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Cisco DNA Center vs DX Performance Management comparison

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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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco DNA Center
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
33rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (2nd), Network Automation (2nd)
DX Performance Management
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
40th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
Infrastructure Capacity Planning (1st), DX NetOps (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2026, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Cisco DNA Center is 0.7%, down from 1.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of DX Performance Management is 0.7%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco DNA Center0.7%
DX Performance Management0.7%
Other98.6%
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Mahir Öztürk - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Engineer at NGN Bilgi ve İletişim Hizmetleri
Client history has helped resolve past network issues more efficiently
I mostly use the client history feature of Cisco DNA Center. I didn't use the real-time monitoring capability of Cisco DNA Center because I primarily used it for client history regarding issues and problems. I don't use it for real-time monitoring. If there is a problem, I can inspect the situation and see what is happening, which is beneficial.
reviewer1810893 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior IT Operations Specialist at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
Flexibility and detailed performance stats enable effective network monitoring
Spectrum is very good at monitoring all network faults and configurations. It enables me to take action based on network issues. The Performance Management provides detailed network performance stats, including CPU, memory, and interface bandwidth. Additionally, Spectrum is flexible and allows me to organize and treat devices uniquely without impacting other devices.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Cisco DNA Center is easier to use than Fortinet FortiManager."
"The monitoring is very valuable to me, as I can easily monitor all my clients through Cisco DNA Center at this point."
"The product's most valuable feature is the visual representation of the switch's front panel."
"In day-to-day operations, especially post-pandemic, the majority of our customers have to work from anywhere, and having that single integrated dashboard for each and every activity while being able to correlate those activities in line with a business objective has been very well addressed by Cisco DNA."
"It does a lot of things automatically, and that's the big thing with it. They're making the software so that you don't need to be as knowledgeable as me on the switching and routing side to get your work done. If you want, you can have DNA troubleshoot your problem for you and give you solutions or fix it itself, if it was something that's just a configuration issue."
"We have many people from the team who manage a lot of devices. By using Cisco DNA Center, it has taken some of that burden away, we are impressed with it. We did the investment in CAPEX, but in the OPEX was very low."
"DNA Center is scalable."
"The most valuable feature of Cisco DNA Center is the AI (Artificial Intelligence) that provides us with valuable information."
"The solution's performance itself is very good because it is a vertical database that loads very fast in comparison to other products."
"The most valuable feature of DX Performance Management is the quick way we can collect data without putting much effort. They have a lot of customization and features with the solution internally and out of the box. We can discover the device, and start collecting information. For example, if the device is available, we can receive the CPU and memory utilization, and the interface optimization is simple and very fast to implement."
"Scalability is the reason we bought the product to begin with; it was designed from the ground up for carrier-grade services, and we are in effect an MSP ourselves, so we were really interested in looking at something to be able to handle the multi-tenancy and scale as large as possible, and this was the only solution that we really considered at that level."
"I can get it to run a report showing, for instance, what root drives are in the critical range in terms of being full, like 90 percent full, and disseminate that information to the other areas of the organization."
"There is another component of the tool called Network Flow Analysis. It gives us the ability to troubleshoot issues which do not appear right away."
"One feature I like about CA Performance Management is the certification of the devices."
"Technical support is very responsive and knowledgeable."
"Customer service is top-notch."
 

Cons

"The network, data center, and SD-WAN are all being treated as different services, but I would like to have only one solution to manage all of them."
"The cost is very high."
"The solution's setup process needs enhancement."
"As a user, it would be good if I could plug in controllers, suites, and devices from other vendors to Cisco DNA Center."
"The initial setup is straightforward except for the issue that this solution is incompatible with switches or access points from other vendors. That is very bad."
"The solution can be quite pricey."
"The solution’s security side could be improved."
"Integration with analytic tools and API integrations would be ideal."
"The solution could improve the database model. It is also not very good because they have a lot of interconnections with other data sources, such as NFA and VNA."
"It could be a little easier to integrate new metrics."
"Some of the individual report views, the way some of the columns sort, there's room for improvement in giving us more flexibility in being able to sort reports based, for example, on what columns the metrics fall under."
"When it goes through discovery, or whatever it is doing in the back-end that slows it down, sometimes we get some failures with it. ​"
"The database should have higher availability in case of an incident."
"​Global synchronization errors. Sometimes it just doesn't finish in time due to the load."
"We experience disconnections between the solutions own components."
"The quantity of views which are tied to specific metric families is too high. Also, the problem is the view doesn't tell you which metric family it uses, so you don't know why you don't see data."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The partnership price is notably high, but it ultimately depends on the chosen business model."
"Licensing for Cisco DNA Center is a little bit expensive, just like any Cisco solution. Its cost could still be improved."
"Cisco DNA Center is too expensive."
"The price could be better. It's a very expensive tool."
"The product is very costly."
"I would rate the pricing a six out of ten, with ten being expensive."
"The tool is medium-priced."
"It is an expensive solution."
"Do your homework and know how many devices you will be managing out of the gate. Be sure to project what your growth will be each year."
"I like the licensing model because it's device-based."
"They should provide more scalable licensing for the product."
"We were looking at other vendors in the marketplace for NetFlow, and CA just beat everybody else in price, cost, and the size to implement. ​"
"The tool's pricing is based on the number of network devices."
"We purchase a license to use the solution every three years and we have multiple contracts. They have been increasing the price annually. We have a baseline for three years and then we need to pay the difference from the baseline, and we are in the process of negotiating a new price for all the licenses we need. The price overall is affordable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
7%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Outsourcing Company
26%
Construction Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Healthcare Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise24
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Large Enterprise25
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco DNA Center?
After evaluating other solutions, we will provide feedback.
What needs improvement with Cisco DNA Center?
The deployment of Cisco DNA Center was complex due to the fact that on the data center side, we have a Juniper infrastructure, which created some complexity, though not significant. The deployment ...
What is your primary use case for Cisco DNA Center?
In my organization, we currently have some Cisco devices such as access switches, and we also have infrastructure, but that is not part of our responsibility. We do not manage that infrastructure. ...
What needs improvement with DX Performance Management?
Spectrum's topology view sometimes does not rebuild automatically when a device is shut down and reconnected. It requires manual discovery and rebuilding of the topology, which I hope can be improved.
What is your primary use case for DX Performance Management?
I have used Spectrum for monitoring all network faults, configurations, and troubleshooting network issues. It provides network performance stats, such as CPU, memory, and interface bandwidth detai...
What advice do you have for others considering DX Performance Management?
I would recommend this solution based on its functionality, flexibility, customizability, and ease of use. Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten. I am just a customer and not a par...
 

Also Known As

DNA Center
CA Performance Management
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Jack Henry & Assoc, Target, CenturyLink, Bell Canada, BrightHouse Networks, Telus, Unisys, Verizon, Southern California Edison, GEICO, Fidelity Investments, Wells Fargo, American Family Insurance Group, Deutsche Telekom AG 
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco DNA Center vs. DX Performance Management and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
914,109 professionals have used our research since 2012.