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Instana Dynamic APM vs New Relic comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 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

Instana Dynamic APM
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
18th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
New Relic
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
158
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (7th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (6th), IT Operations Analytics (3rd), Mobile APM (3rd), Cloud Monitoring Software (4th), AIOps (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2025, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Instana Dynamic APM is 1.0%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of New Relic is 6.3%, down from 9.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

Muhammad Jawwad Hassan - PeerSpot reviewer
A really good GUI that is easy for non-technical users to understand
Our company uses the solution for one of our bank clients. We use App Connect middleware to monitor services and applications such as Docker, Kubernetes, MongoDB, and MS SQL Server. We also monitor the bottleneck for all servers.  We currently have 20 users at one of our branches. We plan to expand…
Iqbal Khowaja - PeerSpot reviewer
Has a simple user interface and end-to-end monitoring and self-healing features
My organization uses many application performance management solutions, such as AppDynamics, New Relic APM, Splunk, and Datadog. I'm the CTO for the state of Hawaii, and across the board, different departments use different APM tools. I'm using the latest version of New Relic APM, but I cannot recall the exact version. My company has a dozen engineers using and monitoring New Relic APM. I'd tell anyone planning to use New Relic APM that it has to fit what you have. For example, most of my company's payload is in AWS, and the tool has adopters and features that CloudWatch cannot provide. Still, New Relic APM can, so you should do a demo or trial run first and see if it's a tool that'll help you with end-to-end monitoring. New Relic APM is working well for my company, so an excellent way to start is to do a trial run to see how the tool works out for your current applications. My rating for the tool is nine out of ten because my experience with it has been great. New Relic also worked closely with my company and has always been upfront on what's available and what's not. My company is a New Relic APM customer.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Instana is very fast to implement and deploy because the dashboards are automated and don't need configuration."
"Visually, it's very good. It provides everything needed for dynamic detection, which is very useful."
"Sometimes it's able to provide a proper RCA on its own. It's able to correlate different events that occurred and that becomes like an RCA in itself."
"We can easily perform root cause analysis using the tool."
"The platform’s most valuable feature is the ability to monitor the performance of containers for request and response analysis."
"The overall capabilities are the most valuable."
"It's great for monitoring services and applications."
"With Instana, the interface and the UI are very simple to use."
"New Relic's dashboard is nice, and it's reliable. It's also compatible with many services, especially Java and the Python ecosystem."
"The alert mechanism is quite accurate when something goes wrong in your system. For example, if you have hundreds of APIs on your server, and any of the APIs is not performing well, you get an alert. When there is a drop or change in the threshold value, the beauty of New Relic is that within a fraction of seconds, all the stakeholders who are configured in the New Relic system will get an alert. That's one good thing."
"The tool's most valuable features were APM and core reliability. We get alerts whenever an anomaly is detected. The solution is very friendly."
"We detect issues using dashboards that we built on New Relic."
"It does everything we wanted it to do."
"It has given us better insight into the performance of the system."
"The feature I found most valuable is being able to design my queries. It's easy to design a query."
"They instrument up from the bottom to the top – every piece of code - they have a very perfect read of what’s being done, and how long it’s taking."
 

Cons

"I think that Instana should improve the university and the certification process, so the users can find experts in Instana with their certification module process."
"They could improve the product’s dashboards and provide more dashboard options."
"The configuration of Instana Dynamic APM needs improvement because it requires quite a bit of work."
"New Relic has a better UI in terms of how it presents the data."
"The App Connect middleware does not integrate with or show corresponding sub nodes."
"The solution's monitoring is pretty weak and should be improved."
"We should be able to go back to scenarios during or before the issue. There should be something like a history playback. Such a feature or functionality would be good."
"Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring."
"Compared to their competitors, they are missing some features at the moment."
"The initial setup can be made easier. Like Mixpanel, New Relic can also have a step-by-step guide for the setup process."
"The solution could improve by having more network monitoring features, such as for all the infrastructure."
"The scalability can be improved."
"Email alert customization is limited."
"New Relic does enable frontend performance monitoring by default. However, when we are troubleshooting the issue, New Relic is not able to trace back to the service where the issue is. Other solutions, such as Dynatrace are better."
"In the next release, I'd like to see a better pricing structure."
"The connectivity between legacy and newer cloud applications is not great."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its pricing isn't a big pain point. Its pricing seems to be better than some of the other competing products in the market, but they also have some of the features and functionalities that are better than Instana."
"Pricing is quite competitive. Dynatrace, AppDynamics, and New Relic were all several times more expensive than Instana, both the on-prem and the SaaS versions. Price-wise they are a lot more competitive than anyone else out there."
"Instana Dynamic APM is more affordable for small and medium-sized companies compared to other vendors."
"The solution's pricing is comparable to other products."
"It's reasonably priced and manageable, especially for individuals who grasp the significance of application monitoring."
"The solution is less expensive than one of its competitors."
"The pricing is $1,200 per year which is a bit high compared to other vendors."
"The pricing and licensing are good if you have an account manager and a partner manager who are looking to help out."
"The pricing is okay comparatively their competitors. The only concern was whether it should be purchased on demand or bring your own license, and which way passes some savings onto the end customers."
"The price depends on how many agents you want."
"We're paying for the New Relic APM license annually."
"It would be nice if we could buy it annually instead of monthly."
"Comparatively, the pricing is expensive."
"The pricing is fine."
"We feel it's a little bit pricey."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
29%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Educational Organization
49%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
4%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Instana Dynamic APM?
The platform’s most valuable feature is the ability to monitor the performance of containers for request and response analysis.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Instana Dynamic APM?
I rate the pricing a seven out of ten. There are no additional costs associated with the product.
What needs improvement with Instana Dynamic APM?
Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring.
Any advice about APM solutions?
There are many factors and we know little about your requirements (size of org, technology stack, management systems, the scope of implementation). Our goal was to consolidate APM and infra monitor...
What do you like most about New Relic Insights?
The product's initial setup phase was very easy.
What needs improvement with New Relic Insights?
Email alert customization is limited; it cannot be tailored much, which makes the system more rigid than optimal. The handling of logs from integration tools is not as advanced compared to other to...
 

Also Known As

No data available
New Relic Browser, New Relic Applied Intelligence, New Relic Insights, New Relic Synthetics, New Relic Servers, New Relic APM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Daxko Lifts Fitness Studios Through COVID Regulations with Quick Engineering PivotsAltissia Meets SLAs to Support Student DeadlinesImmocloud Unlocks Observability to Modernize Real EstateEnento Group Boosts Service Reliability with Real-Time Visibility into Application Performance Instana’s Observability for Amazon EKS Helps Yara Deliver Digital Farming Solutions
World Fuel Services, Verizon, FootLocker, McDonald's, Trainline, Mondia Media, Confused, Costa Coffee, Ryanair, Marks & Spencer, William Hill, Delivery Hero, Skyscanner, BASF, DAZN, Veygo, Virtuo, movingimage, talabat, Australia Post, Tokopedia, Seven Network, Virgin Australia, Zomato, BigBasket, Mercado Libre, Lending Club
Find out what your peers are saying about Instana Dynamic APM vs. New Relic and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
849,686 professionals have used our research since 2012.