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Honeycomb Enterprise vs SolarWinds AppOptics comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 8, 2026

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

Honeycomb Enterprise
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
15th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
AI Code Assistants (8th), AI Observability (10th)
SolarWinds AppOptics
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
56th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
IT Infrastructure Monitoring (62nd), Cloud Monitoring Software (44th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Honeycomb Enterprise is 1.0%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds AppOptics is 0.8%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Honeycomb Enterprise1.0%
SolarWinds AppOptics0.8%
Other98.2%
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

EN
Tech Consultant at multi ideal
Observability has transformed how I troubleshoot microservices and reduce incident time
Overall, I have had a very good experience with Honeycomb Enterprise, but there are a few areas where it could be improved. I would like to see more out-of-the-box dashboards and templates for common Kubernetes and cloud-native workloads so that new users can get value more quickly. The learning curve can be steep, especially for engineers who are new to distributed tracing and observability concepts. Additionally, while the query capabilities are very powerful, there are times when specifying advanced query workflows could be improved to provide a better overall experience for troubleshooting and observability. Beyond what I mentioned, there are a few other areas that could also be improved. I would like to see even deeper native integration with more DevOps and ITSM tools to make it easier to connect observability data directly into incident management and operational workflows. Regarding pricing, Honeycomb Enterprise delivers strong value, but as organizations scale and generate larger volumes of telemetry, cost can become a consideration. More flexible pricing options or cost optimization features for high-volume environments would be helpful. My support experience has been generally positive, but faster turnaround time for complex technical issues and more advanced implementation guides or best practices documentation would make onboarding and troubleshooting easier. These improvements would make an already strong observability platform even more accessible and scalable for enterprise teams.
John Yuko - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant Manager ICT - Projects at I&M Bank Ltd
Unique features allow consolidating and combing metrics into a single dashboard, but don't monitor mobile solutions
I would like to see more granular information provided on Unix applications. Also, the integration with Unix services should be a bit more straightforward in terms having an agent to retrieve your credentials rather than having to enter or save them for SSH on SolarWinds. From the outset, we had to set some commands to log into the search console, and they are saved on the solution, which presents a challenge in terms of exposure. The solution is unable to monitor APK solutions completely because we'd then be forced to break down the APK and provide the APIs or go through the source code. They don't have a module that can analyze an application that is maybe under-used.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The approach offers significant benefits in terms of efficiency, consistency, and proactive security management, particularly valuable for organizations with large, distributed development teams."
"The solution's most valuable features are the queries for the OpenTelemetry events and all the tracing."
"It's very scalable since we used it for a really big organization and it worked."
"Using Honeycomb Enterprise as a tracing service made it very quick to identify and fix issues."
"The solution's initial setup process was straightforward since we were getting enough support from Honeycomb.io's team."
"The most valuable feature of Honeycomb Enterprise for me is the root cause analysis part because it helps me greatly with the response messages and derived error messages which are very clearly mentioned in Honeycomb Enterprise logs."
"Honeycomb Enterprise played a vital role in identifying the problems in the initial calls itself, which has actually saved us a lot of incidents and reduced customer complaints by almost ninety to ninety-two to ninety-three percent as per the data I have."
"From a pros perspective, Honeycomb Enterprise could be a better candidate with high cardinality; when there are too many unique values, Honeycomb Enterprise could be more beneficial there."
"I have found the most valuable feature is application performance management."
"SolarWinds AppOptics does far more than what an individual may realize; it is not just a SIEM tool."
"AppNeta provides a range of products, all based around intelligent network testing algorithms."
"It's a solid application."
"The sum solution, NTA, and DPA."
"The product has a great dashboard."
"Customer service is exceptional, as they are very much in tune with our service needs and are always in contact for both enhancement requests and overall satisfaction."
"With minimal effort on our part, TraceView provides extraordinary visibility into the requests that flow through our SOA applications."
 

Cons

"There are a lot many negatives that Honeycomb Enterprise is having. One of them is that it needs good instrumentation and instrumentation to work properly."
"I rate Honeycomb Enterprise a seven out of ten because I feel a lot of the journeys could be made cleaner."
"I have used better tools, I would say. I would not say that I prefer Honeycomb Enterprise as much."
"Regarding other aspects, I cannot comment fully because we only use that particular part for tracing the particular threads as per the issues and there are multiple issues in which we have not used it."
"One of the disadvantages or areas for improvement I see is that it is very costly. My honest opinion is that its service is very good, but for me as an individual, if I am using it in a small app, it creates a huge amount of data and it is very expensive to manage."
"One challenge is that many things have to be defined manually and are not totally automated, while some competitors used for different projects or clients do have automation."
"On the negative side, dashboarding is not that great."
"The learning curve can be steep, especially for engineers who are new to distributed tracing and observability concepts."
"The solution should be more user-friendly."
"The implementation needs improvement. It needs to get modernized with the newer cloud scenario in both public and private deployment models."
"AppOptics would benefit from having a much more centralized view."
"We had a stability issue with a portion of the installation (Sequencer) when it was first introduced and have chosen not to install that specific function."
"The support is not too bad, but also not very good—it's quite standard."
"I would like to see more integration with other tools that are available on the market."
"I'd like to see the ability to use other internal instrumented applications as filters in the overview/aggregation screen."
"The integration with Unix services should be a bit more straightforward."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"Mostly, it's a perpetual license. We don't have any customers using the subscription right now—it's mostly a perpetual license that the customers purchase. The licensing is based on the number of elements, whereas other solutions are node-based."
"Since it's a negotiable rate, I would rate the pricing as a five out of five."
"I believe the current licensing cost is reasonable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Construction Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise12
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Honeycomb.io?
Overall, I have had a very good experience with Honeycomb Enterprise, but there are a few areas where it could be improved. I would like to see more out-of-the-box dashboards and templates for comm...
What is your primary use case for Honeycomb.io?
I have been using Honeycomb Enterprise for the past three years. My main use case has been troubleshooting and performing monitoring for Kubernetes-based applications and microservices.
What advice do you have for others considering Honeycomb.io?
I would say that Honeycomb Enterprise takes governance and security very seriously. I appreciate that it supports enterprise features such as role-based access control, SSO integration, and audit c...
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Also Known As

Grit
AppOptics, SolarWinds TraceView, Librato
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Clover Health, Eaze, Intercom, Fender
TraxoCovea Insurance BTE TechnologyDatarista
Find out what your peers are saying about Honeycomb Enterprise vs. SolarWinds AppOptics and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
909,948 professionals have used our research since 2012.