CA App Synthetic Monitor vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

Broadcom and SolarWinds are both solutions in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category. Broadcom is ranked #68, while SolarWinds is ranked #22 with an average rating of 7.6. Broadcom holds a 0.5% mindshare in APM, compared to SolarWinds’s 1.3% mindshare. Additionally, 66% of Broadcom users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 89% of SolarWinds users who would recommend it.

CA App Synthetic Monitor

Read 3 CA App Synthetic Monitor reviews

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762 Comparison Views

66% willing to recommend

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

Read 44 SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor reviews

4,708 Views
2,919 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

CA App Synthetic Monitor

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 2024

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and CA App Synthetic Monitor compete in the server and application monitoring space. Based on the data comparisons, SolarWinds seems to have the upper hand due to comprehensive monitoring features and better customer service support.

Features: SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor offers extensive server and application monitoring, customizable dashboards, and detailed reporting features. CA App Synthetic Monitor focuses on synthetic transaction monitoring, providing insights on user experience and proactive issue detection.

Room for Improvement: SolarWinds could improve its alerting mechanisms and provide deeper integration options. Additional requested improvements include more user-friendly interfaces and enhanced cloud monitoring capabilities. CA App Synthetic Monitor users mention the need for more flexible reporting, better usability, and enhanced customization options.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor has a straightforward deployment process with extensive support options praised by users. CA App Synthetic Monitor, though easy to set up, receives feedback on occasionally unresponsive customer service.

Pricing and ROI: SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor offers better pricing flexibility and perceived ROI, despite some concerns about initial setup costs. CA App Synthetic Monitor users feel the product justifies its cost due to its specialized features but mention it has a higher price point.

To learn more, read our detailed CA App Synthetic Monitor vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor Report (Updated: March 2026).

Buyer's Guide

CA App Synthetic Monitor vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

March 2026

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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

CA App Synthetic Monitor

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

68th

Average Rating

7.0

Reviews Sentiment

5.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

22nd

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

4.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Server Monitoring (8th), Active Directory Management (9th)

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of CA App Synthetic Monitor is 0.5%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 1.3%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor	1.3%
CA App Synthetic Monitor	0.5%
Other	98.2%

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

Featured Reviews

reviewer2286675

System Administrator at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

A reliable solution for SSL offloading and to encrypt outside traffic

If you are responsible for monitoring the logs in F5, it isn't very easy. The format is complicated compared to different vendors. For example, Fortinet and Cisco have feasible formats for sending and fetching logs. Suppose I'm monitoring the logs and everything, and when I am retrieving logs from F5, I want to know whether it is regular traffic or any abnormality is happening. The logs itself is not user-friendly. It may not give you a clear way of what's happening. You have to go through different websites and work on it. You have to waste so much time on it.

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NikhilKalwint

Technical Specialist at ServiceIO

Monitoring over a thousand systems has improved decision making and operational visibility

From an advantage perspective, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is comparatively cheaper from a commercial point of view. It is easy to install and configure, very user-friendly, and quick to get up and running, allowing you to see the early value adds in your organization. It is compatible with most technologies for monitoring with very few chances of incompatibility. Configuration also allows us to monitor all the technical parameters we are looking for, making it a very good experience for us. The alerting feature in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is a main advantage, as it alerts based on threshold breaches and can raise tickets to the ticketing system, send SMS, and email notifications, allowing engineers to work on those tickets to resolve issues and avoid further impact. The visibility into server health is a beneficial feature that I am utilizing. We widely use various application performance metrics in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor such as database monitoring and server monitoring, which are quite good enough for any monitoring solution. We utilize the customizable dashboards in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"From our experience, it really helps managers in measuring application SLAs and viewing historical performance data."

"Each had strengths in one area or another, but CA covered the majority of our needs end-to-end."

"Monitoring of processes and services is the most valuable feature; it is not necessarily just the server alone in terms of the CPU or the memory, as we can go in-depth into services and processes."

"The recommendations are a life saver."

"From a customers point of view, they get a good return on investment because they are not paying a lot of money when you compare to what they used to pay for IBM and other large vendors."

"We manage SolarWinds ourselves without outsourcing its services."

"SolarWinds is a very stable platform compared to others on the market."

"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."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is its interface, which is used for monitoring."

"The initial setup was relatively easy, and we didn't have to install anything; all we had to do was put on the devices we wanted to monitor."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pros

Cons

"Pricing makes little sense. We had examples where it would be cheaper to have two basic accounts than one intermediate."

"The RBMS component is limited as you can only record using Internet Explorer."

"PerfStack can be made more effective. I am sure SolarWinds already has a plan for the same in coming versions."

"The tool’s report feature created issues for us. We needed to gain skills to use that feature. The tool’s customization is not easy since you have to reconfigure the whole system."

"MS Azure Service and user experience monitoring is an area in which the SolarWinds tools are lacking; without a doubt, this is the Achilles heel of the Orion monitoring tools, and I am currently reviewing other vendors for Azure service monitoring tools."

"SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor could improve the server monitoring and the web application monitoring features are not good. Microsoft SCOM has better server monitoring."

"Some custom applications cannot be monitored, and a lot more applications need to be included."

"Downside of the tools is the web console are hung or crash. It need to improve the performance."

"The technical support team's response time could be improved."

"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."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"When compared to other licensed models in the market, it stands out as one of the more cost-effective options."

"The solution's price is reasonable. Though it's on the higher side, the tool is worth the money."

"When planning for the number of licenses to purchase, make sure you understand all of the elements within an application required to really understand performance well. In our case, we quickly came to the conclusion that an unlimited license for SAM was the way to go."

"I think SolarWinds' pricing is very decent compared to other competitors in the market."

"Pricing is inexpensive, starting at 2440 euros. For that, you get the ability to monitor a couple of nodes and one year of maintenance and support."

"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."

"The solution is overpriced in terms of application management."

"The price is too high."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pricing and cost advice

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885,376 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

No data available

Educational Organization

12%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	17
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	21

Questions from the Community

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What do you like most about SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?

Identifying the problem statement is easy.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?

The initial cost is quite high, but the renewal cost is reasonable.

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What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?

There is definitely room for improvement besides simplifying its setup. As a non-technical person, I believe the dashboards could be improved. Everything we use appears on video walls, and we need ...

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Compared 7% of the time

Splunk AppDynamics vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

Compared 6% of the time

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Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 4% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

March 2026

Download CA App Synthetic Monitor product report

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

March 2026

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor report

Download SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor product report

Also Known As

CA ASM

SolarWinds SAM

Overview

IT organizations require full visibility into business-critical applications regardless of where they're hosted in order to maintain service levels and proactively deal with issues before the end-user is impacted. CA App Synthetic Monitor uses synthetic transactions to provide performance insight for these applications no matter where they're hosted: outside the firewall, in the cloud or delivered via a managed service provider (MSP). Delivered as software as a service, CA App Synthetic Monitor provides end-to-end transaction response time visibility into cloud, mobile and traditional web applications using synthetic transactions delivered by a network of 95 monitoring stations across six continents, 48 countries, 93 cities and 15 time zones.

Broadcom

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers powerful application and server monitoring capabilities for IT pros, enabling them to diagnose and troubleshoot performance issues faster. Do not let slow applications and downtime impact your end-users and business services. Pinpoint the root cause of application issues across various layers of the IT stack. SolarWinds SAM is affordable and easy to deploy, use, and customize. You can automatically discover your system's environment and start monitoring in about an hour. No professional services or consultation needed.

SolarWinds

Sample Customers

Lexmark

Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite

Buyer's Guide

CA App Synthetic Monitor vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

March 2026

Free Report: CA App Synthetic Monitor vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

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