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SCOM vs SolarWinds Network Device Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 10, 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

SCOM
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
15th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
83
Ranking in other categories
Event Monitoring (5th)
SolarWinds Network Device M...
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
27th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of SCOM is 1.4%, down from 2.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Network Device Monitor is 0.8%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
SCOM1.4%
SolarWinds Network Device Monitor0.8%
Other97.8%
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

AK
Assistant Manager at SMS group GmbH
Have integrated effective monitoring and seamless alerting with improved visualization capabilities
The most valuable feature of SCOM is its monitoring capability, and we have integrated SCOM with Grafana, which is a dashboarding tool. We have implemented and integrated this to create dashboarding of the SCOM monitoring system for the database, SQL, and the Linux servers we have configured in SCOM. We have created separate dashboarding for it, and the monitoring and creating rules and monitors in the management servers and management packs that SCOM provides are very useful for us. The alerting mechanism of SCOM has benefited our operations because we have modified the thresholds as per our internal requirements. We have configured threshold modifications for the CPU, memory, and especially for disk space. For routine disk space usage on the system, we have provided a separate threshold configuration.
SG
IT Infrastructure Senior Network Technician at Autoliv
Offers some features but needs better customization and analysis tools
There are solutions that can perform better, but due to pricing for our corporate implementation, we had to stay with this solution. It accomplishes the necessary tasks, but there is room for improvement. The features are not as customizable as we would prefer, but they are workable. If configured properly, you can perform a drill-down analysis. However, I have not used this feature much for our infrastructure on the network side.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is scalable. If you want to monitor more you have to buy more licenses, but you can add on. We don't plan to increase usage."
"The monitoring features are the most valuable. We have seen a major benefit from that so far."
"Alerts notify the server or service owner of problems, allowing quick decisions or actions to keep the service running based on configured thresholds."
"Being able to make and customize management packs and send out notifications is very valuable."
"SCOM provides alerting capabilities and threshold settings, which are helpful for monitoring."
"I like the historical reporting of observer metrics."
"The advantages of SCOM are that it is definitely user friendly and a more appropriate solution for what we need."
"Setting up SCOM is straightforward and takes about an hour as long as you have all your firewalls and DNS settings in place."
"The deployment process is quick."
"In terms of general network monitoring features, I find SolarWinds Network Device Monitor very flexible and comfortable to use. The software itself is extremely useful when it comes to monitoring how our data moves between different networks and environments."
"The product is useful for switches and IP phones."
"We are doing more with SolarWinds Network Device Monitor than we were doing in the past with WhatsApp Gold; when we moved to SolarWinds Network Device Monitor, the whole observability part started to grow."
"Since our devices are spread out across the world, we can see the status of these devices without having to send someone physically to a remote location, which saves money."
"Link monitoring is the most valuable feature of this solution."
"The most valuable features of SolarWinds Network Device Monitor are the reports. We are configuring the reports, and the first reports are only about the devices. We are configuring the thresholds in order to monitor all the devices."
"I like the mapping that you could do and the dashboards were very pretty."
 

Cons

"SCOM needs to improve its usability."
"We didn't know the solution enough, and therefore, it took a while to set everything up correctly. There was a learning curve."
"The configurations could be better. There are multiple tests where you can do something, but they can be a trigger as well. The overriding methodologies are not that easy. The configurations are difficult. The configuration and thorough day-to-day operations to get them to the level you want takes some time. It's very difficult."
"The management of the servers could be better."
"There could be more integration of SIM in the solution."
"It'll help if they can provide real-time or closer to real-time monitoring."
"It could use some system enhancements, such as better dashboards."
"SCOM is likely to be phased out in favor of more compatible tools like Icinga for application monitoring or when moving to cloud solutions like CloudWatch and Azure."
"It should provide user-friendly page"
"SolarWinds Network Device Monitor could improve by being more user-friendly. The network has so many features which make it difficult to find how to configure how to use it. It is not simple to customize."
"The way they are presenting the map of our devices needs to be improved."
"SolarWinds Network Device Monitor lacks the granularity of other monitoring tools like LiveNX."
"Although I haven't explored all of the features available, I wouldn't mind if the software were made to be a bit more customizable."
"The security could always be improved."
"There is no mobile version of this product, and our team should be able to access it using a mobile device."
"The reporting feature needs improvement because we are unable to configure reports that were included during initial implementation."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is a license needed to use this solution and it is paid annually."
"SCOM is very cheap because it's included in the license for the System Center suite, which is around $8,400 per CAL."
"We have an enterprise agreement that includes this product as part of it."
"Two customers bought the enterprise agreement with Microsoft and paid for Software Assurance. But few customers don't buy it for Software Assurance. They just buy it and deploy it, and they think that we will be using it for the next five years."
"SCOM is part of the System Center suite and I am satisfied with the pricing."
"If you have a Microsoft Enterprise Agreement, then this is part of the agreement."
"I don't know the exact cost because it's managed by our sales team, but Microsoft is on the higher side."
"Our licensing fees are approximately $30 per user, per month."
"I find the cost of SolarWinds Network Device Monitor reasonable for our company. Though, I'm not aware of the exact licensing cost."
"When compared with other solutions SolarWinds is more expensive."
"The enterprise license is good for the SolarWinds Network Device Monitor. However, it is expensive, they should reduce their price."
"The price of the SolarWinds Network Device Monitor is good."
"SolarWinds Network Device Monitor is not an expensive solution."
"The product is expensive."
"Well, we had a perpetual license and the renewal was $20 to $25,000."
"Thankfully, it doesn't take a lot of manpower to install and deploy."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise22
Large Enterprise54
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SCOM?
The tool helps to monitor Windows servers. It offers alerts from a central location.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SCOM?
I am not aware of the exact pricing as it is managed by my supervisor. As an academic institution, we receive substantial discounts.
What needs improvement with SCOM?
We believe that the dashboarding in SCOM needs to be improved or enhanced because it is not too expressive in reporting. We can work on deploying new ways of viewing things and modifying visualizat...
What do you like most about SolarWinds Network Device Monitor?
I rate the product's initial setup process a nine on a scale of one to ten, where one means it is a difficult phase and ten is an easy process.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Network Device Monitor?
I am not a positive person regarding SolarWinds Network Device Monitor.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Network Device Monitor?
There are solutions that can perform better, but due to pricing for our corporate implementation, we had to stay with this solution. It accomplishes the necessary tasks, but there is room for impro...
 

Also Known As

System Center Operations Manager, SCOM 2012
Network Device Monitor
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Dialog Telekom
Air Rarotonga
Find out what your peers are saying about SCOM vs. SolarWinds Network Device Monitor and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,711 professionals have used our research since 2012.