FortiMonitor vs Icinga comparison

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FortiMonitor

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 9, 2024

Icinga and FortiMonitor compete in the network monitoring space. FortiMonitor seems to have the upper hand due to its comprehensive features and better customer support.

Features: Icinga offers open-source flexibility with customizable monitoring, scalability, and extensive plugin support. FortiMonitor includes advanced features like cloud analytics, AI-based problem detection, and comprehensive monitoring capabilities.

Room for Improvement: Icinga could improve with a less complex setup process, more intuitive user interface, and enhanced user guides. FortiMonitor might benefit from reduced pricing, additional customization options, and more plugin integrations.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Icinga has a customizable deployment requiring technical knowledge for configuration. FortiMonitor provides a more streamlined deployment with straightforward setup and robust support options.

Pricing and ROI: Icinga offers a low-cost setup due to its open-source nature, but ongoing maintenance may increase costs. FortiMonitor involves a higher upfront cost, delivering better ROI through improved functionality and support.

To learn more, read our detailed FortiMonitor vs. Icinga Report (Updated: December 2025).

FortiMonitor vs. Icinga

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Helped 879,371 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:

Categories and Ranking

FortiMonitor

Ranking in Network Monitoring Software

19th

Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring

23rd

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

IT Alerting and Incident Management (9th), Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM) (6th)

Icinga

Ranking in Network Monitoring Software

23rd

Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring

28th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Server Monitoring (13th), Cloud Monitoring Software (21st)

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of FortiMonitor is 0.8%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Icinga is 2.2%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Network Monitoring Software Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
FortiMonitor	0.8%
Icinga	2.2%
Other	97.0%

Network Monitoring Software

Featured Reviews

reviewer2677554

Network Engineer III at a energy/utilities company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Managing diverse networks with detailed alerts enhances device oversight

FortiManager is very helpful in managing our networks. We use it to manage 20 farms and various networks with hundreds of devices. The version we are using provides more detail than the older dashboard. We appreciate the alerting capabilities, which are integrated with SolarWinds to notify our team via SMS.

Read full review

Harrison Bulley

Senior Infrastructure Engineer at Net Consulting

A stable, scalable and cost-effective solution that helps with inbuilt scripts for easy modification

I think the software is quite good, but we have had problems with getting it to recognize certain areas and amend certain checks, where we needed so we would have to create backend scripts for those checks. Though, being open source, it has the support to create backend scripts, it would be better to have these scripts in-built.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It provides the best firewall features."

"FortiMonitor has a very intuitive dashboard, which makes it particularly helpful for analyzing traffic, alerts, and other information."

"FortiMonitor is 100% stable."

"Fortinet's customer support is very good."

"Overall, I would recommend FortiMonitor to others."

"FortiMonitor's dashboard is very informative and user-friendly."

"FortiMonitor has a very intuitive dashboard, which makes it particularly helpful for analyzing traffic, alerts, and other information."

"The most valuable feature of FortiMonitor is user monitoring. We are able to see if the user is following the policy or not from their system. Additionally, the solution integrates well with Fortinet FortiGate and has centralized management."

More FortiMonitor pros

"Icinga has multiple automation and integration features. There is an API for everything and a web UI for configurations. The APIs enable you to automate tasks in Icinga. We can also use plugins to talk to the API. The Icinga Director talks to a database in the background, and you can import settings from the CMDB to all systems in Icinga."

"This solution has a self-healing handler where if the service is down, it is automatically restarted."

"I like the ability to amend and adjust things really easily, which is useful in a case where you could make it auto-discover and then set a template to say all of these applications or servers under this template have an automatic threshold set that you’d set up manually."

"We have found the solution to be stable."

"The best thing about the solution is how it highlights errors, the issues, and what needs my attention. The solution directs me to areas that I should look for first."

"The value of Icinga is that it has hundreds of plugins, so it's really easy to monitor pretty much anything."

"There's a module called Icinga Director, which helps us configure the product using an intuitive interface through clicks instead of creating a text configuration. It's very helpful for us."

"The apply rules feature saves a lot of time."

More Icinga pros

Cons

"I think the current features are really good for me, nothing else comes to mind right now. Maybe some small improvements could be made in the customization and configuration part of the UI to make it easier or more intuitive. Customizable UI options, like we saw in the demo, could be helpful for everyone. But in our operational environment, having clear health status and system details is crucial for us system engineers. One feature I'd really like to see is a credential management system. It would help us keep track of who's logged in and how many times, which is important due to user restrictions. Sometimes, we need to manage logins more efficiently, like logging off other users to free up credentials. So having a feature like that would be really helpful."

"FortiMonitor needs to improve its alert system."

"FortiMonitor could improve by having compatibility with other operating systems, such as Linux."

"Sometimes, we get corruption when upgrading from firmware to the new generation, causing a lot of issues."

"The solution's initial setup process is time-consuming."

"There is room for improvement in the FortiMonitor report. It is not ideal for showcasing to tech customers or managers, especially when trying to display high CPU usage from logins within a specific range of months or the most recent month."

"We use FortiToken, and it's a pain to use because you have to send things through your phone and then confirm by email. Only after this can you log in. It's dual-factor authentication. I wish that I could just log in or bring up a dashboard where I could log in from."

"The tool's price in Vietnam is high, making it an area of concern where improvements can be made."

More FortiMonitor cons

"One thing that Icinga lacks is the capability to create advanced and customized dashboards within the tool itself."

"Icinga is a complex solution that's hard to learn. It's a powerful product for monitoring, but new users will have a hard time figuring out what to do."

"In general, the product does not look good. However, it does what it is supposed to do. So, the improvements should focus on usability and UI."

"We have found some problems with Nagios, and support isn't very responsive."

"There is room for improvement in multi-tenancy. It's not perfect, not even really good. It's average, but it should be improved."

"The solution lacks many features important to higher-level IT management and network support."

"One of the areas that are frustrating is remote monitoring for more than one machine."

"It needs Trap SNMP. I saw the documentation for Zabbix, that it has its own built-in product which handles SNMP traps, and there's nothing similar in Icinga or Nagios. I think this feature is most important for me."

More Icinga cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool's pricing model in Vietnam is a bit high. I rate the product price as an eight out of ten."

"There are additional costs needed for certain functionality, such as scalability."

"FortiMonitor's price is very high."

"In terms of licensing, while it may not be the most expensive option on the market, it's relatively cost-effective. You can obtain licenses at a lower cost, with the calculation being straightforward. For example, if you onboard around 5,000 devices, you'll need approximately 5,000 licenses, as each device typically counts as one license."

"We have a large customer base for Fortinet, and the additional buying power got us really great discounts."

"Compared to other solutions, FortiMonitor is a very expensive solution."

"The price of FortiMonitor is approximately $200 annually for 225 users. The price is competitive."

"On a scale from one to ten, I rate the pricing a nine since it is a good solution that is available at a cheap price."

"We're using the free version of Icinga."

"It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low."

"The solution is free to use."

"This is an open-source solution with paid support."

"Even though Icinga's financial cost is low, it is an expensive product regarding the resources required to maintain and operate it."

"It's an open-source solution."

"The solution is cheap."

"The product is inexpensive compared to other DBM products."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Financial Services Firm

Educational Organization

13%

Comms Service Provider

12%

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	8
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	6

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	7

Questions from the Community

What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?

I have a clear bias because I work for Panopta. We aren't a fit for everyone, but I can confirm that Panopta is a lot less work to stand up and maintain. It's also a lot easier to use and onboard n...

What do you like most about FortiMonitor?

In FortiMonitor, we're linked up with our Netgear, CactusServer, and NOC. It's really valuable because everything's migrating to one dashboard for us system engineers. We can keep an eye on traffic...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for FortiMonitor?

FortiMonitor does save time but not significantly on costs, as there are still expenses related to procurement, installation, and licensing.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Icinga?

It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low. If you want to include this product in the services you offer to your customers, the return on i...

What needs improvement with Icinga?

There is room for improvement in multi-tenancy. It's not perfect, not even really good. It's average, but it should be improved. For instance, multi-tenancy for monitoring the virtual infrastructur...

What is your primary use case for Icinga?

We use Icinga as a monitoring solution to monitor customers' infrastructures. We work as a managed service provider, so we offer monitoring and many other services to our customers. So we use it in...

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Comparisons

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PRTG Network Monitor vs FortiMonitor

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SolarWinds Network Device Monitor vs FortiMonitor

Compared 11% of the time

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Zabbix vs Icinga

Compared 31% of the time

Nagios Core vs Icinga

Compared 14% of the time

Checkmk vs Icinga

Compared 10% of the time

Nagios XI vs Icinga

Compared 5% of the time

Netdata vs Icinga

Compared 4% of the time

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Product Reports

Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM)

Download FortiMonitor product report

Download Icinga product report

Also Known As

Panopta

Icinga Cloud Monitoring

Overview

FortiMonitor is a comprehensive, SaaS-based digital experience monitoring (DEM) platform that helps organizations modernize their performance-monitoring tools. It provides visibility into endpoint application performance and digital experience—no matter where the user resides or where the application is hosted.

Fortinet

Icinga is a robust tool for monitoring IT infrastructure, known for its distributed monitoring capabilities and seamless integration with multiple platforms. It efficiently observes servers, network devices, and environments like Linux and Windows, enabling proactive issue identification and resource management.

With a focus on task delegation and clustering, Icinga offers an intuitive interface through its GUI and Icinga Director, simplifying configuration. The extensive plugin library supports diverse technologies, while the API allows automation with tools like Terraform and Ansible. Despite its strengths, users report challenges with data display in the GUI, a need for improved dashboards, and complex configuration processes. Users benefit from its SNMP alerts, email notifications, and automated incident handling, making it essential for managed service environments and enterprises.

What are the key features of Icinga?

Task Delegation: Streamlines monitoring tasks across distributed systems.
Event Handler: Enables automatic service recovery with minimal intervention.
Plugin Library: Offers extensive support for integrating diverse technologies.
API Accessibility: Facilitates automation with popular tools like Terraform.
Custom Plugins: Allows easy creation and personalization for monitoring needs.

What benefits should you consider in Icinga reviews?

Flexibility: Tailors monitoring to specific requirements with community support.
Scalability: Successfully manages growing infrastructure demands.
Proactivity: Enhances issue identification and resource allocation.
Integration: Seamlessly works with existing IT operations platforms.

Icinga is widely adopted in IT environments for monitoring servers, networks, and applications across industries such as finance, healthcare, and technology. Its ability to integrate with various operating systems and automation platforms makes it a versatile choice for industries prioritizing comprehensive surveillance and proactive management of their infrastructure.

Sample Customers

SONY, GoDaddy, HCL, ING, ARMOR, billboard

Puppet Labs, Audi, Spacex, Debian, Snapdeal, McGill, RIPE Network Coordination Centre

FortiMonitor vs. Icinga