Azure Monitor vs Icinga comparison

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Azure Monitor

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 18, 2024

Icinga and Azure Monitor compete in the monitoring solutions category. Azure Monitor may have the upper hand due to its extensive features and cloud integration.

Features: Icinga offers customizable alerting, network services, and multiple automation features. Azure Monitor provides integrated analytics, real-time data surveillance, and application insights.

Room for Improvement: Icinga's complexity in setups can be enhanced, user interface could be more intuitive, and integration features can be broadened. Azure Monitor can improve its cost efficiency, enhance visual data representation, and expand non-Microsoft integrations.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Icinga can be complex to set up but has community support. Azure Monitor benefits from seamless Azure integration and extensive documentation for smooth onboarding.

Pricing and ROI: Icinga is cost-effective with high ROI due to its open-source nature. Azure Monitor has higher usage-based costs, justifying its price for businesses focused on comprehensive cloud monitoring.

To learn more, read our detailed Azure Monitor vs. Icinga Report (Updated: April 2025).

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Azure Monitor vs. Icinga

April 2025

Helped 850,747 peers since 2012

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

Azure Monitor

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

5th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (5th)

Icinga

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

15th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Monitoring Software (15th), Server Monitoring (7th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (14th)

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Cloud Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Azure Monitor is 6.6%, down from 8.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Icinga is 4.5%, up from 2.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Monitoring Software

Featured Reviews

Syed Abid

Snr. Infrastructure Architect at LogicEra

Monthly and weekly resource monitoring has improved efficiency

Azure Monitor can improve by adding some kind of storage for logs. I can get the runtime logs alone, yet if Azure Monitor can independently add one gigabyte, two gigabytes, or five gigabytes at least to log storage, I can fix the logs without syncing with Log Analytics Workspace and Sentinel. If they do that, and if they can integrate a little pricing adjustment, it will be profitable for the Microsoft tool.

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Harrison Bulley

Senior Infrastructure Engineer at Net Consulting

A stable, scalable and cost-effective solution that helps with inbuilt scripts for easy modification

I think the software is quite good, but we have had problems with getting it to recognize certain areas and amend certain checks, where we needed so we would have to create backend scripts for those checks. Though, being open source, it has the support to create backend scripts, it would be better to have these scripts in-built.

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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 features of Azure Monitor are the login analytics workspace and we can write any kind of custom queries in order to receive the data that is inserted into the login analytics workspace, diagnostic settings, et cetera."

"We like this searchability and availability of the data."

"For me, the best feature is the log analysis with Azure Monitor's Log Analytics. Without being able to analyze the logs of all the activities that affect the performance of a machine, your monitoring effectiveness will be severely limited."

"The tool's most valuable feature is the alert system, which can be set according to our metrics. The integration is smooth."

"The most valuable feature is that it ensures our servers are up."

"The features that are most valuable are the alerting function and also the logging functionality to analyze certain issues using log analytics"

"Technical support is good and helpful...The initial setup is easy."

"Recently, they have improved their integration with other resources, so we get even more robust data."

More Azure Monitor pros

"The ability to customize scripts and build your own queries to request information from the infrastructure elements you want to monitor. This level of personalization and customization is highly appreciated."

"The best thing about the solution is how it highlights errors, the issues, and what needs my attention. The solution directs me to areas that I should look for first."

"Icinga has multiple automation and integration features. There is an API for everything and a web UI for configurations. The APIs enable you to automate tasks in Icinga. We can also use plugins to talk to the API. The Icinga Director talks to a database in the background, and you can import settings from the CMDB to all systems in Icinga."

"There's a module called Icinga Director, which helps us configure the product using an intuitive interface through clicks instead of creating a text configuration. It's very helpful for us."

"We have found the solution to be stable."

"The value of Icinga is that it has hundreds of plugins, so it's really easy to monitor pretty much anything."

"The apply rules feature saves a lot of time."

"It is really easy in Icinga to create your own plugin and integrate it without any fuss. And it works just perfectly fine."

More Icinga pros

Cons

"I believe Azure Monitor is already a top-notch solution with excellent functionality and there is not much I would suggest for improvement. However, there is one limitation that certain features require payment, even for testing purposes, which can be a challenge."

"I'd like the solution to do more around vulnerability assessment. It's lacking in the product right now."

"Currently, it seems it's complicated to get the correct information in terms of what to do and how things work."

"Although it's not always the case, the price can sometimes get expensive. This depends on a number of factors, such as how many services you are trying to integrate with Azure Monitor and how much storage they're consuming each month (for example, how large are the log files?)."

"The scalability could be improved as there are some limitations."

"They can simplify the overall complexity since you have multiple data sources in the cloud for monitoring. It's quite simple, but there are so many portals. It takes time to work with it. If they could simplify the user configuration, that would be good."

"The length of latency is terrible and needs to be improved."

"The solution's monitoring feature has limitations for analyzing multiple metrics."

More Azure Monitor cons

"We have found some problems with Nagios, and support isn't very responsive."

"I think the software is quite good, but we have had problems with getting it to recognize certain areas and amend certain checks, where we needed so we would have to create backend scripts for those checks. Though, being open source, it has the support to create backend scripts, it would be better to have these scripts in-built."

"The tool currently fails to provide notifications to users."

"There is room for improvement in multi-tenancy. It's not perfect, not even really good. It's average, but it should be improved."

"It needs Trap SNMP. I saw the documentation for Zabbix, that it has its own built-in product which handles SNMP traps, and there's nothing similar in Icinga or Nagios. I think this feature is most important for me."

"The installation and configuration are very complex."

"One thing that Icinga lacks is the capability to create advanced and customized dashboards within the tool itself."

"In general, the product does not look good. However, it does what it is supposed to do. So, the improvements should focus on usability and UI."

More Icinga cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The Azure Insight is a little bit expensive."

"Azure Monitor is a low-priced solution, which is why it would work best on small-scale projects."

"Azure Monitor is one of the more cost effective solutions on the market."

"The licensing is a monthly fee."

"The cost of Azure Monitor application performance should be less expensive."

"Its cost depends on the ingestion of the logs. It could go anywhere. For an out-of-the-box platform such as FrameFlow, you pay pretty much a fixed price and you get what you get, whereas, with something like Azure Monitor, you pay by the ingestion charge, so you can have one client who pays hardly anything for the same alerts, and another client pays loads and loads."

"Azure Monitor's price is minimal to the point of being almost negligible."

"The solution is expensive, but it is worth the price."

More Azure Monitor pricing and cost advice

"The solution is free to use."

"The solution is cheap."

"It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low."

"We're using the free version of Icinga."

"Even though Icinga's financial cost is low, it is an expensive product regarding the resources required to maintain and operate it."

"The product is inexpensive compared to other DBM products."

"It's an open-source solution."

"This is an open-source solution with paid support."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

11%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

How does Splunk compare with Azure Monitor?

Splunk handles a high amount of data very well. We use Splunk to capture information and as an aggregator for monitoring information from different sources. Splunk is very good at alerting us if we...

What do you like most about Azure Monitor?

Azure Monitor is a very easy-to-use product in the cloud environment.

What needs improvement with Azure Monitor?

What do you like most about Icinga?

The best thing about the solution is how it highlights errors, the issues, and what needs my attention. The solution directs me to areas that I should look for first.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Icinga?

It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low. If you want to include this product in the services you offer to your customers, the return on i...

What needs improvement with Icinga?

There is room for improvement in multi-tenancy. It's not perfect, not even really good. It's average, but it should be improved. For instance, multi-tenancy for monitoring the virtual infrastructur...

Dynatrace vs Azure Monitor

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Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 46% of the time

Nagios Core vs Icinga

Compared 21% of the time

Checkmk vs Icinga

Compared 10% of the time

Nagios XI vs Icinga

Compared 3% of the time

Centreon vs Icinga

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Download Azure Monitor product report

Azure Monitor

May 2025

Download Icinga product report

April 2025

Also Known As

No data available

Icinga Cloud Monitoring

Overview

Azure Monitor is a comprehensive monitoring solution offered by Microsoft Azure. It provides a centralized platform for monitoring the performance and health of various Azure resources, applications, and infrastructure.

With Azure Monitor, users can gain insights into the availability, performance, and usage of their applications and infrastructure. The key features of Azure Monitor include metrics, logs, alerts, and dashboards. Metrics allow users to collect and analyze performance data from various Azure resources, such as virtual machines, databases, and storage accounts.

Logs enable users to collect and analyze log data from different sources, including Azure resources, applications, and operating systems. Azure Monitor also provides a robust alerting mechanism that allows users to set up alerts based on specific conditions or thresholds. These alerts can be configured to notify users via email, SMS, or other notification channels. Additionally, Azure Monitor offers customizable dashboards that allow users to visualize and analyze their monitoring data in a personalized and intuitive manner.

Azure Monitor integrates seamlessly with other Azure services, such as Azure Automation and Azure Logic Apps, enabling users to automate actions based on monitoring data. It also supports integration with third-party monitoring tools and services, providing flexibility and extensibility.

Overall, Azure Monitor is a powerful and versatile monitoring solution that helps users gain deep insights into the performance and health of their Azure resources and applications. It offers a wide range of features and integrations, making it a comprehensive solution for monitoring and managing Azure environments.

Microsoft

Icinga monitors systems, network devices, infrastructure, and services, helping manage and analyze server resources. It automates ticket incidents and alerting, providing oversight of client Windows and Linux systems.

Icinga offers comprehensive monitoring of servers including CPU utilization and RAM space, facilitating automated incident management and alerting. Frequently deployed on-premises, this monitoring tool is key for managed services providers and organizations to oversee and ensure optimal performance of various environments, including applications like databases and web servers. It provides extensive features for creating custom plugins, stabilization, scalability, and high customization capabilities suitable for different infrastructure needs.

What are the key features of Icinga?

Event Handler: Facilitates automatic self-healing of systems.
Extensive Plugin Library: Offers a wide range of plugins for monitoring.
Ease of Use: Simplifies user experience with an intuitive interface and Icinga Director for easy configurations.
Open-Source Nature: Free to use, modify, and distribute.
Automation Capabilities: Integrates with APIs and Ansible Collections for automation.
Custom Plugins: Users can create and integrate their own plugins.
Stability and Scalability: Provides reliable performance across different scale infrastructures.

What are the benefits or ROI to look for when evaluating Icinga?

Critical Issue Highlighting: Effectively identifies and notifies about critical problems.
High Customization: Offers flexibility for diverse monitoring needs.
Automated Alerting: Reduces manual effort and improves response times.
Extensive Integration: Works seamlessly with other tools and platforms.

Icinga implementations span multiple industries, providing essential monitoring for IT infrastructure in healthcare, finance, and education. Managed services providers utilize Icinga to maintain and monitor client systems across various environments while ensuring optimal performance and compliance. It is highly valued in these sectors for its ability to customize monitoring, improving operational efficiency and reducing downtime.

Sample Customers

Rackspace, First Gas, Allscripts, ABB Group

Puppet Labs, Audi, Spacex, Debian, Snapdeal, McGill, RIPE Network Coordination Centre