SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs Zenoss Cloud comparison

SolarWinds and Zenoss are both solutions in the Server Monitoring category. SolarWinds is ranked #12 with an average rating of 7.4, while Zenoss is ranked #26. SolarWinds holds a 2.5% mindshare in SM, compared to Zenoss’s 1.0% mindshare. Additionally, 89% of SolarWinds users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Zenoss users who would recommend it.

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

Read 42 SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor reviews

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153 Comparison Views

89% willing to recommend

Zenoss Cloud

Read 8 Zenoss Cloud reviews

371 Views
19 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

SolarWinds Server and Appli...

Zenoss Cloud

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 6, 2024

Zenoss Cloud and SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor are two competitive products in the IT monitoring space. SolarWinds stands out for its comprehensive monitoring capabilities and superior features despite its higher price.

Features: Zenoss Cloud offers advanced real-time analytics, flexibility in handling dynamic environments, and strong scalability and integration capabilities. SolarWinds provides detailed monitoring of applications and servers, extensive alerting and reporting features, and covers a wide range of infrastructure.

Room for Improvement: Zenoss Cloud users report a steep learning curve due to its complex customization, desire more straightforward deployment options, and need more robust out-of-the-box integration. SolarWinds users mention occasional performance issues, seek enhancements in the user experience, and request smoother updates and better load handling.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Zenoss Cloud's initial setup is intricate and often requires expert intervention, but customer service is responsive. SolarWinds provides a more straightforward deployment process with comprehensive guides, though experiences with customer service responsiveness and support quality are mixed.

Pricing and ROI: Zenoss Cloud's pricing is perceived as high, with some users questioning the value return, though full implementation reports strong ROI. SolarWinds is also noted for higher costs but justified by its extensive features and reliable performance, indicating satisfactory ROI.

To learn more, read our detailed SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Zenoss Cloud Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Zenoss Cloud

June 2025

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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 Server Monitoring

12th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

5.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (18th), Active Directory Management (10th)

Zenoss Cloud

Ranking in Server Monitoring

26th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Infrastructure (30th), Event Monitoring (14th), Network Monitoring Software (77th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (52nd), Container Monitoring (10th), Cloud Monitoring Software (39th), AIOps (25th)

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 2.5%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zenoss Cloud is 1.0%, down from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Server Monitoring

Featured Reviews

Carlos Camargo

Senior Operations Manager at Sencinet

Provides user-friendly API features and has straightforward deployment process

One product area that could benefit from improvement is the synchronization of licensing periods across different modules. The misalignment of licensing terms can present commercial challenges when adding new modules or additional pollers. Additionally, the granularity of polling times for specific components could be enhanced to better meet individual customers' needs without impacting the entire polling pool.

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ClaudiaChen

Cloud Architect - Senior Technology Architect at Telstra

Generates close to real-time alerts so users can resolve issues, but needs more integration and public cloud monitoring features

As Zenoss Service Dynamics is more for network-centric devices and you want to monitor, for example, a server, its services, IP addresses, and interfaces, if it's a network and you're going to monitor multiple items, you'll be charged multiple times. This is what Zenoss Service Dynamics needs to improve to make sure that customers pay just one fee to monitor the entire server. What I'd like to see in Zenoss Service Dynamics in the future is a public cloud monitoring feature, particularly for the Azure public cloud. Another additional feature I'd like to see in the next release of the solution is integration with the Azure public cloud because I know that there are some services from Azure that Zenoss Service Dynamics is currently unable to monitor.

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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

"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."

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

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

"I adore the NTA module that provides deep details on ingress/egress traffic for any interface. With a few clicks, you can correlate who is accessing what and when, beside the bandwidth consuming applications/users."

"One of the most valuable features are the reports. They're pretty good. Also, the ease of installation and customization for the client is another feature that we value. SolarWinds has a lot of features but these are the ones I like the most. We also like that the KPIs have the ability to be preset."

"The solution has good alerts. Notifications are sent via email to technicians. You can filter the kinds of alerts you want to receive as well. It's excellent."

"The most beneficial aspect of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is its ability to monitor at the application level."

"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 product offers good documentation that helps with initial training."

"The most valuable feature is the flexible discovery mechanism."

"What I like most about Zenoss Service Dynamics is that it monitors the devices and gives close to real-time alerts. For example, in case the device is not available, Zenoss Service Dynamics generates an alert so my team can resolve the issue."

"The custom built integration is one of the most valuable features because you can see all the especially critical items."

"They have also accommodated many state-of-the-art technologies like Docker and ZooKeeper."

"Its Docker Container concept is mind blowing. It is the first monitoring tool which comes with Docker features."

"It's easy to use."

Cons

"Support for the IBM Mainframe is needed."

"It should also be easier to upgrade SolarWinds. AppDynamics is harder to deploy but easier to upgrade. So AppDynamics takes a lot of time and effort to install, but you can upgrade it in minutes. SolarWinds is the opposite. It's easy to deploy, but upgrades take forever. To date, nobody can complete it on time, so the production environment is sitting idle."

"They should incorporate more artificial intelligence. There should also be more predictive features."

"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."

"Nodes in Azure are able to be monitored with the use of agents, but this does not apply to cloud service offerings that are not node based."

"The tool’s report feature created issues for us. We needed to gain skills to use that feature. The tool’s customization is not easy since you have to reconfigure the whole system."

"I think they need to make reporting easier and more simple & dynamic."

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

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor cons

"The AI aspect needs to improve."

"As Zenoss Service Dynamics is more for network-centric devices and you want to monitor, for example, a server, its services, IP addresses, and interfaces, if it's a network and you're going to monitor multiple items, you'll be charged multiple times. This is what Zenoss Service Dynamics needs to improve to make sure that customers pay just one fee to monitor the entire server. What I'd like to see in Zenoss Service Dynamics in the future is a public cloud monitoring feature, particularly for the Azure public cloud. Another additional feature I'd like to see in the next release of the solution is integration with the Azure public cloud because I know that there are some services from Azure that Zenoss Service Dynamics is currently unable to monitor."

"Now it is stable, but they should design threshold parameters in percentage instead of raw values."

"The inclusion of a feature to show a graphical view of the network would be a helpful improvement."

"It would be ideal if the product offered sound alerts."

"There was a problem with Zenoss and storage monitoring."

"There is room for improvement with the administrative part. They introduced Control Center to manage things in Zenoss 5. The services that Zenoss provides remained the same, but the administrative part, since they introduced Docker, etc., has become a little complex"

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."

"Price can always be lower. It is neither on the expensive side nor on the cheap side. We have worked with them for a lot of years, so we get a discount due to the size of the installation."

"I think SolarWinds' pricing is very decent compared to other competitors in the market."

"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."

"The price is too high."

"The product is expensive."

"The solution is overpriced in terms of application management."

"We are on an annual license to use the solution. The price of the solution is expensive. The price is based on a bunch of factors, such as the number of engines and elements."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor pricing and cost advice

"The pricing depends on the environment, the number of services, and the size of the data center. It can go from $100,000 to a million dollars."

"There are additional costs you'll have to pay apart from the license fee for Zenoss Service Dynamics. I can't remember exactly how much my company is paying because I don't handle the finance part, but the cost is paid annually. On a scale of one to five, with one being the cheapest and five being the most expensive, I'm rating the solution three out of five."

"It is very cost-effective compared to the tools I worked with in the past. The company is gaining a lot with respect to the cost factor. It provides agentless monitoring and in a very cheap way."

"It depends on the customer, what he wants."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

26%

Computer Software Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

Government

Computer Software Company

22%

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

Performing Arts

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?

Identifying the problem statement is easy.

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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 are no specific features or functionality I would like to see improved or enhanced in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor at this time. I have not encountered any missing features or fu...

See all answers

What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?

In my experience, I worked with many monitoring software, but the one that gave me the most functionalities of a large-scale company is Zenoss, due to its ability to monitor completely hybrid and a...

See all answers

Comparisons

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Prometheus Group vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

Compared 7% of the time

Zabbix vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 31% of the time

Nagios XI vs Zenoss Cloud

Compared 28% of the time

SolarWinds AppOptics vs Zenoss Cloud

Compared 11% of the time

Nagios Core vs Zenoss Cloud

Compared 9% of the time

SolarWinds NPM vs Zenoss Cloud

Compared 7% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor

May 2025

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor report

Download SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor product report

Buyer's Guide

Zenoss Cloud

May 2025

Download Zenoss Cloud product report

Also Known As

SolarWinds SAM

Cloud Monitoring, Zenoss Service Dynamics

Overview

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers powerful application and server monitoring capabilities for IT pros, enabling them to diagnose and troubleshoot performance issues faster. Do not let slow applications and downtime impact your end-users and business services. Pinpoint the root cause of application issues across various layers of the IT stack. SolarWinds SAM is affordable and easy to deploy, use, and customize. You can automatically discover your system's environment and start monitoring in about an hour. No professional services or consultation needed.

SolarWinds

Zenoss Cloud revolutionizes IT infrastructure monitoring with a service-centric approach, prioritizing the overall health of services and applications. Harnessing the power of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (AIOps), Zenoss Cloud offers end-to-end visibility across servers, networks, storage, and applications. Real-time monitoring, event correlation, and automated remediation ensure immediate insights and efficient issue resolution. The customizable dashboards empower users to tailor visualizations to their needs, while scalability accommodates diverse infrastructures. Zenoss Cloud guarantees improved application performance, reduced downtime, and enhanced IT efficiency, making it an ideal choice for businesses of all sizes, from small enterprises seeking simplicity to large corporations requiring advanced scalability. Experience unified monitoring and proactive management with Zenoss Cloud, a comprehensive solution that transforms IT infrastructure optimization in today's complex environments.

Zenoss

Sample Customers

Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite

2degrees, Rackspace, State of North Dakota, El Paso Independent School District, NWN Corporation

Buyer's Guide

SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Zenoss Cloud

June 2025

Free Report: SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor vs. Zenoss Cloud

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