SolarWinds AppOptics vs Splunk Observability Cloud comparison

SolarWinds and Splunk are both solutions in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category. SolarWinds is ranked #56, while Splunk is ranked #8 with an average rating of 8.4. SolarWinds holds a 0.4% mindshare in APM, compared to Splunk’s 2.0% mindshare. Additionally, 80% of SolarWinds users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 95% of Splunk users who would recommend it.

SolarWinds AppOptics

Read 9 SolarWinds AppOptics reviews

1,069 Views
641 Comparison Views

80% willing to recommend

Splunk Observability Cloud

Read 70 Splunk Observability Cloud reviews

5,846 Views
3,391 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

SolarWinds AppOptics

Splunk Observability Cloud

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 21, 2025

Splunk Observability Cloud and SolarWinds AppOptics are leading products in the observability and application performance management sector. Splunk seems to have the upper hand due to its expansive monitoring abilities and strong data integration and reporting capabilities, while SolarWinds is favored for its network-oriented monitoring strengths.

Features: Splunk Observability Cloud is valued for fast data integration, customizable dashboards, and comprehensive monitoring, which greatly enhance observability and operational performance. Users have reported its ability to effectively integrate with tools like ServiceNow and its end-to-end visibility capabilities. SolarWinds AppOptics is appreciated for application performance management, a strong dashboard, and topology discovery, though its features are seen as less comprehensive compared to Splunk's.

Room for Improvement: Splunk requires simplification in its pricing model and more straightforward integration with other products. Users also criticize its high cost and complex configuration. SolarWinds AppOptics could improve with better integration capabilities, a more user-friendly interface, and more granular functionality.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Splunk Observability Cloud supports flexible deployment across on-premises, public, and hybrid cloud environments and is praised for responsive customer service. SolarWinds AppOptics offers satisfactory technical support and supports both on-premises and cloud deployments.

Pricing and ROI: Both Splunk and SolarWinds AppOptics are considered expensive, yet justified by their capabilities. Splunk's pricing is seen as a barrier due to its high upfront investment but is perceived as providing significant ROI through improved visibility. SolarWinds AppOptics offers satisfactory ROI, especially with its perpetual licensing, which provides long-term value predictability.

To learn more, read our detailed SolarWinds AppOptics vs. Splunk Observability Cloud Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds AppOptics vs. Splunk Observability Cloud

September 2025

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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

SolarWinds AppOptics

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

56th

Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring

58th

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

44th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Splunk Observability Cloud

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

8th

Ranking in IT Infrastructure Monitoring

7th

Ranking in Cloud Monitoring Software

8th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Network Monitoring Software (6th), Container Management (6th), Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM) (2nd)

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of SolarWinds AppOptics is 0.4%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk Observability Cloud is 2.0%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Splunk Observability Cloud	2.0%
SolarWinds AppOptics	0.4%
Other	97.6%

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

Featured Reviews

John Yuko

Assistant Manager ICT - Projects at I&M Bank Ltd

Unique features allow consolidating and combing metrics into a single dashboard, but don't monitor mobile solutions

I would like to see more granular information provided on Unix applications. Also, the integration with Unix services should be a bit more straightforward in terms having an agent to retrieve your credentials rather than having to enter or save them for SSH on SolarWinds. From the outset, we had to set some commands to log into the search console, and they are saved on the solution, which presents a challenge in terms of exposure. The solution is unable to monitor APK solutions completely because we'd then be forced to break down the APK and provide the APIs or go through the source code. They don't have a module that can analyze an application that is maybe under-used.

Read full review

Taiwo Ige

IT Operations Engineer at ABC Supply Co. Inc.

Alerting improves incident response across teams and enables faster awareness before customer impact

Splunk Observability Cloud could be improved in terms of integrations with more technical add-ons, such as Zoom. Although they have one with Zoom, it's not available in the cloud, so having that feature would be beneficial. Essentially, Splunk should continue expanding to create easier ways to ingest logs from different products. The out-of-the-box customizable dashboards in Splunk Observability Cloud are very effective in showcasing IT performance to business leaders. However, there are aspects that could be improved, such as linking dashboards to one another. While IT leaders may not drill down, it's crucial to create levels of dashboards for technical users to find root causes, making it effective for stakeholders.

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

"Some of the most valuable features of SolarWinds are the topology discovery and network performance analysis."

"The product has a great dashboard."

"Technical support is always live and they're supportive."

"The sum solution, NTA, and DPA."

"I have found the most valuable feature is application performance management."

"The reporting of the solution is very good."

"Initially, before Splunk, we had a long time to resolve issues; now, with Splunk Observability Cloud, we will be able to solve them quickly and know exactly where the issue is."

"It has been beneficial for our IT infrastructure."

"I have definitely seen a return on investment with Splunk Observability Cloud, particularly through how fast it has grown and how comfortable other teams are in relying on its outputs for monitoring and observability."

"I like the fact that Splunk APM makes it easy to connect to the application database and run queries against the data."

"It's a very easy-to-use solution."

"Splunk Infrastructure Monitoring reduces our mean time to resolve. We are more proactive than reactive."

"The features are pretty much ready out of the box."

"The features I have found most valuable are log searching and log analytics, both of which are quick features."

More Splunk Observability Cloud pros

Cons

"I would like to see more integration with other tools that are available on the market."

"The integration with Unix services should be a bit more straightforward."

"The implementation needs improvement. It needs to get modernized with the newer cloud scenario in both public and private deployment models."

"The solution should be more user-friendly."

"AppOptics would benefit from having a much more centralized view."

"In terms of the technology, I think they need to put some more advanced troubleshooting into SolarWinds, in terms of AI capabilities. That's the next generation, especially in the cases of APIs which have already adopted AI capabilities into their products."

"The licensing model is expensive. We need to monitor the amount of data ingested because the cost is based on the data collected."

"Splunk isn't an ideal tool for application performance management due to the extensive setup required."

"The cardinality is pretty low."

"We still use Splunk Enterprise licensing. A lot of the newer features go into Splunk Cloud before Enterprise. We're not looking to switch our licensing over, so we're falling behind on the newer features."

"The security could be better."

"The deployment can be quite complex."

"The solution should have more sensors regarding fiber intelligence for security measures."

"The only strain point we've encountered with Splunk Observability Cloud is that the search times can be lengthy for some things. We have a large environment, so that's expected."

More Splunk Observability Cloud cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Mostly, it's a perpetual license. We don't have any customers using the subscription right now—it's mostly a perpetual license that the customers purchase. The licensing is based on the number of elements, whereas other solutions are node-based."

"Since it's a negotiable rate, I would rate the pricing as a five out of five."

"I believe the current licensing cost is reasonable."

"The pricing is reasonable."

"I would rate the price of Splunk Infrastructure Monitoring as an eight out of ten, with ten being the most expensive."

"Splunk's infrastructure monitoring costs can be high because our billing is based on data volume measured in terabytes, rather than the number of devices being monitored."

"This is an expensive solution."

"Licensing cost is the biggest argument I get from those divesting from Splunk. There are those within our organization who say we are going to go to other tools since Splunk is too expensive."

"The solution's pricing is costly."

"It is expensive."

"The pricing is based on several factors, including the scale of deployment."

More Splunk Observability Cloud pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Government

15%

Computer Software Company

12%

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

15%

Computer Software Company

12%

Retailer

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	2
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	7

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	20
Midsize Enterprise	10
Large Enterprise	43

Questions from the Community

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What do you like most about SignalFx?

The most valuable feature is dashboard creation.

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What needs improvement with SignalFx?

Regarding dashboard customization, while Splunk has many dashboard building options, customers sometimes need to create specific dashboards, particularly for applicative metrics such as Java and pr...

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What is your primary use case for SignalFx?

The solution involves observability in general, such as Application Performance Monitoring, and generally addresses digital applications, web applications, sites, and mobile applications. I worked ...

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Compared 25% of the time

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Compared 22% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

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Compared 8% of the time

Zenoss Cloud vs SolarWinds AppOptics

Compared 8% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

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Compared 6% of the time

SigNoz vs Splunk Observability Cloud

Compared 5% of the time

Cribl vs Splunk Observability Cloud

Compared 5% of the time

Honeycomb Enterprise vs Splunk Observability Cloud

Compared 4% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

September 2025

Download SolarWinds AppOptics product report

Buyer's Guide

Splunk Observability Cloud

September 2025

Download Splunk Observability Cloud product report

Also Known As

AppOptics, SolarWinds TraceView, Librato

Splunk Infrastructure Monitoring, Splunk Real User Monitoring (RUM), Splunk Synthetic Monitoring

Overview

AppOptics is a SaaS-based simple, powerful and affordable Infrastructure & Application monitoring for custom on-premises, cloud, and hybrid systems.

Your business runs on applications, and when they go down or run slowly, it can impact the business in lost productivity, customers, or revenue. To add to the complexity, your IT environment is changing, and workloads can be spread across data centers, and cloud resources. You need to monitor the availability and performance of applications and infrastructure, regardless of where they are, so you can identify potential issues early and address them before they impact users

SolarWinds

Splunk Observability Cloud offers sophisticated log searching, data integration, and customizable dashboards. With rapid deployment and ease of use, this cloud service enhances monitoring capabilities across IT infrastructures for comprehensive end-to-end visibility.

Focused on enhancing performance management and security, Splunk Observability Cloud supports environments through its data visualization and analysis tools. Users appreciate its robust application performance monitoring and troubleshooting insights. However, improvements in integrations, interface customization, scalability, and automation are needed. Users find value in its capabilities for infrastructure and network monitoring, as well as log analytics, albeit cost considerations and better documentation are desired. Enhancements in real-time monitoring and network protection are also noted as areas for development.

What are the key features?

Log Searching: Efficiently search and analyze logs from various sources.
Data Integration: Seamlessly integrate with multiple environments.
Dashboard Customization: Tailor dashboards to specific monitoring needs.
Monitoring Capabilities: Provides comprehensive insights into application performance.
Security Features: Analyze and address security threats across systems.
Visualization Tools: Enhance data analysis and system performance optimization.

Why consider this for ROI?

Comprehensive Visibility: Gain complete insights into IT infrastructure.
Performance Optimization: Improve overall system performance and efficiency.
Rapid Deployment: Quick setup to meet organization demands swiftly.
Enhanced Security: Strengthen security measures through detailed analytics.

In industries, Splunk Observability Cloud is implemented for security management by analyzing logs from detection systems, offering real-time alerts and troubleshooting for cloud-native applications. It is leveraged for machine data analysis, improving infrastructure visibility and supporting network and application performance management efforts.

Splunk

Sample Customers

TraxoCovea Insurance BTE TechnologyDatarista

Sunrun, Yelp, Onshape, Tapjoy, Symphony Commerce, Chairish, Clever, Grovo, Bazaar Voice, Zenefits, Avalara

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds AppOptics vs. Splunk Observability Cloud

September 2025

Free Report: SolarWinds AppOptics vs. Splunk Observability Cloud

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