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Elastic Observability vs NetWitness Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 9, 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

Elastic Observability
Ranking in Log Management
14th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
28
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (7th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (10th), Container Monitoring (4th), Cloud Monitoring Software (6th)
NetWitness Platform
Ranking in Log Management
33rd
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (30th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Elastic Observability is 1.3%, down from 1.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NetWitness Platform is 0.4%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Log Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Elastic Observability1.3%
NetWitness Platform0.4%
Other98.3%
Log Management
 

Featured Reviews

Adelina Craciun - PeerSpot reviewer
Customization enables tailored monitoring and alerting across departments
The possibility to customize it has been quite useful. Whatever the other departments want to dream up, we implement. Whatever they want to monitor, the granularity of it, the changes in the threshold, and the anomalies that they want reported all require some development. So far, every single request has been fulfilled.
MOTASHIM Al Razi - PeerSpot reviewer
It is a stable solution, but they should make the user interface easier to understand
The solution's initial setup takes work. We have to organize multiple paths and many features. The deployment process takes less than a week. But it takes a month to complete if we want to make the solution smarter by integrating it with various devices. I rate the process as a six out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of Elastic Observability is the text search."
"Elastic APM has plenty of features, such as the Elastic server for Kibana and many additional plugins. It's a comprehensive tool when used as a logging platform."
"It is scalable and supports multitenancy, which is beneficial for MSPs."
"The architecture and system's stability are simple."
"I think Elastic Observability is already in very good shape."
"The ability to ensure that the data is searchable and maintainable is highly valuable for our purposes."
"The product has connectors to many services."
"The most valued feature of Elastic is its log analytics capabilities."
"The most valuable features are the packet decoder, log decoder, and concentrator."
"The most valuable features are its ingestion of logs and raising of alerts based on those logs."
"Alerting Module: It provides real-time event processing language on all the logs/packets stream for advanced alerting, i.e., using SQL LIKE statements."
"I can have enterprise security, email security, next generation firewall security log, HIDS and NIDS logs, etc. all on the same dashboard. It makes it easy to pinpoint or correlate our server to this. I can find out if there is lateral movement. This is the biggest advantage of this solution."
"Possibility to investigate incidents based on logs and raw packets, such as extracting files sent over the network"
"Offers a good wireless feature."
"The most valuable features are the threat prediction and network forensics."
"The most valuable feature is the correlation. It can report in real-time and monitor the management."
 

Cons

"There could be more low-code features included in the product."
"They need more skills in the market. There are not enough skills in the market. It is not pervasive enough on the market, in my opinion. In other words, there isn't a big enough user base."
"The solution would be better if it was capable of more automation, especially in a monitoring capacity or for the response to abnormalities."
"There is room for improvement regarding its APM capabilities."
"I am familiar with Azure Monitor, which I find more user-friendly compared to Elastic, which is a very technical tool."
"One example is the inability to monitor very old databases with the newest version."
"Elastic Observability’s price could be improved."
"There's a steep learning curve if you've never used this solution before."
"Lots of competing products have vulnerability protection built into their products, and this solution would be improved by including that support."
"The documentation is not as structured as I would like, personally, and I think that it can be improved and made much more user-friendly."
"We have encountered issues with unresolved crashes."
"An area for improvement would be better automation and more inbuilt use cases."
"The initial setup was complex because it takes a lot of time to complete the implementation."
"Nowadays, their support is a little subpar compared to other solutions. I rate RSA support six out of 10."
"Security needs improvement."
"The user interface is a little bit difficult for new users and it needs to be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We will buy a premium license after POC."
"One needs to pay for the licenses, and it is an annual subscription model right now."
"Elastic Observability is cheaper than other similar solutions, such as Dynatrace. Its license calculation is based on various factors like data volume and physical infrastructure, particularly related to RAM capacity."
"Elastic Observability's pricing could be better for small-scale users."
"The product’s pricing needs improvement."
"The price of Elastic Observability is expensive."
"So far, there are just the standard licensing fees. Several of the components are embedded in the license or are even open source. They're even free depending on what you use, which makes it even more appealing to someone that is discussing pricing of the solution."
"Since we are a huge company, Elastic Observability is an affordable solution for us."
"We have a perpetual license, so the total cost of ownership is not very expensive. It's a good investment."
"It provides tools to assist in selecting the appropriate license and usage scenarios."
"There is a licensing fee and the customer can choose whether he wishes this to be subscription-based or perpetual."
"Our license is for one year."
"In comparison to other SIEM solutions such as Splunk, NetWitness is less costly."
"The product is expensive."
"It’s cheaper to run virtual machines in a VMware environment."
"The new pricing and licensing mechanisms are fair. I would advise always to get the full solution (i.e., not only Logs)."
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Comparison Review

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Feb 26, 2015
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We at Infosecnirvana.com have done several posts on SIEM. After the Dummies Guide on SIEM, we are following it up with a SIEM Product Comparison – 101 deck. So, here it is for your viewing pleasure. Let me know what you think by posting your comments below. The key products compared here are…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
12%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Performing Arts
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise16
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise20
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Elastic Observability?
Elastic Observability significantly improves incident response time by providing quick access to logs and data across various sources. For instance, searching for specific keywords in logs spanning...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Elastic Observability?
The problem is their licensing model, which is a bit confusing. Many customers struggle to understand their total cost of ownership because Elastic licensing is not dependent on easy, quantifiable ...
What needs improvement with Elastic Observability?
Out-of-the-box use cases have room for improvement in Elastic Observability. They don't invest a lot in building out-of-the-box observable use cases, and they are more focusing on giving a very fle...
What do you like most about NetWitness Platform?
The product's initial setup phase was not at all difficult.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for NetWitness Platform?
The pricing is comparable to others, and I consider the cost to be intermediate. Specific cost details are unknown to me.
What needs improvement with NetWitness Platform?
There is currently no need for improvement in the SIEM ( /categories/security-information-and-event-management-siem ), though there could be potential enhancements by integrating with AI.
 

Also Known As

No data available
RSA Security Analytics
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

PSCU, Entel, VITAS, Mimecast, Barrett Steel, Butterfield Bank
Los Angeles World Airports, Reply
Find out what your peers are saying about Elastic Observability vs. NetWitness Platform and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.