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OP5 Monitor vs SolarWinds NPM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 9, 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

OP5 Monitor
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
38th
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
38th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolarWinds NPM
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
4th
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
158
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Monitoring Software (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of OP5 Monitor is 0.7%, down from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds NPM is 4.7%, down from 5.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Harish Venkateshappa - PeerSpot reviewer
Useful online resources, customizable, and highly effective monitoring
The solution is useful for tweaking. However, there have been some negative experiences, such as limited report capabilities. The only report available is in PDF format, making it difficult for teams managing multiple servers to extract data in Excel format. The speaker recommends that the team improve the report capabilities to better serve users. If there are corrupt files the data can be extracted from them. Anyone who wants to see the performance of memory usage, such as whether it's at 80 to 90 percent, can use this tool. However, other tools can provide this information in two minutes, this tool is more time-consuming and the report it provides is not very effective for practical use. When it comes to reports, the tool falls short. During a recent call, it was noted that while the company has distributed servers across the globe, only the master server can accommodate the reports and events, causing delays. If other servers experience issues, the team cannot view the reporting or tag things, such as for troubleshooting purposes. If this aspect was improved it would be an excellent tool.
MohitKumar - PeerSpot reviewer
High-level, comprehensive, and proactive monitoring in a user-friendly interface
The solution needs to integrate with additional SDN technologies that are part of the hyper market. The solution supports many vendors by default and just included Meraki SDN with the new release, but continued expansion is important. We created a custom method to pair with unsupported vendors but that can produce a lag in performance so future releases should expand SDN support. The solution does a good job of automating features but could expand that even more.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It monitors and continuously tests everything that is of importance to you and your users. It could be everything from monitoring disk space to CPU usage to memory. It could include determining if the response time in your e-commerce platform is quick enough, or whether you have too many bounces from some of the pages on your website. You want to monitor anything that could cost you money or time or resources. You can do that with this system. It's very flexible."
"With limited hardware or a virtual machine, you can address a huge network, hundreds of thousands of elements that need to be monitored. Other commercial software is not on that level."
"We can also observe whatever we want, and there are no limitations."
"The API makes it pretty easy to integrate with any system."
"The best feature is that it is very relatable, stable, and scalable. The logger is a part of the software, but it's not the most important point of it."
"OP5 Monitor is a great choice due to its being built on an open-source monitoring tool and provides ample opportunity for customization based on specific support requirements. It is also user-friendly and easy to manage with a wide range of plugins available for use. In comparison to other enterprise tools, such as Micro Focus, OP5 Monitor stands out for its features and cost-effectiveness, making it the best tool in the market. Customization is one of the key strengths of the tool and provides a lot of capabilities. Additionally, it is easy to find support and plugins for the tool through online resources."
"What I've found most valuable about the solution is that it's scalable."
"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."
"Reporting tools are a great feature along with the ability to create customized reports for you"
"There are a lot of valuable features with SolarWinds NPM. We can receive a lot of detailed data from the monitoring that can use useful for investigations, especially when you are troubleshooting. It is very helpful. Overall it was a very good experience."
"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."
"You can monitor performance counters effortlessly."
"The most valuable feature is the way it monitors the environment, and how user-friendly the console is for the end-user. The interface is also very easy and it captures all the information very well."
"SolarWinds dashboard is very fast. Also, their interface is very good, it looks very user-friendly. The product allows me to see a summary of the network being monitored at a glance."
 

Cons

"The solution is useful for tweaking. However, there have been some negative experiences, such as limited report capabilities. The only report available is in PDF format, making it difficult for teams managing multiple servers to extract data in Excel format. The speaker recommends that the team improve the report capabilities to better serve users."
"They need to improve the dashboard interface."
"We do not get performance reports properly."
"OP5 lacks some visualization, a feature that makes some other products nice. Op5 is built for purpose, which is fine, but if you compare it with some new products, the visualization is not so appealing, especially for management... If you don't need fancy visualizations, OP5 is fine."
"IT environments today are in constant flux. This is driven by the newer cloud technologies such as Kubernetes and Docker, etc. The whole Nagios-based monitoring system that OP5 is created on top of, is based on a host-service model. There is a need for a strategy on what to do with more dynamic environments. There is some cool stuff going on in that direction."
"The user interface is not what we are used to these days, and should be improved."
"The integration needs to be improved."
"We decided that we were no longer going to trust that their products have not been capitalized."
"The initial setup of SolarWinds NPM is complex, and I find it challenging."
"The interface could be made more user-friendly."
"The only real caveat that we have or that I have an issue with is when I go on vacation, it's a little hard for me to go and modify alerts so that I don't get alerted about things when I'm on vacation."
"The console could be more user-friendly. It would be better if SolarWinds updated the user interface."
"It would be nice if SolarWinds could have a polling engine on the site that would collect the reporting and then manage everything itself."
"It has covered everything, so no improvement is required at their end. The only thing is the price."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost of the license and support are separate. If you want platinum call support, it will cost more than a regular call. I did not opt for it, as it is an additional cost."
"OP5 has a very low price as a solution, compared to many other solutions out there."
"It was not expensive. And because it's less demanding in terms of hardware, you don't have to pay for another SQL or other database license, and you can have a huge installation on one machine..."
"SolarWinds NPM is very expensive, and we pay ten thousand yearly."
"The pricing needs to be improved. It is too high. One full engine costs around $10 000, which is why we don't have high availability right now."
"The solution can become very expensive and commercially not viable in countries, such as India."
"The standard licensing fees are what we're paying. It's about $20,000 a year for all our licensing."
"The pricing is very expensive for SolarWinds. That's a huge disadvantage for it."
"Excluding the costs of running VMs and physical blade servers, our licensing costs run around US$200,000/year for over 60 polling engines."
"It is relatively inexpensive compared to other products in the same category."
"It is not an expensive product."
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
Government
16%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Aerospace/Defense Firm
8%
Educational Organization
57%
Computer Software Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Financial Services Firm
4%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about OP5 Monitor?
With limited hardware or a virtual machine, you can address a huge network, hundreds of thousands of elements that need to be monitored. Other commercial software is not on that level.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for OP5 Monitor?
Licensing is done yearly, or you can pay for a longer period. It was not expensive. And because it's less demanding in terms of hardware, you don't have to pay for another SQL or other database lic...
What needs improvement with OP5 Monitor?
It's always good when it's open to more platforms, with even more integration, especially ticketing solutions like ServiceNow. I have built integrations with some other tools, so this is a point fo...
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...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

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

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Svenska Spel, Carus, VGL, Tele2, Viking Line, Clas Ohlson, Vanderlande, Försäkringskassan
Microsoft, Federal Express, Hewlett-Packard, and MasterCard
Find out what your peers are saying about OP5 Monitor vs. SolarWinds NPM and other solutions. Updated: February 2025.
845,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.