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IBM Security QRadar vs Logstash comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 13, 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

IBM Security QRadar
Ranking in Log Management
7th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
211
Ranking in other categories
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (4th), User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (1st), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (18th), Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (4th), Managed Detection and Response (MDR) (8th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (11th)
Logstash
Ranking in Log Management
24th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.6
Number of Reviews
5
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of IBM Security QRadar is 3.8%, down from 4.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Logstash is 0.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Log Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM Security QRadar3.8%
Logstash0.7%
Other95.5%
Log Management
 

Featured Reviews

Mahmoud Younes - PeerSpot reviewer
Reliable installation and diverse use cases provide strong value
IBM Security QRadar has some areas for improvement. We have missed some DSM components. We need to customize logs where there is no DSM or connector for certain products. We can integrate but we have missed the DSM, which is the connector to pass logs coming from different applications. For example, with a university customer, we tried onboarding Canvas service. IBM Security QRadar does not support Canvas, so we had to create custom scripts and workarounds to pull logs from Canvas.
PRANIL CHANDARKAR - PeerSpot reviewer
Open-source accessibility and ease of implementation empower adaptable log management
As both a customer and an integrator, I think the best features in Logstash are that people prefer it because it is open to all, as it is an open-source version. The functionality of Logstash is quite easy to implement. I can say that the plugin ecosystem of Logstash is great. I have used some plugins for shell script monitoring and for SQL monitoring, and these are all working well with Logstash. The real-time processing capabilities of Logstash are also pretty fine with the tool. When I use the community edition, I have to do many things manually. If I am using enterprise Elastic, then that is taken care of by the Elastic native machine learning.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I like that it's easy to use and the performance is good."
"It showed us where weaknesses were in our environment, so we could actively target those patches first."
"The best part of this solution is having a third-party SOC."
"The correlation and the parsing are important features, since it is very important for a SIEM to have a good scalability and performance."
"I have found the most important features to be the flexibility, tech framework, and disk manager."
"One very useful feature is the plug-in offering that allows you to integrate it with other solutions, such as integrating it with plug-ins like Scout, Carbon Black, and the rest."
"It has a lot of good correlation rules. From a customer's point of view, it is one of the best solutions because you don't need to create correlation rules from scratch. You just review them and customize them as you want."
"It is very stable. We have not faced interruptions in the past four and a half years."
"Logstash has numerous plugins for inputs and outputs, allowing it to work well in environments that do not contain other Elastic components."
"The transformation means we ship the logs in the way that we want them to be presented in Kibana, which is the main function we use Logstash for."
"I can collect logs from various data sources, including hardware."
"We have three or four Logstash servers for high availability."
"Everything aligns well with improving our organization."
 

Cons

"I would like to see a more user-friendly product."
"There are reports that I would like to generate that are either not included, or I cannot find."
"Right now, if you look at the compatibility, if you need to deploy QRadar in a physical appliance you have only two choices of server, their own or a Lenovo server. In today's world, you cannot keep something tied to such a big brand. Clients want to be able to use whatever type of server they want."
"QRadar log integration of various applications can be a tough job at times. There may be occasions when you will not find any QRadar guide on adding logs of a particular application. Even if you come across one, adding a log process is not an easy one."
"It is very difficult to activate all of the network equipment, and it would help if it were made easier."
"IBM QRadar User Behavior Analytics could improve machine learning use cases because they are limited and most of the use cases are rule-based. They should develop more use cases, such as in Securonix or Exabeam because they will detect a threat. Using machine learning is mainly on the correlation rules, but if you think about Exabeam or Securonix, they detect using machine learning or machine learning-based algorithms."
"Pricing model could be more cost-effective."
"The only challenge is that IBM has been a closed enterprise. It should be more open to integrating with other providers at an enterprise level. We're a bank and the core banking system integration is not way straightforward and there is no integration between IBM and these products. If IBM could open up and provide a way of integrating it seamlessly, without charging more for it, that would make a big difference."
"There can be a UI to implement with Logstash. Currently, I have to work with config files and everything."
"We still have a problem with importing the log system."
"Almost all the research can be very bad. We still have a problem with importing the log system."
"The product needs to improve its compatibility."
"Elastic does not provide proper support for Logstash worldwide, and I rate their technical support as one out of ten."
"An enhancement we could implement is the ability to cluster Logstash to exist in more than one node."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"A good approach would be to begin with an On Cloud subscription, then later on do a more exact sizing."
"The pricing needs to be such that they are more competitive with other vendors."
"There is a license to use this solution, which is paid annually. However, there are subscription options available."
"It's not expensive for the resources that it gives you."
"Its price is good in terms of efficiency and the number of people required for implementing various things. You might pay more in terms of money, but you might save on the number of people. For example, if you are using Kibana, you have to pay more for people or experts, which is not the case with IBM QRadar."
"The licensing is also overly complex, as there is a need to buy the work load performance monitoring separately."
"I think that the price is fair, but we can always say that the price could be cheaper."
"The pricing is always fine."
Information not available
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Comparison Review

VS
Jun 28, 2015
Qradar vs. ArcSight
Continuing with the SIEM posts we have done at Infosecnirvana, this post is a Head to head comparison of the two Industry leading SIEM products in the market – HP ArcSight and IBM QRadar Both the products have consistently been in the Gartner Leaders Quadrant. Both HP and IBM took over niche SIEM…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
9%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business89
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise102
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What are the biggest differences between Securonix UEBA, Exabeam, and IBM QRadar?
It mostly depends on your use-cases and environment. Exabeam and Securonix have a stronger UEBA feature set, friendlier GUI and are not licensed based on capacity (amount of logs and information in...
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 your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Security QRadar?
When comparing with Splunk, IBM Security QRadar's cost is reasonable. Splunk is more expensive than IBM Security QRadar.
What do you like most about Logstash?
I can collect logs from various data sources, including hardware.
What needs improvement with Logstash?
Customization can be automated with Logstash, but it is at the developer's disposal. The developer has to do it, not the tool as such. There is scope for optimization, but that is all outside the t...
What is your primary use case for Logstash?
The purposes for which I am using Logstash largely include log aggregation and application monitoring.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

IBM QRadar, QRadar SIEM, QRadar UBA, QRadar on Cloud, IBM QRadar Advisor with Watson
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Clients across multiple industries, such as energy, financial, retail, healthcare, government, communications, and education use QRadar.
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Security QRadar vs. Logstash and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
869,566 professionals have used our research since 2012.