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VMware Aria Operations for Applications vs WhatsUp Gold comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 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

VMware Aria Operations for ...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
20th
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
17th
Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software
15th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Container Monitoring (6th)
WhatsUp Gold
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
26th
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
19th
Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software
21st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (24th), Server Monitoring (15th), Configuration Management (20th), Log Management (35th), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of VMware Aria Operations for Applications is 1.3%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WhatsUp Gold is 1.2%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware Aria Operations for Applications1.3%
WhatsUp Gold1.2%
Other97.5%
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

AS
Consultant at HCLTech
Automation and insightful diagnostics elevate operations while improvements are welcome
The new version 8.18 has brought significant improvements. The main purpose of using this tool is having a single console to manage all entities. The cloud integration capabilities, including private, public, and hybrid, are already well-implemented. The ability to manage multiple vCenters across different geographical locations is very effective. The new Skyline health feature and certificate and licensing management are particularly useful improvements. The dashboard's overview tab provides comprehensive information about current vCenter status, resizable amounts, reclamation opportunities, anomalies, diagnostics, licensing, and certificates. However, there is room for improvement in application analysis. The current functionality lacks detailed monitoring at the kernel level, focusing mainly on CPU, memory, and storage matrices. Enhanced application monitoring capabilities, including tracking downtime for specific types of applications such as transactional or e-commerce applications, would be beneficial.
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

"Wavefront gives us the complexity we need, instead of spending time coming up with a nice dashboard from some other means, or just creating and coding our own app."
"The features I find most valuable is the querying and alerting capabilities."
"Scalability for VMware Aria Operations for Applications is easy to implement and manage."
"The stability of Aria Operations for Applications has improved significantly over the years."
"I find VMware Aria Operations for Applications to be very stable, and I would rate it a ten out of ten."
"It has a familiar interface, which makes it easy to get started."
"Using Wavefront, we have been able to reduce the complexity of our pipeline."
"VMware comes with a support team, and if you have trouble, you can easily create a ticket, and VMware will help you. Therefore, the best aspect is the support."
"The solution effectively monitors network devices and servers."
"We no longer have to manually search for problems because we are alerted when something in the network goes down."
"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 link. You can go into a particular part of the topology map, scroll in, and see exactly which module it is."
"I use it on premises to monitor my network database. We monitor the link up/down and use the SNMP traps as well."
"The interface in the last few years it has been a lot greater, they are much more user-friendly. I like the interface."
"The user interface is good enough."
"The tool's most valuable feature is the visibility it offers of everything in the network and infrastructure."
"The most valuable feature is the auto-discovery function."
 

Cons

"I would like to see integration with Kubernetes cluster and APIs so that you can manage the entire stack."
"The documentation and integration with Kubernetes could be improved."
"The main problem I have is that the license cost is very high."
"VMware technical support has declined since the Broadcom acquisition. Previously, they were more focused on issue resolution, but now they prioritize licensing verification before providing support."
"I find that there could be improvements in the support service response time, as the urgency varies unless specified as Priority 2 or 1 cases."
"They could make it more easy to plug-in data so that a nontechnical person will be able to use it, like accountants or finance people. That way they don't have to ask us."
"The main problem I have is that the license cost is very high."
"The solution could be expensive, which might be a limiting factor."
"We can never achieve or get a good picture of the network topology."
"Regional product team support is not very good."
"Users want SMS available via Whatsapp Gold. They don't want to go through third party SMS servers. The solution should work to make this possible."
"Improvements are needed in integration, especially for WhatsApp call and messages."
"The licensing model could be improved. Right now, the levels are too far apart. This causes the solution to be more expensive than it needs to be."
"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."
"Importing the maps and being able to customize them could be easier."
"Sometimes it's a little bit slow."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Different locations require different setups. In your terms, around 300 to around 400K USD."
"The licensing costs are very high, particularly when you consider that we have to purchase a level 1 license for every integration, such as the load balancer, HAProxy, and the MSSP. And if you want to use vSAN, that's another license. Then, of course, Tanzu Observability has its own separate license."
"I don't have the details. In our case, there is a mixture in place. We have production usage, and we are also doing training for VMware. So, we also have a training instance. It is worth the money you would spend on it. That's because if you were to build all of this yourself by using some of the open source tools, then you would need a lot of time."
"I would rate the pricing as three out of five."
"The pricing can be on the expensive side when considering competing products."
"The price of WhatsUp Gold is good."
"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 most valuable feature is the cost compared to other solutions."
"The choice of version depends on the number of points, or devices, that you want to monitor, and this makes the product expensive."
"I'm not sure, but it's expensive. We don't pay any additional fees."
"Pricing is reasonable compared to other products."
"This is a well priced solution."
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Top Industries

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

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise10
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?
The solution includes cost drivers that can be configured according to your environment. You can input server-wise, CPU-wise, storage, and memory costs per hour or day. Once cost drivers are provid...
What needs improvement with VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?
The new version 8.18 has brought significant improvements. The main purpose of using this tool is having a single console to manage all entities. The cloud integration capabilities, including priva...
What is your primary use case for VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?
I have been involved in several projects where I had to implement automation and monitoring alerting. I performed automation using VMware Aria Operations for Applications. There is an automation ta...
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.
 

Also Known As

Tanzu Observability, Wavefront, Wavefront by VMware, VMware Tanzu Observability
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

1. Atlassian 2. Cisco 3. Databricks 4. DigitalOcean 5. Equinix 6. Fidelity Investments 7. Google 8. Hewlett Packard Enterprise 9. Honeywell 10. IBM 11. Intel 12. JetBlue Airways 13. LinkedIn 14. Lyft 15. Mastercard 16. Microsoft 17. MongoDB 18. Netflix 19. Nvidia 20. Oracle 21. PayPal 22. Pinterest 23. Qualcomm 24. Red Hat 25. Salesforce 26. SAP 27. Spotify 28. Square 29. TMobile 30. Twitter 31. Uber 32. VMware
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 VMware Aria Operations for Applications vs. WhatsUp Gold and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,976 professionals have used our research since 2012.