AirCheck G3 vs Wireshark comparison

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AirCheck G3

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 11, 2024

Wireshark and AirCheck G3 are leading network analysis tools with distinct user benefits. Despite Wireshark’s strong user reviews regarding its advanced capabilities and cost-effectiveness, AirCheck G3 stands out for its specialized hardware features and ease of use.

Features: Wireshark users value its comprehensive packet analysis, protocol decoding, and extensive filter capabilities. AirCheck G3 is appreciated for its hardware portability, network discovery features, and real-time troubleshooting.

Room for Improvement: Wireshark reviews suggest a need for more intuitive setup processes and improved graphical analysis tools. Users of AirCheck G3 point to its limited software-based network testing options and higher cost.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Wireshark users note a straightforward deployment but highlight a steep learning curve and community-based support. AirCheck G3 users find the device quick to deploy with strong technical support from the vendor.

Pricing and ROI: Wireshark is praised for its free usage model and high ROI by minimizing network downtimes through its detailed analysis. AirCheck G3’s higher initial setup cost is balanced by its portability and effective troubleshooting.

To learn more, read our detailed AirCheck G3 vs. Wireshark Report (Updated: March 2025).

AirCheck G3 vs. Wireshark

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Helped 845,040 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

AirCheck G3

Ranking in Network Troubleshooting

7th

Average Rating

8.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Wireshark

Ranking in Network Troubleshooting

3rd

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Network Troubleshooting category, the mindshare of AirCheck G3 is 7.6%, down from 8.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Wireshark is 13.2%, up from 12.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Network Troubleshooting

Featured Reviews

David-Prusynski

Senior Network Engineer at a healthcare company with 5,001-10,000 employees

A portable, rugged device that reduces resolution time and saves thousands of dollars

It would be nice if I could import an AP list with a MAC address. When it looks at access points, it should tell me the AP name instead of the MAC address. When you get a MAC address, you can eventually find out where you want to go. However, a lot of times, if I just have an AP name, I know that's in this area or that's over there. I would like that function because AirMagnet, which is the precursor of this, had that ability where you could basically import a list of APs and MAC addresses, and then it could display those instead of just a MAC address. That'd be a nice function. We should be able to put an AP to MAC address in Excel and export it as a CSV file and then import it. That'd be nice to have because I have that information for all my hospitals. The one I'm doing this weekend has got 550 access points. It is much easier for me to look at an AP name than to get a MAC address. Currently, I have to go to a different spreadsheet and try to find that MAC address. If I had the AP name, it would be like, "Okay. Yep. See it. Done." They are doing spectrum analysis in G3, which I would love to have in G2. That's a nice tool to have, and from what I heard, that's the same price. I'd like to have that. The other function I would love to see is the ability to test fiber. I know the $10,000 version has the ability to test fiber, but I would love this lower-cost device to be able to test fiber.

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DonniUgalde

Senior I.T. Systems Engineer at Pro Techs MSP

Provides visibility into the network, and the GUI is easy to use

I wish the filters were a little bit more prepopulated. It would have been easy to hit a drop-down and select a filter. If I only wanted to look at DCP, UDP, or IP, it would be easy to filter it out. Advanced network knowledge is required to get a lot out of the tool. However, it's very easy to install and deploy. It would be nice if there were some handheld Android devices with a Wireshark-specialized application that would allow us to mirror a Cisco port. Then, we can just plug into the port and click the green start button, and it will start ingesting the packet capture. Then, we won’t be using a laptop. The only downside is that we must have a laptop and connect a network cable. Some new laptops don't have network ports, so we have to get another adapter. Having an all-in-one device, like NetAlly or Fluke, and some of their network devices would be cool.

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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 also like the remote session and the ability to log in to the device remotely. You can log in to the tester with your computer and can see the screen and operate the tester remotely. This is a very cool function, but it's very advanced."

"The AirMapper Site Survey on the AirCheck G2 is the most valuable feature. It is really nice to be able to upload the maps remotely to the website, and then have the analyst upload the results so we can review the data."

"AirCheck made a lot of children and caregivers quite happy. While I might not have resolved everything, I have reduced the problems that we had every night. During the day, they would do visible checks and not always rely on the monitors, but every night, they had at least three or four of those alarms. I was able to reduce it to once or twice a week since those appliances are still limited in their wireless capability."

"It is a pretty rock-solid device that is well-built."

"AirCheck has a feature that lets you play a tone so you can track down a rogue AP based on the RF signal. That's a cool feature. It can also help you identify interference like microwave ovens or Bluetooth devices. I also like the ability to link it to your online account. It sends a report via email and saves it on the cloud."

"It has made our networking staff more productive. We spend less time because the device helps us by identifying the issue and providing a solution for the customer. Prior to not having this device, we would have to guess when an issue arose. Now, we don't have to guess. This can easily save us hours per call."

"AirCheck G2 gives me an overview of which channels are used by the access points or who delivers the Wi-Fi, which gives me a clear picture of what's going on."

"The one-button AutoTest feature is an amazing tool. It works well. It tells you whether or not you have shorts in your network, your PoE+ is running low on voltage, and shows you your link speed."

More AirCheck G3 pros

"The GUI is easy to use."

"The transmission and reception issues are valuable."

"The feature to incorporate Voice over IP (VoIP) incidents into network traffic analysis is valuable. Capturing voice or SIP communication allows for examination of interactions between SIP clients and SIP servers. This helps the team investigate or analyze issues related to call center servers and operators."

"Wireshark is very user-friendly; even someone with basic IT knowledge can use it."

"The filter option provided by Wireshark is its most valuable feature...Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."

"It helps in analyzing if something looks suspicious, such as a brute force attack or scanning from somewhere."

"The ability to decrypt traffic and the abundance of filters available are both valuable features."

"The session-level filtering features are valuable."

More Wireshark pros

Cons

"I would like them to modify the interface. The button to change profiles is fairly small. When you have interventions, it is not always possible to have a ballpoint pen or perfect precision touch with it, since sometimes you need to touch it quite a lot when your hands are very dirty. I would like a special pen that is compatible with that responsive screen. That would make it easier."

"The biggest improvement would be an easier upload over wireless to Link-Live. Currently, the device has to be patched into the Ethernet. The wireless upload has been giving us some issues."

"We use .1x authentication, so I need to download the certificate onto the device. It would be nice to have this functionality through the cloud as well. Right now, you need to do it through the software by connecting your laptop physically to the AirCheck. This is one thing that is a bit slow."

"I would love to have a button that pretends that you're an iPhone 5 or an Android Samsung, then tell me what you think the experience is. This is a very difficult thing to do because each of these things has different radios in them and behaves differently. Now, I can go into the user's office, and say, "The tool says everything's green. The WiFI infrastructure is fine, but their iPhone experience sucks." Is it a problem with their particular iPhone or is it a problem with any iPhone model? If I could have this solution emulate an iPhone model so I can walk into that room, and say, "My tools pretending to be your iPhone and it works fine. It must be your particular iPhone that we have a problem with." I found mobile phones in general have lousy radios and the coverage isn't strong enough, but it would be a nice feature."

"If it was capable of downloading MIBs onto the device, then we could identify the manufacturer. Sometimes, when I am troubleshooting, there is a Mac address. For example, there is a rogue device and it just gives us a Mac address, which is fine. It gives us something, which is better than nothing. It would be nice if it was able to download a MIB where we could associate it with that Mac address and the manufacturer."

"We use these out in the field, and because they're not allowed on our network, we usually have to have the person take them home and provide backhaul to them. In other words, they are not allowed through our firewalls to dump the data. So, we have to have them go to a separate wired network to dump the data. There could be an option to put an LTE and have a phone engine in it so that you can buy a SIM card for it and have it use cellular to download the data. That is something that would be nice to have. That's a little kink in this system right now. Other than using the Ethernet port to download data, it'd be nice if we could use either LTE or some other way to get the data that was collected by AirCheck G2 to our Link-Live portal."

"The only thing that would be an improvement would be the ability to do MPO/MPT testing, which is another mode of fiber, along with more options on the SFP to do that testing."

"It was hard to determine which AP was which because it only shows the MAC address. It'll also display the MAC address of the BSSID, so it looked like I had 12 APs in my house. If I have three access points and each is a dual-band with an SSID or BSSID for each radio, it comes out to about 12 APs. That's one of the bugs fixed in the latest firmware update, but it's only available if you have a NetAlly support contract."

More AirCheck G3 cons

"With Wireshark, you cannot download and utilize the packet in automation."

"Wireshark could be improved by adding more monitoring features."

"Wireshark's UI isn't easy to handle and doesn't have as nice a view as Omnipeek."

"In the future, it would be nice to see color coding. It is just black and white."

"Its user interface was a little less friendly. They can make its user interface a little bit more friendly. It is for technical people, and most of the technical people would be able to figure it out, but it would be good to improve its user interface. They can maybe build artificial intelligence into it. Currently, it takes a lot of manpower to analyze and dissect all the data."

"This product needs to improve the UI."

"I would like to see Wireshark improve the ease of application of the command. The command is very powerful, but not easy to apply."

"There is a disadvantage when it comes to sampling intervals. Additionally, I've heard from a colleague that Wireshark might be less effective in the voice domain."

More Wireshark cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The overall cost of the solution, compared to the time saved—the number of man-hours devoted to other means of troubleshooting—is incomparable."

"The product has a pretty good price."

"I'd always love a lower price, but as compared to some of the other tools, it is fairly reasonable. I personally bought one. So, I must have thought the value was there because I'm spending my own hard cash on it, not just the company's. You can get support. I don't have support on my personal device. We did buy support for our company devices. It is reasonable. It is not super expensive or astronomical."

"Because I work in a big company, it is a no-brainer. If I were a consultant, I would still buy it, but it would be a huge investment. Overall, it's a good tool to have."

"The price is fairly expensive, if you are a single individual. For me, it's well worth the cost of the unit. Depending on the nature of the work that you're doing, the upfront costs can be expensive. Typically, what happens in an environment is a department might have one device as opposed to technicians having them individually."

"It costs $3,000. It would be nice if its cost was less. I could then buy more. Currently, when we buy one, we make sure that where we need it is big enough, or if it is too small, when a person has a job, they have to get a temporary one mailed to them to use, which becomes a little less convenient."

"It is definitely well worth the price. It is approximately $2,500. It pays for itself since it eliminates troubleshooting costs and labor due to all the money you would spend kind of troubleshooting the device if you didn't have any of these tools with you."

"Pricing is on par with the rest of the industry and the licensing is decent."

More AirCheck G3 pricing and cost advice

"Wireshark is free of charge, and there's no license involved."

"Wireshark is open-source and free of charge."

"I've never personally had to pay for it, making it a highly valuable internet resource that's accessible for use. While they offer some paid versions, our firm has utilized the free version for the past three years."

"It's free."

"We are using a freeware version of this solution, so there are no licence costs involved."

"It is free."

"This is an open-source product that can be used free of charge."

"It is free to download and install. It runs on multiple platforms, so how can you go wrong?"

More Wireshark pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

13%

Computer Software Company

11%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Government

University

11%

Computer Software Company

11%

Government

10%

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

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What do you like most about Wireshark?

The GUI is easy to use.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Wireshark?

Wireshark is priced at a medium range, not too high, not too low. The pricing could be more flexible, and they might make it more expensive. That said, compared to other products, it is competitive.

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What needs improvement with Wireshark?

The speed of the Internet could be improved, especially its performance. Performance can sometimes be a challenge due to numerous factors.

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AirMagnet Survey vs AirCheck G3

Compared 22% of the time

iTrinegy NE-ONE Network Emulator vs AirCheck G3

Compared 20% of the time

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Compared 21% of the time

Colasoft Capsa vs Wireshark

Compared 16% of the time

SolarWinds NPM vs Wireshark

Compared 12% of the time

Zabbix vs Wireshark

Compared 10% of the time

Nagios XI vs Wireshark

Compared 7% of the time

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Product Reports

AirCheck G3

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Also Known As

AirCheck G2, AirCheck

No data available

Overview

AirCheck G3 is the most cost-effective hardware-enabled site survey solution for Wi-Fi 6/6E networks. It provides network professionals of any skill level with complete and accurate information to survey and validate Wi-Fi deployments and changes, resolve connectivity and performance problems quickly, speed up closure of trouble tickets, and ensure your Wi-Fi network meets end users’ needs.

The new and improved battery life of 10 hours (3 - 4 hours charge) lasts you and your teams throughout the day.

AirCheck G3 Product Info

NetAlly

Wireshark is the world's foremost network protocol analyzer.

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Comversion, ADP, Talbots

AirCheck G3 vs. Wireshark