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SolarWinds Security Event Manager vs USM Anywhere comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 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

SolarWinds Security Event M...
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
36th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
USM Anywhere
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
29th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
115
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (41st), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (51st), Compliance Management (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is 0.8%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of USM Anywhere is 1.0%, down from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
USM Anywhere1.0%
SolarWinds Security Event Manager0.8%
Other98.2%
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

Yashokanth Partkunan - PeerSpot reviewer
Managed Services Engineer at Loop1 Systems
Has supported client needs efficiently but requires deeper analysis features and faster support
The log analyzing capability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager should go into more depth than the current environment. More modification and enhancements are required on the dashboard side in order to make it closer to optimal performance. From observation and feedback from users, they need more functionality related to monitoring, and in-depth analyzing needs to be improved.
Kris Nawani - PeerSpot reviewer
Co-Founder/Director at Bangkok MSP Company Limited
Offers complete coverage without the need to install additional software
USM Anywhere is used for threat detection and investigation. It provides a solution with built-in threat intelligence and various other investigation tools The solution offers complete coverage without the need to install additional software, as it is maintained by the vendor. It helps in saving…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It's extremely easy to deploy."
"SolarWinds Security Event Manager has been generally working well."
"We had to integrate with other teams, and the infrastructure deployment didn't take long. The integration involves learning with different teams, networking, and configuring various network devices and servers. Infrastructure deployment only took one or two days."
"The out of the box reports and dashboard. It was easy to trim down these windows to something we could quickly use."
"SolarWinds is easy to configure, and it provides timely alerts."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the visibility into both attempted and failed logins."
"It's easy to build rules and actions based on the logs and event types we collect with the software."
"SolarWinds' stability is fine. I don't think we've had any software issues."
"What I find the most valuable about USM Anywhere is its compliance. It shows a list of all the administrators logged on and does it quite well. There are no whistles and bells, it's reliable and simple to use."
"Easy to use, scalable, stable, and very intuitive platform that provides protection against security threats."
"Asset discovery seems to be good."
"The dashboards are very descriptive and contain just the right amount of information. The activity alarms and events contain a plethora of data that is very descriptive and useful."
"We're using it more for reporting, that's all. We're using it to help our customers to pass any kind of audits that they receive."
"AlientVault has helped us in improving our visualization and incident response during cybersecurity situations."
"Its powerful correlation engine helps reduce time in manually correlating events."
"The most valuable feature is vulnerability management because it gives you insight into your environment to know what systems need to be updated or patched."
 

Cons

"There is no correlation made between log entries, so no threat information is presented."
"We used the support from SolarWinds Security Event Manager and they are knowledgeable but challenging to get in contact with them."
"The reporting could be more robust. It can be a lot more granular and that will make it a lot more useful in comparison to how it is incorporated at the moment."
"Under the new system, it is not upgradable the way they say. When you try to do an upgrade, it doesn't really work unless you dump everything and start from scratch. You lose a lot of your nodes. Whenever you set your nodes up and everything else, they don't want to bring those nodes back in, so you have to really go back and restructure all your nodes. I went from version 6.5 to version 6.6 and then to version 6.7. I then went to version 2019, and now it is version 2020. It would be good if we can upgrade without having to delete everything and start from scratch. They can maybe build more KPIs and other things for the dashboard. Some of the other systems already have built-in KPIs. SolarWinds is starting to catch up, but it is not there yet. They can include some of the business or industry standards for tracking the time, that is, the meantime to detect (MTTD) and the meantime to resolve (MTTR). They can also find a way to build a KPI that measures the number of instances of port scans experienced in a week or a month."
"The log analyzing capability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager should go into more depth than the current environment."
"It is a very technical program. They can simplify it so that it isn't so hard to deal with."
"The solution's technical support is okay, but we don't have an SLA, and sometimes the response times are very slow."
"We'd like more customization capabilities."
"There are scalability issues due to a 60 TB limit, which restricts its use for large customers like banks."
"Maybe logs are the problem, as the database query is too slow. If you want to search something, you need time to find it."
"I've been told that AlienVault doesn't have a full version of NES running in there, but I'm not sure if that's accurate or if my engineer made it that way. I'm not sure he was completely honest either because we had NES in the environment before. Those tools could be improved because AlienVault is a SIEM, and it added all these other features."
"The lack of mature functionality and expertise in any of those areas is a strong negative."
"The dashboard could be improved as well as the level of customization."
"The AT&T AlienVault USM is okay, but the relational database is not very good for large amounts of data. For example, many logs cannot be processed. It has been very slow for the queries and some data which are large, it is not very good in this case."
"We would like more plugins. This being the main point of improvement which would benefit the users."
"Sometimes the log is unclear, and the report is a bit ambiguous."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is reasonable."
"The tool is available at a good price for customers compared to other solutions in the market. I rate the product's price as an eight out of ten."
"Licensing is on devices, so if you have many, then this may be high."
"It is in the appropriate mid-range. It is not as expensive as some of the other solutions. It is also not cheap."
"We do a yearly license renewal. For a year, the solution costs roughly $500,000 USD. There are no costs beyond this yearly fee."
"The pricing model would benefit from having package deals with other SolarWinds products."
"Licenses can only be purchased in blocks of fifty at a time."
"It's very reasonably priced. It was one of the lowest among the ones I looked at. Licensing is pretty flexible. They can do a two-year or a three-year, even a one-year, perhaps."
"We pay around $12,000 a year including storage."
"QRadar, ArcSight and Splunk are some of the most expensive SIEM products out there in the market and not everyone has the budget to buy them. In such cases, AV USM is a very cost effective alternative."
"We checked out several competitors. For what it can do and the cost, it was the best option!"
"It has good pricing."
"I don't think the product's pricing is a good value because they try to raise the price 50 percent every year... AlienVault needs to understand that not all customers are huge enterprises... Their sales team is way too aggressive. The price they advertise is not always the price you get."
"I rate the price of AT&T AlienVault USM a four out of five."
"​The vulnerability management solution is worse than buying a Nessus Professional license.​"
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
University
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
Computer Software Company
15%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Performing Arts
7%
Financial Services Firm
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business64
Midsize Enterprise29
Large Enterprise25
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
The solution helps you monitor database instances, application instances, other customer application things, Linux servers, IBM servers, and Oracle servers.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
The tool is available at a good price for customers compared to other solutions in the market. I rate the product's price as an eight out of ten.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
The log analyzing capability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager should go into more depth than the current environment. More modification and enhancements are required on the dashboard side in or...
What do you like most about AT&T AlienVault USM?
The most valuable feature of the solution is the ease of deployment that it provides to users. The integrations that the product has with third-party applications are useful.
What needs improvement with AT&T AlienVault USM?
There are scalability issues due to a 60 TB limit, which restricts its use for large customers like banks. It is also limited when used with bigger products and has complex password requirements.
 

Also Known As

SolarWinds LEM, Solarwinds SIEM, TriGeo, Log and Event Manager
AT&T AlienVault USM, AlienVault, AlienVault USM, Alienvault Cybersecurity
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

NetSuite, EasyStreet, Legacy Texas Bank, and Energy Federal Credit Union, to name a few.
Abel & Cole, Bank of Ireland, Bluegrass Cellular, CareerBuilder, Claire's, Hays Medical Center, Hope International, McCurrach, McKinsey & Company, Party Delights, Pepco Holdings, Richland School District, Ricoh, SaveMart, Shake Shack, Steelcase, TaxAct, Taylor Morrison, Vonage and Zoom
Find out what your peers are saying about SolarWinds Security Event Manager vs. USM Anywhere and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,310 professionals have used our research since 2012.