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Microsoft Configuration Manager vs Pandora FMS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 16, 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

Microsoft Configuration Man...
Ranking in Server Monitoring
7th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
85
Ranking in other categories
Software Distribution (1st), Configuration Management (3rd), Patch Management (2nd)
Pandora FMS
Ranking in Server Monitoring
25th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (78th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (55th), Log Management (63rd), Cloud Monitoring Software (45th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of Microsoft Configuration Manager is 4.4%, down from 6.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pandora FMS is 1.5%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Monitoring Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Microsoft Configuration Manager4.4%
Pandora FMS1.5%
Other94.1%
Server Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

JunedBedrekar - PeerSpot reviewer
Expert at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Have effectively deployed patches and applications while integrating with cloud solutions
The features I find most valuable in Microsoft Configuration Manager are replication and scripting. If I want to get a fetch report for anything, such as hardware-related issues or group policy-related issues, I need to fetch the report by using SCCM's scripting language and remediation part. The inventory collection features of Microsoft Configuration Manager are good because we always prefer the inventory. We do it by using the script language. We use remote management capabilities in Microsoft Configuration Manager. Remote management capabilities are useful if the user is not providing access; we can use the backend users to update the group policy and sync the devices. These are the main features we require.
Gabriel Glusgold - PeerSpot reviewer
Asociado/ at Infraestructura Informática
Personalized metrics; simplicity of data
My primary use case for Pandora is monitoring This solution has helped us improve our organization by allowing us to create a lot of metrics on several platforms, including Windows, Linux, and Unix. We then use these Pandora metrics to create an interface. We then pass the interface off to the…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Valuable features include configurations enforcement, compliance data gathering, and deployment of a standardized OS."
"The product is very stable compared to older versions."
"It's helped us solve problems surrounding patching, installing, and reporting different patches, etc., on the virtual machines."
"We have found the scalability to be quite good."
"The tool's most valuable features include security updates and patch management, which are critical functions for maintaining security. The automated software distribution and the ability to manage deployments are also highly useful. Enforcing compliance with set policies on systems is another key functionality we leverage."
"I find the product valuable for deployment recovery and it has done much more than that."
"With the SCCM inventory, we found a lot of rogue applications. We were able to identify them, find out who was running them, and either put them on our application list or remove them."
"It does the job and meets our needs. With everybody working remotely these days, we are using this solution to deploy everything. The deployment of PCs is easy."
"This product has allowed us to identify and correct certain issues that were affecting our solution."
"Features I have found most valuable with Pandora are the personalized metrics and the simplicity of data."
"The network monitoring and configuration within this solution is very good."
"It is easy to create your own custom modules if you just know a little bit of scripting. If you have unique requirements, you can just make your own modules. You can even grab checks from other vendors. There are open-source checks for various things such as SMTP, etc. There is a long list of different ones from Nagios. You can just use them, and within seconds, you get yourself a check that is monitoring whatever you need. It is really flexible. I guess that's why they call it Pandora Flexible Monitoring System (FMS). It is reliable. It does the job, and it alerts. It is also surprisingly feature-rich. Our network guy just recently asked about a particular protocol to monitor the bandwidth on the network, which is not a common protocol. When I looked it up, and I found that they cover it. It is very mature for a not-so-known product."
"This solution has screens that are easy to understand and provide a wealth of information."
"The most valuable feature is that it is an all-in-one monitoring system."
"The monitoring system within this solution is very good. It is easy to use and navigate, and makes issue alarms easily viewable."
"Thanks to its flexibility, I have been able to adapt the tool to our servers and find out quickly how their console works."
 

Cons

"I want the system to provide some dependency relations. I would also like to see the relationship between different machines."
"The time the solution takes for updating systems could be quicker. For example, the system information status is not updating as it should. Additionally, the database synchronization querying is slow and could be improved."
"The main room for improvement is the on-screen display. I think it would be good if some improvements were made."
"The solution can be improved with the addition of a mobile device manager."
"The cost of the product can be improved."
"The solution is a bit heavy on the sources such as RAM or CPU and the software needs to be a bit lighter."
"Regarding this, I'd like to mention the agent situation. When the agent on an end-user device is not functioning correctly, it can be quite problematic. It would be highly beneficial if there were a self-healing mechanism in place. Essentially, if the agent becomes corrupted or encounters issues, it should be able to rectify itself autonomously. This is particularly critical because, in order to utilize a tool like MECM (assuming you're referring to Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager), we need to deploy agents, known as AsMs, on all the devices we use, such as Windows 10 or Windows Server. Sometimes, when we deploy configurations or updates, they don't apply properly due to agent issues. This issue has been present since we began using MECM around 23 years ago. Unfortunately, there is currently no built-in mechanism for the agent to detect its own problems and initiate self-repair. Microsoft doesn’t have any feature to scan vulnerabilities and hence, they could include those."
"Its dashboard can be improved and made a little bit better."
"Third-party integration should be improved for some commonly used products."
"I would like for the solution to be faster and have a better tolerance between parallel servers for Pandora and Pest Control."
"When it comes to the definition of local Software Agents for the first time in the open-source version, it can become very tedious."
"I would like to have a dashboard with all assets displayed, with a quick hover-over status."
"I find that this software is resource heavy, and demands a lot of processing capacity."
"We would like the real-time monitoring of an interface to be improved within this solution."
"Pandora FMS is relatively new, and the interface with the older version crashes at times. We have several different operating systems, such as Linux and Windows, and Pandora does not run as well in these."
"The product lacks APIs for integration with other systems."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"For enterprises, there is an annual license required to use this solution. The price of the solution could be cheaper. However, this is mostly because of the exchange rate from the dollar to the Nigerian currency."
"I would rate the cost as eight out of ten."
"The price is competitive and reasonable."
"Presently, I am using a free trial version."
"As far as I know, it is an annual operating expense license."
"The price of Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager is expensive."
"The solution operates on a licensing model that can be expensive."
"Along with buying a license for MECM, we also have to buy a service called CMG (Cloud Management Gateway) which is a virtual machine in the cloud with which you can link your MECM to the Azure tenant so as to manage teleworkers."
"They are very competitive on the pricing side. That's one reason why my manager keeps using it."
"My rule of thumb would be that if you need more than thirty agents, and you lack an automation tool such as Chef or Puppet, you will save a lot of time and money going to the Enterprise edition."
"You get the license and it includes updates, new versions, and access to the complete library of modules."
"Only one payment and it includes support, updates, new versions, and access to the complete library of plugins except for SAP and z/OS."
"The open-source version offers 100% functionality and the hardware requirements for a solution like this one are very modest."
"Pandora FMS is easy to implement and the pricing of licenses is competitive."
"In terms of money, the Enterprise version is the cheapest that I have found after a market study."
"Growing the solution or migrating to the Enterprise version is easy, and various plans are available."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
11%
Computer Software Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Government
10%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise64
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

How does Ansible compare to Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (SCCM)?
Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager takes knowledge and research to properly configure. The length of time that the set up will take depends on the kind of technical architecture that your org...
How to choose between ManageEngine Desktop Central and Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (formerly SCCM)?
ManageEngine Desktop Central is very easy to set up, is scalable, stable, and also has very good patch management. What I like most about ManageEngine is that I can log on to every PC very easily a...
What do you like most about SCCM?
One of the standout features of SCCM is its application management capabilities. It allows us to create packages efficiently and deploy them to specific groups within our network. This streamlined ...
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Also Known As

Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager, System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM ), Microsoft SMS
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bank Alfalah Ltd., Wªrth Handelsges.m.b.H, Dimension Data, Japan Business Systems, St. Lucie County Public Schools, MISC Berhad
Rakuten, Prosegur, Repsol, Teléfonica, Allianz, Ottawa Hospital, Hughes
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Configuration Manager vs. Pandora FMS and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.