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SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs Tanium comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (19th), Server Monitoring (6th), Active Directory Management (8th)
Tanium
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Vulnerability Management (26th), Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (14th), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (23rd), Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) (8th), Autonomous Endpoint Management (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Security Software solutions, they serve different purposes. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is designed for Server Monitoring and holds a mindshare of 2.9%, up 2.5% compared to last year.
Tanium, on the other hand, focuses on Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP), holds 2.5% mindshare, up 2.4% since last year.
Server Monitoring Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor2.9%
Zabbix9.8%
Nagios XI6.0%
Other81.3%
Server Monitoring
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Tanium2.5%
Microsoft Defender for Endpoint6.7%
CrowdStrike Falcon5.8%
Other85.0%
Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP)
 

Featured Reviews

NikhilKalwint - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Sandeepraj Gatla - PeerSpot reviewer
Dfir Analyst at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Endpoint monitoring has strengthened incident response and provides rapid isolation and forensics
Tanium provides an endpoint which is isolated from the network and environment. We can easily search its logs and history and connect remotely directly to that particular device which has been isolated from the network. We can search for the history and logs, including audit logs and event logs. The complete activity of the user or owner of the device is visible to us. We can see the artifacts of particular USB transfers internally for official use. We can not only connect remotely but also see the device status and how many failures have occurred within the network so far. We can see the IP address, how many times it has changed its IP address, and how many times it was connected to VPN or external VPN or internal VPN and what has been searched while on VPN. We can block the IOCs or IP addresses as well. We can block domains, hashes, SHA values, SHA-256, SHA-1, SHA-5 and MD5. Although I am not completely involved in the automation team, we do have that team and I have worked in some CERT recently. Tanium is more useful while we are in the CERT because most of the times when we are on high alert, Tanium does play a main role for that particular incident or any high case. Tanium is a simple tool and we can easily integrate it to many devices and it is a mandatory tool to secure an endpoint. It is mandatory to give any RDP connection and the tool should be present in the particular device. It is completely mandatory and it is in the policy as well.

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."
"SolarWinds SAM is very stable, and we are using it with hundreds or thousands of customers and there are no stability issues."
"The graphical interfaces, GUI customizations, and alert configurations are impressive."
"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."
"Solarwinds has an open database that allows you to do serious integrations. It doesn't matter which service desk you have, you can implement and integrate it with SolarWinds."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its interface, which is used for monitoring."
"Monitoring the components on your devices with out of the box monitors or the ability to create new ones (SAM)"
"SolarWinds allows network administrators to easily monitor the network by customizing the pages to see what exactly is needed, in addition to the deep statistics shown for nodes and interfaces like response time, packet loss, interface CRC, interface errors, as well as the rich graphs for all network elements."
"The solution is scalable and helps to understand how infrastructure works. It helps to improve the health of the organization."
"Tanium has made the process of detecting threats more proactive with its detection. So, the process is easier and more efficient."
"Threat hunting is a very good feature on Tanium. We have just started using it and have not used it extensively."
"I find the inventory and compliance features of Tanium to be the most impressive."
"For incident response tasks, all these tasks can get done in minutes with minimal disruption to the end-user."
"The solution's technical support is very responsive."
"The interrogation piece was the most valuable feature because it was very detailed."
"I would say Tanium is the best tool for vulnerability management."
 

Cons

"SAM's software-defined network monitoring capability is also low and could be improved."
"An additional feature that would improve this solution is the ability to complete root cause analysis."
"As per my view, Solarwinds should come up the same monitoring system for other certificate expiration alert apart from SSL."
"This product has no real downside unless they fail to continue development of its capabilities."
"SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor could improve by having a cloud version. They have an observability platform but it still needs to be maintained by us."
"When you implement SolarWinds on a larger scale my customers complain about the speed."
"They should incorporate more artificial intelligence. There should also be more predictive features."
"They are complex to operate; users need to know what they want during setup."
"It is not really additional functions, or the features that are needed, rather the complexity would be reduced based on the number of modules required to put together a comprehensive operational security and risk compliance model."
"Any movement into a SaaS solution has challenges since the processes and data flows are not well defined. Hence, you need to build it at the same time."
"The solution lacks mobility."
"We had some issues with the solution's OS upgrade."
"Tanium’s scalability could be improved."
"Most of the time, agent-relative issues have to be more equipped with self-healing features. At times, the agent is there, but for some reason, it doesn't report a status. It gives certain problems that are obviously agent-based."
"Our biggest issue with the solution is its lack of mobility."
"The solution can give a lot of false positives."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution's price is reasonable. Though it's on the higher side, the tool is worth the money."
"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."
"SAM is not per server so the pricing model can be deceiving. If you have an enterprise environment, you will quickly exceed your licensing quickly. You should know this before going in."
"When compared to other licensed models in the market, it stands out as one of the more cost-effective options."
"Its licensing is on a yearly basis. It is just the standard price, but it can vary depending on the current rate of the dollar."
"Pricing and licensing is fair for what you get. It does have a great bang-for-the-buck appeal."
"The price is too high."
"I like the pricing for this SolarWinds product."
"The solution is expensive but it's a good investment."
"The solution offers value for money."
"The product's pricing differs from region to region depending on negotiations and the number of endpoints."
"There is an annual license required to use this solution."
"It's an expensive solution. It would be nice if the cost were lower."
"Tanium is a more expensive solution in Latin America than some of the competitors, such as BigFix."
"It is higher than some competitors in the market."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
13%
University
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Healthcare Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise21
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise12
 

Questions from the Community

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 needs improvement with Tanium?
While there is always room for improvement, I am pleased with Tanium.
What is your primary use case for Tanium?
The primary use case for Tanium ( /products/tanium-reviews ) is compliance, patching, and inventory as part of the core functions.
What advice do you have for others considering Tanium?
For smaller companies, Tanium is quite a big investment, and one needs to have a considerable setup to make it economically viable. I would recommend it to others with a similar use case. The solut...
 

Also Known As

SolarWinds SAM
Tanium Inc Cloud, Tanium XEM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
JPMorgan Chase, eBay, Amazon, US Bank, MetLife, pwc, Cerner, Delphi, MGM Grand, New York Life
Find out what your peers are saying about Zabbix, NinjaOne, Tanium and others in Server Monitoring. Updated: August 2026.
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