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Cribl vs WhatsUp Gold comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 29, 2026

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

Cribl
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
6th
Ranking in Log Management
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
57
Ranking in other categories
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (8th), Observability Pipeline Software (1st)
WhatsUp Gold
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
29th
Ranking in Log Management
35th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (21st), Server Monitoring (15th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (18th), Configuration Management (20th), Cloud Monitoring Software (22nd), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Cribl is 1.2%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WhatsUp Gold is 1.3%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cribl1.2%
WhatsUp Gold1.3%
Other97.5%
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

Aman Verma - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Software Engineer at a retailer with 1,001-5,000 employees
Has helped reduce daily log volume significantly and streamline data routing across multiple destinations
Regarding complexity, as I mentioned before, Cribl is very simple to use. When I started 2.5 years ago, it was very easy to learn. I learned Cribl within a week, and even though I was a fresher at the time, it was easy to understand and not complex enough that someone would need to spend money on labs. It's not that complex to learn. Regarding cost efficiency, it's very good because nowadays the SIEM tools we use are too expensive on license, and SIEM tools base their license on how many logs get ingested. The unwanted logs, particularly firewall logs, represent a significant portion of unnecessary ingestion. Cribl saves our license by filtering out half of the firewall logs that are unwanted. Our main purpose for using Cribl is to save our license and save money. Currently, everyone is moving toward AI agents. We currently use regex, and AI agents could help us create those regex patterns to drop events or add raw data to events. Currently, we sit down, review the logs, and create regex patterns manually, which can be time-consuming. An AI agent could reduce this time. I read some articles indicating that Cribl Cloud has started using AI and considering MCPs and model context, but I'm not certain how far along they are. If Cribl asked me what they could improve, that would be my suggestion. The support is very good, and I had a few issues with Cribl where I raised support cases and received good responses, which is better than the quick response I didn't get from other SIEM tools and vendor tools I use. Compared to other SIEM tools, Cribl is cheaper than Splunk and DataDogs. However, it's still a bit expensive from my point of view, though I won't call it expensive. Overall, I think 99% of companies use Cribl before their SIEM tools, and compared to SIEM tools, Cribl is cheaper. Companies can use any SIEM tool such as Google, Splunk, or Cisco, and Cribl is cheaper than those SIEM tools. They might have a slight chance to reduce costs further, but I'm not the correct person to evaluate that since I'm more focused on the operational side. Regarding training, it was quite easy to grasp. It took me almost a week to understand the basic functionalities and what Cribl does. Getting more expertise took additional time, but basic functionalities and understanding what Cribl does took around four to five days. One point I want to mention is that Cribl could improve their labs or training materials in their Cribl Cloud or whatever portal they have.
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

"Cribl is one of the best data pipelining platforms, and with all the features that have been upgraded over the past three years, it has been seamless."
"What I appreciate most about Cribl is that it addresses a major gap in the market compared to the competition."
"When it comes to the product's installation phase, it is not tough for people who have good knowledge...The tool is worth the investment."
"Cribl feels a lot easier to use and more intuitive, gives you more capability, and you don't have to work as hard to set things up."
"The solution saves a significant amount of time and resources, and I would estimate the return on investment to be double or triple the investment we made."
"There are no complaints, but it has been a very good experience using Cribl."
"I would definitely recommend Cribl to other users because it has helped me reduce my log handling time by 40 to 50%, and it also reduces the log volume by 30 to 40%, which cuts storage and SIEM costs."
"What I appreciate the most about Cribl is the free training, the free access to all the training, and how easy it is to learn it."
"Overall, we have been satisfied with the functionality of the product."
"The best feature of WhatsUp Gold is the automatic generation of topology and its integration with virtualization and wireless."
"There is a flow monitor option, so we can trace the source IP, the destination IP, and top talker feature in this."
"We've been using it for many years and we use it typically for early warning, as it notifies customers of problems prior to failure."
"Our local support team provides excellent service."
"The most important features of WhatsUp Gold are the server health and uptime it provides."
"It's a good product, and if one has the expertise to use it, it will be a good investment and it will help IT to save and plan for the future."
"It is easy to access and discover devices, as well as monitor them automatically. The topology discover is also a useful feature."
 

Cons

"Data cost is a concern, as Cribl charges for everything it sees rather than everything it processes."
"Currently, Cribl Search is dedicated to one bucket at a time in the case of S3 buckets. The ability to search for multiple buckets would be awesome."
"One area that could be improved is the aggregation functionality within Cribl."
"There is no alerting mechanism for the leader/worker nodes status."
"There are opportunities for AI to be incorporated more tightly into Cribl to help build out those pipelines and apply some more complex logic to those transformations could be useful."
"The user interface is acceptable, but I think a person who is just starting to use it will need to go through documentation because there is a steep learning curve to become familiar with Cribl Stream."
"The cost part is very high compared to alternatives such as Edge Delta, which offers much cheaper prices."
"I think Cribl can be improved because I do not believe it is a mature product. It has gone down many times and when we are doing upgrades, many things break and we face a lot of issues, especially with scaling."
"The tool should focus on increasing its market share, as it is the only area of concern where improvements are needed."
"We can never achieve or get a good picture of the network topology."
"Regional product team support is not very good."
"The new release cadence needs to be improved. It takes a while for them to add new features and functionality. There should be a quicker turnaround with new versions."
"Importing the maps and being able to customize them could be easier."
"The point system is not clear and clarity around this would improve our understanding of the system."
"Improvements are needed in integration, especially for WhatsApp call and messages."
"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."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I would not say it is a cheaply priced tool as it has been doing wonders in the market. The tool has been budget-friendly for organizations."
"The product pricing is reasonable compared to other solutions."
"The choice of version depends on the number of points, or devices, that you want to monitor, and this makes the product expensive."
"Pricing is reasonable compared to other products."
"This is a well priced solution."
"There is a license needed to use WhatsUp Gold."
"The pricing can be on the expensive side when considering competing products."
"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."
"The tool's price is reasonable. WhatsUp Gold is cheaper than SolarWinds."
"The most valuable feature is the cost compared to other solutions."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Healthcare Company
6%
Computer Software Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise34
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cribl?
For the current user at a small level, the pricing is good. At a large level, it is not too heavy. The main model of pricing is based on data integrations at approximately $0.32 per GB for ST enter...
What needs improvement with Cribl?
A feature I would want Cribl to add in future releases is the ability to create a greater number of fleets. Currently, Cribl has a limitation on the number of fleets that can be created. In an ente...
What is your primary use case for Cribl?
I use Cribl as our data ingestion source, with Cribl Edge agents installed across all servers. Cribl is used at the pipeline or routing level to send data to our SIEM platform. Firewall logs are se...
What do you like most about WhatsUp Gold?
The interactive mapping interface for scrolling, zooming, and drilling down on an element to learn about a network issue is good. When we see a network there will sometimes be a spot that has one l...
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.
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
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 Cribl vs. WhatsUp Gold and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
886,719 professionals have used our research since 2012.