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Pandora FMS vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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

Pandora FMS
Ranking in Server Monitoring
26th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.6
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (66th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (58th), Log Management (60th), Cloud Monitoring Software (39th)
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Server Monitoring
6th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (18th), Active Directory Management (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of Pandora FMS is 2.1%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 2.9%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Monitoring Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor2.9%
Pandora FMS2.1%
Other95.0%
Server Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

MM
Independent Consultant at Maack Consulting
The open architecture is easy to extend and enhance
Pandora could deliver better analytics out of the box. You can work around these limitations with the help of other tools like Grafana. The shortcomings are mostly on the graphical side. The built-in report generators are a bit limited in some areas. They could improve their management console's ability to monitor large environments could be improved. For example, SNMP management is only partially integrated into the management console.
NikhilKalwint - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Specialist at ServiceIO
Monitoring over a thousand systems has improved decision making and operational visibility
From an advantage perspective, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is comparatively cheaper from a commercial point of view. It is easy to install and configure, very user-friendly, and quick to get up and running, allowing you to see the early value adds in your organization. It is compatible with most technologies for monitoring with very few chances of incompatibility. Configuration also allows us to monitor all the technical parameters we are looking for, making it a very good experience for us. The alerting feature in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is a main advantage, as it alerts based on threshold breaches and can raise tickets to the ticketing system, send SMS, and email notifications, allowing engineers to work on those tickets to resolve issues and avoid further impact. The visibility into server health is a beneficial feature that I am utilizing. We widely use various application performance metrics in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor such as database monitoring and server monitoring, which are quite good enough for any monitoring solution. We utilize the customizable dashboards in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Pandora FMS (the Flexible Monitoring System) is an all-in-one package solution, and we can monitor our whole system with Service perspective."
"You can configure several types of architecture for high availability or load balancing."
"Thanks to this software and to the work of the support team, we have everything under control."
"I like this solution a lot because it has a very large Hispanic community and the platform looks very friendly."
"This tool has been of great help because we can manage faster solutions with the problems in our network and it helped us reduce our response time."
"Features I have found most valuable with Pandora are the personalized metrics and the simplicity of data."
"The open-source version offers 100% functionality and the hardware requirements for a solution like this one are very modest."
"In comparison with most monitoring software, this software is incredibly easy to use."
"From a customers point of view, they get a good return on investment because they are not paying a lot of money when you compare to what they used to pay for IBM and other large vendors."
"The most valuable feature of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is its powerful monitoring capabilities."
"SolarWinds fit the bill because it gave many possibilities in monitoring with a good amount of out of the box capabilities."
"SolarWinds SAM has significantly improved our workflow by allowing us to develop a comprehensive knowledge base of known errors and automate responses to specific alerts."
"The initial setup was relatively easy, and we didn't have to install anything. All we had to do was put on the devices we wanted to monitor."
"The application dependency feature identifies issues between applications and servers or within the network where the application is hosted. It highlights related problems, whether related to packet processing or other issues, enabling the creation of alerts and reports accordingly."
"I'd rate technical support at eight out of ten. They are helpful and fast."
"It is easy to install and configure, very user-friendly, and quick to get up and running, allowing you to see the early value adds in your organization."
 

Cons

"Pandora could deliver better analytics out of the box."
"Pandora FMS is relatively new, and the interface with the older version crashes at times. We have several different operating systems, such as Linux and Windows, and Pandora does not run as well in these."
"We would like the real-time monitoring of an interface to be improved within this solution."
"Pandora FMS is an overall great monitoring solution, but it does not have a community that is as large as Zabbix or Nagios."
"An update to the Android app would be appreciated."
"I would like to have a dashboard with all assets displayed, with a quick hover-over status."
"I think some improvements to the Android app would be good."
"When it comes to the definition of local Software Agents for the first time in the open-source version, it can become very tedious."
"The tool’s report feature created issues for us. We needed to gain skills to use that feature. The tool’s customization is not easy since you have to reconfigure the whole system."
"PerfStack can be made more effective. I am sure SolarWinds already has a plan for the same in coming versions."
"A lot of times, we have to do a lot of manual cleanups."
"MS Azure Service and user experience monitoring is an area in which the SolarWinds tools are lacking; without a doubt, this is the Achilles heel of the Orion monitoring tools, and I am currently reviewing other vendors for Azure service monitoring tools."
"Having two places to build and manage alerts is not efficient and not all alerting tools are available in the trap manager."
"Nodes in Azure are able to be monitored with the use of agents, but this does not apply to cloud service offerings that are not node based."
"An additional feature that would improve this solution is the ability to complete root cause analysis."
"It should also be easier to upgrade SolarWinds. AppDynamics is harder to deploy but easier to upgrade. So AppDynamics takes a lot of time and effort to install, but you can upgrade it in minutes. SolarWinds is the opposite. It's easy to deploy, but upgrades take forever. To date, nobody can complete it on time, so the production environment is sitting idle."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"In terms of money, the Enterprise version is the cheapest that I have found after a market study."
"The open-source version offers 100% functionality and the hardware requirements for a solution like this one are very modest."
"You have to pay for the number of agents and models that you are monitoring. I would rate the cost at three with one being the most expensive and five being the cheapest."
"Growing the solution or migrating to the Enterprise version is easy, and various plans are available."
"Pandora FMS is easy to implement and the pricing of licenses is competitive."
"The Open Source Community Edition is great to just explore the software, or use it on medium-sized infrastructures."
"Only one payment and it includes support, updates, new versions, and access to the complete library of plugins except for SAP and z/OS."
"My rule of thumb would be that if you need more than thirty agents, and you lack an automation tool such as Chef or Puppet, you will save a lot of time and money going to the Enterprise edition."
"I would rate the pricing for this solution a three out of five."
"The product is expensive."
"Understanding the counts of objects to monitor will determine the licensing need. In terms of pricing, it’s not cheap but it’s not expensive as larger vendors whose products don’t have all the features or integrations."
"When compared to other licensed models in the market, it stands out as one of the more cost-effective options."
"I think SolarWinds' pricing is very decent compared to other competitors in the market."
"Price can always be lower. It is neither on the expensive side nor on the cheap side. We have worked with them for a lot of years, so we get a discount due to the size of the installation."
"The solution is overpriced in terms of application management."
"We are on an annual license to use the solution. The price of the solution is expensive. The price is based on a bunch of factors, such as the number of engines and elements."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
16%
Construction Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Educational Organization
13%
University
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business11
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

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What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
There is definitely room for improvement besides simplifying its setup. As a non-technical person, I believe the dashboards could be improved. Everything we use appears on video walls, and we need ...
What is your primary use case for SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
I am doing research as we currently have both solutions, and I am looking to see if we need both or can manage with one. Currently, the outcome indicates that we need both. The focus point is diffe...
 

Also Known As

No data available
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Rakuten, Prosegur, Repsol, Teléfonica, Allianz, Ottawa Hospital, Hughes
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about Pandora FMS vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
902,894 professionals have used our research since 2012.