We performed a comparison between Apica and BlazeMeter based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out what your peers are saying about Datadog, Dynatrace, New Relic and others in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability."It helps with releases because we monitor them in staging. We can tell if something is critically wrong before it gets into production, e.g., if it was load related or function related and also what was different in the dev stage. It then alerts us straightaway inside of our production monitors once it has been released. Therefore, it has improved how we run our systems since we monitor multiple environments."
"There are several features that are really good. The first one is the flexibility and the advanced configuration that Apica offers when it comes to configuring synthetic checks. It provides the ability to customize how the check should be performed and it is very flexible in the number of synthetic locations that it can use. It allows us to run scripts from different locations all over the world, and they have a really good number of these locations."
"I like the transcript download feature. And with UI scripting, it's helpful that Apica handles a lot of the backend work automatically. I don't have to tag everything manually, though I can tag elements later if needed. It's really good at recording the steps."
"You can tell from the operational space of people who are using and consuming this data that they are more integrated. It is not dependent on one team anymore. It saves a lot of time by capturing and pinpointing the exact problem that is happening quickly. We have moved from getting escalations manually to getting escalations synthetically."
"With the ZebraTester, the ability to have and store dynamic variables, when setting up the monitors, means you can extract that value and use it in a subsequent service call. This is something that has made our lives easier... This is one of the features that I like the most because it helps us in configuring these services, in a certain flow, without the need to re-record the whole thing."
"Our application SREs do script checks in such a way that closely mimic our customers' actions using the platform. Because there are so many different ways and options to be able to configure checks to closely mirror your applications' capabilities, it provides a lot of optionality for teams to create the right type of check that can notify when there are any issues. At the end of the day, we want our monitoring tools to be able to catch any outage before our customers do. This is where Apica Synthetic does a great job."
"From our standpoint, there are a number of valuable features. The WebHooks are obviously really great. The alert framework is really good and then the reporting and visualizations that you get from the dashboards is good. Those three areas are primarily what my team's focused on in terms of usage from day to day."
"One of the biggest advantages of moving to Apica is the ability get to a hybrid model with the architecture in the cloud and our agents on-prem. We also have access to Apica's cloud agent across the globe. That has changed the way that we have our load testing setup at this point. Previously, it was always internal. Now, with this change in the way it is implemented for load testing, we can test anywhere across the globe and from the list of agents available within Apica's cloud. If I don't have an agent available in a second location, it just takes an email to their customer support, then it is spun up within 24 hours. That flexibility has changed the way that we perceive our load tests, not just in the US, but globally."
"It has helped us simulate heavy load situations so we can fix performance issues ahead of time."
"It's a great platform because it's a SaaS solution, but it also builds the on-premises hosting solutions, so we have implemented a hybrid approach. BlazeMeter sets us up for our traditional hosting platforms and application stack as well as the modern cloud-based or SaaS-based application technologies."
"For me, the best part is that we can graphically see the test result at runtime. It helps us understand the behavior of the application during all stages of the test."
"They have good support documentation and when we have contacted them, they helped to guide us."
"The product's initial setup phase was straightforward."
"The most valuable features of the solution stem from the fact that BlazeMeter provides easy access to its users while also ensuring that its reporting functionalities are good."
"The solution offers flexibility with its configurations."
"It has a unique programming dashboard that is very user-friendly."
"We have been focused on reducing polling times for synthetic checks. We have gone from 10 minutes down to five minutes for a pretty broad swath, but there is some appetite to reduce that further, which could be an improvement."
"The reporting part that we use for our executives needs a bit more customization capabilities. Right now, you can use only the three main templates for reporting. We would like to be able to customize them."
"We could use more detailed information in the request and response sections."
"The accuracy of alerts can be improved a little bit. Right now, it's pretty good in terms of alerting pretty quickly about failures or changes in response times. However, what we have seen happen is the number of alerts that we are getting is very frequent, and we would like to tone down the number of alerts. That's the only trouble we have. Apica could tone down those settings because there is no option for us to tone it down to a level that would reduce the alerts to a minimum. As a platform, it does send us good alerts, but it could be improved a bit."
"When it comes to the way the internal agent is installed, because you can install an application on a server, I would love to see the application Docker-ized. If you could install internal agents using Docker or using containers, it would be easier for us to manage them and spin up internal agents."
"There are some components of the user interface that are not up to date. Just to give you an idea, today we have web applications that are called single-page applications that are much faster than the old style of web application. If we can move faster into the flow of the graphic user interface, and in a more effective way, it will save us a lot of time."
"The having to install an application on your desktop to utilize something like ZebraTester is a little cumbersome. It would be nice to see that become a web-based application. Having the documentation a little more accessible, and easier to digest by people who are just learning how to use the framework, especially when it comes to more complex or more edge-based cases would be really helpful to have."
"Apica should add more features and integrations with different tools and certain ticketing systems, like ServiceNow."
"The seamless integration with mobiles could be improved."
"Version controlling of the test cases and the information, the ability to compare the current version and the previous version within Runscope would be really nice. The history shows who made the changes, but it doesn't compare the changes."
"From a performance perspective, BlazeMeter needs to be improved...BlazeMeter has not found the extensions for WebSockets or Java Applet."
"BlazeMeter has room for improvement in terms of its integration with GitLab, particularly in the context of CI/CD processes. While it has multiple integrations available, the level of integration with GitLab may need further enhancements. It is known to work well with Git and Jenkins, although the extent of compatibility with GitLab is uncertain."
"I believe that data management and test server virtualization are things that Perforce is working on, or should be working on."
"Integration is one of the things lacking in BlazeMeter compared to some newer options."
"The product currently doesn't allow users to run parallel thread groups, making it an area that should be considered for improvement."
"Scalability is an area of concern in BlazeMeter, where improvements are required."
Earn 20 points
Apica is ranked 55th in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability with 2 reviews while BlazeMeter is ranked 4th in Performance Testing Tools with 41 reviews. Apica is rated 8.4, while BlazeMeter is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Apica writes "Offers transcript download feature and easy to set up and configure tests but not very user friendly". On the other hand, the top reviewer of BlazeMeter writes "Reduced our test operating costs, provides quick feedback, and helps us understand how to build better test cases". Apica is most compared with Dynatrace, Datadog, AppDynamics, Apache JMeter and OpenText LoadRunner Cloud, whereas BlazeMeter is most compared with Apache JMeter, Tricentis NeoLoad, OpenText LoadRunner Cloud, OpenText LoadRunner Professional and Perfecto.
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