SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs VMware Aria Operations for Applications comparison

Why PeerSpot?

SolarWinds and Broadcom are both solutions in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category. SolarWinds is ranked #20 with an average rating of 8.0, while Broadcom is ranked #18 with an average rating of 8.8. SolarWinds holds a 1.0% mindshare in APM, compared to Broadcom’s 1.3% mindshare. Additionally, 89% of SolarWinds users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 93% of Broadcom users who would recommend it.

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

Read 44 SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor reviews

8,214 Views
4,600 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

VMware Aria Operations for ...

Read 14 VMware Aria Operations for Applications reviews

7,944 Views
4,369 Comparison Views

93% willing to recommend

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

VMware Aria Operations for ...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and VMware Aria Operations for Applications compete in the IT infrastructure monitoring and management space. SolarWinds holds an advantage in pricing and support accessibility, while VMware Aria Operations has a more comprehensive feature set, suggesting higher value at a premium cost.

Features: SolarWinds offers robust performance metrics, advanced server monitoring, and easy integration with expansive alerting capabilities. VMware Aria Operations provides predictive analytics, supports various application environments, and delivers detailed analytics for deeper performance insights.

Room for Improvement: SolarWinds could enhance its deployment process to reduce complexity and resource requirements. It may also improve its scalability features to compete with larger enterprise needs. Additionally, simplifying mobile integration could enhance user accessibility. VMware Aria Operations could reduce its premium cost to offer better value to cost-conscious users. Streamlining its rich feature set for simpler use, particularly for less technical users, might improve user experience. It might also benefit from expanding support hours to accommodate more global users.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: VMware Aria Operations is praised for its streamlined deployment process and robust technical support, helping to minimize downtime. SolarWinds, though efficient, often requires more internal resources for effective utilization, posing a slightly more complex deployment challenge. However, its accessible service support is favorably noted by customers.

Pricing and ROI: SolarWinds is known for its competitive pricing structure, providing a beneficial ROI for budget-constrained organizations. VMware Aria Operations, though requiring substantial investment, offers significant long-term cost benefits through advanced analytics and scalability, potentially yielding a higher ROI for organizations ready to invest.

To learn more, read our detailed SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. VMware Aria Operations for Applications Report (Updated: September 2026).

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. VMware Aria Operations for Applications

September 2026

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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

20th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

4.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

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

VMware Aria Operations for ...

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

18th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

IT Infrastructure Monitoring (14th), Container Monitoring (5th), Cloud Monitoring Software (13th)

Mindshare comparison

As of September 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 VMware Aria Operations for Applications is 1.3%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
VMware Aria Operations for Applications	1.3%
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor	1.0%
Other	97.7%

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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Ajay Shukla

Consultant at HCLTech

Automation and insightful diagnostics elevate operations while improvements are welcome

The new version 8.18 has brought significant improvements. The main purpose of using this tool is having a single console to manage all entities. The cloud integration capabilities, including private, public, and hybrid, are already well-implemented. The ability to manage multiple vCenters across different geographical locations is very effective. The new Skyline health feature and certificate and licensing management are particularly useful improvements. The dashboard's overview tab provides comprehensive information about current vCenter status, resizable amounts, reclamation opportunities, anomalies, diagnostics, licensing, and certificates. However, there is room for improvement in application analysis. The current functionality lacks detailed monitoring at the kernel level, focusing mainly on CPU, memory, and storage matrices. Enhanced application monitoring capabilities, including tracking downtime for specific types of applications such as transactional or e-commerce applications, would be beneficial.

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

"Monitoring the components on your devices with out of the box monitors or the ability to create new ones (SAM)"

"The product integrates with Remedy."

"As I mentioned in one of the other points: "Simplicity at its best"."

"The recommendations are a life saver."

"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."

"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."

"Having used various other vendors for monitoring over my career, the SolarWinds products give outstanding value for the price."

"The most valuable feature of the solution is its interface, which is used for monitoring."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pros

"Using Wavefront, we have been able to reduce the complexity of our pipeline."

"The solution provides single-console management for multiple VMware environments and cloud integrations, whether hybrid, private, or public cloud."

"It significantly improves application performance management by offering recommendations for resource allocation to avoid wastage or overcommitment."

"It has a familiar interface, which makes it easy to get started."

"Wavefront gives us the complexity we need, instead of spending time coming up with a nice dashboard from some other means, or just creating and coding our own app."

"I find VMware Aria Operations for Applications to be very stable, and I would rate it a ten out of ten."

"VMware comes with a support team, and if you have trouble, you can easily create a ticket, and VMware will help you. Therefore, the best aspect is the support."

"People are very pleased with the implementation."

More VMware Aria Operations for Applications pros

Cons

"I had some stability issues. I lost my environment, but with the help of SolarWinds support, I was able to get back to a stable platform."

"We are looking into other solutions because it is just too expensive to keep scaling."

"SAM's software-defined network monitoring capability is also low and could be improved."

"In terms of the dashboards on offer, they should work to improve them. The types of dashboards that you get in terms of the graphs on offer aren't ideal right now."

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

"Reporting is the only thing with which we currently have challenges."

"One product area that could benefit from improvement is the synchronization of licensing periods across different modules"

"It needs time-based functions for monitoring. Some things need to be polled on a specific schedule or only during a specific window."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor cons

"VMware technical support has declined since the Broadcom acquisition. Previously, they were more focused on issue resolution, but now they prioritize licensing verification before providing support."

"The return on investment is best suited for organizations that do not have the resources for a dedicated VM environment team. However, the cost of the product doesn't show significant benefits."

"However, it is still not a very mature product."

"The implementation is a long process that should be improved."

"It could use a URL document server. Everything in the market is moving towards automation and everybody's looking for the single click operations as well relational data locality."

"The main problem I have is that the license cost is very high."

"The support from VMware is not very helpful. This is because you always receive many questions from the support service but few actual solutions."

"The solution could be expensive, which might be a limiting factor."

More VMware Aria Operations for Applications cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price is too high."

"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."

"I like the pricing for this SolarWinds product."

"The product might cost you $30,000 USD to buy, but scaling this solution requires the purchase of additional polling engines at $20,000 USD each."

"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 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."

"Pricing and licensing is fair for what you get. It does have a great bang-for-the-buck appeal."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pricing and cost advice

"I would rate the pricing as three out of five."

"Different locations require different setups. In your terms, around 300 to around 400K USD."

"I don't have the details. In our case, there is a mixture in place. We have production usage, and we are also doing training for VMware. So, we also have a training instance. It is worth the money you would spend on it. That's because if you were to build all of this yourself by using some of the open source tools, then you would need a lot of time."

"The licensing costs are very high, particularly when you consider that we have to purchase a level 1 license for every integration, such as the load balancer, HAProxy, and the MSSP. And if you want to use vSAN, that's another license. Then, of course, Tanzu Observability has its own separate license."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

13%

University

Financial Services Firm

Outsourcing Company

Financial Services Firm

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

Outsourcing 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	4
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	10

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...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?

The solution includes cost drivers that can be configured according to your environment. You can input server-wise, CPU-wise, storage, and memory costs per hour or day. Once cost drivers are provid...

See all answers

What needs improvement with VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront?

I have been involved in several projects where I had to implement automation and monitoring alerting. I performed automation using VMware Aria Operations for Applications. There is an automation ta...

See all answers

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

August 2026

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor report

Download SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor product report

Buyer's Guide

VMware Aria Operations for Applications

August 2026

VMware Aria Operations for Applications report

Download VMware Aria Operations for Applications product report

Also Known As

SolarWinds SAM

Tanzu Observability, Wavefront, Wavefront by VMware, VMware Tanzu Observability

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

VMware Tanzu Observability by Wavefront is a powerful tool for monitoring and analyzing the performance and availability of applications and infrastructure in real-time.

With its comprehensive monitoring capabilities, visualizing and analyzing data becomes effortless. The real-time alerting system ensures timely issue resolution, while scalability and a user-friendly interface provide a seamless experience for smooth operations.

Broadcom

Sample Customers

Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite

1. Atlassian 2. Cisco 3. Databricks 4. DigitalOcean 5. Equinix 6. Fidelity Investments 7. Google 8. Hewlett Packard Enterprise 9. Honeywell 10. IBM 11. Intel 12. JetBlue Airways 13. LinkedIn 14. Lyft 15. Mastercard 16. Microsoft 17. MongoDB 18. Netflix 19. Nvidia 20. Oracle 21. PayPal 22. Pinterest 23. Qualcomm 24. Red Hat 25. Salesforce 26. SAP 27. Spotify 28. Square 29. TMobile 30. Twitter 31. Uber 32. VMware

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. VMware Aria Operations for Applications

September 2026

Free Report: SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. VMware Aria Operations for Applications

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