Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

AlienVault OSSIM vs Splunk Enterprise Security comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 25, 2026

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)
13th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Splunk Enterprise Security
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
375
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (2nd), IT Operations Analytics (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of AlienVault OSSIM is 1.7%, down from 4.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk Enterprise Security is 7.1%, down from 9.8% 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 (%)
Splunk Enterprise Security7.1%
AlienVault OSSIM1.7%
Other91.2%
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.
reviewer1469784 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Helps us detect cyber threats quickly and integrate multiple feeds effectively
Overall, the product is good, but when it comes to some infrastructure issues, we have to dig into more logs. There is no straightforward indication of an issue. Health check kind of dashboards are not available. More AI would help us, and more optimization, since security products run more queries. The AI module could suggest solutions, optimizing queries or workload balancing. If the product itself advises on running queries during peak times, it would be similar to what ChatGPT currently offers. We see quite a few issues on stability. Even last week, we faced something, and identifying bottlenecks is not easy. We need more SMEs, and there is no mechanism to tell us about indexer or search head issues. Self-monitoring dashboards could be beneficial. The technical support still requires more improvement. Often, primary support takes a lot of time and forwards most solutions to the engineering side. The primary support team has very limited knowledge to provide.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"AlienVault OSSIM is an enterprise solution that sells easily. It is rated highly by organizations."
"The threat policies of the solution are always very advanced and the best in the market. They are very persistent in terms of keeping up with security protocols."
"There are a lot of people you will find using OSSIM since they are also offering OTX as a service"
"The initial setup was straightforward. I didn't have any problems."
"The most valuable features of this solution are the data correlation and vulnerability assessment."
"The most valuable features of AlienVault OSSIM are case management, ease of configuration, and investigation."
"The threat alerts it gives me from time to time on harmful code within the network, or if they are generating any network traffic, are very useful."
"The solution is very stable. Compared to Qradar and Splunk, it's very stable."
"The initial setup is simple, not very complex. Initial deployment takes around 10 to 15 minutes to set up the entire base for Splunk including all three tiers."
"If I need to integrate devices for logs, it is easier with Splunk. We can integrate different applications, network devices, and databases. It is also very rich in documents. It is the best."
"The risk-based alerting (RBA) is one of the valuable features."
"We primarily use it to correlate logs throughout the enterprise for both searching and use in investigations."
"The consolidated overview of all the events that come in through our environment and an easy-to-access interface for all our end users are valuable."
"The most valuable features for us include its robust log management capabilities, which allow us to efficiently handle and retain logs for extended periods as needed."
"The UI of Splunk makes it easier for our analysts to move around and see what they need to see."
"I find it beneficial that Splunk Enterprise Security easily integrates with other tools. Due to its excellent API capabilities, it facilitates connections with various cybersecurity tools."
 

Cons

"The solution needs more integration with cyber intelligence systems."
"AlienVault OSSIM is costly."
"The user interface could be improved."
"We need more dashboards and we need more customization for dashboards."
"When comparing AlienVault OSSIM to other solutions it looks a bit outdated. Additionally, they need to improve their integration."
"AlienVault OSSIM gives unwanted notifications."
"Lacking in depth of reporting."
"The price of this solution is very high and it could be cheaper."
"The incident response dashboard could be more user-friendly."
"We usually have to follow up with technical support on our open cases."
"The threat detection system has room for improvement."
"It does not give us permission to implement on-premise so we implement them on the cloud."
"I would say we haven't seen any return on investment with Splunk Enterprise Security because we are still maturing and trying to get everything situated, and we're experiencing roadblocks with other teams not wanting to give us what we need."
"The implementation and the scanning of the logs can be difficult."
"One thing that I probably dislike the most about the Splunk product is their support."
"The integration with all our tool sets felt like we were reinventing the wheel, which was a pain point for us."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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 tool's licensing costs are yearly."
"I used the paid version of the tool and found it to be expensive. It has been a while since I changed to Securonix. I will have to check whether AlienVault charges per device, user, or log."
"The solution is open source, so it's free to use."
"AlienVault OSSIM is free."
"AlienVault OSSIM is expensive compared to its competitors."
"When comparing AlienVault OSSIM to Microsoft Sentinel, AlienVault OSSIM incurs additional costs due to its licensing price structure. If you are using AlienVault for security purposes at a certain level it can have a higher price point than the current pricing of Microsoft Sentinel."
"We are using the community version, which can be used for free."
"The pricing depends on the bandwidth of an organization and is good compared to some SIEM tools. IBM, for example, is quite costly. But Microsoft Sentinel is notably cheaper."
"Splunk is priced higher than other solutions."
"The price of Splunk Enterprise Security is high."
"It is expensive. I work for multiple clients. I am working for more than five clients, but most of the clients are switching from Splunk to Sentinel because of the cost. Even though Sentinel is very limited, clients are moving to Sentinel."
"It's definitely worth it."
"Splunk Enterprise Security is not at all cost-friendly to be deployed in very small enterprises like start-ups."
"Splunk Enterprise Security is expensive."
"Setup cost is cheap: It is free, it is user-friendly, and it is fast."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) solutions are best for your needs.
881,384 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

VS
Manager, Enterprise Risk Consulting at a tech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Feb 26, 2015
HP ArcSight vs. IBM QRadar vs. ​McAfee Nitro vs. Splunk vs. RSA Security vs. LogRhythm
We at Infosecnirvana.com have done several posts on SIEM. After the Dummies Guide on SIEM, we are following it up with a SIEM Product Comparison – 101 deck. So, here it is for your viewing pleasure. Let me know what you think by posting your comments below. The key products compared here are…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
 

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 Business109
Midsize Enterprise50
Large Enterprise264
 

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 is a better choice, Splunk or Azure Sentinel?
It would really depend on (1) which logs you need to ingest and (2) what are your use cases Splunk is easy for ingestion of anything, but the charge per GB/Day Indexed and it gets expensive as log ...
How does Splunk compare with Azure Monitor?
Splunk handles a high amount of data very well. We use Splunk to capture information and as an aggregator for monitoring information from different sources. Splunk is very good at alerting us if we...
 

Also Known As

OSSIM
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Council Rock School District
Splunk has more than 7,000 customers spread across over 90 countries. These customers include Telenor, UniCredit, ideeli, McKenney's, Tesco, and SurveyMonkey.
Find out what your peers are saying about AlienVault OSSIM vs. Splunk Enterprise Security and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,384 professionals have used our research since 2012.