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VMware vCenter vs WhatsUp Gold comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 6, 2024

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

VMware vCenter
Ranking in Server Monitoring
2nd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
38
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
WhatsUp Gold
Ranking in Server Monitoring
15th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (30th), Network Monitoring Software (23rd), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (18th), Configuration Management (21st), Log Management (41st), Cloud Monitoring Software (22nd), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (10th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of VMware vCenter is 1.9%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WhatsUp Gold is 3.8%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Monitoring Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware vCenter1.9%
WhatsUp Gold3.8%
Other94.3%
Server Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

VinayKumar7 - PeerSpot reviewer
Manager Data Centre at a consultancy with 51-200 employees
Centralized control has improved data center virtualization and streamlined DC DR replication
The pricing of VMware vCenter is high. What was earlier, before it was acquired by Broadcom, was different. Now, Broadcom has acquired it, and the earlier arrangement was that we used to bundle the license and purchase it according to our choice. Now, they bundle it with vSAN, which many organizations may not use. Although we purchase it along with the bundled license, we pay for something which is of no use to us because we have our own storage. If they had separate pricing for each module, organizations could purchase only the modules they need, and the price would lower. For smaller organizations, this can become a huge cost issue. For larger organizations, there is no issue, but for medium-sized organizations, they have to shell out a lot.
EC
Technical Manager at Quan Hung Gourmet
Efficient monitoring with detailed customization, yet complexity remains
The best feature of WhatsUp Gold is the automatic generation of topology and its integration with virtualization and wireless. I have used the automated device discovery with this topology feature. The interactive map feature helps me manage the topology because sometimes we cannot draw the topology correctly, so we need to manually edit the connections. The alerting system is very tunable and customizable, but it's a little complicated to use. Many customers cannot manage it by themselves and need support from us, the provider. We always use the dashboards in the SOC, where we constantly display a dashboard or multiple dashboards. This allows us to know immediately if the connection or bandwidth is full or if the connection is broken.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The initial setup is straightforward even for complex environments with around 100 hosts."
"I am using vMotion for live migration and storage migrations. I can use vCenter for both now."
"The initial setup is a very user-friendly process. Installation and configuration are easy."
"The most valuable feature of VMware vCenter is the centralized management that allows us to see resources from different data centers and VMware clusters in a single dashboard."
"One feature I really like about VMware vCenter is its ability to change hosts easily. It is highly available and very useful for our operations."
"We use VMware vCenter for centralization and to manage all the VMs."
"The high availability feature is particularly valuable when a host goes down or experiences high usage, as it automatically migrates VMs to other hosts to balance performance."
"The product is scalable."
"The product is reasonably priced."
"The installation and configuration process are easy."
"We no longer have to manually search for problems because we are alerted when something in the network goes down."
"This is a good, stable network monitoring solution for devices."
"The solution effectively monitors network devices and servers."
"The tool's most valuable feature is the visibility it offers of everything in the network and infrastructure."
"The most valuable features are network bandwidth monitoring and monitoring device health."
"It's a good product, and if one has the expertise to use it, it will be a good investment and it will help IT to save and plan for the future."
 

Cons

"The product's technical support services need improvement."
"vCentre licensing cost is on the higher side as well."
"The support for the Linux operating system wasn't great when we used it."
"The web interface is not convenient."
"The stability could be better."
"Sometimes, vCenter management can be difficult if you forget the password. You can't change or recover the password easily. We then have to reinstall vCenter, which means reconfiguring everything. That's a challenge we've encountered."
"The pricing of VMware vCenter is high. Now, they bundle it with vSAN, which many organizations may not use."
"VMware vCenter is an expensive product. Its price needs improvement."
"Sometimes it's a little bit slow."
"I think there are a few bugs now. Although they give some resolution for this, we cannot share the network remotely because of our company policy."
"WhatsUp Gold should work on real-time monitoring and configuration management."
"This product should add other options for monitoring. It does not currently meet the broader needs of the banking industry in the version we have deployed."
"I would like to see better integration with switches so that you can see what is connected to each port, what the traffic is, and have a network map automatically generated."
"One of the biggest things that made us start to look at another product is we're not able to have an end to end monitoring from a user perspective throughout the system and back to the user. All the monitoring is from inside out, we need something that also can give us from outside in."
"The price could be improved. When we first started using this product, the company was new. The prices were very low then, in comparison with HP OpenView or IBM, but now the policy is too high, relative to the number of devices we have."
"The pricing for this solution has gone up quite recently, which has led some of our customers to buy an alternative product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool used to be worth the money, but after Broadcom acquired it and changed the pricing structure to subscription-only, it became too expensive for us to continue using. Unfortunately, we haven't found any alternative solutions that meet our needs, so this is a significant drawback for us as we explore other options."
"For the healthcare industry, the price is considerably higher than the education industry."
"We have purchased monthly licenses for the platform. There are additional costs involved."
"The solution is pretty expensive for small businesses because there are few lower-scale VMware vCenter solutions."
"The platform is highly-priced."
"The product is expensive."
"The platform has reasonable pricing."
"VMware vCenter is not expensive."
"The choice of version depends on the number of points, or devices, that you want to monitor, and this makes the product expensive."
"The most valuable feature is the cost compared to other solutions."
"This is a well priced solution."
"Pricing is reasonable compared to other products."
"There is a license needed to use WhatsUp Gold."
"The price of WhatsUp Gold is good."
"I'm not sure, but it's expensive. We don't pay any additional fees."
"The pricing can be on the expensive side when considering competing products."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Marketing Services Firm
11%
Construction Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise18
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware vCenter?
The initial package for VMware vCenter is not less than $10,000, which can be prohibitive for smaller organizations. The licensing model now requires purchasing 96-core solutions, even if fewer cor...
What needs improvement with VMware vCenter?
The pricing of VMware vCenter is high. What was earlier, before it was acquired by Broadcom, was different. Now, Broadcom has acquired it, and the earlier arrangement was that we used to bundle the...
What is your primary use case for VMware vCenter?
My main use case for VMware vCenter is mainly for virtualization and what we call DCDR replication. I can say we are not using all the features. Our main aim is only that we are using it for virtua...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for WhatsUp Gold?
Clients find the licensing calculator confusing, but we simplify this for them by collecting relevant information first. The licensing is based on devices, providing better cost-effectiveness than ...
What needs improvement with WhatsUp Gold?
It would be great if WhatsUp Gold could add features that simplify management with AI, as it is currently too complicated to manage.
What is your primary use case for WhatsUp Gold?
My use case for WhatsUp Gold includes all device availability checks, bandwidth usage, CPU, and memory usage, as well as alarm notifications.
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

1. Amazon 2. Apple 3. ATT 4. Bank of America 5. Cisco Systems 6. CocaCola 7. Dell 8. ebay 9. Facebook 10. Google 11. HP 12. IBM 13. Intel 14. JPMorgan Chase 15. LinkedIn 16. Microsoft 17. Netflix 18. Oracle 19. PayPal 20. SAP 21. Siemens 22. Tesla 23. Toyota 24. Twitter 25. Visa 26. Walmart 27. WeWork 28. World Bank
Artoni Trasporti, Austin Independent School District, Banca Marche, Burke County North Carolina, Cambridge University School of Clinical Medicine, Clayco, Community Integrated Care, Desca, Deutsche Bergbau, Flexi-Van, Gropper, Hamleys, Hammonds Furniture, Knowledge IT, Idras S.P.A., Sibeg, Swann Engineering, Trivium Lindenhof
Find out what your peers are saying about VMware vCenter vs. WhatsUp Gold and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,311 professionals have used our research since 2012.