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Cisco DNA Center vs Icinga 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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cisco DNA Center
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
20th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (1st), Network Automation (2nd)
Icinga
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
41st
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
Server Monitoring (17th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (48th), Cloud Monitoring Software (32nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 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 Icinga is 1.1%, down from 3.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco DNA Center0.7%
Icinga1.1%
Other98.2%
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.
reviewer2292201 - PeerSpot reviewer
Innovation Service Manager at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Easy to use, and it's possible to customize the product as per the needs we may have but average multi-tenancy aspect
It's supported by the community. We use Icinga, which is not part of the Open-Source platform but is wrapped into a commercial solution from another provider, a local provider in Italy. Icinga is an open-source platform, so it is supported by the community. It's quite easy to use, and it's possible to customize the product as per the needs we may have. So it's not expensive, and it's quite a general purpose. We can easily monitor any kind of infrastructure we encounter. 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 alerting is the same as any other monitoring platform. It's not a "wow" feature that has changed our lives, but it's perfectly adequate.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution helps in user microsegmentation."
"The most valuable features of Cisco DNA Center are wireless assurance and visibility."
"Cisco DNA Center is a user-friendly solution."
"The monitoring features are very useful for network engineers."
"Automation is another key highlight. With automation, you can automate everything through a single port."
"Has a good processing feature with a high level of accuracy."
"It offers automation, security enforcement, analytics, and integration with other Cisco technologies, making it a key driver for efficient network operations and compliance with security protocols."
"The automation features are significant, reducing configuration time. This means outstanding functionality. By deploying the controller automatically, the rest becomes automated"
"We have found the solution to be stable."
"We monitor all, starting from UPS to international mail chains."
"Macros and the ability to connect it to Google Maps are valuable features."
"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."
"I use it for monitoring infrastructure and it was very good for that issue."
"I like the ability to amend and adjust things really easily, which is useful in a case where you could make it auto-discover and then set a template to say all of these applications or servers under this template have an automatic threshold set that you’d set up manually."
"Icinga does the job and is fairly stable."
"The most valuable feature is one that not many are even aware of, as Icinga has a self-healing event handler where if the service is down, it is automatically restarted, and you can configure the handler to take action after the critical alarm without human interaction."
 

Cons

"When it comes to deploying wireless fields, integrating defaults into the DNS interface can be challenging."
"The solution can be quite pricey."
"The solution's integration feature can be better."
"There is a limitation with the number of VRFs that you can have in your network, and this has caused us problems with some customers."
"The weaknesses primarily involve pricing and the ongoing need for increased bandwidth and data throughput."
"The cost is very high."
"An area that needs improvement is the integration with other vendors."
"The solution's setup process needs enhancement."
"One thing that Icinga lacks is the capability to create advanced and customized dashboards within the tool itself."
"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."
"It is not really adequate for our current needs. It causes additional issues which we have to work around and takes us time that a better solution would not."
"The user interface should be improved."
"At this time, the layout of the website is a bit difficult. It should be more user-friendly for changing the background and logos."
"We have found some problems with Nagios, and support isn't very responsive."
"Sometimes, it is very hard to keep an overview of what's happening."
"The connection between Icinga and Icinga Web."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price could be better. It's a very expensive tool."
"I rate the product's pricing an eight on a scale of one to ten, where one is very cheap, and ten is very expensive."
"Cisco DNA Center is too expensive."
"Licensing for Cisco DNA Center is a little bit expensive, just like any Cisco solution. Its cost could still be improved."
"We have a three-year license with them."
"Cisco DNA Center is a licensed product with multiple levels of licensing available such as basic, advanced, and essential. I don't have the exact figure, but Cisco DNA Center is costly. For example, the box has information about the essential license and costs a considerable amount of money. You need to pay extra to use advanced features in Cisco DNA Center. My company sees Cisco DNA Center as a solution that's worth the money, which is why it invested in the solution. If you want centralized management for your network, especially when upgrading it, Cisco DNA Center is perfect, but it's more suitable for a large-scale rather than a small-scale network."
"The licensing cost for Cisco DNA Center is not more than that of other solutions."
"The tool's licensing may not come across as something that may be friendly for users."
"The solution is cheap."
"The solution is free to use."
"We're using the free version of Icinga."
"The product is inexpensive compared to other DBM products."
"It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low."
"Even though Icinga's financial cost is low, it is an expensive product regarding the resources required to maintain and operate it."
"This is an open-source solution with paid support."
"It's an open-source solution."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
13%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Healthcare Company
6%
Educational Organization
14%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
University
9%
 

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 Business9
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise8
 

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. ...
Ask a question
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Also Known As

DNA Center
Icinga Cloud Monitoring
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Puppet Labs, Audi, Spacex, Debian, Snapdeal, McGill, RIPE Network Coordination Centre
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco DNA Center vs. Icinga and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
910,005 professionals have used our research since 2012.