Microsoft System Center vs VMware Aria Operations for Applications comparison

Microsoft and VMware are both solutions in the Cloud Monitoring Software category. Microsoft is ranked #19 with an average rating of 8.4, while VMware is ranked #14 with an average rating of 8.8. Microsoft holds a 0.4% mindshare in CMS, compared to VMware’s 1.7% mindshare. Additionally, 85% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 93% of VMware users who would recommend it.

Microsoft System Center

Read 19 Microsoft System Center reviews

469 Views
272 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

VMware Aria Operations for ...

Read 14 VMware Aria Operations for Applications reviews

2,539 Views
990 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

Microsoft System Center

VMware Aria Operations for ...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 18, 2024

Microsoft System Center and VMware Aria Operations for Applications compete in the IT management and monitoring tools category. VMware seems to have the upper hand in cloud and container integration capabilities.

Features: Microsoft System Center integrates effectively with Microsoft products, offering a seamless experience for Windows environments, notable for its automation capabilities and ability to manage other hypervisors like VMware and Citrix. VMware Aria Operations for Applications excels in multi-environment monitoring, supports open-source technologies like Kubernetes, and provides pre-built dashboards and a strong security framework for container management.

Room for Improvement: Microsoft System Center struggles with integration into non-Microsoft environments, has documentation gaps, and requires high resource consumption. Interface responsiveness and multi-tenant support need enhancement. VMware Aria Operations for Applications could simplify its initial setup, improve dashboard usability, and integrate AI for better alert management and predictions.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Both products offer on-premises and hybrid cloud deployment options. Microsoft support is reported to be costly and slow, while VMware support needs more engagement. Deployment complexity is an issue for both, particularly VMware, which requires significant technical expertise.

Pricing and ROI: Microsoft System Center, part of an enterprise subscription, is considered moderately expensive but offers ROI through efficient management and automation. VMware Aria Operations for Applications, requiring multiple licenses, provides high ROI due to its comprehensive capabilities despite higher costs.

To learn more, read our detailed Microsoft System Center vs. VMware Aria Operations for Applications Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft System Center vs. VMware Aria Operations for Applications

July 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

Microsoft System Center

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

19th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Infrastructure (13th)

VMware Aria Operations for ...

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

14th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (18th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (17th), Container Monitoring (5th)

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Cloud Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Microsoft System Center is 0.4%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Aria Operations for Applications is 1.7%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Monitoring Software

Featured Reviews

Ajinkya Mohod

System Security Engineer at Punch Powertrain nv

Makes user management and application management easy for users

Speaking about the impact of the automation feature that impacted our company's operational efficiency, I can say that the complete tool works on automation. You just have to configure it, and it works, especially in areas like auto-patching updates. I suggest that others can definitely go ahead with Microsoft System Center, especially beginners who choose it, can get hands-on experience with it, and acquire a good understanding of how things work. In terms of the value and benefits derived from the use of the solution, I can say that my company's operations have been made simpler because of the product, especially in areas like user management and application management where we have been benefited a lot. I rate the tool a nine out of ten.

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ToniLindberg

senior consultant at Virtual Consultants Sverige AB

Troubleshooting capabilities have improved application monitoring and support engagement

I can see what happens end to end, which is pretty beneficial. The solution has troubleshooting capabilities, providing a direct connection to knowledge base articles from VMware Broadcom. When I encounter an error, I can search directly within the system to see what solutions have been employed by others. It has a familiar interface, which makes it easy to get started.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Many processes could be implemented out-of-the-box, and this helped to adopt processes in areas which we lacked."

"The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it helps us manage our company's application pool, license pool, application update pool, and OS updates."

"The tool has many valuable features, including license tracking, software deployment, and installation deployment. However, we primarily use it for Windows updates and deployment for Windows servers and desktops. It's a complex product but very well-managed. If you use all the features, they will be valuable to your organization. It allows you to deploy desktops, manage patches, and track various features."

"Managment Packs for Microsoft-specific products, help us implement the best practices for each product."

"It can generate KPIs and management reports with monthly presentations on activities and updating the environment (success and failure)."

"We like Microsoft System Center's Operations Manager. That is primarily why we use it."

"The detail in the alarms is great."

"The availability performance matrix and the reporting capabilities are the solution's most valuable features."

More Microsoft System Center pros

"The solution is great for virtualization and preparing the infrastructure in Tanzu to test products. It's very fast and has good visibility."

"I find VMware Aria Operations for Applications to be very stable, and I would rate it a ten out of ten."

"VMware comes with a support team, and if you have trouble, you can easily create a ticket, and VMware will help you. Therefore, the best aspect is the support."

"VMware Aria Operations for Applications offers significant features such as real-time statistics, the ability to identify possible issues within the VM environment, and helpful heat maps."

"The most valuable aspects of the solution are its ease of use and its ease of implementation."

"This solution allows me to have true visibility for any metrics when it comes to my cloud, and private."

"People are very pleased with the implementation."

"The stability of Aria Operations for Applications has improved significantly over the years."

More VMware Aria Operations for Applications pros

Cons

"Could be more user friendly."

"In Microsoft System Center, it is difficult to follow the steps to create dataflows at times."

"Implementation and integration in the case of multi-tenant environments needs improvement."

"Something super important that we need is this integration via Intune Configuration Manager."

"For me, the tool's UI seems to be too old."

"Most of the documentation is online, however, there are some gaps there. The product documentation still refers back to the 2012 Server. We're pretty much in 2022. There's a ten-year gap there."

"System Center hasn't updated to keep up with the industry. It needs improvements in the user interface, ease of use, and overall product functionality, particularly the cloud-monitoring features. It needs more capabilities to monitor AWS and Azure infrastructure."

"The solution’s pricing could be improved."

More Microsoft System Center cons

"The solution could be expensive, which might be a limiting factor."

"An area for improvement would be more in-depth reporting, such as analyzing disk IO during business hours compared to after hours."

"The implementation is a long process that should be improved."

"The initial setup should be easier and more seamless."

"Its billing model is consumption-based. I understand the consumption-based model, but it is not necessarily easy to estimate and guess how many points or how much we are going to consume on a specific application up until we get to that point. So, for us, it would be helpful to have more insights or predictability into what we can expect from a cost perspective if we are starting to use specific features. This can potentially also drive our consumption a bit more."

"The solution could be expensive, which might be a limiting factor."

"In the new version, I would love to see more prediction capabilities. It would be great if one could see the alerts get a little more enriched with information and become more human-friendly instead of the technical stuff that they put in there. I think those would be really awesome outcomes to get."

"It could use a URL document server. Everything in the market is moving towards automation and everybody's looking for the single click operations as well relational data locality."

More VMware Aria Operations for Applications cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I rate the product price as five to six on a scale of one to ten, where one means it is cheap and ten means it is expensive."

"Microsoft System Center's licensing is costly."

"I know that sometimes there is some reduction in the prices of Microsoft System Center because of the costs of Microsoft SQL Server, which can be advantageous."

"We maximized our license investment."

"Microsoft System Center is quite expensive."

"It's rolled into our enterprise subscription. The entire subscription is around $25,000 a year, however, that covers all the products that we use."

"On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solution's pricing a six out of ten."

"The licensing costs are very high, particularly when you consider that we have to purchase a level 1 license for every integration, such as the load balancer, HAProxy, and the MSSP. And if you want to use vSAN, that's another license. Then, of course, Tanzu Observability has its own separate license."

"I would rate the pricing as three out of five."

"I don't have the details. In our case, there is a mixture in place. We have production usage, and we are also doing training for VMware. So, we also have a training instance. It is worth the money you would spend on it. That's because if you were to build all of this yourself by using some of the open source tools, then you would need a lot of time."

"Different locations require different setups. In your terms, around 300 to around 400K USD."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

No data available

Manufacturing Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Microsoft System Center?

The product's initial setup phase was easy.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft System Center?

Microsoft System Center's licensing is costly.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Microsoft System Center?

Microsoft System Center should be easier to manage. However, it is complex to deploy, so people hesitate to use it. Though it has many features, such as licensing, asset tracking, and software depl...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?

The solution includes cost drivers that can be configured according to your environment. You can input server-wise, CPU-wise, storage, and memory costs per hour or day. Once cost drivers are provid...

See all answers

What needs improvement with VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?

The new version 8.18 has brought significant improvements. The main purpose of using this tool is having a single console to manage all entities. The cloud integration capabilities, including priva...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?

I have been involved in several projects where I had to implement automation and monitoring alerting. I performed automation using VMware Aria Operations for Applications. There is an automation ta...

See all answers

Comparisons

JBoss Enterprise Application Platform vs Microsoft System Center

Compared 27% of the time

Veeam Data Platform vs Microsoft System Center

Compared 19% of the time

IBM BPM vs Microsoft System Center

Compared 15% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

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Compared 8% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

Datadog vs VMware Aria Operations for Applications

Compared 5% of the time

PRTG Network Monitor vs VMware Aria Operations for Applications

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft System Center

August 2025

Download Microsoft System Center product report

Buyer's Guide

VMware Aria Operations for Applications

July 2025

VMware Aria Operations for Applications report

Download VMware Aria Operations for Applications product report

Also Known As

MS System Center

Tanzu Observability, Wavefront, Wavefront by VMware, VMware Tanzu Observability

Overview

System Center helps customers realize the benefits of the Microsoft Cloud Platform by delivering unified management. Experience fast time-to-value with out-of-the-box monitoring, provisioning, configuration, automation, protection and self-service.

Microsoft

VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront is a powerful tool for monitoring and analyzing the performance and availability of applications and infrastructure in real-time.

With its comprehensive monitoring capabilities, visualizing and analyzing data becomes effortless. The real-time alerting system ensures timely issue resolution, while scalability and a user-friendly interface provide a seamless experience for smooth operations.

VMware

Sample Customers

Kassen_rztliche Vereinigung Nordrhein, Magyar Telekom Nyrt., Adeka, QualCare, Aeriandi, UniCredit Bank d.d., Mostar, Allianz Australia Ltd., Grupo Familia

1. Atlassian 2. Cisco 3. Databricks 4. DigitalOcean 5. Equinix 6. Fidelity Investments 7. Google 8. Hewlett Packard Enterprise 9. Honeywell 10. IBM 11. Intel 12. JetBlue Airways 13. LinkedIn 14. Lyft 15. Mastercard 16. Microsoft 17. MongoDB 18. Netflix 19. Nvidia 20. Oracle 21. PayPal 22. Pinterest 23. Qualcomm 24. Red Hat 25. Salesforce 26. SAP 27. Spotify 28. Square 29. TMobile 30. Twitter 31. Uber 32. VMware

Buyer's Guide

Microsoft System Center vs. VMware Aria Operations for Applications

July 2025

Free Report: Microsoft System Center vs. VMware Aria Operations for Applications

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