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IBM Application Performance Management vs Splunk Enterprise Security comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

IBM Application Performance...
Average Rating
6.4
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (50th)
Splunk Enterprise Security
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
315
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (2nd), Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (1st), IT Operations Analytics (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Application Lifecycle Management solutions, they serve different purposes. IBM Application Performance Management is designed for Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability and holds a mindshare of 0.3%, down 0.4% compared to last year.
Splunk Enterprise Security, on the other hand, focuses on Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), holds 9.5% mindshare, down 12.4% since last year.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

Daniel Tamiru - PeerSpot reviewer
A multi-functional solution but has poor stability and performance-related issues
We are using version 4 of IBM Application Performance Management, and it is deployed on-premises. We use it for internet banking and mainly for application performance on-site. For example, if we face performance-related issues in one of our software or managed services, we use this solution to…
ROBERT-CHRISTIAN - PeerSpot reviewer
Has many predefined correlation rules and is brilliant for investigation and log analysis
It is very complicated to write your own correlation rules without the help of Splunk support. What Splunk could do better is to create an API to the standard SIEM tools, such as Microsoft Sentinel. The idea would be to make it less painful. In ELK Stack, Kibana is the query language with which you can search log files. I believe Splunk has also a query language in which they search their log files, but once you have identified the log file that you want to use for further security correlation, you want to very quickly transport that into your SIEM tool, such as Microsoft Sentinel. That is something that Splunk could make a little bit less painful because it is a lot of effort to find that log file and forward it. An API with Microsoft Sentinel or a similar SIEM tool would be a good idea.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's easy to use."
"The most valuable feature is the breakdown that it provides, such as a description of the fields for a particular transaction."
"IBM Application Performance Management helped us increased our response time by 80% and cost 60% less."
"Because we have partnerships with other partners, I can share a bit about what I've noticed with IBM APM compared to other vendor solutions. Specifically, with IBM, the visibility into detailed process information is more tangible. On the OS level, APM displays all processes (or the top 10 processes) that are consuming CPU or resident memory. This is the most important thing that is not always available with other vendors."
"I would rate the scalability an eight out of ten."
"The initial setup was straightforward and took minimal effort."
"The transaction tracking feature from IBM is the most important feature for us. It is something that provides a terrific value for us and our clients. It has a lot of data sources and agents that are collectors. It is also stable."
"Positive features include replication capabilities, software development kits, and the architecture."
"Deployment server for deploying changes in one go."
"I have noticed a return on investment with Splunk Enterprise Security, as it delivers substantial value for money."
"Its alerting is most valuable. We have alerts set up in our environment for certain attacks, such as an SQL injection attempt. We have a front-facing server for the website. It is out there, and anybody can access it. When those SQL injection attempts come in, we are able to detect that with the alert."
"We have a more secure, robust environment, which keeps the harmful software out of the zone required."
"Splunk Enterprise Security is more advanced compared to other solutions, which makes it stand out as a better option."
"They have approximately 50,000 predefined correlation rules, which is quite a lot, and I find that good."
"We can ingest and correlate data from virtually any type of system."
 

Cons

"The stability is not great and should be better."
"The demo that was provided to us is not working very well. At times, there are errors."
"Technical support can be slow and needs improvement."
"With APM, we noticed that the agent can cause a lot of issues for the application, making the agent very unreliable. Many issues are happening, and we've had to discuss it with support to try and get a fix. It affects application availability, and sometimes actions fail because of the agent, degrading the performance of the application."
"They should focus on potentially enhancing the dashboard to make it more contemporary and adding some customization options. Furthermore, there might be room for improvement in the pricing policy."
"Its web user interface is a little bit old in comparison to other solutions, such as New Relic, and it should be improved. Its scalability and technical support should also be improved. Currently, it is scalable, but only in a vertical way. They provide good technical support, but the initial steps for a new case can be improved to fasten the resolution process."
"It's still missing some platforms. For example, if you look to applications itself, it is missing the interface."
"The product is relatively expensive."
"There is a learning curve in order to start using machine learning. We have been trying to do it for three years, and we have not managed anything. It is too complex."
"The Splunk platform is not unified. We have all of these different tools and they feel a bit disjointed."
"The support that is included with the standard licensing fee is very bad."
"The documentation is in definite need of improvement."
"There's been a big push for SBC compute over the ingestion model, which will hamper us."
"Sometimes the communication with support happens with multiple staff. They should reduce the time to resolution."
"Splunk should align its security principles with those of other vendors like SentinelOne. Splunk has mature APIs that can communicate with various security applications and devices. Splunk can process more to produce an understandable dashboard."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"IBM APM is one of the cheaper products on the market, while everything necessary to get started is included in the license."
"As I previously indicated, I initiated the IBM and uncovered all its elements. Consequently, I'm not inclined towards a licensing approach."
"The licensing fees can be paid every six months or on a yearly basis."
"From what I have seen so far, Splunk has multiple cost models. The one that we are using is pretty good when it comes to ingesting data into the environment. It has worked out pretty well."
"Splunk is definitely not a cheap solution. It is an expensive product."
"The price of Splunk Enterprise Security is high."
"Pricing is pretty fair."
"Splunk licensing model might seem expensive but with all the gain in functionalities you will have compared to traditional SIEM solutions I think it’s worth the price."
"Splunk Enterprise Security is not at all cost-friendly to be deployed in very small enterprises like start-ups."
"Splunk's costing is a little more difficult. The pricing method is complicated, and the way that costing is calculated in Splunk is a little more difficult."
"It's a little bit expensive for a small to medium enterprise."
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Comparison Review

VS
Feb 26, 2015
HP ArcSight vs. IBM QRadar vs. ​McAfee Nitro vs. Splunk vs. RSA Security vs. LogRhythm
We at Infosecnirvana.com have done several posts on SIEM. After the Dummies Guide on SIEM, we are following it up with a SIEM Product Comparison – 101 deck. So, here it is for your viewing pleasure. Let me know what you think by posting your comments below. The key products compared here are…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
27%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
8%
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IBM Application Performance Management?
They should focus on potentially enhancing the dashboard to make it more contemporary and adding some customization options. Furthermore, there might be room for improvement in the pricing policy. ...
What is your primary use case for IBM Application Performance Management?
I monitor business applications for more than four end users.
What SOC product do you recommend?
For tools I’d recommend: -SIEM- LogRhythm -SOAR- Palo Alto XSOAR Doing commercial w/o both (or at least an XDR) is asking to miss details that are critical, and ending up a statistic. Also, rememb...
What is a better choice, Splunk or Azure Sentinel?
It would really depend on (1) which logs you need to ingest and (2) what are your use cases Splunk is easy for ingestion of anything, but the charge per GB/Day Indexed and it gets expensive as log ...
How does Splunk compare with Azure Monitor?
Splunk handles a high amount of data very well. We use Splunk to capture information and as an aggregator for monitoring information from different sources. Splunk is very good at alerting us if we...
 

Also Known As

IBM APM
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Mibtree, EatDrinkDeals.com, IT Performance Advisor
Splunk has more than 7,000 customers spread across over 90 countries. These customers include Telenor, UniCredit, ideeli, McKenney's, Tesco, and SurveyMonkey.
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Application Performance Management vs. Splunk Enterprise Security and other solutions. Updated: May 2023.
859,579 professionals have used our research since 2012.