IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

IBM and SolarWinds are both solutions in the Server Monitoring category. IBM is ranked #19 with an average rating of 7.5, while SolarWinds is ranked #12 with an average rating of 7.4. IBM holds a 1.0% mindshare in SM, compared to SolarWinds’s 2.5% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 89% of SolarWinds users who would recommend it.

IBM SevOne Network Performa...

Read 54 IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) reviews

403 Views
66 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

Read 42 SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor reviews

919 Views
153 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

IBM SevOne Network Performa...

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 6, 2024

IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) and SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor compete in network performance and server/application monitoring. SolarWinds appears to have the upper hand due to its comprehensive monitoring capabilities and cost-effectiveness.

Features: IBM SevOne NPM includes extensive network analytics, real-time performance metrics, and advanced analytics. SolarWinds offers comprehensive server and application monitoring, performance tracking, and a broader range of monitoring capabilities.

Room for Improvement: IBM SevOne NPM could enhance customization options, reporting features, and dashboards. SolarWinds should improve scalability, the setup process, and user-friendliness of initial deployment.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM SevOne NPM users find deployment straightforward but seek more responsive customer service. SolarWinds users commend ease of deployment and supportive customer service, with smoother overall deployment experiences.

Pricing and ROI: IBM SevOne NPM has higher setup costs but offers satisfactory ROI for complex environments. SolarWinds has more affordable setup costs and favorable ROI, with better cost-effectiveness appreciated by users.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

June 2025

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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 SevOne Network Performa...

Ranking in Server Monitoring

19th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Monitoring Software (45th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (44th), Log Management (48th), Cloud Monitoring Software (30th)

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

Ranking in Server Monitoring

12th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

5.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (18th), Active Directory Management (10th)

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) is 1.0%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 2.5%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Server Monitoring

Featured Reviews

Grzegorz Nowak

Solution Architect at Wingu

Improves infrastructure planning by helping us analyze network traffic

We use SevOne to collect and report on network flows SevOne improves infrastructure planning by helping us analyze network traffic. We can look at bandwidth for specific endpoints on the customer's network and analyze traffic to identify issues. For example, maybe some connectors are unavailable.…

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Carlos Camargo

Senior Operations Manager at Sencinet

Provides user-friendly API features and has straightforward deployment process

One product area that could benefit from improvement is the synchronization of licensing periods across different modules. The misalignment of licensing terms can present commercial challenges when adding new modules or additional pollers. Additionally, the granularity of polling times for specific components could be enhanced to better meet individual customers' needs without impacting the entire polling pool.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Based on my experience, the stability of IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) is excellent."

"The comprehensiveness of this solution's collection of network performance and flow data is one of the basics in the field for what it does. It meets all of our needs. So for all those areas, for the most straightforward collection capabilities, right up to NetFlow and even telemetry, it meets all those demands. Not only just basic or fundamental SNMP collection capability, but the product also supports what we need for the future with telemetry streaming. So it's very comprehensive."

"In 90% of the cases, new devices are plug-and-play, so when a new version comes out then SevOne has support for it out of the box."

"It's a great solution for highlighting and discovering useful information regarding our network's elements."

"With this tool it is interesting to show the info to the client and explain where the traffic is."

"The monitoring of the network is very customizable. That is its unique feature."

"Its ability to monitor practically any type of network device via SNMP is most valuable. This is the main functionality that we're using. If a network device exposes a metric, such as interface utilization, SevOne will monitor it for us."

"SevOne has rich API capabilities, giving us the flexibility to control what we collect and customize the collection, creation, and manipulation of now metrics as necessary."

More IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) pros

"One of the most valuable features are the reports. They're pretty good. Also, the ease of installation and customization for the client is another feature that we value. SolarWinds has a lot of features but these are the ones I like the most. We also like that the KPIs have the ability to be preset."

"The most valuable feature is the Access Rights Manager."

"We use the solution as a central monitoring tool. We use it to monitor every transaction that has a relation to the organization’s infrastructure."

"SolarWinds is a very stable platform compared to others on the market."

"AppInsight. Provides a simple way to get very in-depth monitoring configured for our most popular applications. Exchange, SQL, and SharePoint."

"It's good at monitoring system-specific things like ports, services."

"The solution is great for monitoring. If something is going wrong, we can immediately find the root cause."

"Monitoring of processes and services is the most valuable feature. It is not necessarily just the server alone in terms of the CPU or the memory. We can go in-depth into services and processes."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pros

Cons

"User-friendly, multi-tenancy."

"The user management features need to be improved. It would be nice if we had more granular control, or layers of control, out of the box."

"The customizations are very hard. The person doing it has to be very good at analytics and has to be very good in all languages"

"NMS has several areas for improvement. It should be more user-friendly inside of NMS for some of the functionality in there. It's been getting better the last version or two, but the there have been bugs in there whenever I've gone to new versions."

"The tool needs improvement in non-Cisco SD-WAN."

"Telemetry is hot these days, and IBM can improve SevOne's support for telemetry correction. Reporting is another feature that could be better. It provides the bare minimum functionality, which is good enough for most engineers, but the management isn't advanced. The new portal provides a much lighter view and better visualization, but the management is not so good."

"SevOne could improve its flexibility because it isn't fully customizable and its out-of-the-box configuration doesn't cover all use cases."

"We need to be thinking about streaming telemetry protocols. They already have the port for enhanced visualization, which they already have through Data Insight."

More IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) cons

"SAM's software-defined network monitoring capability is also low and could be improved."

"The stability, flexibility, and ease of use could be improved."

"I think they need to make reporting easier and more simple & dynamic."

"Downside of the tools is the web console are hung or crash. It need to improve the performance."

"It needs time-based functions for monitoring. Some things need to be polled on a specific schedule or only during a specific window."

"It lacks a user experience for measuring things like the end-to-end time for which a user waits for a specific response in the system. In the application layer, it has some very basic stuff. You have to build your own with manuscripts and things like that."

"When you implement SolarWinds on a larger scale my customers complain about the speed."

"SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor could improve by having a cloud version. They have an observability platform but it still needs to be maintained by us."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"A blocking point is the high upfront cost because it is challenging to get it accepted and the purchase approved."

"There are cheaper solutions available."

"Although I don't have exact details in terms of cost, my experience has been that SevOne is willing to make a deal with the customer."

"Choose a SevOne partner who can provide SevOne as a service and can deliver professional services and maintenance."

"Prices per license are not huge, but they exist."

"There are different options available for licensing, with the per-device option being more expensive but more flexible."

"For the value that you get from SevOne, it's worth the price. There are a lot of cheaper alternatives on the market, and even free options. But they require more staff, more resources, and engineers with more advanced knowledge of monitoring. That's what makes SevOne worth the price."

"The tool is not expensive. We were able to negotiate with SevOne on pricing."

More IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) pricing and cost advice

"I think SolarWinds' pricing is very decent compared to other competitors in the market."

"The solution is overpriced in terms of application management."

"Nagios XI, WhatsUpGold, Uptime Software, PRTG, Manage Engine, and SpiceWorks are the other tools that have lower pricing and licensing costs. However, they can't compete with SolarWinds when it comes to the features and functionality that SolarWinds can provide."

"SAM is not per server so the pricing model can be deceiving. If you have an enterprise environment, you will quickly exceed your licensing quickly. You should know this before going in."

"The solution's price is reasonable. Though it's on the higher side, the tool is worth the money."

"The licenses start from USD 3000.00 and go up to USD 20,000.00 for the year. It's a perpetual license. Nothing is free in SolarWinds, anything that you need is an additional cost."

"Pricing and licensing is fair for what you get. It does have a great bang-for-the-buck appeal."

"I like the pricing for this SolarWinds product."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

16%

Manufacturing Company

15%

Computer Software Company

13%

Legal Firm

Educational Organization

24%

Computer Software Company

11%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with SevOne Network Data Platform?

There is room for improvement in the integration with different vendors and the reporting capabilities. It would be beneficial to have out-of-the-box integration with third-party vendors and improv...

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What is your primary use case for SevOne Network Data Platform?

The primary use case of IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) ( /products/ibm-sevone-network-performance-management-npm-reviews ) is network monitoring. It helps to maintain the infrastru...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering SevOne Network Data Platform?

To compete with custom-built tools, IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) should accommodate the desired features and be timely in the delivery of feature updates. I would rate the overal...

See all answers

What do you like most about SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?

Identifying the problem statement is easy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?

The initial cost is quite high, but the renewal cost is reasonable.

See all answers

What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?

There are no specific features or functionality I would like to see improved or enhanced in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor at this time. I have not encountered any missing features or fu...

See all answers

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Splunk AppDynamics vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

Compared 10% of the time

Prometheus Group vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

Compared 7% of the time

Zabbix vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

Compared 5% of the time

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM)

June 2025

IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) report

Download IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) product report

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

May 2025

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor report

Download SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor product report

Also Known As

SevOne

SolarWinds SAM

Overview

The IBM® SevOne Network Performance Management (IBM SevOne NPM) solution helps you spot, address, and prevent network performance issues early with machine learning-powered analytics from a single source. Boost network performance and improve your user application experience by proactively monitoring your multivendor end-to-end network across enterprise, communication, and managed service provider networks.

Transform raw network performance data into intelligent and actionable insights. The IBM SevOne NPM solution goes beyond detection, combining industry-leading expertise and advanced technology to help your IT team plan and optimize your network and act on what matters: improving network performance to provide an exceptional customer experience.

For further information, please visit www.ibm.com/cloud/sevo...

IBM

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers powerful application and server monitoring capabilities for IT pros, enabling them to diagnose and troubleshoot performance issues faster. Do not let slow applications and downtime impact your end-users and business services. Pinpoint the root cause of application issues across various layers of the IT stack. SolarWinds SAM is affordable and easy to deploy, use, and customize. You can automatically discover your system's environment and start monitoring in about an hour. No professional services or consultation needed.

SolarWinds

Sample Customers

ATOS, Devereux, Spark New Zealand, Access4, Rogers Communication, Lumen (formerly known as CenturyLink)

Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite

Buyer's Guide

IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

June 2025

Free Report: IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

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