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Icinga vs Nagios XI comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 6, 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

Icinga
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
49th
Ranking in Server Monitoring
17th
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
51st
Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software
35th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Nagios XI
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
15th
Ranking in Server Monitoring
9th
Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring
11th
Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software
21st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
58
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the IT Infrastructure Monitoring category, the mindshare of Icinga is 1.3%, down from 3.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Nagios XI is 3.5%, up from 3.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
IT Infrastructure Monitoring Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Nagios XI3.5%
Icinga1.3%
Other95.2%
IT Infrastructure Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2292201 - PeerSpot reviewer
Innovation Service Manager at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Easy to use, and it's possible to customize the product as per the needs we may have but average multi-tenancy aspect
It's supported by the community. We use Icinga, which is not part of the Open-Source platform but is wrapped into a commercial solution from another provider, a local provider in Italy. Icinga is an open-source platform, so it is supported by the community. It's quite easy to use, and it's possible to customize the product as per the needs we may have. So it's not expensive, and it's quite a general purpose. We can easily monitor any kind of infrastructure we encounter. The ability to customize scripts and build your own queries to request information from the infrastructure elements you want to monitor. This level of personalization and customization is highly appreciated. The alerting is the same as any other monitoring platform. It's not a "wow" feature that has changed our lives, but it's perfectly adequate.
Emmanuel Appiah Boateng - PeerSpot reviewer
Network and Security Engineer at a educational organization with 1,001-5,000 employees
Simplifies setup and requires user interface enhancement
Nagios XI is easy to install, which sets it apart from other open-source solutions I've tried. Typically, setting up a monitoring system on Linux involves cloning files from GitHub, building it, and installing many dependencies, but with Nagios XI, it wasn't like that. Nagios XI simplifies our setup and reduces the time spent configuring monitoring tools.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Macros and the ability to connect it to Google Maps are valuable features."
"The best thing about the solution is how it highlights errors, the issues, and what needs my attention. The solution directs me to areas that I should look for first."
"We have found the solution to be stable."
"We monitor all, starting from UPS to international mail chains."
"People should know that it is simple and advanced."
"I like the ability to amend and adjust things really easily, which is useful in a case where you could make it auto-discover and then set a template to say all of these applications or servers under this template have an automatic threshold set that you’d set up manually."
"There's a module called Icinga Director, which helps us configure the product using an intuitive interface through clicks instead of creating a text configuration. It's very helpful for us."
"The apply rules feature saves a lot of time."
"You want to monitor a specific metric that nobody else has? You can do it even with the most basic of scripting skills, and you can always share it with the vast community of Nagios Exchange."
"Since the cost is zero and it can use a fairly cheap server to run on the ROI is nearly immediate."
"Nagios allows us to configure any device so that we can send pager alerts when people don't have access to emails, and it also allows us to schedule downtime and maintenance."
"The features I've found the most useful are the plug-ins, the fact that you can connect almost everything to it. That's very useful."
"The solution has a lot of plugins and scripts integrated with it."
"Nagios is a custom API manager, and we can expose custom APIs for our integration. This is a great feature."
"You can save a lot of time using Nagios monitoring because otherwise you need to check all of your services or system one by one."
"The Script Module in Nagios is really easy to use and is really cost efficient."
 

Cons

"The tool currently fails to provide notifications to users."
"Sometimes, it is very hard to keep an overview of what's happening."
"It is not really adequate for our current needs. It causes additional issues which we have to work around and takes us time that a better solution would not."
"Icinga’s automation could be improved."
"Network Discovery capabilities would be extremely helpful."
"It needs Trap SNMP. I saw the documentation for Zabbix, that it has its own built-in product which handles SNMP traps, and there's nothing similar in Icinga or Nagios. I think this feature is most important for me."
"I think the software is quite good, but we have had problems with getting it to recognize certain areas and amend certain checks, where we needed so we would have to create backend scripts for those checks. Though, being open source, it has the support to create backend scripts, it would be better to have these scripts in-built."
"Scalability is problematic. If you have a stable environment it's good, but if the environment is growing, I had some problems with Icinga."
"I would like a much easier GUI so that I can delete events and logs, which will free up a lot of space."
"The GUI could be improved. It's a bit too basic, and maybe having a GraphQL interface would resolve this."
"There's no convenient way to manage notes as the only way is to manage them through the database."
"Nagios XI can improve network and hardware monitoring, these parameters should be simplified to allow usage for monitoring. Additionally, if there was automatic reporting it would be helpful."
"The web interface is perfectly fit for purpose but isn't up there with the best modern admin panels."
"The PNP4Nagios plugin not working easily with XI is an issue for me, because some open source monitoring plugins do not work out of the box. But in the end, you learn to live with it."
"The technical support is variable - sometimes I get answers, but most of my tickets go unanswered."
"As it is open-source, it is not user-friendly. Open-source software is usually not user-friendly."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This is an open-source solution with paid support."
"The product is inexpensive compared to other DBM products."
"We're using the free version of Icinga."
"It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low."
"Even though Icinga's financial cost is low, it is an expensive product regarding the resources required to maintain and operate it."
"The solution is cheap."
"It's an open-source solution."
"The solution is free to use."
"The licensing fees for this solution are approximately $3,000 USD per year."
"The pricing is high with separate licensing for the product and support."
"Nagios XI is open source."
"It is good to contact experts for advice about what is the best solution for your specific infrastructure and enterprise."
"As it is not an agentless tool, I think it is expensive."
"We are using the free version of this solution."
"Nagios Core does not have any payment, but Nagios XI requires payment for the license."
"Licensing costs are reasonable."
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Comparison Review

it_user174738 - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Developer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
May 31, 2015
Nagios vs. Zabbix vs. PRTG vs. Spiceworks vs. Solarwinds Network Performance Monitor
I have researched a quite a few network monitoring tools which can be used for various monitoring purposes of not only the servers, but the intermediate routers as well. There are majorly three types of these softwares. Ones which are completely open-source, you can do almost anything you want…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
14%
University
13%
Comms Service Provider
12%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Nagios XI?
The pricing for the Nagios XI product is good and better than other solutions. I would give it a four or five.
What needs improvement with Nagios XI?
The user interface needs improvement. Many tools have poor user interfaces, making them hard to manage and navigate.
What is your primary use case for Nagios XI?
I normally use Nagios XI for our servers. It's not particularly used for network equipment, however, I use it for monitoring our server performance, including CPU, memory, data, and services runnin...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Icinga Cloud Monitoring
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Puppet Labs, Audi, Spacex, Debian, Snapdeal, McGill, RIPE Network Coordination Centre
Nagios has over one million users globally, including AOL, DHL, McAfee, MCI, MTV, Yahoo!, Universal, Toshiba, Sony, Siemens, and JPMorgan Chase.
Find out what your peers are saying about Icinga vs. Nagios XI and other solutions. Updated: October 2026.
920,939 professionals have used our research since 2012.