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DX SaaS vs OpenText Real User Monitoring vs Splunk AppDynamics comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of DX SaaS is 0.6%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenText Real User Monitoring is 0.7%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk AppDynamics is 3.7%, down from 5.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Splunk AppDynamics3.7%
OpenText Real User Monitoring0.7%
DX SaaS0.6%
Other95.0%
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

JM
Technical Manager at Tech Mahindra Limited
It's highly customizable but lacks many features of available in competing solutions
DX SaaS is a latecomer to the APM market. Some things that are straightforward in Dynatrace are complicated in DX. For example, upgrading the agents is a seamless process in Dynatrace, but it's a pain in DX SaaS. You should be able to upgrade in the Application Command Center. However, it is not working correctly. They upgrade the product every 15 to 30 days, and the process isn't seamless. It's like implementing the solution all over again. We monitor around 1,000-plus applications and have more than 100,000 agents, so we require a smooth upgrade process. It's nearly impossible to stay updated on the latest version. Upgrading the Dynatrace agent is smoother. You don't need to worry about it. If the agent is on the Dynatrace server, you only need to push it. After that, you will be notified to reboot the APM or CLM. That's it. It took us three years to deploy the agent on 1,000-plus applications across 40,000-plus servers. Now, they are saying they are ending support for 7.0.49, and we need to upgrade. The path to upgrading isn't straightforward. The first process is manual, and we can push it to different servers so it is visible. What's our configuration? Who is going to do the configuration? It's not typical or practical. I don't understand how product teams don't see that. That feature is not there. We hope they add this feature to the new product called DX Platform, which consists of net apps. All those network monitoring tools will be combined into DX Platform. All the monitoring functionality is moved to DX Platform. You can't see a trend of your metrics grouped according to the last month, six months, one year, etc. The resolution is not there. I want granular visibility into data captured in the last 15 seconds. Those are essential features. I am not saying that DX lacks solid features, but they need to consider it. Some core functionality of the product is missing. We have around 50-plus requests to add previously available features in the on-premise version. That is one reason application teams are reluctant to go to DX SaaS. We are struggling to make them understand and trying to find alternatives for the existing features. We've had many discussions with the product team, telling them we need this functionality. However, they tell us it's not on their product roadmap. They are gradually adding other features, but we need our requirements to be a priority. You cannot say you will try to add those requested features that aren't on your product roadmap. There is always a catch in the product. We use around 10 tenants in production and six in the test run. First of all, there is nothing in the pane. If we are trying to see the data from an application, how do we know which tenant and application are reporting? There was a feature called Enterprise Team Center, but that functionality has been removed. All the applications are connected to the manager, which is connected to ETC. If you go to ETC, you can find the server and see your data, but that functionality was not there. Every product should have a management feature, but that is missing, and they are saying that it is not there in the roadmap. It is a basic requirement. You need to understand that. That is not there, manager, and they are saying that is not there in the roadmap as well. They have created a new tenant page temporarily. It is not there currently. It is not a required thing. There is a feature called Domain, but that concept is gone. We've struggled a lot, and what they provided in the initial migration stage is no longer working. We were delayed for two months because we didn't give them the correct input. They don't know their product. We tell them there is a problem, and they say they're fixing it. Are we their Guinea pig? You cannot treat your customers like this.
YA
Sr. Solution Architect, Project Manager at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
User-level monitoring with near-real-time analytics boosts service availability
The use case is about user-level monitoring and the availability of a service for a user. It's about whether the service is available, its performance, and the type of errors a user is receiving, from a user perspective The functions that Real User Monitor is intended for, which is to provide the…
DK
Technology lead at Infosys
Has enabled us to detect issues instantly through alerts and monitor every service from a single dashboard
Splunk requires significantly more improvements compared to Splunk AppDynamics, specifically regarding the licensing aspect. Splunk renews licenses every six months, which is inconvenient. It would be better to have a one-year license to avoid needing to update keys constantly, which can only occur on weekends, making it a burdensome task. Although Splunk is better for certain use cases, Splunk AppDynamics is broader in functionality. Specifically, I want enhancements related to creating dashboards not only for logs or minor services but also for configuration levels, allowing us to check configurations immediately without manually opening the entire code when exceptions arise—a feature I wish to see improved in Splunk, although it may not be necessary for Splunk AppDynamics.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"DX allows you to customize and gives you a high degree of control."
"It supports numerous platforms."
"Actionable insight is the most valuable feature."
"With the solution, you can easily access any issues in your infrastructure."
"Real User Monitoring tools help proactively identify problems before they become critical by monitoring thresholds. There is a threshold and an SOA threshold."
"The technical support is good at resolving issues."
"The Real User Monitor, with its transaction and synthetic transaction monitoring, is the typical classic in APM cases when the customer would like to do transaction monitoring. Micro Focus scores better where the underlying infrastructure management is also covered by Micro Focus tools."
"The most valuable feature is application performance monitoring."
"Very easy to implement."
"It offers near-real-time analytics, which is helpful."
"The reporting feature is good for us."
"The most valuable feature of AppDynamics is that we can see all query times. If a particular query is taking too much time, we can alert it."
"It reduces the time to resolve issues and requires less manpower."
"It is a good monitoring tool. Its stability is very good."
"The best feature of AppDynamics Browser Real-User Monitoring is that it lets you find errors in synthetic jobs ahead of the users. The solution shows you all front-end metrics. You can also see JavaScript errors and jQuery errors through AppDynamics Browser Real-User Monitoring. You can also do a correlation between the front end and the backend, or from the user to the navigator, to the backend through the solution."
"The transaction snapshots let you find out where the application broke; it pinpoints where in the call stack, and then how long it took to resolve."
"Immediately allows you to see the relationships between the different nodes."
"The feature that is most valuable to us is the snapshot feature. It allows us to get a snapshot of different SQL scripts that are being executed simultaneously and we can identify everything we need on them."
"The event alerting feature or the trigger system is what I like most about AppDynamics Server Monitoring. Whenever an issue occurs, the tool automatically generates an even trigger that tells engineers in the company to take action, so it's an essential feature of AppDynamics Server Monitoring. Another valuable feature of the tool is end-to-end monitoring, which means if you need to debug, you can go transaction by transaction, where the issue lies, and how it's linked. For example, if it's a low-performance issue, you can look into it more through AppDynamics Server Monitoring in terms of which area takes too much time to execute. You can also see the SQL queries and the kind of query going on through the tool."
 

Cons

"Old user interface and dashboards could be improved."
"The ability to scale presents a challenge as the cost of handling vast amounts of data in the cloud must be taken into account."
"DX SaaS is a latecomer to the APM market. Some things that are straightforward in Dynatrace are complicated in DX. For example, upgrading the agents is a seamless process in Dynatrace, but it's a pain in DX SaaS. You should be able to upgrade in the Application Command Center. However, it is not working correctly."
"Customer support needs to improve by bringing in more people who are knowledgeable about the tool, as there are very few left."
"One area to improve is the user interface, of course. The second one is their R&D has virtually stopped building a product roadmap."
"The product needs more R&D to make it easier and more compatible with other software."
"Everybody is moving away from traffic and installing agents on the application to do the job, but Micro Focus is using traditional ways to collect the traffic. They should change their architecture completely."
"We would like to see support for non-Windows environments."
"When we want to monitor our encrypted traffic, this product doesn't work because our cipher is not supported."
"The solution's technical support presents a lot of issues with too many delays."
"Real User Monitor needs to cover more protocols to provide more in-depth information. It could also be better at monitoring voice-related traffic. There is currently no visibility in that channel."
"The limitations are often due to the vendors not supplying all the profiling features to AppDynamics."
"There are certain limitations with the agents in the solution"
"Sometimes, while fetching details, Splunk AppDynamics provides answers within a minute, but it can occasionally take seven or eight minutes, which can be problematic when time is limited."
"Customer support takes time. Whenever we face any issues, we have to open the vendor case and then there will be back and forth happening."
"It would help to maybe have a more graphical interface and more user-friendly graphics."
"Rolling out version upgrades is a difficult job at times."
"Needs more integration with applications suites, like Oracle Enterprise Server or BMC Remedy."
"The only improvement I see is intercepting calls in a mobile application without injecting additional code. Currently, when instrumenting or monitoring a mobile application, it's necessary to release updates, prompt users to upgrade, and inject code into the backend. It would be beneficial if there were a method to intercept these calls without requiring users to download and upgrade the application. However, I'm unsure about the feasibility of such an approach."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Our monthly cost for DX SaaS is approximately $5 per user, which I considered affordable."
"Compared to other tools, OpenText Real User Monitoring is an expensive solution."
"Not expensive."
"The price is approximately €30,000 ($35,500 USD) for the enterprise edition."
"If I compare with other vendors, other vendors are more expensive"
"As compared to other applications, its price is moderate. Its price is neither very high nor very low."
"There is an annual cost for the use of this solution."
"AppDynamics Server Monitoring is an expensive solution."
"It does require licensing to be paid."
"It is expensive. However, our time to recover has been reduced, and this product has helped recuperate costs and provided us with ROI."
"In terms of pricing, I feel that when you compare the benefits that we get to the price that we paid, it is reasonable."
"I was not involved with the procurement of AppDynamic, but I believe it's expensive."
"Yearly payments have to be made toward the licensing costs of the solution. The solution has no additional costs apart from the licensing costs."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
17%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Legal Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Performing Arts
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Marketing Services Firm
6%
Financial Services Firm
25%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business55
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise195
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
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What needs improvement with Micro Focus Real User Monitor?
The diagnostics perspective, particularly in terms of the root cause analysis of failures, should be improved. There ...
What is your primary use case for Micro Focus Real User Monitor?
The use case is about user-level monitoring and the availability of a service for a user. It's about whether the serv...
What advice do you have for others considering Micro Focus Real User Monitor?
I rate the solution as nine. It is a good product. Everyone should have it as it is essential today, but choose the v...
Any advice about APM solutions?
There are many factors and we know little about your requirements (size of org, technology stack, management systems,...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AppDynamics?
I would rate the pricing an eight out of ten. The solution is highly expensive. Our company pays for the solution on ...
 

Also Known As

CA DXI, CA Digital Experience Insights
Micro Focus Real User Monitor, Micro Focus RUM, HPE RUM
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

CNN
Avea, Maccabi Healthcare Services, TEB
Cisco, Sony, Nasdaq, Reserve Bank of New Zealand, Edmunds.com, Puma, Fox News, DirecTV, Pizza Hut, T-Systems, Cornell University, OpenTable, BITMARCK, Green Mountain Power, Care.com, Overstock, Paddy Power, eHarmony, Kraft, The Motley Fool, The Container Store, and more See more customers
Find out what your peers are saying about Datadog, Dynatrace, Splunk and others in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability. Updated: February 2026.
881,821 professionals have used our research since 2012.