SolarWinds Virtualization Manager vs VMware Aria Operations comparison

SolarWinds and Broadcom are both solutions in the Virtualization Management Tools category. SolarWinds is ranked #7, while Broadcom is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.6. SolarWinds holds a 11.5% mindshare in VM, compared to Broadcom’s 25.2% mindshare. Additionally, 71% of SolarWinds users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Broadcom users who would recommend it.

SolarWinds Virtualization M...

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864 Comparison Views

71% willing to recommend

VMware Aria Operations

Read 376 VMware Aria Operations reviews

9,256 Views
3,795 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

SolarWinds Virtualization M...

VMware Aria Operations

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 13, 2024

VMware Aria Operations and SolarWinds Virtualization Manager compete in the virtualization management space. VMware Aria Operations is favored for its integration and analytics capabilities, while SolarWinds Virtualization Manager stands out for its ease of use and specialized virtualization features.

Features: VMware Aria Operations provides robust performance optimization, automation features, and dynamic threshold monitoring that leverages historical data to set performance baselines. Its integration with multiple cloud platforms offers unified visibility and advanced predictive analytics for capacity management. SolarWinds Virtualization Manager delivers simplicity in virtual machine performance insights, capacity planning tools, and customizable dashboards, making it efficient for targeted virtualization management.

Room for Improvement: VMware Aria Operations could enhance its user interface for easier navigation and reduce deployment complexity, especially for smaller organizations. It also requires improvement in reporting granularity. SolarWinds Virtualization Manager could benefit from deeper integration with third-party tools, more comprehensive analytics, and broader support for heterogeneous virtual environments.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: VMware Aria Operations requires meticulous planning but provides extensive resources and customer support for complex environments. SolarWinds Virtualization Manager is quicker to deploy with an emphasis on user-friendliness, offering efficient customer support specifically tailored for virtualization concerns.

Pricing and ROI: VMware Aria Operations, while potentially entailing higher setup costs, offers substantial ROI for businesses requiring broad IT management functionalities. SolarWinds Virtualization Manager presents a cost-effective solution with solid ROI for enterprises primarily focused on virtualization management, valued for its affordability and efficiency.

To learn more, read our detailed SolarWinds Virtualization Manager vs. VMware Aria Operations Report (Updated: March 2026).

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Virtualization Manager vs. VMware Aria Operations

March 2026

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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

SolarWinds Virtualization M...

Ranking in Virtualization Management Tools

7th

Average Rating

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

VMware Aria Operations

Ranking in Virtualization Management Tools

1st

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

376

Ranking in other categories

Cloud Management (2nd)

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Virtualization Management Tools category, the mindshare of SolarWinds Virtualization Manager is 11.5%, up from 9.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Aria Operations is 25.2%, down from 33.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Virtualization Management Tools Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
VMware Aria Operations	25.2%
SolarWinds Virtualization Manager	11.5%
Other	63.3%

Virtualization Management Tools

Featured Reviews

Ravi Khanchandani

Founder Director at Techsa Services

Optimizing virtual environments by reclaiming and allocating resources efficiently

SolarWinds Virtualization Manager optimizes VM performance and virtualization. It provides me with recommendations for resource allocation, indicating if a virtual machine is under-provisioned or over-provisioned. This allows me to reclaim resources, such as reducing the number of CPU cores or RAM, which is beneficial. Its capacity planning feature is also very useful for me. The GUI is highly simplified, cutting across various virtualization platforms, including VMware, Hyper-V, and Nutanix environments.

Read full review

AldoDomini

Senior System Network Analyst at Net spa

Have faced limitations due to high costs but have maintained reliability over time

The primary issue is the pricing, which is very expensive for my company's budget. We cannot afford to pay such a large fee. We are not Microsoft or BMW; we are a small company. As a small company, I have no power to negotiate directly with VMware. Perhaps larger companies have more opportunity to contract directly with VMware, but I do not have that leverage. The only path I can follow is to change solutions. Net.spA is a company working in the field of waste management. We are not a technological company, so we do not have a large margin to justify purchasing and maintaining the VMware infrastructure at current costs.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"SolarWinds Virtualization Manager optimizes VM performance and virtualization."

"Virtualization manager’s cost analysis comparison report identified areas in which specific customers were being grossly undercharged for their resource consumption levels, as compared to rates available through AWS."

"SolarWinds Virtualization Manager optimizes VM performance and virtualization."

"The most valuable features of SolarWinds Virtualization Manager are the non-Windows servers' monitoring and capacity planning."

"SolarWinds Virtualization Manager is a great tool that is easy to use...It is a stable solution."

"Like most organizations, our training budgets are tight. Without an intuitive product like vROps, we wouldn't be able to get the insight that we do into our environment on a day-to-day basis."

"The automation brings insight into how we will grow. I can look at it, then make my recommendations on what equipment we need to do for the next fiscal year."

"The system dashboards allow us to drill down into systems and find how they are talking to each other. They allow us to fix issues quickly and easily for the end user."

"vRealize has products created especially for virtualized infrastructure by VMware. Its main features are great."

"We have all the information that we need in one place and don't have to search for our monitoring tools everywhere."

"Its job automation features and reporting capabilities are unique and valuable."

"It has helped us reduce the time it takes to troubleshoot issues."

"The main point of installing, deploying, and troubleshooting with vRealize Operations is to provide visual dashboards to ensure that the entire workload is functioning properly."

More VMware Aria Operations pros

Cons

"The problem or issue with the product is related to its pricing."

"The SolarWinds Virtualization Manager platform in general can have a better response time in the performance."

"SolarWinds needs to support integration with other virtualization platforms like KVM or Linux-based systems."

"Out of the box support for a wider array of hardware vendor/device-specific SNMP mibs could be improved upon."

"It is sometimes quite hard to use. If I need details, there is a huge amount of information that I need to review. It isn't a three-click solution."

"The VMware Aria Operations solution is a very technical product and is not for everyone. As a top-of-the-chain VMware tool, it is only normal that it has a learning curve. While the UI has been improved, it may still be difficult for some users. The solution has a lot of functionality and can monitor all areas of infrastructure, such as storage and network."

"It does the functions that we need it to. Although we do have some issues from time to time. We're looking for more maturity out of the product but it's getting better with every release."

"We would like the default views on the reports for this solution to be improved; at present we have to customize the view before use."

"A lot of feedback that we're getting from some of our engineers who are actually using Operations today is that the graphics are very low-key. When it comes to red, yellow, green, yes, "Skittles Theory," but when it actually comes down to what's optimized and what's not optimized, it's very rudimentary. If they could actually make nicer pie charts or graphics involved in it, it would make it a lot easier to read the data on a higher level, rather than actually having to dive down and know specifically what you're looking at."

"Enhancing automation features without interruption would be beneficial."

"They should include an integration feature through which we can connect to different vendors by installing a small plugin."

"The room for improvement is in the definition of the metrics. There are millions of metrics inside the solution, but there is no documentation from VMware for what those exact metrics are. That is a trouble point at times."

More VMware Aria Operations cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The is an annual subscription needed to use this solution."

"The maintenance and support are a part of the package, meaning it is included in the product's price."

"The solution requires an annual license which is very expensive."

"Most small users don't adopt VMware Aria Operations until it's necessary. Small businesses are looking for it, too. We need more monitoring and insights, so we're analyzing solutions to help us out here. I rate the solution’s pricing a five out of ten."

"The predictive analysis of the infrastructure helps our customers to reduce downtime and improve capacity planning. Issues are fixed faster with vROps."

"If the VMs were trimmed, then we wouldn't have to buy as much software/hardware, and this means less licenses. While most of it is VMware licenses, which are relatively cheap, there are SQL licenses for Microsoft, and this is where we could start saving a lot of money."

"In terms of the pricing for VMware vRealize Operations (vROps), I can't remember exactly how much it costs, but it was included in the VMware vSphere enterprise plus licensing package my company paid for."

"As we continue to implement it across multiple environments, it reduces costs as well."

"It is an affordable solution that doesn't require any additional costs."

"I would like to see a free offering. Cost is always a factor in any sort of line. Obviously, the value added is there and it's worth it."

More VMware Aria Operations pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

13%

Non Profit

10%

Government

Healthcare Company

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Marketing Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	2
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	3

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	65
Midsize Enterprise	62
Large Enterprise	278

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Virtualization Manager?

This solution delivers significant cost savings, especially from a capacity perspective. Consistent monitoring is essential in a virtualization environment, and Virtualization Manager, or VMAN as i...

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What needs improvement with SolarWinds Virtualization Manager?

SolarWinds needs to support integration with other virtualization platforms like KVM or Linux-based systems.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for SolarWinds Virtualization Manager?

We predominantly work with financial organizations such as large banks, stock exchanges, and insurance companies, as well as IT-enabled services (ITES). I use SolarWinds Virtualization Manager at o...

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What's the difference between VMware vRA (automation) and vROps (operations)?

vROP is a virtualization management solution from VMWare. It is efficient and easy to manage. You can find anything you need from the software interface. It provides complete visibility over applic...

See all answers

Is VMware Aria Operations a user friendly solution?

In terms of user-friendliness, VMware Aria Operations is one of the best solutions out there. It is not overly complex to set up and you can rely on the technical support to provide you with assis...

See all answers

What is the most useful new feature of VMware Aria Operations?

For me, the alerts features are the most unique part of this product, no matter the current name it uses. When they introduced the new version of VMware Aria Operations, they also introduced more a...

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Comparisons

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Compared 12% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

Savision Cloud Reporter vs SolarWinds Virtualization Manager

Compared 8% of the time

Dell OpenManage Integration for VMware vCenter vs SolarWinds Virtualization Manager

Compared 8% of the time

IBM Turbonomic vs SolarWinds Virtualization Manager

Compared 5% of the time

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VMware Aria Automation vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 9% of the time

IBM Turbonomic vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 7% of the time

Nutanix Cloud Manager (NCM) vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 5% of the time

Nutanix Prism vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 5% of the time

Veeam Data Platform vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 4% of the time

More VMware Aria Operations Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Virtualization Management Tools

March 2026

SolarWinds Virtualization Manager report

Download SolarWinds Virtualization Manager product report

Buyer's Guide

VMware Aria Operations

February 2026

Download VMware Aria Operations product report

Also Known As

SolarWinds VMAN

VMware vRealize Operations (vROps), vCenter Operations Manager (VCOPS)

Overview

SolarWinds Virtualization Manager reduces downtime by 53% and time spent troubleshooting by 59%. Analyze and remediate VM performance problems by viewing active, critical, and warning issues in your environment.

SolarWinds

VMware Aria Operations is a high-ranking virtualization management and cloud management tool that automates and simplifies IT management to the applications it supports. It achieves this through full-stack visibility from physical, virtual, and cloud infrastructure. The product allows users to enable self-driving IT operations management across private, hybrid, and multi-cloud environments. This is conducted with the unified operations platform that delivers continuous performance, capacity and cost optimization, and integrated compliance through artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), and predictive analytics.

VMware Aria Operations Use Cases

VMware Aria Operations has several use cases, some of which include:

Continuous performance optimization: VMware Aria Operations allows users to assure application performance at a minimal cost, facilitated by real-time predictive analytics and artificial intelligence. The product can be used to automatically balance workloads, improve consolidation rations, optimize and rightsize workloads, and avoid contention.
Capacity and cost management: VMware Aria Operations can be utilized to reduce cost and improve efficiency with real-time ML-based capacity and cost analytics. The solution uses these tools to visualize cost savings opportunities and accelerate decision-making.
Intelligent remediation: This product can also be used to predict, prevent, and troubleshoot issues with actionable insights. Through other VMware integrations, users can streamline and centralize IT operations.
Integrated compliance: The solution can be utilized to reduce risk and enforce IT regulatory standards for VMware Cloud through integrated compliance and automated drift remediation.

VMware Aria Operations Features

The product has various features which users can utilize. Several of the features that the 2022 version of VMware Aria Operations introduced include:

Management pack builder: This feature is a no-code solution that allows users to expand their operations visibility to anywhere they wish. The builder allows users to connect to a data source using an HTTP or Amazon AWS data source, as well as to make API calls, create objects, and build out relationships with other objects in the product.
Public cloud basic actions: This is a set of features that allows VMware Aria Operations users to initiate actions automatically via the product's UI for AWS, Microsoft Azure, or GCP CE instances.
Rule-based application discovery: Through this new feature of the product, users can easily discover multiple applications running in all or specific areas of infrastructure and view associated resources. This can be achieved through simple user-defined rules, including discovering applications based on tags, object names, and properties.
Aria Operations capacity management: This feature allows organizations to view the results of what-if analysis based on their allocation model and specify business hours for capacity calculations.
Alerts: This is a set of features that include components called Conditions and Symptoms, which are used to alert different types of issues on the platform.
User access management: Through this feature, users can benefit from improved ways to configure in VMware Aria Operations with the introduction of scopes.
Support for raw device mapping storage: This feature allows users to get configuration details about their raw device mapping (RDM), such as disk sharing, compatibility mode, and SCSI Bus Sharing.

VMware Aria Operations Benefits

VMware Aria Operations brings various benefits to the organizations using it. Among them are the following:

The product helps organizations reduce unplanned downtime and maximize return on investment (ROI) in hybrid and multi-cloud environments.
VMware Aria Operations simplifies management for hybrid clouds from migration assessments.
Users can benefit from an accelerated journey to VMware Cloud on AWS through this solution.
The product can be delivered on premises or as a service, providing flexibility for its users.
VMware Aria Operations can increase operational efficiency through monitoring and management features.
The solution accelerates decision-making through detailed cost analytics, which is visualized for users' convenience.
VMware Aria Operations allows users to both utilize standard compliance templates and create their own custom ones.

Reviews from Real Users

Mohamed N., a tech lead VMware support engineer at a tech services company, appreciates VMware Aria Operations because it is easy to use, stable, and support is always available.

Mojtaba K., a senior system administrator at a comms service provider, values VMware Aria Operations due to the fact that its dashboards give you a glimpse of what is really going on in your virtualized environment.

Broadcom

Sample Customers

Elliot Health System

Science Applications International Corporation, Tribune Media, Heartland Payment Systems, Telkom Indonesia, Columbia Sportswear, iGATE, CSS Corp, Angel Broking, Adira Finance, Hipskind, Beiersdorf Shared Services, Innovate Mas Indonesia, Adobe, Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi , Join Experience S.A, Borusan Holdings, Department of Transport - Abu Dhabi

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Virtualization Manager vs. VMware Aria Operations

March 2026

Free Report: SolarWinds Virtualization Manager vs. VMware Aria Operations

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