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AppDynamics vs Splunk Enterprise Security comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

AppDynamics
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
156
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (5th), Mobile APM (3rd), Container Monitoring (3rd)
Splunk Enterprise Security
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
301
Ranking in other categories
Log Management (1st), Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (1st), IT Operations Analytics (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Application Lifecycle Management solutions, they serve different purposes. AppDynamics is designed for Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability and holds a mindshare of 5.4%, down 6.5% compared to last year.
Splunk Enterprise Security, on the other hand, focuses on Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), holds 10.9% mindshare, down 14.3% since last year.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

Venus Yaker Dalton - PeerSpot reviewer
Oct 5, 2023
Very good real-time monitoring capabilities, deep problem diagnosis, and transaction mapping
As for areas of improvement, AppDynamics could benefit from greater integration with emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning. This would allow the tool to automatically analyze and correlate application performance and behavior data to detect patterns and anomalies not evident to users. Additionally, the ability to track performance in multi-cloud environments would be valuable as many organizations are adopting hybrid cloud or multi-cloud strategies. In terms of additional features, it would be beneficial to include a capacity management module that allows operations teams to proactively plan and adjust capacity, avoiding performance issues related to lack of resources.
Avinash Gopu. - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 1, 2024
Offers good visibility into multiple environments, significantly reduces our alert volume, and speeds up our security investigations
There are limitations with Splunk not detecting all user activity, especially on mainframes and network devices. This is because Splunk relies on agents, which cannot access certain workstations. In these cases, we have to rely on application data. For example, with mainframes, manual reports are generated and sent to Splunk, limiting visibility to what's manually reported. This lack of automation for specific platforms needs improvement from Splunk. Additionally, API access is limited for other applications that rely on API calls and requests. This requires heavy customization on Splunk's end. These are the main challenges we've encountered. Monitoring multiple cloud platforms, like Azure, GCP, and AWS, with Splunk Enterprise Security presents some challenges. While Splunk provides different connectors for each provider, consolidating data from two domains across distinct cloud environments can be complex. However, leveraging pre-built templates and Splunk's data collation capabilities can help overcome these hurdles. Despite initial difficulties, I believe Splunk can effectively address this task, earning it an eight out of ten rating for its multi-cloud monitoring capabilities. While Splunk Enterprise Security offers insider threat detection capabilities, its effectiveness could be enhanced by integrating with additional tools, such as endpoint security solutions. This integrated approach is particularly crucial for financial institutions, which often require dedicated endpoint security teams. While using multiple tools is valuable, further improvements within Splunk itself are also necessary. Considering both external integration and internal development, I would rate its current insider threat detection capabilities as three out of ten. Threat detection is where Splunk falls behind. While it offers tools, other use cases require additional work. PAM is an enterprise tool that centralizes information about users, servers, and everything else. It needs real-time monitoring, which I haven't seen in any of the companies I've worked for. They only rely on Splunk for alerting, but real-time monitoring should be handled by the endpoint security team's tools. This means there's no detection or analysis at the machine or endpoint level. Additionally, threat analysis reporting is also absent.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The features that I like best are the dashboard and Business Journey."
"The AppDyniamics technical support is good. We haven't had any problems with them. They answer very quickly."
"We previously had an operations team continuously monitoring applications. Now, they just have set things up and our developers can monitor, view, and act on them, accordingly."
"AppDynamics' most valuable feature is Business iQ, which is based on analytics."
"The most valuable feature of AppDynamics is Proactive Monitoring and Alerting."
"The real user monitoring helps us evaluate our customers' real experiences, which is valuable as an eCommerce company."
"What I like best about AppDynamics is that it's functional, particularly in APM in Java and .NET."
"Applications: This provides us insight into how our applications are performing within our environments and affords us the ability to identify opportunities and make changes to code / environment to effect positive performance lift."
"The solution is stable and reliable."
"The two features I appreciate most in Splunk Enterprise Security are the content management system and the inter-incident review dashboard."
"The solution's most valuable features are its ability to transact in the cloud and its ability to onboard data easily with minimum connectors."
"The product provides visibility and enables us to correlate data and generate alerts."
"We used it to create a custom anomaly detection data model to monitor the activity of our back-end services on an hourly basis relative to the past three months of activity."
"The solution's most valuable features are the granularity and analysis of the logs."
"The reporting aspect is good and it does what I need it to do."
"What I really like is that even if you have already collected the data, you can extract fields and can build searches."
 

Cons

"I think I would like to see a better way to deploy and upgrade the machine agents that we use. Currently, we have to use SCCM, and that might just be our environment with the customer."
"The integration ability of AppDynamics with other performance testing tools is an area with shortcomings where improvements are required."
"The cost element is an issue. I can't expect the company to change its way of work. However, given the fact that we earn and do all our business in South African Rand, I would prefer to buy in Rand as opposed to the American dollar or British pound."
"One area for improvement is the MST model. It would be more helpful if it could be offered as a managed service provider model with more multi-tenancy and features."
"The QA and test environment need improvement."
"AppDynamics's agent management could be improved."
"The documentation and training material have room for improvement."
"The resolution time takes longer than expected."
"The price of the solution could be cheaper."
"While Splunk Enterprise Security offers valuable features, its cost is high and could be more competitive."
"The GUI can be improved. Splunk has always suffered from having a kind of goofy UI, it needs some updating."
"Previously, they developed custom connectors or add-ons for a lot of applications. But that number can be upgraded still. There are a lot of applications in the world that are not supported."
"The solution could improve by making it more business analysis oriented. The way it is now is designed more for developers."
"I would like to have fraud detection features. Fraud is within the same turf as with security operations. Fraud and cybersecurity work hand in hand. I would like to have detection capabilities, or at least dashboards in Enterprise Security for fraud."
"Could be more user friendly."
"Its search or filtering capability is nice, but it can be improved. It is currently a bit complicated, and it should be simplified. If we can write the search filter in a more simplified way, it would be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I would say the solution is affordable because it is widely used across financial service sectors."
"It could be cheaper. It's a little cost prohibitive. There are so many features that also show a lot of value, but it’s not always easy to justify the cost."
"Purchasing the product through the AWS Marketplace was good."
"We are looking forward to purchasing the solution on the AWS Marketplace."
"Yearly payments have to be made toward the licensing costs of the solution. The solution has no additional costs apart from the licensing costs."
"The product is a bit expensive compared to other tools."
"The cost is prohibitive."
"This solution is not the cheapest but it works well. You will end up doing more work with a cheaper solution than if you just spent the extra money on a better solution like this one."
"Unlike other security tools, Splunk provides a fixed amount of gigabytes per day, and we are required to pay for any additional usage beyond that limit, in addition to our monthly cost."
"The price can always be lower, but it is fair at the moment. The cost efficiencies depend on the licensing and how much data we are bringing in. We have a fairly large footprint, so it is cost-effective."
"Pricing and licensing is quite expensive. But for the value the product provides, it seems at par in the market."
"The Splunk licensing is high."
"Licensing is a yearly, one-time cost."
"Truly evaluate the data you want to ingest and go slow. Pulling in data that can provide no use to your mission only wastes data against your license."
"It's definitely worth it."
"Splunk Enterprise Security's pricing is pretty competitive."
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Comparison Review

VS
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
Educational Organization
48%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
14%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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...
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...
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

AppD, AppDynamics APM
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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
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 AppDynamics vs. Splunk Enterprise Security and other solutions. Updated: May 2023.
815,854 professionals have used our research since 2012.