Chronosphere vs Splunk AppDynamics comparison

Chronosphere and Splunk are both solutions in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category. Chronosphere is ranked #34 with an average rating of 9.0, while Splunk is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.3. Chronosphere holds a 0.3% mindshare in APM, compared to Splunk’s 4.6% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Chronosphere users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 91% of Splunk users who would recommend it.

Chronosphere

Read 1 Chronosphere review

702 Views
424 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Splunk AppDynamics

Read 249 Splunk AppDynamics reviews

11,994 Views
6,408 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

Chronosphere

Splunk AppDynamics

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Executive SummaryUpdated on May 11, 2025

Splunk AppDynamics and Chronosphere compete in cloud monitoring and application performance management. Chronosphere has an upper hand due to its advanced features and scalability.

Features: Splunk AppDynamics offers comprehensive application performance tracking, real-time business metrics visualization, and flexible deployment models. Chronosphere stands out with high scalability, seamless integration with cloud-native environments, and strong observability focus.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Splunk AppDynamics supports on-premise, hybrid, and cloud environments, emphasizing support via professional services. Chronosphere is cloud-native by design, known for rapid deployment and a collaborative support experience. Its deployment ease and support structure make it adaptable for cloud-centric organizations.

Pricing and ROI: Splunk AppDynamics offers predictable pricing with diverse licensing options, often leading to positive ROI reports. Chronosphere may have high initial setup costs but promises significant returns through efficiency and advanced insights.

To learn more, read our detailed Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

June 2025

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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

Chronosphere

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

34th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Log Management (30th), AIOps (16th)

Splunk AppDynamics

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

3rd

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

249

Ranking in other categories

IT Infrastructure Monitoring (5th), IT Operations Analytics (2nd), Mobile APM (1st), Container Monitoring (3rd)

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Chronosphere is 0.3%, down from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk AppDynamics is 4.6%, down from 6.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

Featured Reviews

Arvind Pant

Senior Data Engineer at DoorDash

Monitors pipelines with real-time alerts and good documentation

It isn't very easy. It's not easy for everyone. It would be much easier if there could be a simpler version, like a data number version or an SQL version. It's hard to debug if you don't know the syntax. Also, I saw the Slack alerts feature, which is pretty cool, but I cannot customize my messages on the Slack alerts. It would be great if it were possible to tag people in the alerts. At DoorDash, we have hundreds of pipelines, and if something fails, I want to tag specific people so they can start working on the issue immediately.

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Gyanesh Rahatekar

Back office at Reliance Industries Ltd

Application performance management and error resolution improved with data-driven insights

Dynatrace has multiple functions compared to Splunk AppDynamics, so Splunk AppDynamics should add those functions, which are not available as of now. Dynatrace has a universal agent that collects all information related to their CI, and if one CI has multiple languages, then there is no need to instrument multiple agents. However, Splunk AppDynamics requires multiple agents; if I have one server with multiple applications in different languages, then I need to instrument different agents for each application. Splunk AppDynamics should work with Dynatrace with one single universal agent that works with all application languages, eliminating the need for multiple implementations.

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

"The alerting features are good"

"We are able to correlate performance between tiers."

"AppDynamics Database Monitoring's most valuable feature is the ability of the out-of-the-box to update the information, provide various metrics, and possibly include custom metrics."

"It allows us to configure health rules so that we can, based on our own experience, determine when an application is behaving incorrectly."

"The business transaction that stands between multiple applications is proving to be most valuable."

"The feature we find most valuable, is that the solution creates a unified platform making it really easy to pinpoint a problem, and then drill down into a transaction to resolve the issue."

"Database scaling or migration projects play a supportive role throughout the development, monitoring, and troubleshooting phases."

"The best features of AppDynamics would be the code application monitoring capabilities."

"Knowing which tables on the database were working the most was valuable. It helped the client understand where they need to focus. They streamlined a lot of their queries and brought the resource usage down. It helped them to find long-running queries. They rewrote them completely so that they don't take as long and the application performs better."

More Splunk AppDynamics pros

Cons

"It's not easy for everyone."

"The solution could be more user-friendly for diagnostic purposes. Anyone who is using the solution should be able to infer what that error is about, they should be able to troubleshoot it better."

"Regarding Search Guard functionality, there is room for improvement."

"The AppDynamics installation process needs to be more straightforward. Deploying the product is also tricky."

"I would like to see a better way to automate actions based on the events generated by the tool."

"AppDynamics scaled well up to around 3,000 agents. The performance deteriorated after that, while Dynatrace could support more than 10,000 agents. We were surprised that AppDynamics' scalability is not so good."

"In the current version of AppDynamics, there is a correlated section, where we can see all servers’ performance along with application performance, but network performance is missing."

"The user access management could be a bit better."

"The overall performance of this solution could be improved. The hot-hot infrastructure features could also be improved."

More Splunk AppDynamics cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"I would like more flexible pricing: A pay-per-use model, rather than just a fixed-price model."

"The solution is highly expensive"

"AppDynamics Server Monitoring is an expensive solution."

"The license for AppDynamics is procured by our customers."

"AppDynamics is what I would consider an enterprise-level solution. This means that it's a solution that is intended for use by larger organizations, while small or medium-sized businesses may find it difficult to afford. The number of agents required will also impact the pricing, and smaller companies may only be able to afford a limited number of agents. Essentially, the cost of the solution is not within the reach of every organization, and only some may be able to afford it."

"Take into consideration what you get for specific pricing models and how much it costs to add on things you may need later."

"There is an annual cost to use this solution. The licensing model could be improved by making it more cost-effective."

"In terms of pricing, I feel that when you compare the benefits that we get to the price that we paid, it is reasonable."

More Splunk AppDynamics pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

17%

Financial Services Firm

17%

Retailer

13%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Educational Organization

33%

Financial Services Firm

21%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Chronosphere?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Chronosphere?

I work as a data engineer, and we have many streaming pipelines. We use Chronosphere to monitor various metrics, such as how much data our pipeline is processing in each batch, the volume of incomi...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Chronosphere?

If you want to monitor pipelines and use something like Kafka or any streaming platform, Chronosphere is the best option for monitoring pipelines with real-time alerts. It is loosely coupled with y...

See all answers

Any advice about APM solutions?

There are many factors and we know little about your requirements (size of org, technology stack, management systems, the scope of implementation). Our goal was to consolidate APM and infra monitor...

See all answers

APM tools for a Managed Service Provider - Dynatrace vs. AppDynamics vs. Aternity vs. Ruxit

Hi Avi! It's great to see your thorough approach to selecting an APM package for your MSP company. Considering your focus on SMBs and enterprises in Israel, Dynatrace seems like a solid choice with...

See all answers

What do you like most about AppDynamics?

The solution saves time and cost.

See all answers

Comparisons

Honeycomb.io vs Chronosphere

Compared 23% of the time

Datadog vs Chronosphere

Compared 19% of the time

Grafana vs Chronosphere

Compared 19% of the time

Splunk Real User Monitoring (RUM) vs Chronosphere

Compared 19% of the time

Dynatrace vs Chronosphere

Compared 11% of the time

More Chronosphere Competitors

Dynatrace vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 15% of the time

Datadog vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 9% of the time

Splunk Enterprise Security vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 8% of the time

New Relic vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 7% of the time

Grafana vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 5% of the time

More Splunk AppDynamics Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

June 2025

Download Chronosphere product report

Buyer's Guide

Splunk AppDynamics

May 2025

Download Splunk AppDynamics product report

Overview

Chronosphere provides a robust platform for managing and monitoring cloud-native applications with features like real-time observability, incident management, and capacity planning. It offers scalable, detailed observability across complex systems, an intuitive interface, and cost-efficient resource management. Users report enhanced productivity, improved collaboration, and better decision-making, bolstering operational capabilities and organizational growth.

Chronosphere

Splunk AppDynamics enhances application performance monitoring with advanced diagnostics and real-time insights, offering seamless end-to-end transaction tracking and infrastructure visibility.

AppDynamics provides critical tools for businesses to analyze application behavior and performance. Through innovative features like transaction snapshot analysis and adaptable dashboards, users can quickly identify and address issues, ensuring high levels of system uptime and efficiency. It is designed to support complex environments including Kubernetes and AWS, enhancing user experience by detecting performance issues early. Despite needing improvements in network monitoring and integration, it remains a robust option for tracking application health.

What are the key features of AppDynamics?

Real-time Performance Monitoring: Offers immediate insights into application behavior.
Business Transaction Tracking: Tracks transactions from start to finish for bottleneck identification.
JVM Memory Monitoring: Provides detailed JVM metrics and memory use information.
Deep-dive Diagnostics: Enables in-depth analysis of code and stack traces.
Adaptable Dashboards: Customizable views for better data interpretation.

How does AppDynamics benefit users?

Improved Incident Resolution: Faster problem detection and solution implementation.
Enhanced Application Performance: Real-time monitoring optimizes system operations.
Comprehensive Visibility: Provides a full view of application infrastructure.
Informed Decision Making: Detailed analytics guide performance improvements.
Customer Satisfaction: Enhances user experience through faster issue resolutions.

In industries like financial services and e-commerce, AppDynamics facilitates performance tracking across distributed systems, optimizing infrastructure to meet consumer demands. It excels in environments needing precise transaction monitoring and is pivotal in delivering high value and satisfaction.

Splunk

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

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

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

June 2025

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