Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Nagios XI vs Wireshark vs Zabbix 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 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
Network Monitoring Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Zabbix11.4%
SolarWinds NPM4.4%
LibreNMS4.4%
Other79.8%
Network Monitoring Software
 

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.
B Ahmed - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables seamless global client monitoring with reliable remote connectivity
I use the solution to provide a perfect environment for remote connectivity with my clients. Many tools that I require for system maintenance are included. I can easily monitor all of my clients throughout the world I did not give much thought to it, however, improvements could be made to Zabbix.…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Though I downplayed the administrative NCC GUI, this is by far the strongest aspect of the Nagios XI product."
"The solution's most valuable feature is its simplicity."
"The installation is no problem. I've installed Nagios several times."
"The most useful aspect of this solution is the ability to customize it for the client agent."
"It's great for monitoring IT services infrastructure."
"The alerting system is very effective."
"The ability to set up templates and groups of checks, as well as customize the checks themselves."
"The most valuable feature is the dashboard, where I can have a single screen that provides a summary for hundreds of servers."
"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."
"The most valuable feature of Wireshark is the ability to choose a destination of flow that has not been working as expected."
"Wireshark's best feature is that it's adaptive, which means it's the go-to tool for network-related developers."
"I like the filtering feature as we can filter data easily. This feature is also available in tcpdump, but it's a simple piece of software. Wireshark is more advanced and has many features. It allows you to filter a lot of things. The output can be filtered easily. The most important feature is colorization. If I say, "Okay, this particular SMB protocol in red, it will show me red." It's easy to identify that protocol or capture data."
"Being able to dissect email data and figure out what is inside email messages was the most valuable feature. Such a feature is pretty helpful for an ongoing forensic investigation or when there is a potential insider threat that you are trying to investigate. It allows you to see the network activity of the users you are investigating. It also gives you more visibility into your network. It was very easy to set up. There is a lot of information out there on Google and YouTube about how to use it. There is also community support. If you have any trouble, it is pretty easy to find an answer online. You will have to do some digging only if you have a very specific use case."
"The product is simple to implement."
"It has a good syntax to put the commands in and get information out of."
"The best part about Wireshark, in my opinion, is its ability to analyze packet capture files."
"The level of discovery-based configuration that lets us auto-configure the monitoring for various systems is a valuable feature."
"There is a problems page that shows us every warning or problem that occurs on our VMs globally. The map screen is also really useful because this is something that was missing. I don't know every other tool in the market. So, I don't know if this is a good point of only Zabbix, or other tools are also doing it, but from my point of view, this is the most useful page that I use, along with the problems page that efficiently lists the problem, recovery time, ending hours, starting hours, and so on."
"The solution is open-source, easy to manage, and user-friendly making it easy for anyone to use."
"Zabbix is a cost-effective solution. We're a small organization with a few dozen devices to monitor, and it was available for free. We can see what we need. We haven't done an in-depth analysis on it, but we're currently okay with the product."
"Our customers also like that they don't have to use multiple modules. Micro Focus and major vendors typically require you to buy several modules and plugins. Our customers do not like that. We offer them a single product for all their monitoring needs."
"The implementation process is very straightforward."
"Zabbix helps to save time."
"In terms of customization and integration, we have more flexibility. We can automate configurations, define deletion rules, and customize based on the needs. The client interface allows for further configuration, making it quite comprehensive."
 

Cons

"There's room for improvement in the visibility, and in the ability to extract information. Stuff like this should be more simple."
"The product does not have SAP monitoring."
"I would like to see support for notification via SMS."
"The user interface needs improvement."
"The interface could be more user-friendly."
"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 a much easier GUI so that I can delete events and logs, which will free up a lot of space."
"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 initial setup depends upon the basics. You need to have a clear understanding of the basics."
"Sometimes I need to use tcpdump when I need to check the packets on CLI."
"Wireshark gets stuck when it is a larger file."
"Big trace files (more than 1,000,000 packets) can be slow, but then you can use "TraceWrangler" (also free) to help with slicing and dicing the data."
"DNS could be improved."
"Wireshark is restricted when any sort of encryption is involved, such as XSL encryption or DLX."
"With Wireshark, you cannot download and utilize the packet in automation."
"The product has been using the same GUI for many years."
"In terms of user-friendliness, large maps could be more interactive. We should be able to click on some areas and move some objects. It would make it simpler to see things while analyzing some dedicated parameters."
"The server monitoring could be better."
"I would like for this solution to be more cloud-friendly."
"The user interface could be a bit better. They could update it a bit."
"They should open an SSH session from the web interface."
"There are not too much documentation or manuals. We found the tutorials very easy to understand but do not go deep enough in the use of Zabbix. We need more manuals, proper use, documentation, etc."
"The user interface could be better."
"If Zabbix had a better dashboard then it would be nice."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"As it is not an agentless tool, I think it is expensive."
"Nagios XI is an expensive solution."
"Licensing costs are reasonable."
"You can grow into the higher-priced scale as they learn how to utilize the features for Nagios XI."
"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 pricing is high with separate licensing for the product and support."
"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."
"We are using the free version of this solution."
"Wireshark is free software, so you don't have to pay any licensing fee. Individual people can use it and then donate to Wireshark."
"We are using a freeware version of this solution, so there are no licence costs involved."
"Wireshark is an open-source product, so it's free to use."
"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?"
"We're using the free version of Wireshark."
"It is an open-source solution."
"The solution is open source so is free."
"This solution is completely open-source, so it is quite affordable."
"It is worth every cent to pay or even study to do your own installation."
"If you have 20,000 hosts, the support costs around €95,000 for a year."
"There are no licenses."
"It is free, which allows us to reduce costs."
"For pricing, it's free. We don't pay anything for it. They open-source the code, and people pay for support."
"It's an open-source solution that can be used free of charge."
"My manager is very happy because it doesn't cost anything."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which IT Infrastructure Monitoring solutions are best for your needs.
871,469 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

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%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

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
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business53
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise34
 

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 mon...
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...
What do you like most about Zabbix?
The template system in Zabbix is very beneficial as it saves time in configuration.
What needs improvement with Zabbix?
The reporting is lacking because this is an open-source tool, and nowadays, management's expectation is that the repo...
 

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
1. IBM 2. Dell 3. Cisco 4. HP 5. Oracle 6. Microsoft 7. Amazon 8. Google 9. Facebook 10. Twitter 11. LinkedIn 12. Netflix 13. Adobe 14. VMware 15. Salesforce 16. SAP 17. Intel 18. AT&T 19. Verizon 20. T-Mobile 21. Vodafone 22. Ericsson 23. Nokia 24. Siemens 25. General Electric 26. Honeywell 27. Philips 28. Sony 29. Samsung 30. LG 31. Panasonic 32. Toshiba
Find out what your peers are saying about Zabbix, Auvik, Datadog and others in IT Infrastructure Monitoring. Updated: October 2025.
871,469 professionals have used our research since 2012.