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Centreon vs Cisco DNA Center comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 10, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
8.1
Centreon enhances ROI through efficient monitoring, quick issue resolution, cost savings, and minimal impact during outages.
Sentiment score
6.5
Cisco DNA Center enhances efficiency by reducing configuration time, despite licensing costs, with positive but varied ROI evaluations.
It significantly saves time by automating monitoring tasks and reduces costs as it requires fewer resources.
Centreon provides timesaving and costsaving benefits as it lets us manage multiple devices on a single platform.
Although Cisco DNA Center is expensive, we have seen a return on investment in terms of time savings.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.1
Centreon's customer service is responsive and knowledgeable, though availability limitations and support level improvements are needed.
Sentiment score
6.2
Cisco's DNA Center support is praised for responsiveness but criticized for slow responses and challenges with complex issues.
We do not have direct access to Centreon's technical support.
If issues arise, like services appearing as down in Centreon, technical support helps check the polar-server communication.
Technical support from Centreon responds within 24 hours and resolves issues quickly.
Overall, Cisco DNA Center rates eight out of ten as a complete solution.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.0
Centreon is valued for flexibility and scalability, though improvements in data management and alert scaling are recommended.
Sentiment score
7.6
Cisco DNA Center is highly scalable, effectively supports small to large networks, but licensing costs can be high.
Occasionally, for several hours, we do not receive any alerts, causing a business impact.
We use other tools for adding and deploying configured devices, but direct access from Centreon would be beneficial.
The solution is designed for large enterprise companies.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Centreon is stable and reliable, though stability may vary; support resolves issues swiftly, especially with the latest versions.
Sentiment score
7.5
Cisco DNA Center is generally stable, with some users reporting occasional bugs and needed updates affecting stability.
Sometimes we do not receive alerts, causing business impact, and users ask why no alerts were received.
Centreon is a much more straightforward and stable tool compared to Icinga.
 

Room For Improvement

Centreon users seek improved customization, monitoring, UI, documentation, integration, mobile features, auto-remediation, multilingual support, and notifications.
Cisco DNA Center needs better integration, user-friendliness, and support, with pricing, scalability, and compatibility issues impacting its effectiveness.
Enhancements are needed in identifying configuration issues, providing real-time alerts in case of issues, and improving the HTTP configuration tasks.
Reliability is sometimes an issue. Centreon has a developer mode and production mode, but sometimes alerts don't come through in production mode.
While Centreon excels at server-level monitoring, it lacks the ability to track web app availability and latency, unlike Dynatrace, which is efficient in this area.
The AI-driven insights have contributed significantly to faster troubleshooting and predictive analytics.
 

Setup Cost

Centreon provides an open-source solution for SMEs but has a complex pricing model for enterprises needing premium features.
Cisco DNA Center is costly, justified for enterprises, challenging for mid-market, with SaaS and promotions occasionally aiding affordability.
Centreon's pricing is not very expensive.
 

Valuable Features

Centreon offers unlimited monitoring, enhanced visualization, and customizable features for efficient oversight with extensive device compatibility and anomaly detection.
Cisco DNA Center provides centralized management, security, AI-driven insights, and automation, enhancing network control and operational efficiency.
Monitoring is a fundamental pillar of technical support, and Centreon streamlines this process, reducing the need for extensive manual checks.
Centreon's real-time monitoring, despite having some manual aspects, supports us in managing our operations effectively.
Centreon allows us to monitor all of our devices on one platform.
The most valuable features include AI-driven insights which make troubleshooting much easier.
 

Categories and Ranking

Centreon
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
15th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
IT Infrastructure Monitoring (18th), Cloud Monitoring Software (15th)
Cisco DNA Center
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
14th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
42
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (1st), Network Automation (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Centreon is 2.4%, down from 3.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco DNA Center is 1.4%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Simon KONAN - PeerSpot reviewer
Plug-ins are free but it has limitations in sending out information to users
The issue my company has with the tool stems from the fact that it didn't give an on-time response to us. The product collects the information, but it fails to send them via SMS, WhatsApp or Telegram. The solution can be used if you want to get email notifications, which is not good for our company because if someone is not in front of their desktop, you can't receive information about an equipment or LAN that is down.
Ahmed  Helmy - PeerSpot reviewer
Experience unified visibility and monitoring for enterprise campus and significant time savings and enhanced troubleshooting with reliable support
We have been working with Cisco DNA Center for ten years. Our clients use Cisco DNA Center for unified visibility/monitoring across Enterprise Campus both LAN & WLAN along with Access and fast technical issues troubleshooting The solution provides fast troubleshooting capabilities and fast…
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Computer Software Company
15%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Centreon?
Centreon's most valuable features are preventative maintenance and cost-efficiency. Everything is monitored, and we get a log before the system fails. We have an opportunity to fix the issue and av...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Centreon?
Centreon's pricing is not very expensive. Initially, I rated it seven, but corrected to five out of ten.
What needs improvement with Centreon?
I have certain concerns with Centreon, such as being unable to set downtime for multiple devices at once due to the limitation of adding only 50 devices in a single go. Increasing this limit would ...
What do you like most about Cisco DNA Center?
The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it gives some kind of ease in operations, especially since our company is moving from CLI to GUI-based configuration.
What needs improvement with Cisco DNA Center?
The system is working fine for me currently.
 

Also Known As

No data available
DNA Center
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Airbus, Bollore, BT, Canal Plus, Kuehne Nagel, Limagrain, LVMH, Oberthur Technologies, Orange, Darty, Addax Petroleum, Plastic Omnium, Auchan, Valeo, Saint Gobin, Clarins, Hugo Boss, JC Decaux, French Government (Defense, Justice, Environment, Agriculture), OptiComm, Thales, Zeiss.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Centreon vs. Cisco DNA Center and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,129 professionals have used our research since 2012.