Nmap vs WhatsUp Gold comparison

Nmap and Progress Software are both solutions in the Network Monitoring Software category. Nmap is ranked #19 with an average rating of 8.6, while Progress Software is ranked #26 with an average rating of 8.7. Nmap holds a 0.7% mindshare in NMS, compared to Progress Software’s 2.0% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Nmap users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 85% of Progress Software users who would recommend it.

Nmap

Read 22 Nmap reviews

2,129 Views
1,937 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

WhatsUp Gold

Read 25 WhatsUp Gold reviews

5,476 Views
3,176 Comparison Views

85% willing to recommend

Nmap

WhatsUp Gold

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 10, 2024

WhatsUp Gold and Nmap are competing in the network monitoring and management domain. WhatsUp Gold has the upper hand in user experience and support, while Nmap is ahead in network analysis capabilities.

Features: WhatsUp Gold offers a comprehensive dashboard, real-time monitoring, and extensive third-party integrations. Nmap provides unparalleled network scanning, port detection, and versatility across various protocols and environments.

Room for Improvement: WhatsUp Gold could enhance its capability for complex technical scenarios, reduce initial costs, and expand protocol versatility. Nmap needs better user-friendliness, more comprehensive customer support, and increased ease of use for technical novices.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: WhatsUp Gold features straightforward deployment and excellent customer support for a smooth setup. Nmap has a simpler, lightweight installation but requires technical expertise due to limited support.

Pricing and ROI: WhatsUp Gold entails higher initial costs justified by integrated features and strong support, providing favorable ROI for businesses seeking all-in-one solutions. Nmap, as an open-source tool, offers minimal setup cost and significant ROI for enterprises without subscription overhead.

To learn more, read our detailed Nmap vs. WhatsUp Gold Report (Updated: February 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Nmap vs. WhatsUp Gold

February 2026

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Helped 881,821 peers since 2012

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

Nmap

Ranking in Network Monitoring Software

19th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

WhatsUp Gold

Ranking in Network Monitoring Software

26th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (29th), Server Monitoring (16th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (24th), Configuration Management (19th), Log Management (32nd), Cloud Monitoring Software (23rd), Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (10th)

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Nmap is 0.7%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WhatsUp Gold is 2.0%, up from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Network Monitoring Software Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Nmap	0.7%
WhatsUp Gold	2.0%
Other	97.3%

Network Monitoring Software

Featured Reviews

MoshiurRahman Khan

CEO at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Improves network monitoring and offers insights into traffic, including VPNs

The real-time reporting feature of Nmap is particularly valuable. It generates detailed reports on the source and destination IP addresses, the protocols used, and the types of traffic. This feature is crucial for law enforcement agencies to monitor and analyze network connectivity effectively. It also has traffic analysis. For example, assessing bandwidth usage and configuring the tool to track specific types of traffic is crucial. Unlike SolarWinds, which requires configuration for this, Nmap has built-in functionality that allows it to check all 4,000 computer ports. It identifies the type of traffic each port is using and can easily generate reports on network communications between computers, whether there are 100 or 1000 in the network.

Read full review

Erik Cheng

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.

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

"The initial setup was simple."

"The solution detects the operating systems, which makes testing the software much easier before making the payload."

"From a functionality standpoint, it's robust and straightforward to comprehend."

"The most valuable feature of the solution for security audits stems from the fact that it serves as a powerful tool with the ability to scan a large number of ports."

"The real-time reporting feature of Nmap is particularly valuable. It generates detailed reports on the source and destination IP addresses, the protocols used, and the types of traffic."

"The most important function, according to me, is the capability to use some arguments in the scanning. The solution's capability to go figure and do a deep dive, discovering information on specific aspects."

"Nmap has a powerful command line tool and a set of diagnostic features."

"It helps us secure the network infrastructure."

More Nmap pros

"The interface in the last few years it has been a lot greater, they are much more user-friendly. I like the interface."

"It handles the basics of monitoring."

"The installation and configuration process are easy."

"This is a good, stable network monitoring solution for devices."

"The interactive mapping interface for scrolling, zooming, and drilling down on an element to learn about a network issue is good. When we see a network there will sometimes be a spot that has one link. You can go into a particular part of the topology map, scroll in, and see exactly which module it is."

"The most important features of WhatsUp Gold are the server health and uptime it provides. Additionally, WhatsUp Gold is a Windows-based solution which is a benefit."

"The most valuable feature is the monitoring of resources."

"The threshold alerting is the most valuable feature."

More WhatsUp Gold pros

Cons

"The solution is not that easy for a beginner to learn."

"They should deliver Playtech's username and password."

"There are concerns with the stability of the product, making it an area where improvements are required."

"Customization is not very user-friendly in Nmap."

"The tool's license limits the number of scans it can perform. Improving the license model could benefit customers by allowing more scans for compliance and other purposes."

"The solution should increase the number of features under a free license."

"The solution's initial setup could be better."

"There could be a specific option to check non-pingable endpoints for the product."

More Nmap cons

"We can never achieve or get a good picture of the network topology."

"Importing the maps and being able to customize them could be easier."

"The product is old and not updated."

"The interface needs some work."

"The initial setup of WhatsUp Gold is a medium range of difficulty levels. However, if it is your first time it could be difficult."

"Integrations with other devices. I want to have a product that has full integration with my active directory so I can track user activity. I want to track my complete user activity, so I'm looking for a product to implement in the near future, which will have full integration with my network and active directory users. It became very difficult to track user activity."

"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."

"The pricing for this solution has gone up quite recently, which has led some of our customers to buy an alternative product."

More WhatsUp Gold cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Nmap is an open-source and free product."

"It's an open-source product, and I haven't seen any premiums. Options are available for those who purchase, but for my use case, everything I need is available in the community and forums."

"Nmap is an open-source product. You don't need a license to install it."

"I am using the free version of Nmap."

"The solution is free of cost."

"The product's pricing is fine. The licensing options for Nmap include perpetual licenses and volume-based licenses. For perpetual licenses, once you purchase it, there's no need to invest in renewals. And for volume-based licenses, enterprise companies can use it multiple times based on the number of users or devices they need to scan. It's a pay-as-you-go model, similar to how you pay for what you use."

"The solution is open source so it is free."

"It's an open-source solution. Commerically, only the support service is available."

More Nmap pricing and cost advice

"The price of WhatsUp Gold is good."

"The choice of version depends on the number of points, or devices, that you want to monitor, and this makes the product expensive."

"It is per device, per year. The pricing is very clear. If you have a service agreement, you get all of your major upgrades and minor upgrades. It was under $10,000 to go all-in with all of the different add-ons for it."

"There is a license needed to use WhatsUp Gold."

"Pricing is reasonable compared to other products."

"The most valuable feature is the cost compared to other solutions."

"I'm not sure, but it's expensive. We don't pay any additional fees."

"This is a well priced solution."

More WhatsUp Gold pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

13%

Government

University

Retailer

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

12%

Government

10%

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	11

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	14

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Nmap?

Nmap is mostly helpful during compliance checks. We run the scanner to see how many devices are on our network and find vulnerabilities in those that aren't compliant. We also use it monthly to sca...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Nmap?

I am using the free version of Nmap.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Nmap?

Nmap is used for network scanning to map the network, identify devices, and assess their status. It helps determine open ports and services running on a particular endpoint or server within an ente...

See all answers

What do you like most about WhatsUp Gold?

The interactive mapping interface for scrolling, zooming, and drilling down on an element to learn about a network issue is good. When we see a network there will sometimes be a spot that has one l...

See all answers

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 ...

See all answers

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.

See all answers

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Compared 4% of the time

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Compared 3% of the time

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Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Nmap

January 2026

Download Nmap product report

Buyer's Guide

WhatsUp Gold

January 2026

Download WhatsUp Gold product report

Overview

Nmap ("Network Mapper") is a free and open source (license) utility for network discovery and security auditing. Many systems and network administrators also find it useful for tasks such as network inventory, managing service upgrade schedules, and monitoring host or service uptime. Nmap uses raw IP packets in novel ways to determine what hosts are available on the network, what services (application name and version) those hosts are offering, what operating systems (and OS versions) they are running, what type of packet filters/firewalls are in use, and dozens of other characteristics. It was designed to rapidly scan large networks, but works fine against single hosts. Nmap runs on all major computer operating systems, and official binary packages are available for Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X. In addition to the classic command-line Nmap executable, the Nmap suite includes an advanced GUI and results viewer (Zenmap), a flexible data transfer, redirection, and debugging tool (Ncat), a utility for comparing scan results (Ndiff), and a packet generation and response analysis tool (Nping).

Nmap

Explore and manage your entire network infrastructure effortlessly with WhatsUp Gold's robust layer 2/3 discovery, creating a detailed interactive map from the edge to the cloud. Monitor devices, wireless controllers, servers, virtual machines, applications, and traffic flows across various environments. Real-time alerts ensure optimal performance, allowing you to meet or exceed SLAs. The platform offers customizable maps, dashboards, and alerts for easy network management. Quickly resolve issues with intuitive workflows, reducing Mean Time to Resolution (MTTR). WhatsUp Gold's integrated log management provides easy visibility and control of device log data, allowing monitoring, filtering, searching, and alerting on syslogs or Windows logs. Archive logs to comply with regulatory requirements and preserve historical data, all through a user-friendly interface. Streamline network monitoring and issue resolution with WhatsUp Gold, making network management efficient and hassle-free.

Progress Software

Sample Customers

Lockheed Martin, Eastern Bank Boston, Perspecta, Harris Corporation, Discovery Communication

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

Buyer's Guide

Nmap vs. WhatsUp Gold

February 2026

Free Report: Nmap vs. WhatsUp Gold

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