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AlienVault OSSIM vs SolarWinds Security Event Manager comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 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

AlienVault OSSIM
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
25th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolarWinds Security Event M...
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
37th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of AlienVault OSSIM is 1.2%, down from 3.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is 1.0%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
AlienVault OSSIM1.2%
SolarWinds Security Event Manager1.0%
Other97.8%
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

BP
Independent Contractor at a comms service provider with 5,001-10,000 employees
Enables cost-effective security management for small businesses
Scaling for USM is always challenging for any product unless it is purpose-built or overbuilt at the front end. They will use Palo Alto and its competitors, and LevelBlue will manage that implementation. The main area where the AlienVault product was lacking around the 2018 timeframe was in its ability to scale. By pushing it to a cloud-based system, they've largely alleviated scale issues. It's native in Amazon but will also run in Azure. They have worked with cloud service providers to offer enough throughput at a cost reasonable for a corporation. Scaling was their biggest problem, and they've largely conquered those issues.
Yashokanth Partkunan - PeerSpot reviewer
Managed Services Engineer at Loop1 Systems
Has supported client needs efficiently but requires deeper analysis features and faster support
The log analyzing capability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager should go into more depth than the current environment. More modification and enhancements are required on the dashboard side in order to make it closer to optimal performance. From observation and feedback from users, they need more functionality related to monitoring, and in-depth analyzing needs to be improved.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The paid version of the solution has reporting and better scalability options."
"Better than other SIEM solutions because almost everything can be integrated."
"This solution is very stable; it runs on a Linux box, you only interface with it through the GUI, it works behind the scenes, and it has never crashed in the time that I have used it."
"The product is easy to use."
"It has helped us remediate threats in the past by providing significant events that assisted in identifying suspicious activities, such as logins from multiple countries."
"The product is majorly used for threat detection of the agents on servers and endpoints."
"The threat alerts it gives me from time to time on harmful code within the network, or if they are generating any network traffic, are very useful."
"The tool's security detection is good. It helps us with login tracking and generating reports. We aim to identify potential issues, such as brute-force attacks on user accounts or server-level anomalies. For instance, if I receive a report indicating a server is at an abnormal level, I investigate and address the issue."
"The solution helps me to go back in time and search for different events. For example, if you wanted to know who activated an account; you could go back in time and find out."
"SolarWinds is one of the products that I use, amongst many others, to fit the needs of our customers which includes their budget, size, and industry."
"The File Integrity Monitoring is great, giving you visibility into who has changed a file, when that file was changed, and more, with easy out-of-the-box reporting and customization for reports and alerts that help maintain compliance and security."
"The solution helps you monitor database instances, application instances, other customer application things, Linux servers, IBM servers, and Oracle servers."
"SolarWinds' stability is fine. I don't think we've had any software issues."
"The out of the box reports and dashboard. It was easy to trim down these windows to something we could quickly use."
"If you have no monitoring tool in place, SolarWinds SIEM is a good place to start and very inexpensive."
"It has in-depth monitoring capabilities and an easy way for setting up dashboards. I can expand in various areas, or I can reduce areas. It supports different types of breakdowns, filters, and rules. It is very simple for an out-of-the-box type of product. It doesn't take a lot of time to figure it out, which is unlike some of the solutions that I have looked at. It meets all the aspects."
 

Cons

"AlienVault OSSIM is costly."
"AlienVault OSSIM could improve by having better integration with some of the newer tools."
"Lacking in depth of reporting."
"There needs to be more support or some kind of training program so users can self-learn the system more effectively."
"From a management console perspective and the maturity of the dashboards, I would probably put it slightly behind some of the other players that have been in the market for ages."
"The correlation engine needs to be improved."
"It's so hard to configure and explore something new on it. It is not easy to find the steps we need to follow in order to use the solution effectively."
"The documentation could be improved."
"Under the new system, it is not upgradable the way they say. When you try to do an upgrade, it doesn't really work unless you dump everything and start from scratch."
"The main area that would mean a big improvement for me would be for the product to include multiple dashboards."
"We have automated threat detection in the Alliance Security, Antoinette. However, if these features could be further enhanced, it would simplify my work, potentially allowing me to allocate more time to address complex issues."
"The reporting could be more robust. It can be a lot more granular and that will make it a lot more useful in comparison to how it is incorporated at the moment."
"SolarWinds should improve its correlation capabilities. The correlation does not automatically detect and reduce the events fast enough. You have to manually do a correlation report, which means the tool is not scalable in many ways."
"The only issue is the pricetag. SolarWinds is a costly solution."
"It is a very technical program. They can simplify it so that it isn't so hard to deal with."
"We'd like more customization capabilities."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We are using a free version of the solution. If you purchase a license there are more features available but the price is a little high. The solution should be cheaper to allow more customers to be able to afford it."
"The solution is open source, so it's free to use."
"The price of AlienVault OSSIM is too high sometimes for us to present to our customers. The price should be lower. We are on a three-year license to use the solution. We had to pay extra for the support."
"AlienVault OSSIM is free."
"AlienVault OSSIM is expensive compared to its competitors."
"OSSIM is free."
"I used the paid version of the tool and found it to be expensive. It has been a while since I changed to Securonix. I will have to check whether AlienVault charges per device, user, or log."
"We are using the community version, which can be used for free."
"The tool is available at a good price for customers compared to other solutions in the market. I rate the product's price as an eight out of ten."
"Licensing is on devices, so if you have many, then this may be high."
"The pricing model would benefit from having package deals with other SolarWinds products."
"It is in the appropriate mid-range. It is not as expensive as some of the other solutions. It is also not cheap."
"Licenses can only be purchased in blocks of fifty at a time."
"The price of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is reasonable."
"We do a yearly license renewal. For a year, the solution costs roughly $500,000 USD. There are no costs beyond this yearly fee."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
14%
Financial Services Firm
7%
University
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Construction Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AlienVault OSSIM?
It depends. I would need to review their cost models, but generally, they are on a scaled basis based on throughput usage. Because it's a software as a service solution for their core product for U...
What needs improvement with AlienVault OSSIM?
Scaling for USM is always challenging for any product unless it is purpose-built or overbuilt at the front end. They will use Palo Alto and its competitors, and LevelBlue will manage that implement...
What is your primary use case for AlienVault OSSIM?
This solution is very similar to most of the other MSSPs that you would find out there. When I look at use cases, AlienVault was initially aimed at small to medium businesses. It grew, and that was...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
The log analyzing capability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager should go into more depth than the current environment. More modification and enhancements are required on the dashboard side in or...
What is your primary use case for SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
I work with all SolarWinds products mostly, including Network Configuration Manager and NPM. I am a reseller. I usually recommend SolarWinds products for Loop1. It's for the bigger ones; we are the...
What advice do you have for others considering SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
I am still dealing with SolarWinds products and use most of their solutions. User-friendly configuration is key, and the configurations are simple, not complex. The only important part is what we d...
 

Also Known As

OSSIM
SolarWinds LEM, Solarwinds SIEM, TriGeo, Log and Event Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Council Rock School District
NetSuite, EasyStreet, Legacy Texas Bank, and Energy Federal Credit Union, to name a few.
Find out what your peers are saying about AlienVault OSSIM vs. SolarWinds Security Event Manager and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
912,022 professionals have used our research since 2012.