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Icinga vs Pulseway vs Zabbix 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:
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Icinga is 3.1%, up from 2.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pulseway is 0.2%, down from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zabbix is 12.3%, up from 11.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Harrison Bulley - PeerSpot reviewer
A stable, scalable and cost-effective solution that helps with inbuilt scripts for easy modification
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.
Pieter Plas - PeerSpot reviewer
A solution with a great monitoring system and ability to control access remotely
The initial setup was straightforward. Deployment depends on the size of a customer. We make the customer in the enterprise server, and there is a download per customer for the installation package. We can also roll it out very easily, and when we install it on one or two systems, it explores the network for more systems. We can then fire a deployment package on the other systems. So in one hour, we can do a lot. Most of the time, 90% of the work is very easy, and the last 10% are the business-critical systems from a customer. Also, we manually install important customer systems, like special applications where we like to monitor specific services in the server itself.
B Ahmed - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables seamless global client monitoring with reliable remote connectivity
I use the solution to provide a perfect environment for remote connectivity with my clients. Many tools that I require for system maintenance are included. I can easily monitor all of my clients throughout the world I did not give much thought to it, however, improvements could be made to Zabbix.…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"An affordable solution for small organizations to do basic network monitoring."
"This solution has a self-healing handler where if the service is down, it is automatically restarted."
"The drafts are easy but what I like about Icinga is that there are many add-ons that you can download."
"Macros and the ability to connect it to Google Maps are valuable features."
"Icinga does the job and is fairly stable."
"The value of Icinga is that it has hundreds of plugins, so it's really easy to monitor pretty much anything."
"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."
"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."
"It gives you remote control and has a mobile app."
"The setup is simple."
"The solution has great workflow and server modules."
"We like the patching of the window updates in the client's systems. You can automatically do updates with a single click."
"It has been very helpful to get notifications about various issues with my servers and network to help me take action to resolve problems before they become major issues."
"Zabbix can use old data to current data to set the threshold. We can use previous data to set the threshold."
"It has good graphs of what is going on within the operating system.​"
"Zabbix is good for discovery."
"The best thing about Zabbix is the integration and the APIs that are included are very fast"
"Zabbix is a cost-effective solution. We're a small organization with a few dozen devices to monitor, and it was available for free. We can see what we need. We haven't done an in-depth analysis on it, but we're currently okay with the product."
"There is a problems page that shows us every warning or problem that occurs on our VMs globally. The map screen is also really useful because this is something that was missing. I don't know every other tool in the market. So, I don't know if this is a good point of only Zabbix, or other tools are also doing it, but from my point of view, this is the most useful page that I use, along with the problems page that efficiently lists the problem, recovery time, ending hours, starting hours, and so on."
"The most valuable feature is the monitoring of virtual machines."
"Templates are good. We download them from the official Zabbix site or the community. If the information we need isn't available, we create custom templates based on client requirements."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvement in multi-tenancy. It's not perfect, not even really good. It's average, but it should be improved."
"The user interface should be improved."
"Icinga’s automation could be improved."
"The tool currently fails to provide notifications to users."
"In general, the product does not look good. However, it does what it is supposed to do. So, the improvements should focus on usability and UI."
"One thing that Icinga lacks is the capability to create advanced and customized dashboards within the tool itself."
"At this time, the layout of the website is a bit difficult. It should be more user-friendly for changing the background and logos."
"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."
"GUI needs to be improved and the solution lacks a process for monitoring VOIP calls."
"It would be nice if it also had a desktop application, similar to the phone app, which would allow me to monitor and control computers from my desktop."
"They have good technical support but it's not excellent."
"There are some bugs or glitches."
"The solution does not allow you to make a script for just one customer."
"I would like to remotely connect to the computer, and Zabbix doesn't have this capability."
"For us, the initial setup was complex"
"Zabbix isn't very good at automation just yet."
"When using this solution in enterprise monitoring, you are able to see that there are some issues with equipment that could be causing a problem. Sometimes you want to make a root command that you do not want to be executed automatically. What we have tried to do is open an SSH session directly from the solution's interface but it is not possible."
"The integration of the product is not so easy, especially when it comes to the application database."
"Having a more customizable interface and dashboard would be an improvement."
"The event correlation could be better."
"The only improvement I would suggest, revolves around its AI and ML capabilities."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"The solution is cheap."
"This is an open-source solution with paid support."
"It's an open-source solution."
"The solution is free to use."
"The product is inexpensive compared to other DBM products."
"Even though Icinga's financial cost is low, it is an expensive product regarding the resources required to maintain and operate it."
Information not available
"I was using the free, Community Edition."
"For pricing, it's free. We don't pay anything for it. They open-source the code, and people pay for support."
"This solution is completely open-source, so it is quite affordable."
"The solution is free to use but they offer support as a paid service. If you can go read the manuals and do the fine-tuning based on your needs, you do not need to pay anything and you will have a full solution."
"This is an open-source solution that can be used free of charge."
"It is free, which allows us to reduce costs."
"We were searching for an open source solution and Zabbix fit the bill because it is free and open source under the GPL license."
"Zabbix is an open-source tool, and it's free to use."
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Comparison Review

it_user174738 - PeerSpot reviewer
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
Comms Service Provider
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Educational Organization
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Real Estate/Law Firm
9%
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Icinga?
The best thing about the solution is how it highlights errors, the issues, and what needs my attention. The solution ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Icinga?
It is cost-effective, and the return on investment can be very interesting because the price is low. If you want to i...
What needs improvement with Icinga?
There is room for improvement in multi-tenancy. It's not perfect, not even really good. It's average, but it should b...
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What do you like most about Zabbix?
The template system in Zabbix is very beneficial as it saves time in configuration.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zabbix?
We didn't use the commercial version. We used the free version.
What needs improvement with Zabbix?
I think it's the best solution for monitoring. I don't know any better.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Icinga Cloud Monitoring
No data available
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Puppet Labs, Audi, Spacex, Debian, Snapdeal, McGill, RIPE Network Coordination Centre
Dell, Canon, Siemens, Harvard University, Northwestern University
1. IBM 2. Dell 3. Cisco 4. HP 5. Oracle 6. Microsoft 7. Amazon 8. Google 9. Facebook 10. Twitter 11. LinkedIn 12. Netflix 13. Adobe 14. VMware 15. Salesforce 16. SAP 17. Intel 18. AT&T 19. Verizon 20. T-Mobile 21. Vodafone 22. Ericsson 23. Nokia 24. Siemens 25. General Electric 26. Honeywell 27. Philips 28. Sony 29. Samsung 30. LG 31. Panasonic 32. Toshiba
Find out what your peers are saying about Zabbix, Auvik, SolarWinds and others in Network Monitoring Software. Updated: August 2025.
865,164 professionals have used our research since 2012.