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AWS Auto Scaling vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor 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

AWS Auto Scaling
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
15th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
18th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.0
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
Server Monitoring (12th), Active Directory Management (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of AWS Auto Scaling is 0.1%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 1.6%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

Mbula Mboma - PeerSpot reviewer
Boosts deployment efficiency with seamless automatic scaling capabilities
My primary use case for Auto Scaling is mainly to deploy applications at scale Auto Scaling has made the deployment of applications more efficient, allowing us to manage traffic and maintain performance as user counts increase. Auto Scaling is a cool feature that works well and its automatic…
Carlos Camargo - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides user-friendly API features and has straightforward deployment process
One product area that could benefit from improvement is the synchronization of licensing periods across different modules. The misalignment of licensing terms can present commercial challenges when adding new modules or additional pollers. Additionally, the granularity of polling times for specific components could be enhanced to better meet individual customers' needs without impacting the entire polling pool.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature is the ability to select a minimum amount of active servers so that a new server automatically launches if one fails."
"The setup is not very complex."
"The tool gives you the flexibility to scale up and grow. The solution is also fast to deploy."
"The health check integration feature ensures that the instances are healthy and capable of absorbing traffic, thus serving their purpose effectively."
"It helps us to reduce the cost."
"AWS Auto Scaling is very good for managing traffic and creating new instances when necessary."
"The solution's monitoring effectively monitors our application and CPU utilization."
"The various scaling options available, such as step scaling, are particularly useful."
"SSL Certificate Monitoring and Expiry Alerting"
"The more valuable feature of this solution is the Exchange feature."
"The most valuable feature is application monitoring."
"Manage Groups: The capability to group appropriate devices gives better visibility of sites, categories, or critical regions. The same can be used to represent a dashboard for higher management."
"Hardware health: It allows for proactive monitoring of the hardware health and is a game changer."
"The component and cable monitoring are good. SolarWinds is more intuitive and user-friendly than AppDynamics. The AppDynamics console is more complex because it's a more feature-rich solution, so it's not easy for somebody to pick it up."
"I adore the NTA module that provides deep details on ingress/egress traffic for any interface. With a few clicks, you can correlate who is accessing what and when, beside the bandwidth consuming applications/users."
"Extremely user friendly: Any IT professional can learn how to admin NPM in a short time."
 

Cons

"It could be cheaper."
"There hasn't been a need for improvements."
"The product’s pricing needs improvement."
"Flexibility in configuring the workload is missing in AWS Auto Scaling."
"Setting up the configuration involves too much work for the cloud engineer, like configuring the ALB, the target group, and all the steps."
"It is sometimes very critical to deploy on AWS since some servers are already running in the background. There are challenges for employees on how to deploy at a given time."
"It requires a downtime before deploying the Auto Scaling group."
"In comparison to other public clouds, the product is costly."
"This product has no real downside unless they fail to continue development of its capabilities."
"SAM AppInsight for SQL: The ability to ignore fragmentation of specific indexes."
"Some custom applications cannot be monitored, and a lot more applications need to be included."
"The product does not explain why a problem occurred."
"The technical support team's response time could be improved."
"The tool's AppStack needs to improve in the storage monitoring part. It should also include an analytics and recommendation approach. If I have found a fault in a server or application, I would like to know what caused it and how do I recover from it."
"Downside of the tools is the web console are hung or crash. It need to improve the performance."
"The templates could use improvement. Currently, they are quite complex. They should have drag-and-drop functionality instead. It would make it easier to use."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is good. I have not had any customers that have complained about the price."
"AWS Auto Scaling is a cheap solution."
"AWS Auto Scaling's price is high."
"AWS Auto Scaling is a pay-per-use and pay-as-you-use service."
"The product has moderate pricing."
"AWS Auto Scaling is an expensive solution."
"The product is expensive."
"I have always said SolarWinds is very “proud” of their products, meaning they are expensive. I cannot afford to purchase all the licenses I need for all the SolarWinds products."
"We are on an annual license to use the solution. The price of the solution is expensive. The price is based on a bunch of factors, such as the number of engines and elements."
"Price can always be lower. It is neither on the expensive side nor on the cheap side. We have worked with them for a lot of years, so we get a discount due to the size of the installation."
"The licenses start from USD 3000.00 and go up to USD 20,000.00 for the year. It's a perpetual license. Nothing is free in SolarWinds, anything that you need is an additional cost."
"I would rate the pricing for this solution a three out of five."
"I like the pricing for this SolarWinds product."
"The product is expensive."
"The solution's price is reasonable. Though it's on the higher side, the tool is worth the money."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Educational Organization
26%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about AWS Auto Scaling?
The tool's most valuable feature is vertical auto-scaling, which is easy to use. However, most companies now prefer horizontal scaling. I set up the health check integration to monitor CPU usage. W...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AWS Auto Scaling?
The pricing of Auto Scaling is medium range, neither high nor low.
What needs improvement with AWS Auto Scaling?
It is sometimes very critical to deploy on AWS since some servers are already running in the background. There are challenges for employees on how to deploy at a given time. It requires a downtime ...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
There are no specific features or functionality I would like to see improved or enhanced in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor at this time. I have not encountered any missing features or fu...
 

Also Known As

AWS Auto-Scaling
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Expedia, Intuit, Royal Dutch Shell, Brooks Brothers
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Auto Scaling vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
857,688 professionals have used our research since 2012.