SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs Stackify comparison

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 2024

Stackify and SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor are two prominent solutions in monitoring server and application performance. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor has the upper hand with its feature-rich offering, making it a worthwhile investment for users.

Features: Stackify offers seamless integration, efficient performance monitoring capabilities, and intuitive dashboards. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor provides comprehensive monitoring features, in-depth insights, and broad compatibility with various environments.

Room for Improvement: Stackify could enhance its troubleshooting tools, offer more detailed analytics, and improve user interface customization. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor could improve its complexity, ease of navigation, and manage the steep learning curve.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Stackify is praised for its quick, hassle-free deployment, and responsive customer service. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor often requires a more intricate setup and seasoned IT knowledge, and though effective, its customer support is perceived as less approachable.

Pricing and ROI: Stackify is noted for its competitive pricing and good ROI, especially for small to medium-sized enterprises. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor, despite higher setup costs, delivers substantial ROI through its extensive features and reliability, making it a favored choice for larger-scale implementations.

To learn more, read our detailed SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Stackify Report (Updated: September 2026).

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Stackify

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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

22nd

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

4.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Server Monitoring (5th), Active Directory Management (8th)

Stackify

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

62nd

Average Rating

7.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

IT Infrastructure Monitoring (68th), Log Management (56th)

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 1.0%, down from 1.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Stackify is 0.8%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor	1.0%
Stackify	0.8%
Other	98.2%

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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Moses Arigbede

Head of DevOps at Partsimony

Easy to set up with great custom dashboards but needs to improve non-.NET infrastructure

They need to improve non-.NET infrastructure. We always had difficulty when it comes to reporting or metrics that come from Linux operating systems and Docker containers. For anything that runs within the Unix environment, we always had problems with them, however, if it was a document-based application, Stackify was 100%, it gave everything. Now, the aggregation agent, the metric agent for Stackify for Linux, collects everything. When I say everything, I mean, everything. It collects so much information that we now started to term it as useless data as all that ingestion will just come in and overwhelm your log retention limit for the month and really this spike up your cost at the end of the month. You'll need to do a lot in order to train down the data coming in from all your Linux environments, to get to what you really need, which actually takes some time as well. I would like to be able to see metrics about individual running containers on the host machines. Stackify has not really gotten that right, as far as I'm concerned. Netdata has done a better job and New Relic has also done a better job. They need to improve on that. We need to be able to see the individual resource usage of containers running within a particular host.

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

"I find it to be a strong product suite, particularly when you need a comprehensive monitoring tool."

"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."

"We manage SolarWinds ourselves without outsourcing its services."

"The solution is end-to-end from the network and the application to the processes. Everything about the enterprise infrastructure is being covered by the solution. It's easy to use and easy to navigate and one of the leaders among monitoring solutions."

"AppInsight. Provides a simple way to get very in-depth monitoring configured for our most popular applications. Exchange, SQL, and SharePoint."

"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."

"I'd rate technical support at eight out of ten. They are helpful and fast."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pros

"The deployment is very fast."

"My advice to anyone who wants to use Stackify is to go for it because my experience with it is good."

"What stood out to us were the metrics and granular details we received."

"We switched from New Relic and Loggly as it provides us more info at a lower price."

"The solution is stable and reliable."

"It is very simple and very easy to configure."

"The filter feature on Stackify is one of the features I found valuable. It's awesome. When I want to get the application logs, the solution gives me many filters. For example, if I want to get logs from my test environment, the option is there for me to select the environment from Stackify, and you can also select the particular application, and you'll see the information you need there. The filter feature alone and the fact that Stackify offers a lot of different filters is what I like the most about the solution because I've used other tools with the filter feature, but the filtering was very difficult, versus Stackify that has good filtering. On Stackify, you can filter the information by the last one hour, or the last four hours, and you can also select the date range and specify the timestamp, then the solution will give you the information based on the date range you specified. Another feature I found valuable on Stackify is its rating feature because it tells you how your application is faring. For example, a rating of A means excellent, while a rating of F means very bad, or that your application is not doing well at all. The ratings are from A to F. I also like that Stackify helps you in terms of load management because the solution gives you information on overutilized resources. These are the most valuable features of the solution."

"The performance dashboard and the accurate level of details are beneficial."

More Stackify pros

Cons

"The technical support team's response time could be improved."

"The technical support is nothing special."

"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."

"Application-based monitoring, such as monitoring within servers like Apache and IIS, has room for improvement."

"From an integration point of view, if you want to have a manager of manager kind of layer, that is currently lacking in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor."

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

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

"The tool's AppStack needs to improve in the storage monitoring part. It should also include an analytics and recommendation approach. If I have found a fault in a server or application, I would like to know what caused it and how do I recover from it."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor cons

"It should be easily scalable and configurable in different instances."

"When I redeploy my solution and the application starts, I don't see the logs immediately, and it would take two to three minutes before I see the logs."

"Better mobile support."

"One thing that happens as a new user on Stackify is when you install the agent it pulls everything and if you're not careful, your log allowance will just be exhausted as you are actually pulling too much data."

"I've not used Stackify for a while, and I'm currently using a solution now that's not as good as Stackify. Among the solutions I've been using so far, Stackify has been one of the best for me, but there's always room for improvement. For example, I don't know if it's just me, but when I try to get the log from Stackify, sometimes it doesn't appear in real-time. It takes a few minutes before the logs appear. When I redeploy my solution and the application starts, I don't see the logs immediately, and it would take two to three minutes before I see the logs. I don't know if other customers have a similar experience. It's the wait time for the logs to appear that's a concern for me, could be improved, and is what the Stackify team should be looking into. In terms of any additional feature that I'd like added to the solution, I'm not sure if Stackify has a way to export logs out. I've been trying to do it. On the solution, you can click on a spiral-like icon and it shows you the entire error, and I'd prefer an export button that would let me download the error and save that into a text file, for example, so it'll be available on my local machine for me to reference it, especially because the log keeps going and as you're using the solution, the system keeps pushing messages on to Stackify, so if I'm looking at a particular error at 12:05 PM, for example, by the time I go back to my system and would like to revisit the error at 12:25 PM, on Stackify, the logs would have gone past that level and I won't see it again which makes it difficult. When you now go back to that timestamp, you don't tend to see it immediately, but if the solution had an export feature for me to save that particular error information on my local machine for reference at a later time, I won't have to go back to Stackify. I just go to that log, specifically to that particular export that I've received on my local machine. I can get it and review it, and it would be easier that way versus me going back to Stackify to find that particular error and request that particular information."

"The search feature could be improved."

"Another improvement would be the agent memory utilization, which led to our recent reevaluation."

"I would like to be able to see metrics about individual running containers on the host machines."

More Stackify cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is available for my company at a good price point."

"I would advise potential buyers to wait until the end of the quarter, end of year, or other time to place orders. There are actually great deals to be had at those times if your budget cycle can match up."

"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."

"When compared to other licensed models in the market, it stands out as one of the more cost-effective options."

"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 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."

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

"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."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pricing and cost advice

"The price is variable. It depends on how much data we have received in that particular month. Usually, it goes up to $2,000, or, at times, $3,000 USD per month."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

13%

University

Financial Services Firm

Outsourcing Company

Construction Company

19%

Comms Service Provider

19%

Outsourcing Company

Media 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	3
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	2

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.

See all answers

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 ...

See all answers

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...

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Product Reports

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

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SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor report

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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

Stackify enhances application performance monitoring with features like detailed logging and effective filtering options, integrating capabilities to eliminate the need for multiple tools, and providing rapid deployment and stable performance.

Stackify offers a comprehensive solution for business insight through custom dashboards, error monitoring, load management, and application scoring. Its ability to visualize performance by creating responsive dashboards helps connect business and technical teams. Despite its strengths, users seek improvements such as better mobile support, real-time log appearance, and Docker documentation. Enhanced Linux support and agent memory optimization are also desired, along with better visibility into container and application performance metrics. Integrating more plugins and options would make Stackify a more robust monitoring tool.

What are the key features of Stackify?

Detailed Log and Error Data: Provides in-depth traces and logs for error and data analysis.
Custom Dashboards: Offers business insights and application scoring through tailored dashboards.
Performance Metrics: Monitors application and server performance effectively.
Simple Configuration: Ensures easier setup and deployment without complexities.
Filtering Options: Enables effective management of logs and errors through filters.

What benefits should be expected from using Stackify?

Improved Performance Monitoring: Provides tools to identify root causes and enhance application and server monitoring.
Resource Management: Manages server utilization and handles resource spikes efficiently.
Proactive Alerts: Allows setting up alerts across platforms like AWS and Docker.
Log Aggregation: Compiles logs for testing and analysis to improve system performance.

Organizations across industries use Stackify for extensive application performance monitoring, particularly in testing environments. It is crucial for analyzing database calls, third-party requests, and aggregating logs. Its capabilities in monitoring across AWS and Docker environments make it especially valuable for dynamic and distributed infrastructures.

Sample Customers

Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite

MyRacePass, ClearSale, Newitts, Carbonite, Boston Software, Children's International, Starkwood Media Group, Fewzion

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Stackify