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Nagios XI vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer vs Wireshark 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

IT Infrastructure Monitoring
Network Traffic Analysis (NTA)
Network Troubleshooting
 

Featured Reviews

Amir  Said - PeerSpot reviewer
Effective alerting enhances network monitoring experience with an easy setup
We love Nagios XI due to the fact that JPS Web is very useful. JPS monitors the modem and performs switching, monitoring the computer, and performing switching. We implement some applications and traffic monitoring. The alerting system is very effective. For instance, if we have an alarm on some RAM storage if the traffic is cut or dropped.
Raja Xabi - PeerSpot reviewer
Improved bandwidth management and network visibility have resulted in financial benefits and streamlined operations
There is always room for improvement in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, such as implementing instant reporting based on business intelligence reports and more granular filters in their dashboard to improve the GUI view and reporting. The licensing model of SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is always an issue for users because competitors offer unlimited and perpetual licenses, and SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer's model is quite costly compared to other brands. If users are comfortable with SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, they have to make the hard decision to invest, and it's suggested from a user's perspective that SolarWinds should improve their financial model and licensing to become competitive, especially for small to medium businesses.
Vijay Duggal - PeerSpot reviewer
Provides detailed traffic analysis and helps troubleshoot issues
There is a disadvantage when it comes to sampling intervals. While the solution supports sampling as fine as one millisecond, it requires a copy at that interval. My Python script allows me to achieve a granularity of up to ten microseconds, but I can't go beyond that. When dealing with provisioning on both issues, it would be beneficial if I could go down to the microsecond level, if not the nanosecond. Additionally, I've heard from a colleague that Wireshark might be less effective in the voice domain.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We love Nagios XI due to the fact that JPS Web is very useful."
"The solution has a lot of plugins and scripts integrated with it."
"BPI: It allows defining peripherals to map business criticality for efficient monitoring, as required."
"The ability to set up templates and groups of checks, as well as customize the checks themselves."
"It is an open-source platform with valuable features for performance and stability."
"The most valuable feature is its support for different types of devices, where it can use all of the equipment that you need."
"The most valuable feature is the dashboard, where I can have a single screen that provides a summary for hundreds of servers."
"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."
"With SolarWinds, we are now able to accurately gauge bandwidth consumption."
"It helps us know when a branch is down because it has a graphic presentation of all the locations a node represents."
"The bandwidth indicates the utilization of the devices; if any issue occurs, it triggers an alert for me."
"I like that it is able to monitor multiple devices and it's vendor-agnostic."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to look for any increases in bandwidth over time so that we can plan before it becomes critical."
"I rate the support in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer as 10 out of 10 because whenever I open a tech ticket, they respond instantly, and their engineer is well-equipped to resolve the issues."
"I can point out the exact root cause 'why.' If there is a slowness, I can point out what was before the issue or before the slowness, what it is, and what is now."
"What I like about SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is that it's useful for analyzing traffic. It also has an application visibility feature that lets you control applications."
"The GUI is easy to use."
"It is a stable product. I would rate the stability a ten out of ten."
"The initial setup is simple."
"It helps in analyzing if something looks suspicious, such as a brute force attack or scanning from somewhere."
"It has a good syntax to put the commands in and get information out of."
"Wireshark's best features are that it lets us see what traffic is in the network and what data should be encrypted."
"Packet-capture files can be hard to use due to their size. Wireshark has a tool called tshark that can parse the files with out opening them so that you can take large captures, say 2-10GB, and return only relevant information."
"If you're dealing with troubleshooting network, voice issues, or network operations, having a tool like Wireshark to dive into packet details is important. The initial setup is straightforward. Anyone starting out or looking to deploy it on your personal PC or machine can do it easily."
 

Cons

"The user interface needs improvement."
"I would like to see support for notification via SMS."
"The Configuration Wizard needs improvement, because not all vendors are present."
"Improve the documentation, examples, and best practices, therefore users can understand how to do things."
"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."
"I would like to see more customization in the network map because it is a bit tricky to use it."
"I would like to be able to extend it to all of our data centers, whether they are in the cloud or not. It would be helpful if I could connect everywhere."
"The pricing has recently risen. I know they've changed what is covered under the license, however, it doesn't change the way we use it and adds nothing to our experience, and yet we now have to pay more."
"An area for improvement in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is application visibility because some applications aren't being recognized correctly. You can see applications such as Facebook and YouTube, but SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer needs to have more visibility into more applications. Currently, SolarWinds fails to detect more powerful applications, such as Zoom and Teams. If SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer can recognize every application and be able to report on each in terms of bandwidth, then that would be good. This is what I'd like to see in the next release of the solution."
"Technical support could be improved with quicker response times."
"I would like to see more training videos and additional material for learning how to use this solution."
"It's not a cheap product, so the pricing could be improved."
"There is room for improvement when it comes to the traffic generated by the analyzer and the analysis of that traffic."
"The pricing is expensive."
"SolarWinds' technical support is ok, but it could be faster and more knowledgeable."
"There is a lack of documentation ......as well as a lack of dashboards."
"The speed of the Internet could be improved, especially its performance."
"It needs the ability to follow multiple interfaces for specific traffic from different network zones/virtual networks. It would help to understand how any packet is going through the network."
"You need some basic knowledge to work with Wireshark. Maybe it could be more user-friendly just for new users. Just for the new generation."
"There is a disadvantage when it comes to sampling intervals. Additionally, I've heard from a colleague that Wireshark might be less effective in the voice domain."
"I would like to see Wireshark improve the ease of application of the command. The command is very powerful, but not easy to apply."
"Wireshark could be improved with a delay option when getting data automatically."
"Wireshark could be improved by adding more monitoring features."
"Its user interface was a little less friendly. They can make its user interface a little bit more friendly. It is for technical people, and most of the technical people would be able to figure it out, but it would be good to improve its user interface. They can maybe build artificial intelligence into it. Currently, it takes a lot of manpower to analyze and dissect all the data."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing fees for this solution are approximately $3,000 USD per year."
"Nagios Core does not have any payment, but Nagios XI requires payment for the license."
"We are using the free version of this solution."
"Nagios XI is open source."
"You can grow into the higher-priced scale as they learn how to utilize the features for Nagios XI."
"This solution is very expensive, at approximately $5,000 USD when I purchased it, which is why I haven't upgraded my version in several years."
"The pricing is high with separate licensing for the product and support."
"For our country in North Africa, it's expensive and we could purchase another solution for that price. But it's a reasonable price if we're speaking in international terms."
"The price of this solution is exceptional."
"We have licenses for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer. In terms of pricing, its license is not that expensive versus other tools such as HP."
"The pricing is really good."
"NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is reasonably priced."
"We pay yearly, and we are happy with its price."
"Pricing for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is very high. I have a customer that needs the solution but doesn't have the budget for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer because the problem is that you can't use the solution only. You have to buy requirements such as the SolarWinds NPM first, and some companies don't have the budget for all the required components and modules. SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer can cost up to $10,000, and some customers don't have that budget. Another product has all the modules that SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer has, with a very low price, that can be a replacement, which is ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer. PRTG is another solution that can replace SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer."
"For our environment, we pay approximately $25,000 USD yearly."
"Licensing for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is paid yearly, and there are no additional costs that you need to pay apart from the standard licensing fees because you don't need to purchase another solution to make SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer work. Pricing for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is more expensive than other solutions."
"We are using a freeware version of this solution, so there are no licence costs involved."
"This is an open-source product that can be used free of charge."
"Wireshark is open-source and free of charge."
"It is free to download and install. It runs on multiple platforms, so how can you go wrong?"
"I've never personally had to pay for it, making it a highly valuable internet resource that's accessible for use. While they offer some paid versions, our firm has utilized the free version for the past three years."
"It's a stand-alone tool. If there is a commercial license for it I am unaware of it."
"We're using the free version of Wireshark."
"Wireshark is free software, so you can download it and use it for free with no licensing fees."
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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
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
9%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Computer Software Company
9%
Healthcare Company
7%
University
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Nagios XI?
It is an open-source platform with valuable features for performance and stability.
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 the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
I have worked from 1973 with all kind of systems in large enterprises across the world. And have experience with all ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer?
The licensing model of SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is always an issue for users because competitors offer unl...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer?
Regarding improvement, the application monitoring capabilities are not exceptional. If SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Ana...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Wireshark?
Wireshark is priced at a medium range, not too high, not too low. The pricing could be more flexible, and they might ...
What needs improvement with Wireshark?
The speed of the Internet could be improved, especially its performance. Performance can sometimes be a challenge due...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Netflow Traffic Analyzer
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nagios has over one million users globally, including AOL, DHL, McAfee, MCI, MTV, Yahoo!, Universal, Toshiba, Sony, Siemens, and JPMorgan Chase.
Oceaneering International, Asia Pacific Network Information Centre, 335th Signal Command, Immofori
Comversion, ADP, Talbots
Find out what your peers are saying about Zabbix, Datadog, Auvik and others in IT Infrastructure Monitoring. Updated: July 2025.
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