Chronosphere vs Splunk AppDynamics comparison

Chronosphere and Splunk are both solutions in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category. Chronosphere is ranked #33 with an average rating of 9.0, while Splunk is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.3. Chronosphere holds a 0.3% mindshare in APM, compared to Splunk’s 4.6% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Chronosphere users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 91% of Splunk users who would recommend it.

Chronosphere

Read 1 Chronosphere review

748 Views
688 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Splunk AppDynamics

Read 249 Splunk AppDynamics reviews

13,425 Views
10,740 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

Chronosphere

Splunk AppDynamics

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Executive SummaryUpdated on May 11, 2025

Splunk AppDynamics and Chronosphere compete in cloud monitoring and application performance management. Chronosphere has an upper hand due to its advanced features and scalability.

Features: Splunk AppDynamics offers comprehensive application performance tracking, real-time business metrics visualization, and flexible deployment models. Chronosphere stands out with high scalability, seamless integration with cloud-native environments, and strong observability focus.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Splunk AppDynamics supports on-premise, hybrid, and cloud environments, emphasizing support via professional services. Chronosphere is cloud-native by design, known for rapid deployment and a collaborative support experience. Its deployment ease and support structure make it adaptable for cloud-centric organizations.

Pricing and ROI: Splunk AppDynamics offers predictable pricing with diverse licensing options, often leading to positive ROI reports. Chronosphere may have high initial setup costs but promises significant returns through efficiency and advanced insights.

To learn more, read our detailed Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

July 2025

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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

Chronosphere

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

33rd

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Log Management (28th), AIOps (16th)

Splunk AppDynamics

Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

3rd

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

249

Ranking in other categories

IT Infrastructure Monitoring (5th), IT Operations Analytics (2nd), Mobile APM (1st), Container Monitoring (3rd)

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Chronosphere is 0.3%, down from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk AppDynamics is 4.6%, down from 5.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

Featured Reviews

Arvind Pant

Senior Data Engineer at DoorDash

Monitors pipelines with real-time alerts and good documentation

It isn't very easy. It's not easy for everyone. It would be much easier if there could be a simpler version, like a data number version or an SQL version. It's hard to debug if you don't know the syntax. Also, I saw the Slack alerts feature, which is pretty cool, but I cannot customize my messages on the Slack alerts. It would be great if it were possible to tag people in the alerts. At DoorDash, we have hundreds of pipelines, and if something fails, I want to tag specific people so they can start working on the issue immediately.

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Gyanesh Rahatekar

Back office at Reliance Industries Ltd

Application performance management and error resolution improved with data-driven insights

Dynatrace has multiple functions compared to Splunk AppDynamics, so Splunk AppDynamics should add those functions, which are not available as of now. Dynatrace has a universal agent that collects all information related to their CI, and if one CI has multiple languages, then there is no need to instrument multiple agents. However, Splunk AppDynamics requires multiple agents; if I have one server with multiple applications in different languages, then I need to instrument different agents for each application. Splunk AppDynamics should work with Dynatrace with one single universal agent that works with all application languages, eliminating the need for multiple implementations.

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 alerting features are good"

"We set up alerts recently so we can fix any issues more quickly in production."

"What I like most about AppDynamics Server Monitoring is that it's easy to manipulate and easy to implement. All solutions have the same features, but what sets AppDynamics Server Monitoring apart is that it's really quick to implement. AppDynamics Server Monitoring has a great interface. As a developer, it doesn't matter whether it's SolarWinds, Dynatrace, or any APM you're using, but it would matter to the customer. A product must be easy to manipulate or use, for example, AppDynamics Server Monitoring, for the customer, but for developers like my team, there's no pressure, even if a solution requires coding."

"It reduces the time to resolve issues and requires less manpower."

"Technical support is helpful."

"The proactive monitoring from AppDynamics definitely helps."

"We have found the scalability to be quite good."

"The most valuable feature of AppDynamics is Proactive Monitoring and Alerting."

"AppDynamics has been stable."

More Splunk AppDynamics pros

Cons

"It's not easy for everyone."

"The Log Analytics feature is a bit complicated."

"The solution could improve the server size for AppDynamics to include middleware products, which is doesn't yet cover. If they add middleware for sophisticated sites, AppDynamics would be the global choice."

"The product’s dashboard could be more easy to implement."

"The interface and user experience could be better."

"An area that has room for improvement on the CR and ERP would be the addition of monitoring of the internal solution. For example, you can monitor the day-to-day and everything in the transactions with AppDynamics, but there's also a lot going on in the kernel itself that you cannot monitor. The automation needs to improve as well. As it stands, a lot of customization needs to happen before you can use AppDynamics."

"I am not very impressed with support. The service could be better."

"An improvement could be if the monitoring was able to be summarized into something more clear and simple for people who don't have the technical skills on the database side."

"There needs to be an option to capture all the sessions for all the users, not just samplings."

More Splunk AppDynamics cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available

"The pricing for AppDynamics is expensive, but it is possible to negotiate special pricing through bids."

"AppDynamics Database Monitoring requires a license for database monitoring and other features, while Dynatrace provides monitoring and other features out of the box without additional costs. Sometimes this makes it more challenging to pitch AppDynamics Database Monitoring to customers, especially because you need to buy a separate license. As an implementer, I have yet to learn about the pricing for AppDynamics Database Monitoring. Pricing is taken care of by the sales team."

"The licensing cost is fairly high"

"It's a very expensive product. Each of the licenses after this month for one server is around $9,000 or $10,000."

"The pricing model for AppDynamics could be better. You have to subscribe to a yearly or a three-year licensing, which isn't very handy. The solution is one of the most expensive in the market today."

"One of the main downsides to the solution is its cost."

"It is a more expensive APM among the competitors, which is fine because it also does a lot more on the auto-detection and the AI side... It is not a cheap product. None of them are. The price is fair, but I could use it on more projects if they had a lower price."

"AppDynamics does not usually do monthly payments. They do it on an annual basis, at the very least."

More Splunk AppDynamics pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

16%

Financial Services Firm

16%

Retailer

13%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Financial Services Firm

26%

Computer Software Company

14%

Educational Organization

12%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Chronosphere?

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Chronosphere?

I work as a data engineer, and we have many streaming pipelines. We use Chronosphere to monitor various metrics, such as how much data our pipeline is processing in each batch, the volume of incomi...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering Chronosphere?

If you want to monitor pipelines and use something like Kafka or any streaming platform, Chronosphere is the best option for monitoring pipelines with real-time alerts. It is loosely coupled with y...

See all answers

Any advice about APM solutions?

There are many factors and we know little about your requirements (size of org, technology stack, management systems, the scope of implementation). Our goal was to consolidate APM and infra monitor...

See all answers

APM tools for a Managed Service Provider - Dynatrace vs. AppDynamics vs. Aternity vs. Ruxit

Hi Avi! It's great to see your thorough approach to selecting an APM package for your MSP company. Considering your focus on SMBs and enterprises in Israel, Dynatrace seems like a solid choice with...

See all answers

What do you like most about AppDynamics?

The solution saves time and cost.

See all answers

Comparisons

Splunk Observability Cloud vs Chronosphere

Compared 29% of the time

Datadog vs Chronosphere

Compared 21% of the time

Honeycomb.io vs Chronosphere

Compared 21% of the time

Grafana vs Chronosphere

Compared 20% of the time

Dynatrace vs Chronosphere

Compared 9% of the time

More Chronosphere Competitors

Dynatrace vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 14% of the time

Datadog vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 9% of the time

Splunk Enterprise Security vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 8% of the time

New Relic vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 8% of the time

Grafana vs Splunk AppDynamics

Compared 5% of the time

More Splunk AppDynamics Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

July 2025

Download Chronosphere product report

Buyer's Guide

Splunk AppDynamics

June 2025

Download Splunk AppDynamics product report

Overview

Chronosphere provides a robust platform for managing and monitoring cloud-native applications with features like real-time observability, incident management, and capacity planning. It offers scalable, detailed observability across complex systems, an intuitive interface, and cost-efficient resource management. Users report enhanced productivity, improved collaboration, and better decision-making, bolstering operational capabilities and organizational growth.

Chronosphere

Splunk AppDynamics enhances application performance monitoring with advanced diagnostics and real-time insights, offering seamless end-to-end transaction tracking and infrastructure visibility.

AppDynamics provides critical tools for businesses to analyze application behavior and performance. Through innovative features like transaction snapshot analysis and adaptable dashboards, users can quickly identify and address issues, ensuring high levels of system uptime and efficiency. It is designed to support complex environments including Kubernetes and AWS, enhancing user experience by detecting performance issues early. Despite needing improvements in network monitoring and integration, it remains a robust option for tracking application health.

What are the key features of AppDynamics?

Real-time Performance Monitoring: Offers immediate insights into application behavior.
Business Transaction Tracking: Tracks transactions from start to finish for bottleneck identification.
JVM Memory Monitoring: Provides detailed JVM metrics and memory use information.
Deep-dive Diagnostics: Enables in-depth analysis of code and stack traces.
Adaptable Dashboards: Customizable views for better data interpretation.

How does AppDynamics benefit users?

Improved Incident Resolution: Faster problem detection and solution implementation.
Enhanced Application Performance: Real-time monitoring optimizes system operations.
Comprehensive Visibility: Provides a full view of application infrastructure.
Informed Decision Making: Detailed analytics guide performance improvements.
Customer Satisfaction: Enhances user experience through faster issue resolutions.

In industries like financial services and e-commerce, AppDynamics facilitates performance tracking across distributed systems, optimizing infrastructure to meet consumer demands. It excels in environments needing precise transaction monitoring and is pivotal in delivering high value and satisfaction.

Splunk

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Cisco, Sony, Nasdaq, Reserve Bank of New Zealand, Edmunds.com, Puma, Fox News, DirecTV, Pizza Hut, T-Systems, Cornell University, OpenTable, BITMARCK, Green Mountain Power, Care.com, Overstock, Paddy Power, eHarmony, Kraft, The Motley Fool, The Container Store, and more See more customers

Buyer's Guide

Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability

July 2025

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