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Graylog vs VMware Aria Operations for Logs 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

Graylog
Ranking in Log Management
15th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMware Aria Operations for ...
Ranking in Log Management
12th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
28
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Graylog is 6.4%, up from 6.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Aria Operations for Logs is 1.3%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Log Management
 

Featured Reviews

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.
LarsChristensen - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient troubleshooting with precise log filtering and an easy setup
The tool could benefit from improved filter settings and dashboarding. While there are dashboards available, they are often created by community members and may not work after updates. It would be beneficial to have a roadmap for these dashboards to ensure consistent functionality. It would also be advantageous if the tool could process even large amounts of data faster, though this may be more related to data movement challenges rather than the software itself.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We're using the Community edition, but I know that it has really good dashboarding and alerts."
"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."
"The ability to write custom alerts is key to information security and compliance."
"I like the correlation and the alerting."
"The product is scalable. The solution is stable."
"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."
"UDP is a fast and lightweight protocol, perfect for sending large volumes of logs with minimal overhead."
"Log Insight correlates with the VMware product log. It can assemble the logs you want, making it easier to find the output, incident, or keyword you want to search."
"The setup and installation are very easy."
"One of the things I like about it is its interface. When it comes to generating reports on VMs and stuff, it's very quick. This is very handy for the technical team, who need to generate reports quickly. So that's really good."
"It allows us to gain a comprehensive overview of our infrastructure."
"The root cause analysis feature is very valuable."
"The solution is quite user-friendly."
"The events are notably more descriptive, aiding in security and event analysis. We've also integrated Sky Collector, providing valuable insights and solutions for troubleshooting."
"The trace log is the solution's most valuable feature. It's very helpful in troubleshooting problems."
 

Cons

"The infrastructure cost is the main issue. I like the rest. If the infrastructure costs could be lower, it would be fantastic."
"More customization is always useful."
"Its scalability gets complicated when we have to update or edit multiple nodes."
"I would like to see some kind of visualization included in Graylog."
"I would like to see a date and time in the Graylog Grok patterns so that I can save time when searching for a log. I like how the streams and the search query work, but adding a date and time will allow me to pull out a log in a milli-second."
"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-"
"The biggest problem is the collector application, as we wanted to avoid using Graylog Collector Sidecar due to its architecture."
"More complex visualizations and the ability to execute custom Elasticsearch queries would be great."
"The monitoring landscape is getting bigger. When it comes to infrastructure monitoring, we need more visibility. VMware needs to integrate more related applications and third-party products. That would make it more appealing to an audience beyond the VMware team."
"Integration with other vendors is something that could be improved, they could add more vendors."
"The dashboard needs to be improved because this is what I need to monitor my infrastructure."
"Customer service and support have declined. Six months ago, I would have rated it as an eight or nine. Currently, it feels more like a four, five, or six."
"The response time and quality need improvement. It takes too long to prove a problem and get a solution."
"If data migration occurs during a search, it alters performance, causing delays."
"Technical support should be improved."
"Paid or free does not matter, but it is complex to find good training material for vRealize Log Insight."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's an open-source solution that can be used free of charge."
"I am using a community edition. I have not looked at the enterprise offering from Graylog."
"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."
"I use the free version of Graylog."
"It's open source and free. They have a paid version, but we never looked into that because we never needed the features of the paid version."
"We're using the Community edition."
"Having paid official support is wise for projects."
"Consider Enterprise support if you have atypical needs or setup requirements.​"
"I think it is a reasonably priced product."
"I rate the product's price a six on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."
"I am not sure what the exact cost is. However, I believe the vRealize suite costs $2,500.00 per year."
"The product's price is reasonable, but when it comes to SQL licensing, it's a bit expensive."
"It is not cheap. But it is worth it."
"Pricing could always be lower. If it were free, I would be more satisfied."
"The pricing has been updated recently."
"The license cost for any other monitoring tool is too high compared to this product."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Government
8%
University
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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 that we didn't need an enterprise plan, which is more suited for clients with less...
What needs improvement with Graylog?
An improvement I would suggest is in Graylog's user interface, such as allowing for font size adjustments. A potential enhancement could be the integration with Ollama to run large language models ...
What do you like most about vRealize Log Insight?
The events are notably more descriptive, aiding in security and event analysis. We've also integrated Sky Collector, providing valuable insights and solutions for troubleshooting.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for vRealize Log Insight?
The cost of using VMware Aria Operations for Logs was very high, around two to three million dollars, although the exact figure is uncertain. The price was proving to be too much, especially with t...
What needs improvement with vRealize Log Insight?
VMware Aria Operations for Logs is not a cost-effective tool. Changing any telemetry requires creating a new template, such as changes to the VM disk size. Always having to create a new template ma...
 

Also Known As

Graylog2
vRealize Log Insight
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Blue Cross Blue Shield, eBay, Cisco, LinkedIn, SAP, King.com, Twilio, Deutsche Presse-Agentur
Wildlands Adventure Zoo, Medic Mobile, IBM, Seventy Seven Energy, Baystate Health, Osis, Oxford University, Columbia University, Siemens, Cardinal Health, Ashdod Port, Vasakronan, Sydney Adventist Hospital, University of Derby
Find out what your peers are saying about Graylog vs. VMware Aria Operations for Logs and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
864,155 professionals have used our research since 2012.