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AlienVault OSSIM vs Rapid7 InsightIDR comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 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

AlienVault OSSIM
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
12th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Rapid7 InsightIDR
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
15th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
User Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) (6th), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (23rd), Threat Deception Platforms (4th), Extended Detection and Response (XDR) (17th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of AlienVault OSSIM is 1.9%, down from 4.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Rapid7 InsightIDR is 2.2%, down from 2.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
AlienVault OSSIM1.9%
Rapid7 InsightIDR2.2%
Other95.9%
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

BP
Independent Contractor at a comms service provider with 5,001-10,000 employees
Enables cost-effective security management for small businesses
Scaling for USM is always challenging for any product unless it is purpose-built or overbuilt at the front end. They will use Palo Alto and its competitors, and LevelBlue will manage that implementation. The main area where the AlienVault product was lacking around the 2018 timeframe was in its ability to scale. By pushing it to a cloud-based system, they've largely alleviated scale issues. It's native in Amazon but will also run in Azure. They have worked with cloud service providers to offer enough throughput at a cost reasonable for a corporation. Scaling was their biggest problem, and they've largely conquered those issues.
SohailHyder - PeerSpot reviewer
Head of Cyber Security at Super Secure
Has supported compliance needs for mid-sized organizations but lacks customization and advanced integration
If we pitch Rapid7 InsightIDR against solutions such as SIEMs from Splunk or LogRhythm, it is not as customizable as a SIEM solution is. This is where it can improve if we keep in front the feature sets of a complete SIEM solution. Most common in the market is QRadar, but it is depleting now. It has been taken over by some other products such as Splunk and LogRhythm. If we compare these things with Rapid7 InsightIDR, then there are definitely some gaps that need to be filled. Data retention is also one concern because Rapid7 InsightIDR is cloud-based and operates on a subscription model. Whatever data you want to retain, it has to be paid for separately or it has a cost. Other solutions that are on-premises can have their own infrastructure or they provide some data retention for a month or in some capacity-wise, they provide that solution to them which makes them more attractive.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is very stable. Compared to Qradar and Splunk, it's very stable."
"Better than other SIEM solutions because almost everything can be integrated."
"I recommend it due to the experience of the people running it."
"With AlienVault you get everything in one box."
"The most valuable features of AlienVault OSSIM are case management, ease of configuration, and investigation."
"Its user-friendliness is the most valuable. It is very easy to use and explore. The dashboard is very well packaged and integrated. You don't have to spend a lot of time in configuring it and checking out the RPM etc. It is also free and very powerful."
"Network traffic analysis is highly efficient."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"I like that it's a cloud-based solution."
"Great coverage of all systems within our network from endpoint to firewall."
"Features for user behavior analytics and the rules for attack review are good."
"InsightIDR has allowed us to find potential security issues that we did not know existed, and get remediation quickly."
"Very intuitive and easy to set up."
"I rate Rapid7 nine out of 10 for affordability"
"The log aggregation and storage provided by InsightIDR has shown no issues with scalability; aggregating over one hundred millions events daily."
"​​User behavioral analytics allows us to pinpoint abnormal or suspicious behavior among millions of events every day."
 

Cons

"GUI could be improved."
"I suggest more in-built rules based on modern threats and environments to make it a more competitive solution."
"Sometimes technical issues take very long to get resolved."
"I would like the solution to be able to integrate with my firewall, my IDS and my Honeypot solutions so that it can provide real-time reporting as things occur and then have alert sent to me on my phone when suspicious activity is happening."
"There are somewhat more false positives with the user behavior analytics, which could benefit from an additional machine learning model to detect user patterns more rapidly."
"The initial setup was a bit complex. You've got to do a lot of reading. It's not an intuitive implementation."
"It takes some time. It does not give me a prompt response for any such [malicious] traffic. It takes time to get that alert from the AlienVault system."
"The incidence reporting could be better."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR is not intuitive to search for logs. It should be more user-friendly and improve the dashboards. We should be able to use ready-made templates instead of having to build one."
"The integration capabilities of the solution have certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
"The product allows us to make only 30 custom rules."
"The searching feature in Rapid7 InsightIDR needs to evolve"
"Lacks a mobile application."
"If we pitch Rapid7 InsightIDR against solutions such as SIEMs from Splunk or LogRhythm, it is not as customizable as a SIEM solution is."
"The reporting is the weakest aspect. There needs to be multi-level grouping for events (for example, group by user and destination). Right now, we can do a group by user and a separate table or group by destination. But I'd be more interested in where a person was logging into instead of who was logging in or where he was logging in."
"I would like the ability to adjust the threshold of certain existing alerts. Currently the only option is to change the notifications or create my own alert."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"AlienVault OSSIM is free."
"AlienVault pricing is the best. Whatever cost you are paying, you are getting a return on every penny... It's not like your IBM, your QRadar, or Splunk, where the cost is too high."
"AlienVault OSSIM is expensive compared to its competitors."
"AlienVault OSSIM is an open-source solution."
"OSSIM is open source, and USM is the paid license. So, if you want, you can switch to USM. There you will have to buy a license, and they have a support team that helps you out on issues you face."
"The licensing fees for the non-community edition are paid on an annual basis, and there are no costs in addition to this."
"We are using a free version of the solution. If you purchase a license there are more features available but the price is a little high. The solution should be cheaper to allow more customers to be able to afford it."
"The solution is open source, so it's free to use."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR's pricing is reasonable but we have challenges with the Minimum Order Quantity. It is not reasonable for customers who have less than one hundred devices. If they can reduce Minimum Order Quantity, it is good. You have to pay around 5000-6000 dollars per year for the product. The pricing includes maintenance and support costs."
"Licensing is straightforward. If, for some reason, you don’t meet the minimum licensing requirements, there is a third-party managed service that can help."
"Licensing is by endpoint and amount of retention time (at least ours is). Default retention was one year, but we are able to push the retention further if needed. There's also a provide-your-own-S3 option for longer retention if you don't want to pay for the additional retention years in your Rapid7 agreement."
"It is on a yearly basis. For our own company, for about 250 users, it was 16,000 euros a year."
"The pricing and licensing are competitive."
"Rapid7 InsightIDR is a cheaply priced product. On a scale of one to ten, where one is very expensive, and ten is very cheap, I rate the product's price at seven or eight."
"It is a reasonably priced solution."
"The pricing of the solution depends on the user. But there is a yearly licensing cost."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise6
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AlienVault OSSIM?
It depends. I would need to review their cost models, but generally, they are on a scaled basis based on throughput usage. Because it's a software as a service solution for their core product for U...
What needs improvement with AlienVault OSSIM?
Scaling for USM is always challenging for any product unless it is purpose-built or overbuilt at the front end. They will use Palo Alto and its competitors, and LevelBlue will manage that implement...
What SOC product do you recommend?
For tools I’d recommend: -SIEM- LogRhythm -SOAR- Palo Alto XSOAR Doing commercial w/o both (or at least an XDR) is asking to miss details that are critical, and ending up a statistic. Also, rememb...
What do you like most about Rapid7 InsightIDR?
During simulations or demonstrations, the tool generates alerts, providing details such as the specific application, its origin, and potential threats. For instance, it can identify if an applicati...
 

Also Known As

OSSIM
InsightIDR
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Council Rock School District
Liberty Wines, Pioneer Telephone, Visier
Find out what your peers are saying about AlienVault OSSIM vs. Rapid7 InsightIDR and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,422 professionals have used our research since 2012.