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Nagios XI 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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Nagios XI
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
58
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (25th), Server Monitoring (13th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (28th), Cloud Monitoring Software (25th)
Wireshark
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
63
Ranking in other categories
Network Troubleshooting (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Network Management solutions, they serve different purposes. Nagios XI is designed for IT Infrastructure Monitoring and holds a mindshare of 3.5%, down 3.7% compared to last year.
Wireshark, on the other hand, focuses on Network Troubleshooting, holds 13.0% mindshare, up 12.3% since last year.
IT Infrastructure Monitoring Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Nagios XI3.5%
Zabbix12.0%
Datadog5.0%
Other79.5%
IT Infrastructure Monitoring
Network Troubleshooting Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Wireshark13.0%
LinkRunner12.7%
NetAlly EtherScope nXG9.7%
Other64.6%
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.
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

"BPI: It allows defining peripherals to map business criticality for efficient monitoring, as required."
"The technical support is good."
"The most useful aspect of this solution is the ability to customize it for the client agent."
"The solution's most valuable feature is its simplicity."
"The most valuable feature is the dashboard, where I can have a single screen that provides a summary for hundreds of servers."
"You want to monitor a specific metric that nobody else has? You can do it even with the most basic of scripting skills, and you can always share it with the vast community of Nagios Exchange."
"It's a monitoring agent. It's designed to do one thing. Its most valuable feature is its monitoring."
"It's great for monitoring IT services infrastructure."
"Wireshark is a good tool to start with network analyzing and packet capturing."
"The initial setup is simple."
"The most valuable feature is the traffic gate, which shows which IPs are getting more bandwidth or traffic."
"I have found the most valuable feature you can design your sniffer the way you want to."
"It has good basic features."
"It has a good syntax to put the commands in and get information out of."
"The drill-down available for packet analysis is great. It gives a network security engineer insight into what is going on at the packet level and enables better troubleshooting."
"Wireshark helps us to understand network traffic."
 

Cons

"From an alerting point of view, some graphics and metrics don't work properly with Nagios XI as they do with Checkmk."
"The PNP4Nagios plugin not working easily with XI is an issue for me, because some open source monitoring plugins do not work out of the box. But in the end, you learn to live with it."
"The reporting part should be made simpler. While we can obtain all the reports we need, we always have to create work-arounds to get them."
"Nagios XI can improve its GUI for users with a new look."
"We often need to develop custom plugins to get Nagios to work the way we want it to work because the features we need are not always available in Nagios."
"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."
"The tool's AI model needs to be fixed."
"Technical support is an area that needs improvement. It is not available 24/7."
"In the future, it would be nice to see color coding. It is just black and white."
"A room for improvement in Wireshark is its ease of use for beginners. It could be better. Another room for improvement in the tool is for it to provide more details about the traffic load. At the moment, Wireshark is adequate for me, so there isn't anything I'd like added to it in its next version."
"It would be better if they offered a hybrid version like My Cloud Control."
"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 is restricted when any sort of encryption is involved, such as XSL encryption or DLX."
"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."
"The decryption of encrypted packets could be better."
"The product has been using the same GUI for many years."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Nagios XI is an expensive solution."
"The pricing is really cost efficient. The licensing is perpetual and can be renewed very easily."
"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."
"As it is not an agentless tool, I think it is expensive."
"Nagios Core does not have any payment, but Nagios XI requires payment for the license."
"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 licensing fees for this solution are approximately $3,000 USD per year."
"The pricing is high with separate licensing for the product and support."
"The tool is free."
"Wireshark is free of charge, and there's no license involved."
"Wireshark is open source and gives great value and functionality to the network investigation."
"This is an open-source product that can be used free of charge."
"Wireshark is an open-source product, so it's free to use."
"We're using the free version of Wireshark."
"Wireshark is free software, so you don't have to pay any licensing fee. Individual people can use it and then donate to Wireshark."
"It's a stand-alone tool. If there is a commercial license for it I am unaware of it."
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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
8%
University
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
Hospitality Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business22
Midsize Enterprise17
Large Enterprise21
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise27
 

Questions from the Community

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 your primary use case for Nagios XI?
I normally use Nagios XI for our servers. It's not particularly used for network equipment, however, I use it for monitoring our server performance, including CPU, memory, data, and services runnin...
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 make it more expensive. That said, compared to other products, it is competitive.
What needs improvement with Wireshark?
The speed of the Internet could be improved, especially its performance. Performance can sometimes be a challenge due to numerous factors.
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nagios has over one million users globally, including AOL, DHL, McAfee, MCI, MTV, Yahoo!, Universal, Toshiba, Sony, Siemens, and JPMorgan Chase.
Comversion, ADP, Talbots
Find out what your peers are saying about Zabbix, Auvik, Datadog and others in IT Infrastructure Monitoring. Updated: October 2025.
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