Splunk Observability Cloud vs Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) comparison

Splunk and Zscaler are both solutions in the Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM) category. Splunk is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.3, while Zscaler is ranked #9 with an average rating of 7.0. Splunk holds a 4.9% mindshare in DEM, compared to Zscaler’s 9.3% mindshare. Additionally, 94% of Splunk users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Zscaler users who would recommend it.

Splunk Observability Cloud

Read 78 Splunk Observability Cloud reviews

8,968 Views
628 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

Zscaler Digital Experience ...

Read 2 Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) reviews

800 Views
800 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Splunk Observability Cloud

Zscaler Digital Experience ...

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 28, 2025

Splunk Observability Cloud and Zscaler Digital Experience compete in IT operations, focusing on performance monitoring and digital experience management. Splunk holds an advantage in pricing and support, while Zscaler excels with detailed digital experience metrics.

Features: Splunk Observability Cloud offers comprehensive monitoring capabilities, real-time data analysis, and the ability to handle vast volumes of data across various IT assets. Zscaler Digital Experience provides in-depth user experience analytics, a focus on end-user connectivity, and application delivery performance.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Splunk Observability Cloud provides a straightforward deployment process with extensive customer support, facilitating fast and efficient scaling. Zscaler Digital Experience, despite potentially complex deployment, offers detailed guidance and responsive customer service, emphasizing configuration for optimal performance.

Pricing and ROI: Splunk Observability Cloud is perceived as more cost-effective with competitive pricing structures that lead to faster ROI due to efficient deployment and support. Zscaler Digital Experience, with potentially higher initial setup costs, delivers long-term value through enhanced digital experience capabilities, justifying the investment for some.

To learn more, read our detailed Splunk Observability Cloud vs. Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) Report (Updated: December 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Splunk Observability Cloud vs. Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)

December 2025

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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

Splunk Observability Cloud

Ranking in Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM)

2nd

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (7th), Network Monitoring Software (7th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (7th), Cloud Monitoring Software (6th), Container Management (6th)

Zscaler Digital Experience ...

Ranking in Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM)

9th

Average Rating

7.0

Reviews Sentiment

4.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM) category, the mindshare of Splunk Observability Cloud is 4.9%, up from 3.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) is 9.3%, up from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Splunk Observability Cloud	4.9%
Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)	9.3%
Other	85.8%

Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM)

Featured Reviews

Taiwo Ige

IT Operations Engineer at ABC Supply Co. Inc.

Alerting improves incident response across teams and enables faster awareness before customer impact

Splunk Observability Cloud could be improved in terms of integrations with more technical add-ons, such as Zoom. Although they have one with Zoom, it's not available in the cloud, so having that feature would be beneficial. Essentially, Splunk should continue expanding to create easier ways to ingest logs from different products. The out-of-the-box customizable dashboards in Splunk Observability Cloud are very effective in showcasing IT performance to business leaders. However, there are aspects that could be improved, such as linking dashboards to one another. While IT leaders may not drill down, it's crucial to create levels of dashboards for technical users to find root causes, making it effective for stakeholders.

Read full review

Chella Chalapathi

Senior Technical Program Manager at Infosys

Offers steady access and reliable support but could benefit from better integration and user-friendly insights

Regarding future updates, I would like to see Zscaler prioritize pricing and integrate more with multiple products. Multiple integrations with various platforms would enable some sort of automation. Zscaler provides real-time insights, but it is not reaching the end users properly, which is something Zscaler should improve because it should be user-friendly for understanding what Zscaler is offering. When there is too much technology, people cannot understand it, so it should be very simplified, and there should be some ways for users to gain knowledge about the product themselves. Zscaler's ability to analyze millions of telemetry data points in real-time is still somewhat unclear to me; perhaps that level of knowledge has not been reached by me or the end users, indicating that Zscaler has to focus on that area.

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

"It has been beneficial for our IT infrastructure."

"The ability to create custom dashboards is one of the best features and that's typically why most people deploy Splunk. Users can create dashboards for just about anything."

"Splunk Infrastructure Monitoring provided our customers with visibility into their overall infrastructure."

"Initially, before Splunk, we had a long time to resolve issues. Now, with Splunk Observability Cloud, we will be able to solve them quickly and know exactly where the issue is."

"The features of Splunk Observability Cloud that I prefer the most are its all-encompassing licensing model, which is comparatively better than others in the market."

"I have definitely seen a return on investment with Splunk Observability Cloud, particularly through how fast it has grown and how comfortable other teams are in relying on its outputs for monitoring and observability."

"Splunk has drawn our attention to how the network is running. If there are alarms on things that are not functioning, it gives us early warning on problems that could arise."

"Splunk Observability Cloud scales with the growing needs of my organization effectively."

More Splunk Observability Cloud pros

"Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) positively impacted my organization by providing Zero Trust Network Access, which many organizations are moving towards."

"Regarding the benefits of Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)'s traffic analysis for my IT operations, I believe it greatly supports our needs."

Cons

"The user interface of Splunk Observability Cloud needs a lot of work."

"We still use Splunk Enterprise licensing. A lot of the newer features go into Splunk Cloud before Enterprise. We're not looking to switch our licensing over, so we're falling behind on the newer features."

"We currently lack log analysis capabilities in Splunk APM."

"I would like to see an improvement and some innovation in the customer interface."

"The UI enhancements could be a way to improve the solution in the future."

"They can improve the flow system and the keyword language. It has predefined keywords, but they can be improved."

"There is room for improvement in the alerting system, which is complicated and has less documentation available."

"There is room for improvement in customer support due to delays and standard feedback responses."

More Splunk Observability Cloud cons

"I have noticed drawbacks within Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX), as the sales team is too arrogant and too aggressive, playing politics, but the product itself is very good."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is reasonable."

"Splunk's infrastructure monitoring costs can be high because our billing is based on data volume measured in terabytes, rather than the number of devices being monitored."

"Splunk Infrastructure Monitoring is an expensive solution."

"It is expensive."

"Licensing cost is the biggest argument I get from those divesting from Splunk. There are those within our organization who say we are going to go to other tools since Splunk is too expensive."

"Splunk offers a 14-day free trial and after that, we have to pay but the cost is reasonable."

"It appears to be expensive compared to competitors."

"Splunk APM is a very cost-efficient solution."

More Splunk Observability Cloud pricing and cost advice

Information not available

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

Manufacturing Company

11%

Healthcare Company

Financial Services Firm

Insurance Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	20
Midsize Enterprise	10
Large Enterprise	50

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SignalFx?

The most valuable feature is dashboard creation.

See all answers

What needs improvement with SignalFx?

Regarding dashboard customization, while Splunk has many dashboard building options, customers sometimes need to create specific dashboards, particularly for applicative metrics such as Java and pr...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for SignalFx?

The solution involves observability in general, such as Application Performance Monitoring, and generally addresses digital applications, web applications, sites, and mobile applications. I worked ...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)?

Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) is comparatively an expensive product. There will not be any cost reductions since it is a new and better secured product. The issue arises when any organization wa...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)?

I have noticed drawbacks within Zscaler, as the sales team is too aggressive bypassing partners, but the product itself is very good. The sales approach is quite aggressive globally, and it is not ...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)?

I am still working with Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX), and I continue to search for good solutions in the market as an architect.

See all answers

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Compared 2% of the time

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Compared 2% of the time

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Compared 2% of the time

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ThousandEyes vs Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)

Compared 35% of the time

Nexthink vs Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)

Compared 19% of the time

ControlUp vs Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)

Compared 12% of the time

SysTrack vs Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)

Compared 10% of the time

Alluvio Aternity vs Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)

Compared 4% of the time

More Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Splunk Observability Cloud

January 2026

Download Splunk Observability Cloud product report

Buyer's Guide

Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM)

January 2026

Download Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) product report

Also Known As

Splunk Infrastructure Monitoring, Splunk Real User Monitoring (RUM), Splunk Synthetic Monitoring

No data available

Overview

Splunk Observability Cloud offers sophisticated log searching, data integration, and customizable dashboards. With rapid deployment and ease of use, this cloud service enhances monitoring capabilities across IT infrastructures for comprehensive end-to-end visibility.

Focused on enhancing performance management and security, Splunk Observability Cloud supports environments through its data visualization and analysis tools. Users appreciate its robust application performance monitoring and troubleshooting insights. However, improvements in integrations, interface customization, scalability, and automation are needed. Users find value in its capabilities for infrastructure and network monitoring, as well as log analytics, albeit cost considerations and better documentation are desired. Enhancements in real-time monitoring and network protection are also noted as areas for development.

What are the key features?

Log Searching: Efficiently search and analyze logs from various sources.
Data Integration: Seamlessly integrate with multiple environments.
Dashboard Customization: Tailor dashboards to specific monitoring needs.
Monitoring Capabilities: Provides comprehensive insights into application performance.
Security Features: Analyze and address security threats across systems.
Visualization Tools: Enhance data analysis and system performance optimization.

Why consider this for ROI?

Comprehensive Visibility: Gain complete insights into IT infrastructure.
Performance Optimization: Improve overall system performance and efficiency.
Rapid Deployment: Quick setup to meet organization demands swiftly.
Enhanced Security: Strengthen security measures through detailed analytics.

In industries, Splunk Observability Cloud is implemented for security management by analyzing logs from detection systems, offering real-time alerts and troubleshooting for cloud-native applications. It is leveraged for machine data analysis, improving infrastructure visibility and supporting network and application performance management efforts.

Splunk

Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX) is a cloud-based service that provides comprehensive visibility into a user's digital experience by monitoring and analyzing real-time traffic for enhanced connectivity and performance.

ZDX is designed to help organizations ensure optimal application performance and user satisfaction by identifying and diagnosing issues in the network, application, or device level. It offers extensive monitoring solutions that empower IT teams to troubleshoot and resolve issues quickly, which is essential for maintaining productivity in a distributed workforce. By leveraging advanced analytics, ZDX provides insights into user experiences across the entire network, helping to pinpoint performance bottlenecks and streamline IT operations.

What are the important features of Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)?

Real-time Analytics: Monitor user performance in real-time to detect and address issues swiftly.
Comprehensive Visibility: Gain end-to-end visibility across networks, applications, and devices.
Proactive Troubleshooting: Quickly identify and resolve issues before they impact productivity.
Advanced Reporting: Access detailed reports to help optimize digital experiences and enhance decision-making.

What benefits and ROI should users look for?

Enhanced Productivity: Faster issue resolution leads to reduced downtime and improved user efficiency.
Cost Efficiency: Streamlining IT operations minimizes overhead costs associated with manual troubleshooting.
User Satisfaction: Better application performance enhances user experiences and satisfaction.
Scalability: Easily scale monitoring across growing digital infrastructures without compromising performance.

In industries like finance, healthcare, and tech, ZDX implementation enhances digital transformation initiatives by providing the tools needed to ensure seamless application performance and connectivity for remote and onsite employees. By leveraging this approach, businesses can improve operational workflows and cater to sector-specific requirements efficiently.

Zscaler

Sample Customers

Sunrun, Yelp, Onshape, Tapjoy, Symphony Commerce, Chairish, Clever, Grovo, Bazaar Voice, Zenefits, Avalara

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

Splunk Observability Cloud vs. Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)

December 2025

Free Report: Splunk Observability Cloud vs. Zscaler Digital Experience (ZDX)

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