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Illumio Insights vs VMware NSX 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

Illumio Insights
Ranking in Network Detection and Response (NDR)
19th
Ranking in Microsegmentation Software
6th
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
1.8
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Detection and Response (CDR) (11th)
VMware NSX
Ranking in Network Detection and Response (NDR)
10th
Ranking in Microsegmentation Software
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
107
Ranking in other categories
Network Virtualization (1st), Cloud and Data Center Security (6th), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (6th), Network Automation (4th)
 

Featured Reviews

EM
Manager at OOCL
Micro-segmentation has improved threat visibility and supports ongoing zero-trust monitoring
Deployment of Illumio Insights was not difficult, but the difficulty depends on how micro your design is. For Docker containers, it is not quite suitable for that kind of application traffic. For container architectures, it is not quite designed that way. For normal VMs it might be acceptable, but for container architectures, I cannot be as micro-segmented as I want to be. Illumio Insights is not very well designed for containers, which is one of the drawbacks and weak sides of the product. I use Illumio Insights' real-time analytics for micro-segmentation, and beyond zero-trust monitoring, I also want to do analysis. However, the product coverage is not very broad, so I have to do my own filtering and analysis, and integration with other tools is necessary. The reporting and analysis are not ready out of the product itself. Reporting is another area for improvement in this product and is not very sufficient, so I have to further integrate or do it on my own. Illumio Insights is stable and a mature product. The functionality, such as reporting and analysis, may extend in the roadmap, but it has not in the past. The current functionality is adequate and quite mature, which is how I chose it based on maturity and market share. However, it is not very modern for Kubernetes and containers. If this functionality can extend, that would be a valuable roadmap addition. Streamline integration with Illumio Insights does not help me much since it does not require too much integration with my other operations.
TAIYAB HASAN - PeerSpot reviewer
Windows Redhat Linux Vmware & Azure & Cloud & Nutanix Ahv-Vmware & Backup Senior System Administrator at AlDawaa Medical Services
Has improved network visibility and security through micro-segmentation and SDN capabilities
This feature gives us flexibility and allows us to manage everything under one pane. We can see everything on one console, including network operations and behavior. Monitoring and security are among the best features for VMware NSX. For micro-segmentation, it's integrated with our endpoint security. If there are any issues with servers or VMs, it notifies us so we can isolate the servers and investigate. It provides distributed security features such as firewall and intrusion, IDS, IPS. The security level with IPS and IDS in VMware NSX is excellent. It also provides logical switching and routing which gives an extra layer for Layer 2 and Layer 3 switching requirements. The solution provides flexibility, automation, and self-service capabilities, resulting in cost savings as extensive expertise isn't required. Once automation and self-service are implemented, many tasks can be completed automatically. Load balancing is another excellent feature. Multiple servers can run on load balancing features, which is particularly useful since we have many application servers running. Sharing loads between servers provides the best performance.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Illumio Insights is stable and a mature product."
"Illumio Insights impressed me with its ease of use, clarity, and potential to significantly improve breach containment strategies."
"This solution has contributed to quick detection of risky traffic and offers one-click containment."
"One of the most valuable features is the ability to map traffic and patterns over multiple hyperscalers, not just AWS."
"It has allowed our customers to scale extend their existing IP subnets and spin up new subnets on-demand for new app web DB tiers, increasing overall VM-to-VM security and policy deployments and helping increase operational efficiency from a network management perspective."
"The alert features are the most valuable."
"The most valuable feature is to control application behavior, and it provides us with features that other products have not."
"We are happy with the scalability."
"The solution is great for controlling virtual switches and it is easy to establish VLANs and micro-segmentations."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"The most valuable features are the micro-segmentation and integrated security options."
"The solution is robust as it covers everything we want to do and is stable, so we're happy enough with it. We have had no problems so far. Everything is great."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvement with more AI-based detection to report traffic abnormalities and potential issues."
"Illumio Insights is not very well designed for containers, which is one of the drawbacks and weak sides of the product."
"In some of the views, an IP address appears to be a link, but it doesn't open any new windows or display any new information."
"I have concerns on the stability of VMware NSX, because it breaks multiple times in customer environments, especially when you scale it across a big data center."
"The network-extending capabilities for the physical environment need improvement."
"The initial setup was a bit lengthy in the beginning."
"Pricing and licensing could be improved as we are a government entity."
"The support needs improvement."
"They need to enhance their technical support. There is no comparison between VMware technical support and Cisco's technical support."
"Any technical product has its own limitations in one place or another."
"The price is rather high."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"There is a license required for this solution and there is also a support license available. The price of the solution could be better."
"The price is based on the virtual desktop infrastructure(VDI) side and also is dependant on the size of the environment. The price is expensive and it could attract more purchasers in smaller organisations if it was reduced."
"I was not involved in the purchase of the solution but I hear it is on the expensive side."
"All the institutions have to pay monthly for the services in the cloud. They have to pay $30,000 every month for this service every three years."
"We are using a perpetual license to use the solution and we have support."
"I would rate the pricing of VMware NSX as seven out of ten"
"We haven't had to hire a dedicated network engineer because NSX handles 90 percent of it. The reduced overhead in terms of managing networks has been the biggest plus."
"The price of VMware NSX is reasonable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
8%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business34
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise69
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Illumio Insights?
Deployment of Illumio Insights was not difficult, but the difficulty depends on how micro your design is. For Docker containers, it is not quite suitable for that kind of application traffic. For c...
What is your primary use case for Illumio Insights?
Illumio Insights plays its own role in enhancing threat visibility. Illumio Insights performs micro-segmentation according to the traffic, determining whether to trust it, allow it, or block it. Mi...
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
There are some very major differences between both the Products and to name a few. -Cisco ACI have physical network gear (9K Switches) where the Code runs in ACI Policy Mode & the UCS server wh...
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
Once you know your way around the Cisco ecosystem, using Cisco ACI is not so difficult. It is a global product, so when you change one interface, changes are automatically reflected on every switch...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware NSX?
When measuring complexity and costs for our organization, we consider some parameters for effectiveness. In terms of effectiveness in reducing operational complexity, I measure it to be high on the...
 

Also Known As

No data available
VMware Nicira, Lastline Defender
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
City of Avondale, Lumeta, Kroll Ontrack, Heartland Payment Systems, Baystate Heallth, Exostar, Tribune Media, iGATE, NTT Communications, Synergent, California Natural Resources Agency, Bloomington Public Schools, Columbia Sportswear, Join Experience S.A, Schuberg Philis
Find out what your peers are saying about Illumio Insights vs. VMware NSX and other solutions. Updated: July 2026.
909,725 professionals have used our research since 2012.