Foglight for Databases vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server vs Spotlight comparison

Quest Software and IDERA are both solutions in the Database Development and Management category. Quest Software is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.2, while IDERA is ranked #12 with an average rating of 7.0. Quest Software holds a 7.6% mindshare in DDM, compared to IDERA’s 4.3% mindshare. Additionally, 93% of Quest Software users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of IDERA users who would recommend it.

Foglight for Databases

Read 14 Foglight for Databases reviews

1,842 Views
1,824 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manage...

Read 9 IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server reviews

822 Views
608 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

Spotlight

Read 5 Spotlight reviews

1,185 Views
1,185 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Foglight for Databases

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manage...

Spotlight

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Foglight for Databases, IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server, and Spotlight based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle, Quest Software, Nutanix and others in Database Development and Management.

To learn more, read our detailed Database Development and Management Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Database Development and Management

July 2025

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Helped 866,088 peers since 2012

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 August 2025, in the Database Development and Management category, the mindshare of Foglight for Databases is 7.6%, up from 7.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server is 4.3%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Spotlight is 6.5%, down from 8.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Database Development and Management Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Quest Foglight for Databases	7.6%
Quest Spotlight	6.5%
IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server	4.3%
Other	81.6%

Database Development and Management

Featured Reviews

Stuart Dairiki

Senior IT Manager at a wholesaler/distributor with 1,001-5,000 employees

Empowers efficient database monitoring and performance troubleshooting with powerful workload analysis

I find it extremely helpful to use Foglight to triage any database issues, specifically performance issues using what Foglight calls PI investigator. It is a very powerful workload analysis tool that helps me understand where bottlenecks are. It allows me to see performance issues as end users report them. It can save time and effort when doing root cause analysis. It enables me to obtain information quicker and easier compared to manually compiling it. Foglight provides us with a near-real-time activity database. It's not 100% real-time. It has less than a minute latency. It allows us to see performance issues as end-users report them. We started seeing benefits pretty much immediately. We use Foglight to display intensive databases. However, it's not something we monitor regularly. It's only something we kind of dig into as we troubleshoot and triage issues. It does help us determine potential IT help issues. When we use Foglight, we find it helps drill down holistically into potential bottlenecks. It helps us to see what is going on in the database. Foglight allows us to monitor multiple database platforms. We use, for example, Oracle, SQL Server, Postgres, Amazon Redshift, and SAP HANA. It gives us insight into our entire landscape of production workloads in near real-time. The solution saves costs when performing root cause analysis. It can save time and effort when doing root cause analysis. It allows us to obtain information quicker and easier than by manually compiling information.

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reviewer2317098

Assistant at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Offers effective monitoring of resources but lacks the ability to connect to an AWS instance and write custom queries.

We use it mainly for monitoring, including CPU, memory, and disk space, and for troubleshooting purposes We've set up alerts to notify us when performance deviates from the baseline we've configured for each resource. So, whenever that happens, we get an alert and can investigate immediately. So,…

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Seha R

Group Product Manager at Uop Ipl

Good tool for the design and development of public APIs

The software does not support webhooks. It doesn't support advanced versions of APIs. The tool also doesn't support advanced versions of specifications. The change that we do in one part of the model is not reflected throughout the specification. There are also some mutations in the clones. I am not able to do a local source control with the product as well.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The PI module allows [my colleague] to identify which new indexes or modified indexes are going to make the biggest impact."

"What I really like is the SQL PI feature, which allows us to drill down into queries and identify what is causing contention in the database. Using the SQL PI feature, I am able to drill down into the queries, see what is blocking, and try to improve it."

"The real-time activity screens are also helpful... if there is something that is running slowly, we can eliminate the database as being an issue and perhaps look at the server, network activity, or something outside of the realm of the database as being the issue."

"Foglight's Change Tracking capabilities are another huge feature. It is wonderful to be able to do that. People don't realize the amount of information that Foglight gathers from a given server or instance. It gets down to the version of SQL, the disk array, everything that's there. Any change that's made, any upgrade to SQL, shows up on the dashboard almost immediately. You don't know how much time you save just having a tool in your back pocket that does that for you."

"We can visualize all the different types of DB servers that we are monitoring in a single pane of glass. It uses a 360-degree overview of the database, for each of those databases that we are monitoring. That includes what kind of resource utilization is happening and what kind of DB parameters are getting monitored, as well as the different types of DB parameters that are being offered for each database type."

"The alarms alert proactively if there are any potential or ongoing issues with the databases that we support. That means we can take preventive or corrective action before the issue becomes a big issue. And the SQL PI features enable us to drill down into performance issues in our databases so that we can improve performance, which is important."

"The most valuable feature is the in-depth capability SQL Performance Investigator provides. It allows you to drill down to the smallest detail that occurs on our platform. It does a highly detailed and atomic follow-up of what one wants to look for in relation to time and our different instances."

"The ability to monitor multiple database platforms streamlines our database operations. The single pane of glass is what we were really after when we picked Foglight. We knew we wanted something that could monitor cross-platform because it does save a lot of time to use the same tool. The one thing that I like with Foglight is that we don't have to install anything locally, like agents, directly on the database servers. That was also a big seller because it simplifies things."

More Foglight for Databases pros

"Monitors and alerts on our mission critical instances in real-time on a 24/7 basis."

"The ability to go back and look at historical data is the most valuable feature."

"The most valuable features are disk space projections for planning, and also the Snapshotting ability, to look back in time, to see what was going on the server at a particular time. It's basically the output of an sp_who2."

"SQL DM made troubleshooting much easier and allowed multiple people to look into an issue with confidence."

"We're able to diagnose issues prior to their actually becoming issues. Without the alerting, we wouldn't have a clue as to what was going to happen. With the alerting, it gives us a heads-up that a specific threshold has been met, and we need to take specific action."

"Memory and CPU utilization features are good."

"The best part of SQL DM is the ability to customize alerts and counters. This allows our team to find an issue then alert on the issue at a granular level."

"Spotlight provides valuable features such as the ability to get alerted and drill down to a very granular level to find out where actual problems are coming from."

"The tool is a SaaS product where I just need to type a URL and start with the design process. I can integrate all elements of source control like GitHub, GitLab, etc. The tool also supports authentication-related provisions like SSH."

"Its dashboards are most valuable. The drill-down of the dashboards is useful."

"I consider the solution very scalable."

Cons

"The monitoring capabilities for Postgres should be at par with SQL Server. This is the area where we push back on our Quest representative."

"I would like the rule development code to be made available so we don't always have to be referred to professional services for custom solutions. For example, if we want to exclude certain databases from a particular rule, we shouldn't have to go to support and to professional services for that solution. If the code and syntax were available, we have resources that could quickly turn something like that around."

"One thing that I would like, and it's probably something that I could set up internally, is something other than a dashboard which I have to look at to know that a server is down. I'd like bells and whistles to go off... If I look at the dashboard I know there's a server down. But if I'm not looking at it, if I'm looking at some other problem, I want to know about it. You can do that, you can use SMSs and alerts to your phone, and I could set it up to handle that, but it would be nice if, out-of-the-box, Foglight did that."

"The system is not that stable. We have been facing a lot of issues. We built a new store environment of Foglight, an environment for monitoring the Lowe's store servers, which are all Db2 servers. The objective is to monitor 800 Db2 servers in each Foglight instance. Up to 150 Db2 servers, the environment was working fine. The moment it crossed 150 or 160, we started having a lot of stability issues."

"Quest must release a Spanish version. That's critical because not everyone speaks English in Latin America. It's an excellent product, so it's super important that they offer the application and customer service in Spanish."

"When we decided to go with Foglight, a lot of people stopped using the diagnostics part because it was very intimidating... They still won't use it because they feel it's too intimidating. They will open something up and not know what to do. It's not very user-friendly. You have to click on a lot of stuff to find the information."

"When holding data for two years for 20 SQL Servers, the reporting becomes sluggish and unresponsive."

"The data model needs improvement when it comes to creating custom reports. That is an area where it needs a bit of improvement. Foglight gathers a lot of information around our databases as part of its monitoring. While I know all this information is in there, trying to pull the metric we want out for custom reports is sometimes hard to find. One nice thing about Foglight is that you can create custom dashboards, which you can easily convert to reports. We would be doing a lot more of that if it weren't for the challenging data model."

More Foglight for Databases cons

"It would helpful if SQL DM could mark when changes are made within the program."

"The initial setup gives too many user rights to the server, so you have to put a user that is part administrator's group - that's the preferred way - on each server, which is kind of a risk. You want to do least privilege and you're not doing that."

"They can improve checking the status of the CPU, memory, and IO utilization from each task."

"I would absolutely love to create customized dashboards but, unfortunately, they don't provide me the information that I need to create the report. The report I need is the detail or the transaction detail that's happening on those Snapshots. I'd like to be able to go back through time and search for things. I don't have that functionality, which is very disappointing. That's pretty bad and frustrating because I could query it and find out so much information about what's hitting my environment and when, but instead, they want control over it and to not give me that information. So it's encrypted. I can't pull it out and that is really bothersome."

"We don't find that it helps us with performance monitoring and diagnostics. We find that SentryOne does that better. Also, in terms of alerts, we had to customize them dramatically so that we didn't get alerted on every little thing."

"I'm going to do an upgrade which may resolve my issues, but one area for improvement is its ability to handle the amount of data that we collect with it. We're likely one of the largest installations, with over 300 servers being collected with this product, and sometimes there are gaps. That would really be my only concern, in terms of how the data is collected and stored, for consistency."

"One thing I'd like to see is the ability to view the execution plan and have the system automatically recommend potential query optimizations, especially at the query level."

"One improvement could be the inclusion of suggestions for missing indexes or better analysis of how indexes are utilized and how execution plans are used, similar to what other products offer."

"There's no reporting with this tool, and there really should be. They should add that into future releases."

"Some customizations of the dashboard, such as having backup reports, would be useful."

"One improvement could be the inclusion of suggestions for missing indexes or better analysis of how indexes are utilized and how execution plans are used, similar to what other products offer."

"The software does not support webhooks. It doesn't support advanced versions of APIs. The tool also doesn't support advanced versions of specifications. The change that we do in one part of the model is not reflected throughout the specification. There are also some mutations in the clones. I am not able to do a local source control with the product as well."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of Foglight could be a little more competitive in Chile, and it should be lowered for long-time customers— at least by 20 percent. Sometimes the price is a limitation. We have seven instances and nearly 5 million users. If Quest Foglight could reduce its prices for the clients that have been with it for a long time, we would be able to have more instances."

"This is like the "Cadillac" of performance monitoring software. It's not cheap... I am currently with a company that I was able to convince that the product is worth the cost."

"Pricing is very reasonable. We were able to construct a pretty easy contract with Quest, who were very easy to work with and very amenable to what we are trying to do. It worked out well for us."

"The price is worth it, if you have the time to go through the information."

"It is cost-effective. With our EA, it is really based on the scale of our database environment. We found the Quest team to be reasonable and flexible when it comes to pricing and scaling of licenses."

"Compared to the other tools on the market, Foglight is okay in terms of pricing and licensing."

"The pricing is reasonable, it's comparable with the competitors."

"We were upgraded to Premium Support without their actually asking us, when we were quoted. Then I asked for Standard Support and that they had to re-quote us that. But they don't do that by default. They upcharge you by default, which I didn't think was very nice, without even asking."

"The tool is cloud-based. It is priced well."

"Its cost was somewhere in the middle."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

12%

Government

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

10%

Comms Service Provider

Insurance Company

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

15%

Healthcare Company

11%

Computer Software Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	2
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	10

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	3
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	4

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	2
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	4

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Quest Foglight for Databases?

The pricing is palatable. We've already done one renewal and we are in our second contract. We're happy thus far.

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What needs improvement with Quest Foglight for Databases?

It would be amazing if they could enable the "Performance Investigator" functionality across all database platforms. ...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Quest Foglight for Databases?

I primarily use the solution for database monitoring, specifically for Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, Postgres, SAP HA...

See all answers

What do you like most about IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server?

The ability to go back and look at historical data is the most valuable feature.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server?

One thing I'd like to see is the ability to view the execution plan and have the system automatically recommend poten...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server?

We use it mainly for monitoring, including CPU, memory, and disk space, and for troubleshooting purposes.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Quest Spotlight?

One improvement could be the inclusion of suggestions for missing indexes or better analysis of how indexes are utili...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Quest Spotlight?

I primarily use Spotlight for on-the-spot troubleshooting and alerting to see if there are any issues. The drill-down...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Quest Spotlight?

I would rate Spotlight probably an nine out of ten. My advice would be to consider its cost-effectiveness and ease of...

See all answers

Comparisons

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 23% of the time

Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 9% of the time

Oracle Enterprise Manager vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 7% of the time

SQL Sentry vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 6% of the time

Toad for Oracle vs Foglight for Databases

Compared 4% of the time

More Foglight for Databases Competitors

Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 32% of the time

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 25% of the time

SCOM vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 14% of the time

SQL Sentry vs IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

Compared 13% of the time

More IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server Competitors

SolarWinds Database Performance Analyzer vs Spotlight

Compared 14% of the time

Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials vs Spotlight

Compared 12% of the time

IDERA SQL Inventory Manager vs Spotlight

Compared 11% of the time

Oracle Enterprise Manager vs Spotlight

Compared 9% of the time

SQL Sentry vs Spotlight

Compared 6% of the time

More Spotlight Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Foglight for Databases

August 2025

Download Foglight for Databases product report

Buyer's Guide

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server

August 2025

IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server report

Download IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server product report

Buyer's Guide

Database Development and Management

July 2025

Download Spotlight product report

Also Known As

No data available

IDERA SQL DM, IDERA SQL Diagnostic Manager

Dell Spotlight

Overview

Foglight for Databases offers comprehensive monitoring with real-time activity screens and adaptive baselines. It provides a 360-degree overview and efficient UI, requiring no custom scripts, aiding in proactive issue identification and resolution before impacting end users.

Foglight for Databases is a robust tool for monitoring across multiple platforms, including SQL and Oracle. It provides features like the "Morning Coffee" dashboard and SQL Performance Investigator, enabling effective workload analysis and historical investigation. Despite some challenges with sluggish performance on large data volumes and excessive non-critical alerts, it remains a preferred choice for its ability to support proactive management and resource planning. Users appreciate its centralized view of extensive database systems, enabling swift detection and resolution of issues in real-time.

What are the key features?

Comprehensive Monitoring: Provides cross-platform real-time monitoring, ensuring effective database management.
Adaptive Baselines: Adjusts to various workloads, enhancing monitoring accuracy.
SQL Performance Investigator: Offers detailed workload analysis without server impact.
Proactive Alerts: Delivers timely notifications, aiding in immediate issue resolution.
Efficient UI: Streamlines user interaction, minimizing the need for custom scripts.

What benefits and ROI should be considered?

Time Saving: Reduces time in root cause analysis, enhancing productivity.
Proactive Management: Detects issues before they affect end users, minimizing downtime.
Resource Planning: Aids in effective allocation planning for enterprise and cloud platforms.

Foglight is extensively implemented in industries managing extensive database systems, handling numerous servers to ensure availability and performance. It assists businesses in resolving blocking and locking deadlocks, crucial for maintaining smooth operations in production and development environments.

Quest Software

SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server helps database administrators to find and fix SQL Server performance problems in physical, virtual, and cloud environments. Unlike its competition, it provides effective scalability, advanced SQL query analysis and optimization, prescriptive analysis with corrective SQL scripts, powerful automated alert responses, broad PowerShell integration, complete customization, and extensive support for current and legacy SQL Server and Windows.

IDERA

Spotlight efficiently facilitates database monitoring, performance tuning, and troubleshooting with features that enhance problem isolation and long-term capacity planning. While valuable for API development, improvements in virtualization support and pricing could elevate its appeal.

Spotlight empowers users with capabilities such as alerting processes and comprehensive dashboards, making it an essential asset in analyzing historical data and time monitoring to identify problems. It integrates seamlessly with source control like GitHub and supports authentication, streamlining design processes and facilitating root cause analysis with drill-down capabilities. Primarily used for identifying indexing, long-running processes, and other performance issues, Spotlight aids API design through its daily monitoring capabilities, ensuring smooth operations. It currently has room for enhancements, particularly in support for Hyper-V virtualization overhead, webhooks, and API advancements. Pricing adjustments and improvements in custom dashboards, especially for backup reports, would increase user satisfaction.

What are Spotlight's key features?

Alerting Processes: Swiftly identifies issues with real-time notifications.
Ease of Setup: Simple integration with existing systems.
Comprehensive Dashboards: Offers a clear analysis of system performance.
Historical Data Analysis: Helps in problem identification and anomaly detection.
Drill-Down Capabilities: Enhances problem isolation and root cause analysis.

What benefits can users expect from Spotlight?

Problem Detection: Quick identification of issues improves system performance.
Efficiency in Capacity Planning: Supports long-term infrastructure management.
Seamless Integration: Works well with tools like GitHub to streamline processes.
Enhanced API Development: Aids in creating quality APIs with proper documentation.

Companies in diverse sectors utilize Spotlight for its robust database monitoring and problem-solving capabilities. Its integration with tools like GitHub allows software development teams to streamline processes. Finance and tech industries leverage its performance tuning features to ensure optimal database operations, while organizations focused on API development benefit significantly from its detailed monitoring and alerting functionalities.

Quest Software

Sample Customers

CommitDBA

Padnos, University of Notre Dame, D4, Infeon Technologies, Chevron, LC Waikiki, Sisters of Saint Francis Health Services, Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, CVE, Colorado State University, St. Charles, Chaucer PLC, 1-800-Flowers, Ancoris, Money Management, National Opinion Research Center, California Department of Health, Plexus; Aviva, Burlington Northern Santa Fe, CBS, Comcast, Google, Merck, Regions Financial, Schneider Electric, Tata Consultancy Services, Verizon Communications, Zurich Financial Services

Jenkon

Buyer's Guide

Database Development and Management

July 2025

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