SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) comparison

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence)

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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 Server and Appli...

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

18th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

4.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Server Monitoring (6th), Active Directory Management (8th)

Splunk ITSI (IT Service Int...

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

9th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

IT Alerting and Incident Management (4th)

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 1.1%, down from 1.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) is 0.8%, up from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence)	0.8%
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor	1.1%
Other	98.1%

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

Featured Reviews

NikhilKalwint

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.

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DhirendraSingh2

Senior Consultant at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees

Service health has been monitored and visual insights support proactive telecom operations

The installation process is the first aspect I dislike about Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence). If you do not configure it correctly, you will encounter issues in the search head. Because we use a distributed environment where each component has its own specific roles, installation is critical and requires careful attention. Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) is built with many applications. It is a compressed file, and when you extract the Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) app, you receive approximately 19 apps. Some applications, add-ons, and packages must be installed on specific components. If you do not configure an application correctly, it will not work. Sometimes we encounter issues during installation because of this complexity. I believe the installation process should be more uniform, meaning it could be deployed across all components to avoid post-installation issues. Sometimes after installation, you receive errors, and users cannot access Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence). We have experienced this type of issue due to installation errors. I believe there is currently room for improvement regarding scalability. When we create Glass Tables containing many searches, the Glass Tables sometimes fail due to memory constraints, and we receive error pages. Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) should have a lightweight version to address these concerns. I would rate current scalability as medium.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable features of the solution are its real-time node monitoring and Help Desk's feedback."

"The features like trends, capacity planning, recommendations, and diagnostics are the main items I focus on for added value."

"The component and cable monitoring are good. SolarWinds is more intuitive and user-friendly than AppDynamics. The AppDynamics console is more complex because it's a more feature-rich solution, so it's not easy for somebody to pick it up."

"I am impressed with the tool's AppStack feature which mainly helps us in the identification process. This feature can give an overview of the fault and help us identify the issues for performance degradation. Instead of looking at multiple places, we can look at a single place to identify the issues."

"SSL Certificate Monitoring and Expiry Alerting"

"SAM has altered the way monitoring is being looked at - from just being able to monitor CPU, Mem, Disk and network utilization levels we have moved to the next levels of finding out process related issues, service related issues and specific application related issues to identify root cause of performance issues."

"The most valuable feature of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is its powerful monitoring capabilities."

"The solution is great for monitoring. If something is going wrong, we can immediately find the root cause."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pros

"The most valuable feature is the Glass Tables. It gives you a nice, good overview of your KPIs. It's really slick and clean."

"Regarding ROI percentage, we estimate a 30 to 35 percent saving on resource costs and around 25 to 30 percent savings on inventory expenses, all credited to utilizing Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) effectively."

"ITSI's KPI and correlation search aspects are powerful, and the service creation suits the project well. It allows for good segregation of the monitoring solution, and up-to-date quick-time monitoring. We're notified quickly when something goes wrong."

"The feature that stood out to me most from Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI) was automated dashboarding or reporting. The solution lists the severity level of issues, and the response times."

"I particularly appreciate two features of Splunk ITSI: data forwarding and the marketplace."

"Splunk's intuitive interface and scalability make it accessible to non-technical users, and its capacity to monitor every millisecond of data across multiple applications is truly impressive."

"The most valuable features are the agility, being able to ingest many data sources with no limitation on capacity."

"The flexibility to develop and consolidate many solutions into one platform is great."

More Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) pros

Cons

"The setup was complex. We had local support to assist us."

"The technical support was better in previous years. With the launch of the premium support service, the normal support has declined."

"SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor could improve the server monitoring and the web application monitoring features are not good. Microsoft SCOM has better server monitoring."

"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."

"The current script monitoring feature has limitations, especially when dealing with custom scripts."

"As per my view, Solarwinds should come up the same monitoring system for other certificate expiration alert apart from SSL."

"Some custom applications cannot be monitored, and a lot more applications need to be included."

"AppInsight needs to include more applications, the current list is very limited."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor cons

"From my perspective (since I don't have administrator or developer access to Splunk ITSI), we could have a better user interface."

"The dashboard queries should be improved. More queries should be suggested in order to produce better dashboards."

"ITSI is an almost perfect tool, but there is room for improvement in a few features like the deep dive and multi-KPI alerts. We're using most of the features like service API, coding searches, and aggregation, but our team members hardly use multi-KPI and deep dive. We don't use the multi-KPI or deep dive because everything is available in the service KPI. I don't think this feature is necessary."

"Splunk ITSI consumes a lot of CPU resources."

"Splunk ITSI lacks out-of-the-box solutions for enterprise users."

"Splunk ITSI could benefit from including more features that other solutions support, such as vulnerability management modules."

"Integration is the most critical area to improve in Splunk IT Service Intelligence (ITSI). It wasn't a great experience because you had to do a little back and forth to integrate the solution."

"It is pretty okay. I am not sure whether the current release has already moved to the new framework where instead of the glass tables, we can directly use the Dashboard Studio. It would be nice to have that integrated into the same framework."

More Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Pricing is inexpensive, starting at 2440 euros. For that, you get the ability to monitor a couple of nodes and one year of maintenance and support."

"The product is expensive."

"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."

"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."

"We pay around $ 2,000 to $ 5,000 yearly for the solution."

"When planning for the number of licenses to purchase, make sure you understand all of the elements within an application required to really understand performance well. In our case, we quickly came to the conclusion that an unlimited license for SAM was the way to go."

"I would rate the pricing for this solution a three out of five."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pricing and cost advice

"Its pricing has been changed as per the market. You get a good support service with it as well. They have 24/7 customer support. There is a portal, and if you are having issues, they are available in order to resolve them. So, its pricing isn't too much."

"It depends on how big an organization is. If we have a lot of resources, the licensing needs to be upgraded. If we have a small environment, the licensing cost is definitely going to be less."

"The cost of the modules is a bit high for non-global companies, making it difficult for them to afford Splunk ITSI."

"Splunk ITSI is expensive."

"It is interesting. I am not involved that much lately, but if I recall correctly, you license primarily on the volume of data that you are using in Splunk ITSI, but there is no way Splunk can ever check if that is true, so that is interesting. We are not doing it, but someone can pretend to just use 10%, and it would be super cheap. It is tricky, but it is more tricky for Splunk than for us."

"Splunk ITSI is expensive; however, with the appropriate use case, it justifies the cost."

"I would prefer that the price be reduced, as it would be easier to implement it and to sell it."

"I know that it is expensive, but I do not think there is another solution that can do similar things for that price."

More Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability solutions are best for your needs.

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

13%

University

Financial Services Firm

Government

Financial Services Firm

16%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Outsourcing Company

Construction Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	17
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	21

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	17
Midsize Enterprise	8
Large Enterprise	45

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?

The initial cost is quite high, but the renewal cost is reasonable.

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...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence)?

From a pricing perspective, it is not that bad because we get it from a distributor and do not purchase it directly from Splunk. We get it from a distributor who gives the pricing to a partner and ...

What needs improvement with Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence)?

In terms of improvements for Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence), I would suggest adding more out-of-the-box plugins and adapters, especially as there is a high demand for observability and dashb...

What is your primary use case for Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence)?

I use Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) as a manager of the managers, a tool sitting on top of all the other observability tools. It gets the alerts feed from all the sources such as Splunk Ent...

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Product Reports

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

Download SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor product report

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor report

Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence)

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Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence) report

Also Known As

SolarWinds SAM

No data available

Overview

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor provides comprehensive server, application, and infrastructure monitoring, focusing on integration, application dependency, and network insights through user-friendly interfaces and detailed dashboards.

With AppStack and AppInsight support, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor offers service management, detailed resource dashboards, and integration capabilities. It monitors hardware metrics and performance parameters, facilitating database and network insights for cloud and virtual environments. Robust alerting, predictive analytics, and capacity planning ensure efficient management of server health and application performance.

What are the key features?

Integration: Seamlessly connects with existing tools.
AppStack: Provides a holistic view of applications.
AppInsight: Supports widely-used applications.
SNMP Polling: Efficient network data collection.
Diagnostics: Real-time troubleshooting.
Customizable Dashboards: Tailored monitoring views.

What benefits should users expect?

Comprehensive Monitoring: Extends from servers to databases.
Transparent Control: Enhances visibility into performance metrics.
User-Friendly: Simplifies proactive monitoring with alerts.
Predictive Features: Supports capacity and trend planning.

Industries implement SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor to enhance server utilization reporting, network configuration, and AV equipment performance tracking. They benefit from monitoring critical services across diverse deployment models, improving management efficiency and decision-making.

SolarWinds

Splunk ITSI offers intelligent alerting, predictive analysis, customizable dashboards, and improves visibility and monitoring through Service Analyzer and Glass Tables. Event correlation enhances incident management, reducing alert fatigue, and improves mean time to resolution.

Splunk ITSI enables businesses to proactively monitor their IT environments by offering functionalities that reduce noise and provide enhanced visibility through sophisticated dashboards. Service Analyzer and Glass Tables facilitate the monitoring of KPIs, allowing for the prompt identification of potential issues. The platform's event correlation capabilities streamline incident management. Its scalability efficiently supports large data volumes, integrating diverse data resources while incorporating AI for predictive insights. Future improvements are sought in integration, documentation, and user-friendly interfaces, with an emphasis on simplifying configurations in expansive deployments.

What are the Key Features of Splunk ITSI?

Intelligent Alerting: Provides proactive monitoring and noise reduction.
Service Analyzer: Enables KPI monitoring and issue identification.
Glass Tables: Allows visual monitoring of crucial metrics.
Event Correlation: Simplifies incident management and reduces alert fatigue.
Scalability: Supports large data volumes and integrates vast data sources.

What Benefits and ROI can Users Expect from Splunk ITSI?

Proactive Monitoring: Enhances ability to foresee and mitigate IT issues.
Improved Resolution Time: Accelerates incident resolution and operational efficiency.
Enhanced Business Resilience: Strengthens IT operations through detailed insights.

Industries leverage Splunk ITSI to monitor infrastructure and applications effectively, employing its Service Analyzer and KPI models. Especially in sectors requiring stringent incident management and predictive analytics, integrations like ServiceNow enable visual health assessments and automated anomaly detection, positioning ITSI as a manager of managers by enhancing IT operations with comprehensive reporting and alert correlations.

Splunk

Sample Customers

Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite

TransUnion, Cox Automotive, Carnival Cruises, Leidos, Econocom, National Ignition Factory, Entrust Datacard, Molina Healthcare, United States Census Bureau

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Splunk ITSI (IT Service Intelligence)