No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

FortiMonitor vs Splunk Security Essentials comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 2, 2025

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 IT Alerting and Incident Management
16th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (37th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (40th), Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM) (11th)
Splunk Security Essentials
Ranking in IT Alerting and Incident Management
15th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
4.8
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (14th), Security Incident Response (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the IT Alerting and Incident Management category, the mindshare of FortiMonitor is 2.0%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk Security Essentials is 1.7%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
IT Alerting and Incident Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Splunk Security Essentials1.7%
FortiMonitor2.0%
Other96.3%
IT Alerting and Incident Management
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2677554 - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
reviewer2836941 - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant Manager at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
Centralized monitoring has given our SOC real-time visibility into security and application activity
When I first implemented Splunk Security Essentials in this environment, it took a week for each log source to onboard and to create use cases and implement the data model, CIM, etc., for production readiness. Training is mandatory, and we need at least the Splunk Security Essentials User certification because it is a very critical resource in the organization, as we are handling security logs. In my organization, Splunk Security Essentials is used not only by the SOC but also for monitoring logs across different teams, as it is important for handling both security and application logs, given its capability to manage unstructured logs. Splunk Security Essentials has dramatically impacted my organization, as without it, we were blind to what is happening from both a security and application perspective, and it provides vital visibility into the organization's operations.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"FortiMonitor is 100% stable."
"Fortinet's customer support is very good."
"FortiMonitor has a very intuitive dashboard, which makes it particularly helpful for analyzing traffic, alerts, and other information."
"The product's initial setup phase is easy."
"The tool continuously improves, adapting to support new vendors and technologies. Importantly, it automates the process, triggering alerts when devices require attention, and eliminating the need for manual intervention."
"Overall, I would recommend FortiMonitor to others."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is what the devices are used for. We have big backups for our Cradlepoint solutions, but FortiMonitor is a great routing device and we love working with them."
"The most valuable feature of FortiMonitor is user monitoring, as we are able to see if the user is following the policy or not from their system, and additionally the solution integrates well with Fortinet FortiGate and has centralized management."
"We are focusing on security to ensure incidents are reported efficiently. In addition to that, for reporting purposes, we are utilizing our dashboards or creating new ones. We will be using free visualization tools for this purpose."
"They have a good catalog of plans to use to resist the attacks."
"Splunk Security Essentials has impacted my organization in that we have been getting the results that we wanted."
"Splunk Security Essentials has dramatically impacted my organization, as without it, we were blind to what is happening from both a security and application perspective, and it provides vital visibility into the organization's operations."
"The network monitoring feature is particularly valuable for gathering information about users, login times, and other statistics."
"I would have to rate Splunk Security Essentials a 10 out of 10 because it's free and there's tons of usable content."
 

Cons

"The solution's initial setup process is time-consuming."
"FortiMonitor could be improved by making it more convenient for smaller workloads, such as when configuring a few branches."
". Enhancements in the dashboard, such as clearer alerting, maintenance window management, software version tracking, and better visualization, would be beneficial."
"Additionally, there are no AI features in FortiMonitor, which might be an area for enhancement."
"Sometimes, during high CPU usage, we cannot access FortiMonitor and must refresh it."
"FortiMonitor could improve by having compatibility with other operating systems, such as Linux."
"The tool's price in Vietnam is high, making it an area of concern where improvements can be made."
"For our type of country, it is always expensive, but it has competitive pricing."
"They could add more AI content or AI and machine learning."
"If I could change one thing about Splunk Security Essentials, it would be pricing. I believe they are still very costly as compared to the competition."
"The biggest friction points I have with Splunk Security Essentials are the high license costs and user behavior that causes performance issues due to inappropriate wildcard searches."
"It takes a lot of time to install Splunk Security Essentials. It's not very difficult, but it requires time."
"The reporting feature needs to be more user-friendly."
"The price could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"There are additional costs needed for certain functionality, such as scalability."
"The price of FortiMonitor is approximately $200 annually for 225 users. The price is competitive."
"FortiMonitor's price is very high."
"The tool's pricing model in Vietnam is a bit high. I rate the product price as an eight out of ten."
"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."
"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."
Information not available
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which IT Alerting and Incident Management solutions are best for your needs.
902,894 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
8%
Healthcare Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Construction Company
20%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Healthcare Company
8%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise6
No data available
 

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 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 needs improvement with FortiMonitor?
There are areas for improvement that FortiManager is addressing. We have not yet upgraded to the latest software versions, being a full revision behind, but we plan to update soon since the current...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Splunk Security Essentials?
Our SecOps manager and CISO were more familiar with Splunk, and the price was right. That was probably the primary driver, and we did evaluation as well with strict criteria and Gartner ratings.
What needs improvement with Splunk Security Essentials?
There are features I wish Splunk Security Essentials had that it does not have today, in terms of the data sources that can increase. A simple example is images. If we can add something like images...
What is your primary use case for Splunk Security Essentials?
My main use case for Splunk Security Essentials is that we have been working in an environment where we have to collect all the security logs from all the devices, perform the correlation, and fina...
 

Also Known As

Panopta
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

SONY, GoDaddy, HCL, ING, ARMOR, billboard
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about FortiMonitor vs. Splunk Security Essentials and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
902,894 professionals have used our research since 2012.