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Elastic Security vs Graylog vs Splunk Enterprise Security comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Elastic Security is 3.1%, down from 6.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Graylog is 6.7%, up from 5.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk Enterprise Security is 7.3%, down from 10.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Log Management
 

Featured Reviews

SyedAli17 - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized monitoring improves security posture through rapid data processing
The processing part of Elastic Security ( /products/elastic-security-reviews ) is very interesting for us since we handle almost 7,000 to 8,000 alerts per minute. We require rapid processing speed for alerts and event data, and Elastic Security is very efficient at handling this level of data. Additionally, Elastic Security helps improve the security posture of Pakistan through centralized visibility and real-time processing.
Ivan Kokalovic - PeerSpot reviewer
Facilitates backend service monitoring with efficient log retrieval and API flexibility
Graylog is valuable because it bridges technical knowledge to non-technical teams, presenting complex backend processes in a simple timeline. It boosts the knowledge of sales and customer support teams by allowing them to see the backend operations without needing to read the code. Its API is flexible for visualization, and its powerful search engine efficiently handles large volumes of log data. Moreover, its stability, fast search capabilities, and compatibility with languages like ANSI SQL enhance its utility in IT infrastructure.
ROBERT-CHRISTIAN - PeerSpot reviewer
Has many predefined correlation rules and is brilliant for investigation and log analysis
It is very complicated to write your own correlation rules without the help of Splunk support. What Splunk could do better is to create an API to the standard SIEM tools, such as Microsoft Sentinel. The idea would be to make it less painful. In ELK Stack, Kibana is the query language with which you can search log files. I believe Splunk has also a query language in which they search their log files, but once you have identified the log file that you want to use for further security correlation, you want to very quickly transport that into your SIEM tool, such as Microsoft Sentinel. That is something that Splunk could make a little bit less painful because it is a lot of effort to find that log file and forward it. An API with Microsoft Sentinel or a similar SIEM tool would be a good idea.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Enables monitoring of application performance and the ability to predict behaviors."
"It's very customizable, which is quite helpful."
"It's not very complicated to install Elastic."
"The most valuable features are the speed, detail, and visualization. It has the latest standards."
"Elastic is straightforward, easy to integrate, and highly customizable."
"It's a good platform and the very best in the current market. We looked at the Forester report from December 2022 where it was said to be a leader."
"The most valuable feature of Elastic Security is that you can install agents, and they are not separately licensed."
"The most valuable features of the solution are the prevention methods and the incident alerts."
"What I like about Graylog is that it's real-time and you have access to the raw data. So, you ingest it, and you have access to every message and every data item you ingest. You can then build analytics on top of that. You can look at the raw data, and you can do some volumetric estimations, such as how big traffic you have, how many messages of data of a type you have, etc."
"Open source and user friendly."
"We have scaled from a single machine installation (a VM with a Graylog + ES + MongoDB) to (2 Graylog + 2 ES + 3 MongoDB). This was done smoothly with a minimal impact on logging."
"It has data adapters and lookup tables that utilize HTTP calls to APIs."
"Graylog's search functionality, alerting functionality, user management, and dashboards are useful."
"We're using the Community edition, but I know that it has really good dashboarding and alerts."
"Everything stands out as valuable, including the fact that I can quantify and qualify the logs, create pipelines and process the logs in any way I like, and create charts or data maps."
"One of the most valuable features is that you are able to do a very detailed search through the log messages in the overview."
"Good for log collection and log management."
"It is very scalable."
"Splunk has significantly reduced the time in performing the task of aggregating logs, reviewing as well as time spent during investigations."
"Splunk Enterprise Security gives us a single pane of glass so that we can use just one tool instead of having to use different tools."
"Its usability is the best part. It is easy for our developers to use if they want to search their logs, etc."
"The level of robustness on offer is very good."
"The most valuable feature is that it's very good for log aggregation."
"Aggregation searches have reduced time and difficulty of identifying trends and conditions which need to reviewed."
 

Cons

"The price of this product could be improved, especially the additional costs. I would also like to see better-quality graphics."
"The solution should generate an automatic product that integrates with ELK Stack to use artificial intelligence."
"I think because we are a cybersecurity company, the thing that can be improved is the prebuilt tools, especially quality. Compared to its competitor, they still have fewer prebuilt security rules. Elastic Security, in terms of generating alerts, cannot group the same products into one another. Even though the alerts are the same, they still generate them one by one. So, it is very noisy in our dashboard. I would like the Elastic Security admin to group all the same alarms into one alarm so that our dashboard is not noisy."
"We'd like to see some more artificial intelligence capabilities."
"It could use maybe a little more on the Linux side."
"The interface could be more user friendly because it is sometimes hard to deal with."
"This type of monitoring is not very mature just yet. We need more real-time information in a way that's easier to manage."
"The tool should improve its scalability."
"Graylog can improve the index rotation as it's quite a complex solution."
"Elasticsearch recommendations for tuning could be better. Graylog doesn't have direct support for running the system inside of Kubernetes, so it can be challenging to fill in the gaps and set up containers in a way that is both performant and stable."
"When it comes to configuring the processing pipeline, writing the rules can be very tedious, especially since the documentation isn't extensive on how the functions provided for these rules work."
"Since container orchestration systems are popular and Graylog fits the niche well, perhaps they could officially support running in docker containers on Kubernetes as a StatefulSet as a use case. That way, the declarative nature of Kubernetes config files would document their best case deployment scenario-"
"We ran into problems with Elasticsearch throwing a circuit-breaking exception due to field data size being too large. It turned out that the heap size directly impacted this size in a high-throughput environment, causing unexplained instability in Graylog. We were able to troubleshoot on the Elasticsearch size, but we should have been able to reference some minimum requirements for Graylog to know that our settings weren't sufficient."
"The area in Graylog that needs to be improved or enhanced would be the integrations."
"When it comes to configuring the processing pipeline, writing the rules can be very tedious, especially since the documentation isn't extensive on how the functions provided for these rules work."
"Over six months, I had two similar issues where searches were performed on field "messages". It exhausted all the memory of the ES node causing an ES crash and a Graylog halt."
"Better directions on search head clusters."
"I would like Splunk to add more integration. QRadar has many indications with more products than Splunk."
"Its pricing is extremely high. There are other tools out in the market that are competitive. They do not necessarily have all the functionality, but they are competitive. The professional services we have used have been high as well in comparison to the market."
"Data retention can be better. If we want to look at the data for five months or six months, that is not available to us. We only have a history of 20 or 30 days. After that, the information gets lost. That is a drawback."
"The analytics of Splunk could be improved."
"The complexity could be worked on so that it's even easier and faster."
"Splunk Enterprise Security has not helped reduce our alert volume."
"Most importantly, Splunk can be outrageously expensive. That is the problem with both Splunk and Sentinel. Their pricing literally explodes based on the amount of data you feed in."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The base product is open-source but if you need advanced security features then you need to pay for the subscription. Elastic Security's price is reasonable in some cases and in other cases it's not."
"It's a monthly cost with Elastic SIEM, but I am not sure of the exact cost."
"When compared to other products, the price is average or on the low side."
"Elastic Security is free to use."
"We use the open-source version, so there is no charge for this solution."
"We are using the free, open-source version of this solution."
"It is easy to deploy, easy to use, and you get everything you need to become operational with it, and have nothing further to pay unless you want the OLED plugin."
"The tool's pricing is flexible and comes at unit cost. You don't have to pay for everything."
"Graylog is a free open-source solution. The free version has a capacity limitation of 2 GB daily, if you want to go above this you have to purchase a license."
"​You get a lot out-of-the-box with the non-enterprise version, so give it a try first."
"I use the free version of Graylog."
"Consider Enterprise support if you have atypical needs or setup requirements.​"
"We are using the free version of the product. However, the paid version is expensive."
"There is an open source version and an enterprise version. I wouldn't recommend the enterprise version, but as an open source solution, it is solid and works really well."
"I am using a community edition. I have not looked at the enterprise offering from Graylog."
"We're using the Community edition."
"While licensing can be a concern, there are ways to reduce the licensing costs including filtering some events."
"It's definitely worth it."
"The price of Splunk is reasonable."
"It can be expensive, especially the licensing costs. However, there is added value in what it can do, not just log aggregation."
"It is not cheap."
"We have seen ROI and improvements as we have continued to use the product, but they are more reactive."
"The licensing is good, but the pricing absolutely needs some work. It is very high."
"Truly evaluate the data you want to ingest and go slow. Pulling in data that can provide no use to your mission only wastes data against your license."
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Comparison Review

VS
Feb 26, 2015
HP ArcSight vs. IBM QRadar vs. ​McAfee Nitro vs. Splunk vs. RSA Security vs. LogRhythm
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
Computer Software Company
16%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Computer Software Company
17%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Educational Organization
7%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Datadog vs ELK: which one is good in terms of performance, cost and efficiency?
With Datadog, we have near-live visibility across our entire platform. We have seen APM metrics impacted several time...
What do you like most about Elastic Security?
Elastic provides the capability to index quickly due to the reverse indexes it offers. This data is crucial as it con...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Elastic Security?
Since Elastic Security is community-based, it does not require significant costs. This is beneficial for SMEs as they...
What do you like most about Graylog?
The product is scalable. The solution is stable.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Graylog?
I am not familiar with the pricing details of Graylog, as I was not responsible for that aspect. It was determined th...
What needs improvement with Graylog?
An improvement I would suggest is in Graylog's user interface, such as allowing for font size adjustments. A potentia...
What SOC product do you recommend?
For tools I’d recommend: -SIEM- LogRhythm -SOAR- Palo Alto XSOAR Doing commercial w/o both (or at least an XDR) is a...
What is a better choice, Splunk or Azure Sentinel?
It would really depend on (1) which logs you need to ingest and (2) what are your use cases Splunk is easy for ingest...
How does Splunk compare with Azure Monitor?
Splunk handles a high amount of data very well. We use Splunk to capture information and as an aggregator for monitor...
 

Also Known As

Elastic SIEM, ELK Logstash
Graylog2
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Texas A&M, U.S. Air Force, NuScale Power, Martin's Point Health Care
Blue Cross Blue Shield, eBay, Cisco, LinkedIn, SAP, King.com, Twilio, Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Splunk has more than 7,000 customers spread across over 90 countries. These customers include Telenor, UniCredit, ideeli, McKenney's, Tesco, and SurveyMonkey.
Find out what your peers are saying about Wazuh, Splunk, Datadog and others in Log Management. Updated: May 2025.
856,873 professionals have used our research since 2012.