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WhatsUp Gold vs vRealize Network Insight 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

vRealize Network Insight
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
34th
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
38th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
47
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
WhatsUp Gold
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
30th
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
29th
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), 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 vRealize Network Insight is 0.7%, up from 0.7% 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 (%)
WhatsUp Gold1.5%
vRealize Network Insight0.7%
Other97.8%
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Shaijith KB - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior System Specialist at General Directorate of Residence and Foreigners Affairs (GDRFA)
Comprehensive management and detailed reports benefit operations while improvements are needed in support and maintenance
We have Tanzu and OpenShift. We have OpenShift, Canonical, and the Tanzu one. The Tanzu platform from VMware is a Kubernetes platform. We haven't completely installed Tanzu yet; we installed the vROps part. vRealize Network Insight is beneficial because you can control the East-West traffic. vRealize has a component called NSX, which has East-West traffic controlling and micro-segmentation, that is one of the best options, and we have the layer extension, layer 2 extension possible through NSX. If you have anything accountable in any business, even in a candy business, having proper accountability on what you are selling and buying will save a lot. If you don't know what you're selling and buying, you will end up with a loss. My team does not use the flow analytics feature; we have a security and network monitoring team, which is a different SOC team. I am using it as an administrator internally. We perform different tasks including costing analysis, capacity management, and many other things. vRealize Network Insight has a concern about the maintenance part, as it requires a person to monitor it completely. It's not something you install and your report will be generated automatically. You have to work on this properly to get the insights. vRealize Network Automation, vRealize Operations, and vRealize Network Insight are completely related to the network. I cannot say much about these network aspects because I am on the operations side, but overall, the vRealize suite is good for reporting perspective or any ISO-related documentation; this is very helpful. The product is called vRealize Operations Manager, and now it is referred to as Aria or vAria. I am now a Senior System Specialist. We use different metrics because we have multiple departments, and we can monitor utilization and comparisons with the previous year. On a scale of one to ten, I rate this solution a seven.
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

"If we deploy NSX it shows us how the workflow will flow in the organization, what the roadblocks are, and what we need to do to overcome those hurdles. When we run this product, it gives us reports which describe problems with physical switches. We work with the network team to get them all resolved."
"It is user-friendly. It's pretty simple to deploy and to run. It gives you pretty easy-to-understand reports, very graphically intense, so you can visualize what's going on in your network."
"The most valuable feature for us is that insight into what our network is really doing - it's a fairly complex network. Not having to go through thousands of lines of network configuration to find firewall ports that were open or closed, for various ports, was very valuable. It went out and found everything we need very quickly."
"We can see everything going on in NSX and get a good picture of our environment."
"It has enabled us to set up and do application discovery, as far as network traffic is concerned, and set up the appropriate rules that we need to make sure we're compliant with our security frameworks."
"I find that the interface of most VMware products is very similar, which I consider an advantage due to its ease of use compared to other tools like Splunk."
"It allows you to see traffic that you couldn't otherwise see, which is traffic within your Layer 3-bounded network, meaning east-west traffic. It's hard to get that any other way."
"What's valuable to us is the ability to get a view into the virtual space, which is something we haven't had before. Before, it was done by collecting from network endpoints and extrapolating into the virtual environment. Now it's coming directly from the virtual environment."
"The most valuable feature is the auto-discovery function."
"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 most valuable feature of WhatsUp Gold is NetFlow and the virtualized maps."
"The solution effectively monitors network devices and servers."
"WhatsUp Gold is very easy to deploy."
"The interface in the last few years it has been a lot greater, they are much more user-friendly. I like the interface."
"The most valuable features are network bandwidth monitoring and monitoring device health."
"The most valuable feature is the monitoring of resources."
 

Cons

"I would like to see more interoperability on the firewall and low balancer sides."
"The solution can be improved by making it more compatible with other brands, allowing for better integration."
"vRNI needs more remediation where it hooks into NSX."
"In a very general way, I would like to see an improvement in interoperability with third-party product, from other vendors."
"Since Broadcom acquired VMware, it has been experiencing challenges. Many sales processes are not well defined."
"I'd like to see better support for being able to search the hardware NetFlow data. It ingests fairly well, but you can't tell, in a lot of cases, what source the data came from. I'd like to see more support for picking specific sources. That way you could really make a compelling use case. There are also some difficulties where it can't exactly trace the path between source and destination but if you hit the reverse flow on the same search it shows the entire path."
"It needs to be a little easier to use and to understand the information it's putting out. That would make it more helpful. If you're not a network person you need to understand things like network policies and concepts. If you gave it to a regular admin, it would be nice if it were easier for them to pick up what is going on, understand the flows and whether or not stuff should be talking to each other, as opposed to just port groups and IP addresses."
"There are some random glitches in the Web UI, but they are usually pretty cosmetic in nature. I don't really seem to use any browser other than Chrome with it. I also get some weird errors from time to time on the hardware NetFlow Collectors, where it doesn't sync data."
"Importing the maps and being able to customize them could be easier."
"I might like to see a better interface in the future."
"The point system is not clear and clarity around this would improve our understanding of the system."
"Improvements are needed in integration, especially for WhatsApp call and messages."
"The pricing for this solution has gone up quite recently, which has led some of our customers to buy an alternative product."
"WhatsUp Gold should work on real-time monitoring and configuration management. If they succeed in doing this, the solution will cover all the network troubleshooting aspects and will be a benefit."
"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."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It has brought more money into our company."
"The solution has helped us to reduce time, increase performance, reduce costs, and even easily manage networks. We are probably seeing 10 to 20 percent labor savings because we are able to be very specific and focused on what we want to do. It ends up saving the customer money and makes us be more efficient on our cost deliveries."
"It's an expensive product because we have a lot of nodes."
"We have spent less time investigating network flows, so it is absolutely cost-effective."
"They should include the product in NSX because it's important to have it for deployment."
"It reduces costs. It takes something that may be challenging and makes it more usable and visual by being able to bring in tools, seeing what their impact is, such as microsegmentation and application rationalization, and seeing it quickly."
"The solution has reduced the time that we spend on other products. For example, with NSX, we were able to quickly find things that we would normally spend days trying to figure out."
"I rate vRealize Network Insight's pricing a seven point five out of ten."
"This is a well priced solution."
"The pricing can be on the expensive side when considering competing products."
"It is per device, per year. The pricing is very clear. If you have a service agreement, you get all of your major upgrades and minor upgrades. It was under $10,000 to go all-in with all of the different add-ons for it."
"The price of WhatsUp Gold is good."
"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 most valuable feature is the cost compared to other solutions."
"The tool's price is reasonable. WhatsUp Gold is cheaper than SolarWinds."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
14%
Computer Software Company
12%
Healthcare Company
8%
Government
8%
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 Business11
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise41
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about vRealize Network Insight?
The tool's ease of configuration and use and the availability of information and artifacts through professional services and the web are key factors that customers find valuable.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for vRealize Network Insight?
In VMware you have to buy a separate license for it. We have VVF and VCF-type of licenses, and if you want to go with this NSX and sort of higher-end professional services, you need to go with VCF....
What needs improvement with vRealize Network Insight?
There is room for improvement as not all cases are getting resolved, and we often do not get L3 support directly, having to go through L1 and L2, resulting in delays that usually are a headache for...
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

Arkin
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NTTi3, VCIX-NV, VMware Networking and Security Business Unit, Illumio, CompuNet
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 WhatsUp Gold vs. vRealize Network Insight and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,082 professionals have used our research since 2012.