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POWERHOUSE Application Performance Monitoring vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 2024

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

POWERHOUSE Application Perf...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
73rd
Average Rating
8.8
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
17th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Server Monitoring (8th), Active Directory Management (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of POWERHOUSE Application Performance Monitoring is 0.5%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 1.2%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor1.2%
POWERHOUSE Application Performance Monitoring0.5%
Other98.3%
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

it_user328959 - PeerSpot reviewer
Manager of Cell Architecture and Integration at a non-profit
Gives us clear information on what is going wrong and where we need to focus to improve our applications, but it lacks automatic alerting.
Have real-time performance metrics Alerting Profiling in production Gives us clear information on what is going wrong and where we need to focus to improve our applications. Real added value in our IT internal and external organization (we open Nudge APM dashboard to our outsourced…
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

"Performance management is a shared concern and APM tools must be used by all people involved in the build and run process."
"Gives us clear information on what is going wrong and where we need to focus to improve our applications, with real added value in our IT internal and external organization as we open Nudge APM dashboard to our outsourced suppliers."
"Nudge APM helps my organization to meet all SLA requirements, thanks to alert triggers."
"Great reduction in resolution time: proactive identification of errors before users send incidents."
"I adore the NTA module that provides deep details on ingress/egress traffic for any interface. With a few clicks, you can correlate who is accessing what and when, beside the bandwidth consuming applications/users."
"This product can monitor application environments no matter where they reside and provides capabilities for deep insight into infrastructure."
"We use the solution as a central monitoring tool. We use it to monitor every transaction that has a relation to the organization’s infrastructure."
"The most valuable feature is application monitoring."
"There are many valuable features, including the network configuration manager, and the network performance manager."
"The most valuable feature is the Access Rights Manager."
"Having used various other vendors for monitoring over my career, the SolarWinds products give outstanding value for the price."
"AppInsight for SQL: Enables us to see the relevant error log entries on the same page as performance parameters."
 

Cons

"No automatic alerting"
"There is room for improvement on the portal to access the collected data, but it has already been enhanced with great zooming features."
"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."
"SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is not stable. We have to maintain the platform and it goes down frequently."
"The stability, flexibility, and ease of use could be improved."
"I would like to see support for non-Windows or non-Microsoft domains, especially Apache and other non-Windows servers."
"When you implement SolarWinds on a larger scale my customers complain about the speed."
"It would be helpful if the solution could integrate more with the security compliances, like this IDSS, etc."
"It lacks a user experience for measuring things like the end-to-end time for which a user waits for a specific response in the system. In the application layer, it has some very basic stuff. You have to build your own with manuscripts and things like that."
"This product has no real downside unless they fail to continue development of its capabilities."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"Nagios XI, WhatsUpGold, Uptime Software, PRTG, Manage Engine, and SpiceWorks are the other tools that have lower pricing and licensing costs. However, they can't compete with SolarWinds when it comes to the features and functionality that SolarWinds can provide."
"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."
"SAM is not per server so the pricing model can be deceiving. If you have an enterprise environment, you will quickly exceed your licensing quickly. You should know this before going in."
"Its licensing is on a yearly basis. It is just the standard price, but it can vary depending on the current rate of the dollar."
"I have always said SolarWinds is very “proud” of their products, meaning they are expensive. I cannot afford to purchase all the licenses I need for all the SolarWinds products."
"When compared to other licensed models in the market, it stands out as one of the more cost-effective options."
"The product is expensive."
"The product might cost you $30,000 USD to buy, but scaling this solution requires the purchase of additional polling engines at $20,000 USD each."
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894,738 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Educational Organization
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
7%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
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

Nudge APM
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bank and Insurance : Crédit Agricole, CDC (Caisse des dépots et consignations), ACMS (French healthcare insurance), Service : Unibail Rodamco, Elis, Public : CNIL, Mairie de Paris, AESN, HAS, EPIDE, Ministere Education Nationale Software : Jalma, Neoxia, AFI, Traceone, Infinancials, Telecom operator : NordNet Media : Les Echos,
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about POWERHOUSE Application Performance Monitoring vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
894,738 professionals have used our research since 2012.