Nmap vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer comparison

The compared Nmap and SolarWinds solutions aren't in the same category. Nmap is ranked #19 in NMS , with an average rating of 8.6, and holds a 0.7% mindshare in the category. SolarWinds is ranked #3 in NTA , with an average rating of 7.8, and holds a 5.8% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Nmap users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 83% of SolarWinds users who would recommend it.

Nmap

Read 22 Nmap reviews

2,129 Views
1,937 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic ...

Read 43 SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer reviews

2,260 Views
791 Comparison Views

83% willing to recommend

Nmap

SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic ...

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Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Nmap and SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Zabbix, Auvik, Datadog and others in Network Monitoring Software.

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Network Monitoring Software

February 2026

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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

Nmap

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Monitoring Software (19th)

SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic ...

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (3rd)

Mindshare comparison

While both are Network Management solutions, they serve different purposes. Nmap is designed for Network Monitoring Software and holds a mindshare of 0.7%, up 0.5% compared to last year.
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer, on the other hand, focuses on Network Traffic Analysis (NTA), holds 5.8% mindshare, up 5.4% since last year.

Network Monitoring Software Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Nmap	0.7%
Zabbix	5.7%
SolarWinds NPM	3.4%
Other	90.2%

Network Monitoring Software

Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer	5.8%
Darktrace	17.9%
Cisco Secure Network Analytics	10.5%
Other	65.8%

Network Traffic Analysis (NTA)

Featured Reviews

MoshiurRahman Khan

CEO at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Improves network monitoring and offers insights into traffic, including VPNs

The real-time reporting feature of Nmap is particularly valuable. It generates detailed reports on the source and destination IP addresses, the protocols used, and the types of traffic. This feature is crucial for law enforcement agencies to monitor and analyze network connectivity effectively. It also has traffic analysis. For example, assessing bandwidth usage and configuring the tool to track specific types of traffic is crucial. Unlike SolarWinds, which requires configuration for this, Nmap has built-in functionality that allows it to check all 4,000 computer ports. It identifies the type of traffic each port is using and can easily generate reports on network communications between computers, whether there are 100 or 1000 in the network.

Read full review

Raja Xabi

Technical Manager at APRAL

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.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Nmap has a powerful command line tool and a set of diagnostic features."

"It enables us to delve deeper and identify the services and open ports on the system and visualize this information on a dashboard automatically."

"Nmap's performance is great, and I've never noticed any issues in this respect. It really doesn't put a heavy load on the machine when using it."

"The solution detects the operating systems, which makes testing the software much easier before making the payload."

"The tool's most valuable feature is its scripts. These scripts prove beneficial when security features may obscure or block connections. Nmap helps identify vulnerabilities across different systems, including web servers and various server types."

"The scanning procedure includes UDP ports which sets it apart from competitors."

"The best feature of Nmap is that it lets me see useful information about each endpoint in my entire network environment. For example, I can see every single connection of the network as well as each and every port."

"The most important function, according to me, is the capability to use some arguments in the scanning. The solution's capability to go figure and do a deep dive, discovering information on specific aspects."

More Nmap pros

"The dashboard alerts me when a critical device goes off the network."

"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."

"It provides proactive monitoring, rather than waiting for applications to go down due to heavy bandwidth or latency."

"The performance analysis is a valuable feature. With the performance analyzer, we can see the realtime monitoring, the realtime performance, and historical performance on specific components like virtualization storage, CPU, servers and network equipment."

"What the network team found most valuable in SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is that it helps them to troubleshoot or analyze the issue. For example, traffic that comes from our location: India, goes to the US, so for the network team to analyze where the traffic comes from and where it is directed, and whether the packets are being dropped, they use SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer. The network team also likes that through the solution, they can analyze the complete traffic utilization and how they're going to use it. SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is user-friendly. The team finds it comfortable to use."

"As it offers enterprise solutions, it has all the essential features for business."

"The most valuable features are the bandwidth analyzer, the monitoring, the network analyzer, it has overall good performance, and an easy deployment."

"The program is scalable enough for our usage."

More SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer pros

Cons

"The price is high and could be cheaper."

"The tool's license limits the number of scans it can perform. Improving the license model could benefit customers by allowing more scans for compliance and other purposes."

"The challenge often lies in finding suitable courses and professional resources."

"The solution is not that easy for a beginner to learn."

"They should deliver Playtech's username and password."

"There could be a specific option to check non-pingable endpoints for the product."

"There are concerns with the stability of the product, making it an area where improvements are required."

"The solution's initial setup could be better."

More Nmap cons

"It does not flow. It cannot do our metric performance monitoring. So it is very limited. They can do it but in a very limited fashion. It is only good for SNMP-based alerts."

"The solution should improve its automation feature. It's quite limited compared to other products."

"One area that we struggle with is the price. Because the price of this solution is so high, we are largely unable to introduce it into the local market, and only the banking sector has the means to afford it."

"SolarWinds' technical support is ok, but it could be faster and more knowledgeable."

"The tool itself is very complicated, so training is required to handle it effectively."

"I would like to see more artificial intelligence capabilities."

"This solution does not do a very good job when I am trying to look deeper into my internal network, in particular with respect to individual ports."

"The licensing should be more realistic so that we can adjust the number of nodes according to my needs, rather than in fixed increments."

More SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's an open-source product, and I haven't seen any premiums. Options are available for those who purchase, but for my use case, everything I need is available in the community and forums."

"Nmap is an open-source product. You don't need a license to install it."

"It's an open-source solution. Commerically, only the support service is available."

"The solution is free of cost, but there are specific services that we have to buy."

"The product's pricing is fine. The licensing options for Nmap include perpetual licenses and volume-based licenses. For perpetual licenses, once you purchase it, there's no need to invest in renewals. And for volume-based licenses, enterprise companies can use it multiple times based on the number of users or devices they need to scan. It's a pay-as-you-go model, similar to how you pay for what you use."

"The solution is free of cost."

"Nmap is an open-source and free product."

"The solution is open source so it is free."

More Nmap pricing and cost advice

"NetFlow Traffic Analyzer is reasonably priced."

"SolarWinds' pricing structure is the primary reason why some customers opt for another solution such as ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer. In NTA, you are charged per port, meaning that if you have a 24-port switch you will be charged for 24 individual nodes. ManageEngine NetFlow Analyzer, on the other hand, charges per switch, such that if you add a switch, the entire switch will count as one single node."

"The solution's licensing is high-priced."

"We pay yearly, and we are happy with its price."

"The licensing for this solution is based on the number of nodes."

"While the pricing is fair, it could be better."

"The price of this solution is exceptional."

"I don't have information on the licensing cost for SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer because it's bundled with another SolarWinds solution. My organization has seven different models and pays for the license yearly. My organization also had to deploy additional pollers, but the cost wasn't very expensive, though I can't give the exact numbers."

More SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

13%

Government

University

Retailer

Financial Services Firm

17%

Manufacturing Company

13%

Healthcare Company

University

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	11

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	13
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	26

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Nmap?

Nmap is mostly helpful during compliance checks. We run the scanner to see how many devices are on our network and find vulnerabilities in those that aren't compliant. We also use it monthly to sca...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Nmap?

I am using the free version of Nmap.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Nmap?

Nmap is used for network scanning to map the network, identify devices, and assess their status. It helps determine open ports and services running on a particular endpoint or server within an ente...

See all answers

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 kind of software in monitoring from infra to end to end, it depends on the funct...

See all answers

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 unlimited and perpetual licenses, and SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer's model i...

See all answers

What needs improvement with SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer?

Regarding improvement, the application monitoring capabilities are not exceptional. If SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer could improve in that area, it would be helpful. It is less AIOps driven a...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Compared 9% of the time

Zabbix vs Nmap

Compared 8% of the time

Domotz Pro vs Nmap

Compared 8% of the time

SolarWinds NPM vs Nmap

Compared 7% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

Zabbix vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer

Compared 8% of the time

Darktrace vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer

Compared 8% of the time

SolarWinds NPM vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer

Compared 6% of the time

Auvik Network Management (ANM) vs SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer

Compared 3% of the time

More SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Nmap

January 2026

Download Nmap product report

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer

January 2026

SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer report

Download SolarWinds NetFlow Traffic Analyzer product report

Also Known As

No data available

Netflow Traffic Analyzer

Overview

Nmap ("Network Mapper") is a free and open source (license) utility for network discovery and security auditing. Many systems and network administrators also find it useful for tasks such as network inventory, managing service upgrade schedules, and monitoring host or service uptime. Nmap uses raw IP packets in novel ways to determine what hosts are available on the network, what services (application name and version) those hosts are offering, what operating systems (and OS versions) they are running, what type of packet filters/firewalls are in use, and dozens of other characteristics. It was designed to rapidly scan large networks, but works fine against single hosts. Nmap runs on all major computer operating systems, and official binary packages are available for Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X. In addition to the classic command-line Nmap executable, the Nmap suite includes an advanced GUI and results viewer (Zenmap), a flexible data transfer, redirection, and debugging tool (Ncat), a utility for comparing scan results (Ndiff), and a packet generation and response analysis tool (Nping).

Nmap

SolarWinds Netflow Traffic Analyzer enables you to capture data from continuous streams of network traffic and convert those raw numbers into easy-to-interpret charts and tables that quantify exactly how the corporate network is being used, by whom, and for what purpose.

SolarWinds

Sample Customers

Lockheed Martin, Eastern Bank Boston, Perspecta, Harris Corporation, Discovery Communication

Oceaneering International, Asia Pacific Network Information Centre, 335th Signal Command, Immofori

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February 2026

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