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Apica vs Instana Dynamic APM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 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

Apica
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
18th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (17th), IT Operations Analytics (6th)
Instana Dynamic APM
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
21st
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Apica is 0.3%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Instana Dynamic APM is 1.3%, down from 1.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

Noorul Mustafa Khan - PeerSpot reviewer
Validates content and perform login functionalities on front-end applications
First of all, it will depend on the type of application. If it's a web application, I would recommend implementing it in your lower environment first and checking for functionality. If you are satisfied, then push it to the higher environments. Apica has detected server-related issues and various web application-related issues promptly, alerting us in a timely manner. This allowed us to implement automation within our processes, ensuring comprehensive performance monitoring from failure detection to recovery. It was pretty easy to learn. I attended a couple of sessions with team members. They provided knowledge transfer, which took about a week. After that, I was able to onboard the company. However, for minor issues, I would still contact them. If you're a quick learner, it could take just a couple of weeks to get the hang of it. You can integrate Apica architect into your system because they provide APIs. With these APIs, you can utilize Apica where and when it's needed. For instance, you can create your own microservices to automate tasks or integrate it with tools like Postman. This flexibility allows you to embed Apica into various automation processes or any other functionalities you require. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.
Muhammad Jawwad Hassan - PeerSpot reviewer
A really good GUI that is easy for non-technical users to understand
Our company uses the solution for one of our bank clients. We use App Connect middleware to monitor services and applications such as Docker, Kubernetes, MongoDB, and MS SQL Server. We also monitor the bottleneck for all servers.  We currently have 20 users at one of our branches. We plan to expand…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"As always, within the IT industry, everybody's always looking to upgrade and update everything else like that. Apica has been one of those things but it's really hard to replace because it offers us the unique capability to see what the customer is seeing. A lot of other ones can do Selenium script and things like that, but there's a lot in Apica that we use right now. We utilize a lot of the scenario options in Apica right now, and there's a lot of other ones that do parts of it, but it doesn't do everything that Apica does."
"Our application SREs do script checks in such a way that closely mimic our customers' actions using the platform. Because there are so many different ways and options to be able to configure checks to closely mirror your applications' capabilities, it provides a lot of optionality for teams to create the right type of check that can notify when there are any issues. At the end of the day, we want our monitoring tools to be able to catch any outage before our customers do. This is where Apica Synthetic does a great job."
"From our standpoint, there are a number of valuable features. The WebHooks are obviously really great. The alert framework is really good and then the reporting and visualizations that you get from the dashboards is good. Those three areas are primarily what my team's focused on in terms of usage from day to day."
"It uses a basic scripting language, which is easy to learn and customize as needed. Compared to LoadRunner, I found writing and customizing code much easier in Apica."
"What I like the most is that Apica can simulate different browsers and different versions of desktop or mobile browsers."
"Anyone can understand the solution easily because it doesn't require a specific scripted language."
"There are several features that are really good. The first one is the flexibility and the advanced configuration that Apica offers when it comes to configuring synthetic checks. It provides the ability to customize how the check should be performed and it is very flexible in the number of synthetic locations that it can use. It allows us to run scripts from different locations all over the world, and they have a really good number of these locations."
"It is easy for beginners to learn and use Apica."
"The primary selling point of this product is its unparalleled transparency into the infrastructure."
"If a key monitored value has crossed a threshold, it sends out an alert. And the solution is able to intelligently find out if something is beyond the range that it normally resides in."
"With Instana, the interface and the UI are very simple to use."
"Instana is very fast to implement and deploy because the dashboards are automated and don't need configuration."
"The platform’s most valuable feature is the ability to monitor the performance of containers for request and response analysis."
"Visually, it's very good. It provides everything needed for dynamic detection, which is very useful."
"We can easily perform root cause analysis using the tool."
"With auto-discovery, we didn't need to consider much. We just installed the agent on the host and it was able to detect everything from the host level up to the service level, for whatever stack was installed, and that includes containers and dockers."
 

Cons

"It is difficult to create a script using ZebraTester."
"We could use more detailed information in the request and response sections."
"Alerting needs improvement. It's a little noisy. It needs some better options. Currently, they have an issue, when you set up a synthetic monitor, you can set up where it's monitoring from, a data center that Apica owns."
"Apica should add more features and integrations with different tools and certain ticketing systems, like ServiceNow."
"The initial screen on their dashboard could have a bit more data, but this is a small thing. It could have more data, so we do not need to drill down to a screen behind that initial information. I would like them to get a little better on the user interfaces that we need to go into."
"If you are adding any input file, the tool fails to capture the path."
"The customer service and support were a little slow to respond. The browser sometimes checks alerts on unknown issues like latency from Apica's side."
"The tool does not provide automatic correlation features."
"I think that Instana should improve the university and the certification process, so the users can find experts in Instana with their certification module process."
"The auto-remediation features must be improved."
"New Relic has a better UI in terms of how it presents the data."
"Its SLI and SLA features need improvement in setting up alerts."
"They could improve the product’s dashboards and provide more dashboard options."
"Many managers, as well as our customers, used to ask for reports, such as "top X number of queries that are slow," or "top pages that have the highest number of issues." This is something that can be improved by Instana. Currently, they don't have that kind of reporting available out-of-the-box."
"The configuration of Instana Dynamic APM needs improvement because it requires quite a bit of work."
"Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is completely free and open source. I've been using it for about two and a half years and installed it on both my personal and client machines without needing a license. All features are available for use without any hidden fees."
"The pricing and licensing are very reasonable. At the end of the day, you are using their technology/software and getting X amount of checks for a very decent value. As for discounts, they try to meet your budgets as much as they can. For example, if you need 100 checks and you have X amount of budget for it, then they will try and get down to that price. Costing-wise, it is a reasonably cost product. They will always try and come down to your price if you need them to come down to it by knocking off certain areas."
"The pricing is fair. It is neither too cheap nor too expensive."
"I know Apica is an expensive solution, but it is worth the money for the service it provides."
"Apica is pretty cost-effective if you buy both solutions together: Synthetic and LoadTest. If you are going for one solution, the cost is on par with any tool in the market."
"The level of alerting accuracy has saved us time and money in operational costs. Overall, it has automated a lot of the manual efforts which have been more complex with some of our other scripting tools or monitors. So, it brings things together by doing things faster and saves us money."
"The product is less expensive compared to LoadRunner."
"Another main difference between Apica and the other products was the cost. We really thought that the balance in Apica between the features and costs was the best among all the products on which we did a PoC."
"Pricing is quite competitive. Dynatrace, AppDynamics, and New Relic were all several times more expensive than Instana, both the on-prem and the SaaS versions. Price-wise they are a lot more competitive than anyone else out there."
"It's reasonably priced and manageable, especially for individuals who grasp the significance of application monitoring."
"The solution's pricing is comparable to other products."
"Instana Dynamic APM is more affordable for small and medium-sized companies compared to other vendors."
"The solution is less expensive than one of its competitors."
"The pricing is $1,200 per year which is a bit high compared to other vendors."
"Its pricing isn't a big pain point. Its pricing seems to be better than some of the other competing products in the market, but they also have some of the features and functionalities that are better than Instana."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
35%
Insurance Company
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Media Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
27%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Apica Synthetic?
The GUI is powerful and doesn't require scripting or regular expressions. It has a vast finder for correlation, which is easier than other tools like JMeter and LoadRunner. It's also easy to integr...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Apica Synthetic?
I know Apica is an expensive solution, but it is worth the money for the service it provides.
What needs improvement with Apica Synthetic?
Apica is costly, and there's no way to test mobile applications through Apica. You can test mobile applications through other platforms. However, Apica is only for APIs and applications.
What do you like most about Instana Dynamic APM?
The platform’s most valuable feature is the ability to monitor the performance of containers for request and response analysis.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Instana Dynamic APM?
I rate the pricing a seven out of ten. There are no additional costs associated with the product.
What needs improvement with Instana Dynamic APM?
Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring.
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Apica LoadTest, Apica Synthetic
No data available
 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

HBO, JPMC, Morgan Stanley, Xander, EA Sports, Volvo
Daxko Lifts Fitness Studios Through COVID Regulations with Quick Engineering PivotsAltissia Meets SLAs to Support Student DeadlinesImmocloud Unlocks Observability to Modernize Real EstateEnento Group Boosts Service Reliability with Real-Time Visibility into Application Performance Instana’s Observability for Amazon EKS Helps Yara Deliver Digital Farming Solutions
Find out what your peers are saying about Apica vs. Instana Dynamic APM and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,265 professionals have used our research since 2012.