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SCOM vs WhatsUp Gold comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 10, 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

SCOM
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
15th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
83
Ranking in other categories
Event Monitoring (5th)
WhatsUp Gold
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
30th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (29th), Server Monitoring (16th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (29th), Configuration Management (19th), Log Management (31st), Cloud Monitoring Software (24th), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of SCOM is 1.4%, down from 2.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WhatsUp Gold is 1.5%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
SCOM1.4%
WhatsUp Gold1.5%
Other97.1%
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

AK
Assistant Manager at SMS group GmbH
Have integrated effective monitoring and seamless alerting with improved visualization capabilities
The most valuable feature of SCOM is its monitoring capability, and we have integrated SCOM with Grafana, which is a dashboarding tool. We have implemented and integrated this to create dashboarding of the SCOM monitoring system for the database, SQL, and the Linux servers we have configured in SCOM. We have created separate dashboarding for it, and the monitoring and creating rules and monitors in the management servers and management packs that SCOM provides are very useful for us. The alerting mechanism of SCOM has benefited our operations because we have modified the thresholds as per our internal requirements. We have configured threshold modifications for the CPU, memory, and especially for disk space. For routine disk space usage on the system, we have provided a separate threshold configuration.
EC
Technical Manager at Quan Hung Gourmet
Efficient monitoring with detailed customization, yet complexity remains
The best feature of WhatsUp Gold is the automatic generation of topology and its integration with virtualization and wireless. I have used the automated device discovery with this topology feature. The interactive map feature helps me manage the topology because sometimes we cannot draw the topology correctly, so we need to manually edit the connections. The alerting system is very tunable and customizable, but it's a little complicated to use. Many customers cannot manage it by themselves and need support from us, the provider. We always use the dashboards in the SOC, where we constantly display a dashboard or multiple dashboards. This allows us to know immediately if the connection or bandwidth is full or if the connection is broken.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We are able to do problem determination on runaway processes."
"The solution has improved our overrides and the ability to start services if they're stopped."
"SCOM provides alerting capabilities and threshold settings, which are helpful for monitoring."
"This solution helps our application teams by allowing them to drill further into issues and perform a root cause analysis."
"The inbuilt management pack that Microsoft provides is really helpful. I know it's a mature product, and they keep upgrading the management pack."
"It works better than other products I’ve used – namely SolarWinds, which is cumbersome and error prone for web app monitoring. SCOM is not."
"It discovers the components automatically, which is a fantastic thing. The discovery works in an automatic way, and it has a dynamic way of discovering the components, assets, and applications. It doesn't require any manual intervention."
"I enjoy its integration with the Microsoft Active Directory functions, which means users, computers, or other group policies can connect with Windows Active Directory."
"The most important features of WhatsUp Gold are the server health and uptime it provides. Additionally, WhatsUp Gold is a Windows-based solution which is a benefit."
"The user interface is good enough."
"The threshold alerting is the most valuable feature."
"The solution effectively monitors network devices and servers."
"The most valuable feature is the monitoring of resources."
"The most valuable features are network bandwidth monitoring and monitoring device health."
"Auto scanning is most valuable. It looks for rogue devices on your network."
"It handles the basics of monitoring."
 

Cons

"Stability and some performance issues exist and they need improvement."
"SCOM is not as straightforward in terms of user interface or general experience, which could be improved."
"I would like to see them improve their network monitoring."
"Regarding certain issues in the solution, it can be difficult to generate reports if we have a program that is not user-friendly for reporting. While this is not necessarily negative, we may need to use another solution."
"There could be more integration of SIM in the solution."
"Then there is also an issue with capacity and limited space. That is something that needs to be improved."
"It lacks certain details that other products do better, like granular access and better application monitoring."
"They could provide better dashboards, detailed logs, and reports crucial for monitoring services in real-time."
"The pricing for this solution has gone up quite recently, which has led some of our customers to buy an alternative product."
"You have to invest a few days to become an expert in this solution."
"One of the biggest things that made us start to look at another product is we're not able to have an end to end monitoring from a user perspective throughout the system and back to the user. All the monitoring is from inside out, we need something that also can give us from outside in."
"I would like to see them do an enhancement to the application monitoring. A lot of other products do better application monitoring so they should do some improvements to the application monitoring."
"Regional product team support is not very good."
"Integrations with other devices. I want to have a product that has full integration with my active directory so I can track user activity. I want to track my complete user activity, so I'm looking for a product to implement in the near future, which will have full integration with my network and active directory users. It became very difficult to track user activity."
"I think there are a few bugs now. Although they give some resolution for this, we cannot share the network remotely because of our company policy."
"Adding on services increases the cost and on the version we have there is no option for ATM monitoring."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is more expensive than the competition."
"I don't know the exact cost because it's managed by our sales team, but Microsoft is on the higher side."
"There is a license needed to use this solution and it is paid annually."
"Our licensing fees are approximately $30 per user, per month."
"The platform is cost-effective due to our existing Microsoft support."
"If you have a Microsoft Enterprise Agreement, then this is part of the agreement."
"The pricing is good, and it's part of their system center suite."
"We have an enterprise agreement that includes this product as part of it."
"This is a well priced solution."
"The most valuable feature is the cost compared to other solutions."
"I'm not sure, but it's expensive. We don't pay any additional fees."
"There is a license needed to use WhatsUp Gold."
"The tool's price is reasonable. WhatsUp Gold is cheaper than SolarWinds."
"There are some subscription charges that are quite heavy. I need to pay for support every year and these charges can be quite expensive. Aside from the initial cost for the tool, you need to pay additionally for support."
"The price of WhatsUp Gold is good."
"The pricing can be on the expensive side when considering competing products."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Government
11%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise22
Large Enterprise54
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SCOM?
The tool helps to monitor Windows servers. It offers alerts from a central location.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SCOM?
I am not aware of the exact pricing as it is managed by my supervisor. As an academic institution, we receive substantial discounts.
What needs improvement with SCOM?
We believe that the dashboarding in SCOM needs to be improved or enhanced because it is not too expressive in reporting. We can work on deploying new ways of viewing things and modifying visualizat...
What do you like most about WhatsUp Gold?
The interactive mapping interface for scrolling, zooming, and drilling down on an element to learn about a network issue is good. When we see a network there will sometimes be a spot that has one l...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for WhatsUp Gold?
Clients find the licensing calculator confusing, but we simplify this for them by collecting relevant information first. The licensing is based on devices, providing better cost-effectiveness than ...
What needs improvement with WhatsUp Gold?
It would be great if WhatsUp Gold could add features that simplify management with AI, as it is currently too complicated to manage.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

System Center Operations Manager, SCOM 2012
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Dialog Telekom
Artoni Trasporti, Austin Independent School District, Banca Marche, Burke County North Carolina, Cambridge University School of Clinical Medicine, Clayco, Community Integrated Care, Desca, Deutsche Bergbau, Flexi-Van, Gropper, Hamleys, Hammonds Furniture, Knowledge IT, Idras S.P.A., Sibeg, Swann Engineering, Trivium Lindenhof
Find out what your peers are saying about SCOM vs. WhatsUp Gold and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.