system"
"GUI needs improvement with a more graphical dashboard."
"One of the challenges with SolarWinds is that in order to pull the data, we have to have a lot of false positives."
"The solution needs to integrate with additional SDN technologies that are part of the hyper market."
"It has covered everything, so no improvement is required at their end. The only thing is the price."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is currently the most expensive on the market."
"The pricing for a small setup is only a few hundred dollars a year. The fee is subscription-based."
"Licensing for Meraki Dashboard is paid every year, and it's on a per-device model that costs roughly $300 to $400 per device, but that comes with full support and troubleshooting, etc. Compared to similar products, Meraki Dashboard is quite high-end, but the costs you pay are all-in."
"You don't have to pay for the dashboard."
"Licensing is around under 1000 pounds. The licensing is either one year, three years, five years or ten years and during the licensing, we can choose to renew it per year or per every three years. We've got a license for three years. It's about 160 or about 200 pounds each."
"Meraki Dashboard's pricing is reasonable. It is sold yearly, typically for one, three, or five years. I rate its pricing a five out of ten."
"The licensing fees are $180 USD, per AP, for three years."
"It is said to be expensive."
"The cost is based on the number of nodes, so it is expensive when you have a lot of them."
"There's standard licensing, and then it depends on the size of the customer."
"You have to license it per year, for the support. You don't really need to have support once you've already set it up. Once you install SolarWinds, you can skip on the licensing. It will still work."
"Most of the licenses are perpetual, and the annual maintenance charges are not high."
"Some solutions are open source and free."
"Our customer reports that the solution is somewhat costly and licensing is a bit complicated."
"SolarWinds NPM is very expensive, and we pay ten thousand yearly."
"Price could be improved on"
report
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Comparison Review

it_user174738 - PeerSpot reviewer
May 31, 2015
Nagios vs. Zabbix vs. PRTG vs. Spiceworks vs. Solarwinds Network Performance Monitor
I have researched a quite a few network monitoring tools which can be used for various monitoring purposes of not only the servers, but the intermediate routers as well. There are majorly three types of these softwares. Ones which are completely open-source, you can do almost anything you want…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Educational Organization
7%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Meraki Dashboard?
We greatly utilize the network because we can plug it into the DNS, VPN, or equipment. It's very good. Meraki Dashboard enhances wireless network management. We appreciate its flexibility, as it al...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Meraki Dashboard?
The cost of the Meraki solution is high, which may not be affordable for smaller companies, especially in developing countries.
What needs improvement with Meraki Dashboard?
The aspect I find challenging about this solution is that it is too extensive and complex. For example, when comparing Meraki Dashboard to Juniper Mist, the latter is quite simple. Mist is a very a...
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
It actually depends on the exact purpose or kind of devices (network devices, servers, something else). Some tools are better for only network devices while others are better for a cloud monitoring...
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
We are partners with SolarWinds and we sell a lot of Network management to large enterprises also because of scalability, products like Network Performance Monitor & Netflow Traffic Analyzer ar...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Solarwinds Network Performance Monitor, SolarWinds Network Bandwidth Analyzer
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Coop eG, Peet's Coffee & Tea, Priefert Manufacturing, Century Care Management, Clifton College, Zürs Ski Resort, Capital FM Arena, MAXI Autohöfe
Microsoft, Federal Express, Hewlett-Packard, and MasterCard
Find out what your peers are saying about Meraki Dashboard vs. SolarWinds NPM and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.