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Cisco Secure Network Analytics vs WhatsUp Gold 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 Secure Network Analytics
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
33rd
Ranking in Network Traffic Analysis (NTA)
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
Network Detection and Response (NDR) (5th), Cisco Security Portfolio (7th)
WhatsUp Gold
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
22nd
Ranking in Network Traffic Analysis (NTA)
10th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (29th), Server Monitoring (14th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (18th), Configuration Management (20th), Log Management (39th), Cloud Monitoring Software (23rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Cisco Secure Network Analytics is 0.9%, down from 1.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WhatsUp Gold is 2.2%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
WhatsUp Gold2.2%
Cisco Secure Network Analytics0.9%
Other96.9%
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Akash Das Barman - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber Security Trainee at DataSpace Academy
Network analytics has reduced investigation time and provides deeper visibility into lateral movement
Several features often look very promising during evaluation or implementation but end up being used only lightly in day-to-day operations. Advanced reporting and scheduled compliance reports look very attractive for audit and compliance teams at implementation time and can generate structured reports for visibility, risk posture, and traffic summaries. In practice, many teams do not rely on it heavily because SIEM tools or GRC platforms already handle reporting better. Built-in threat intelligence feeds represent another area where expectations do not always match usage. The platform includes threat intelligence-based detection and classifications. Initially, teams expect to depend on this heavily, but later SOC teams often prefer their own threat intelligence feeds or correlate intelligence inside SIEM instead. The built-in feeds are used but not as a primary detection source. Automated incident summaries and guided investigation views are designed to simplify triage by automatically grouping related activity into incidents. However, teams often move away from them due to various factors affecting adoption.
EC
Technical Manager at Quan Hung Gourmet
Efficient monitoring with detailed customization, yet complexity remains
The best feature of WhatsUp Gold is the automatic generation of topology and its integration with virtualization and wireless. I have used the automated device discovery with this topology feature. The interactive map feature helps me manage the topology because sometimes we cannot draw the topology correctly, so we need to manually edit the connections. The alerting system is very tunable and customizable, but it's a little complicated to use. Many customers cannot manage it by themselves and need support from us, the provider. We always use the dashboards in the SOC, where we constantly display a dashboard or multiple dashboards. This allows us to know immediately if the connection or bandwidth is full or if the connection is broken.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Visibility. The ability to look East and West. To see what is passing through your circuits, where it is coming from, and how big it is."
"The solution has reduced our incident response times by at least 50% and also reduced the amount of time it takes to detect and remediate threats by around 50%."
"Stealthwatch doubled our threat detection rate, while halving our incident response time and the time it takes us to detect and remediate threats."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the logging, keeping threats under control, and keeping our data and environment secure."
"This solution is doing everything that we want, and my only complaint is in regards to the quirks during installation."
"The fact that it can identify down to an IP address of a system that is causing problems, or potentially causing problems, is very valuable."
"The most valuable features include encrypted traffic analytics and the ability to fulfill requirements at the network level."
"It provides good visibility to the customers. People are still evaluating it, but it provides visibility and helps them to take action to remediate and mitigate the issues that are highlighted on the dashboard. It has good integration with the Cisco switching platform."
"Our local support team provides excellent service."
"The most valuable feature of WhatsUp Gold is NetFlow and the virtualized maps."
"The most important features of WhatsUp Gold are the server health and uptime it provides. Additionally, WhatsUp Gold is a Windows-based solution which is a benefit."
"We primarily use the solution to check the state of the network, monitoring thousands of devices and all of the internal network, and it is the first tool we use to see the state of the network for real-time monitoring."
"The solution effectively monitors network devices and servers."
"This product has aided us in procurement and is overall a well-priced solution."
"The new version has a lot of improved features."
"The interface in the last few years it has been a lot greater, they are much more user-friendly. I like the interface."
 

Cons

"The GUI could use some improvement. Being able to find features more easily would be a great improvement if it was simplified."
"The reporting of day-to-day metrics still has room for improvement."
"I would like to see better filters. You should be able to filter the data out to more rapidly find what you're looking for."
"The interface is sluggish and not updated."
"Cisco Stealthwatch has increased the administrative time required just to get everything up and running smoothly."
"The configuration of the solution was quite complex."
"Stealthwatch needs improvement when it comes to speed."
"If they can make this product more web-based, that would be amazing."
"The technical support does not bother to respond."
"Pricing is too high relative to how many devices we use. The price list is not linear to number of devices."
"There is a very big gap in the support."
"The pricing for this solution has gone up quite recently, which has led some of our customers to buy an alternative product."
"The product is old and not updated."
"This product should add other options for monitoring. It does not currently meet the broader needs of the banking industry in the version we have deployed."
"Users want SMS available via Whatsapp Gold. They don't want to go through third party SMS servers. The solution should work to make this possible."
"I would like to see them do an enhancement to the application monitoring. A lot of other products do better application monitoring so they should do some improvements to the application monitoring."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Today, we are part of the big Cisco ELA, and it is a la carte. We can get orders for whatever we want. At the end of the day, we have to pay for it in one big expense, but that is fine. We are okay with that."
"The licensing costs are outrageous."
"Pricing is much higher compared to other solutions."
"This is an expensive product. We have quit paying for support because we don't want to have to upgrade it and keep paying for it."
"Licensing is done by flows per second, not including outside>in traffic."
"​Licensing is done by flows per second, not including outside (in traffic)."
"Licensing is on a yearly basis."
"NetFlow is very expensive."
"It is per device, per year. The pricing is very clear. If you have a service agreement, you get all of your major upgrades and minor upgrades. It was under $10,000 to go all-in with all of the different add-ons for it."
"I'm not sure, but it's expensive. We don't pay any additional fees."
"There are some subscription charges that are quite heavy. I need to pay for support every year and these charges can be quite expensive. Aside from the initial cost for the tool, you need to pay additionally for support."
"There is a license needed to use WhatsUp Gold."
"The pricing can be on the expensive side when considering competing products."
"The most valuable feature is the cost compared to other solutions."
"This is a well priced solution."
"The choice of version depends on the number of points, or devices, that you want to monitor, and this makes the product expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
8%
Construction Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise52
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco Stealthwatch?
Regarding cost, for the Bangladesh context, Cisco Secure Network Analytics is a little bit high-priced because we are a developing country, making it tough to manage affordable solutions. However, ...
What needs improvement with Cisco Stealthwatch?
Several features often look very promising during evaluation or implementation but end up being used only lightly in day-to-day operations. Advanced reporting and scheduled compliance reports look ...
What is your primary use case for Cisco Stealthwatch?
My main use case for Cisco Secure Network Analytics has been network visibility and anomaly-based threat detection within the enterprise environment. In security operations and VAPT-related activit...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for WhatsUp Gold?
Clients find the licensing calculator confusing, but we simplify this for them by collecting relevant information first. The licensing is based on devices, providing better cost-effectiveness than ...
What needs improvement with WhatsUp Gold?
It would be great if WhatsUp Gold could add features that simplify management with AI, as it is currently too complicated to manage.
What is your primary use case for WhatsUp Gold?
My use case for WhatsUp Gold includes all device availability checks, bandwidth usage, CPU, and memory usage, as well as alarm notifications.
 

Also Known As

Cisco Stealthwatch, Cisco Stealthwatch Enterprise, Lancope StealthWatch
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Edge Web Hosting, Telenor Norway, Ivy Tech Community College of Indiana, Webster Financial Corporation, Westinghouse Electric, VMware, TIAA-CREF
Artoni Trasporti, Austin Independent School District, Banca Marche, Burke County North Carolina, Cambridge University School of Clinical Medicine, Clayco, Community Integrated Care, Desca, Deutsche Bergbau, Flexi-Van, Gropper, Hamleys, Hammonds Furniture, Knowledge IT, Idras S.P.A., Sibeg, Swann Engineering, Trivium Lindenhof
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco Secure Network Analytics vs. WhatsUp Gold and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
902,270 professionals have used our research since 2012.