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NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG vs Packetbeat 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

NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
73rd
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Packetbeat
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
61st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
2.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG is 0.5%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Packetbeat is 0.3%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Packetbeat0.3%
NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG0.5%
Other99.2%
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Michael Gideon Genita - PeerSpot reviewer
Associate System Engineer at SMS Global Technologies, Inc.
Easy to set up with good documentation and helpful support
I'm using it for a customer The packet flow switch is the most valuable aspect of the solution.  It's an easy product to set up. We can scale the solution if we need to. It's stable.  The documentation is well-written and quite useful. It's compatible with other products.  Under the pocket flow…
Mohammed-Abdelalim - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant Vice President at QualityKiosk Technologies Pvt. Ltd.
Network analytics have delivered lightweight, integrated visibility for search, observability, and security
Packetbeat analyzes specific protocols and is not suitable for full capture of all network traffic and network flows. I recall that Packetbeat can cover a limited number of protocols including ICMP, but not as deeply as other solutions. It covers NetFlows and these types of flows, but not at the level of a deep packet capture that you can find in the market where it taps every single packet in the network. Packetbeat is more about bringing statistics about the packets, but it doesn't capture these packets. The development intention of Packetbeat appears to be to provide a window for application monitoring and performance analytics, and for that purpose, it is doing sufficiently well. However, if the vendor has another goal to build a similar network monitoring solution that exists in the market, which is outside of Elastic's business nature, Packetbeat is a sensor that needs to be improved to the level of deep packet capture where it loses no packets in the network. That improvement would take Elastic to another level.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I love the single pane of glass view. It makes it easier to not have to navigate everywhere. It allows more simplistic visibility, without having to go from tool to tool to tool, or from window to window to window."
"The most valuable features are speed and cost."
"It has cut our group's troubleshooting time down significantly, e.g., depending on the issue, what would normally take maybe a couple of hours will now take minutes."
"If you are looking for a good application monitoring and packet analysis tool, you can strategically use NETSCOUT to get it done."
"The most valuable feature is utilization."
"The ability to troubleshoot customers' connectivity has been very beneficial."
"From a troubleshooting perspective, it allows us to quickly search all data TAP points in the network and helps our network engineers get to root cause quickly."
"The product is stable. I have never had any issue where we have lost an InfiniStream, or visibility from that particular InfiniStream, throughout the bank."
"The beauty of Packetbeat is that it is easy, free, and lightweight, while other solutions are expensive and will accumulate a huge amount of data."
"Elastic's scalability, in terms of cluster robustness, is definitely the most valuable feature."
 

Cons

"I'd like them to make the product more user-friendly."
"The stability depends on who is using the tool, because you only can get as much out of the tool as you put into it. There are a lot of patches for this particular environment, so you have to keep on them. If you lose track of them, then the product is not useful anymore."
"The technology goes end-of-life on us every year, which is why I am looking forward to vSTREAM."
"Being able to manage the packet flow switches in nGeniusONE would be great."
"We don't use the single pane of glass view, even though we own it."
"The monitoring and reporting tool needs improvement. Users want more information, such as the level of detail when doing a packet analysis. They want more detail to be able to isolate down to a specific point."
"The NetFlow Collectors could handle more flows per minute."
"I would like to see an improved level of stitching between IPs."
"Packetbeat analyzes specific protocols and is not suitable for full capture of all network traffic and network flows."
"The scalability of the agent itself could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is a little high."
"I would like it to be more scalable with less spend."
"This product could be cheaper."
"The scalability is good, but it comes at a cost. E.g., if you need 100 InfiniStream because you are sending gigs or terabytes of data to one InfiniStream, then you will have to purchase another InfiniStream, which are not cheap."
"To capture more with the solution that we bought, you have to buy another InfiniStreamNG, and there are only four ports in the back."
"It can be scalable. It just costs too much. With a company as big as ours, it gets too expensive to accommodate every single site."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
14%
Construction Company
13%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
9%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise8
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Packetbeat?
Elastic is pretty cheap for large enterprises but unaffordable for small ones.
What needs improvement with Packetbeat?
Packetbeat analyzes specific protocols and is not suitable for full capture of all network traffic and network flows. I recall that Packetbeat can cover a limited number of protocols including ICMP...
What is your primary use case for Packetbeat?
I have dealt with all of them: Elasticsearch, Kibana, Logstash, Beats, Elastic Agent, and Fleet, because I need to use all of them to achieve a solution for customers. These solutions are typically...
 

Also Known As

InfiniStreamNG, NETSCOUT ISNG, Infinistream
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

U.S. Department of Defense
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about NETSCOUT InfiniStreamNG vs. Packetbeat and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
909,948 professionals have used our research since 2012.