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Azure Monitor 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

Azure Monitor
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
3rd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
54
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Monitoring Software (4th)
Instana Dynamic APM
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
18th
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 February 2025, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Azure Monitor is 8.0%, down from 8.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Instana Dynamic APM is 1.0%, down from 1.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

Swapan Biswas - PeerSpot reviewer
A powerful Kusto query language but the alerting mechanism needs improvement
Alerts cannot be configured to monitor at a certain point in time. For example, we might want to alert people at zero hours but that is not possible. Splunk can accomplish this and its alerts are far better than the solution's options. The alerting mechanism is not up to the market. The default interface should be improved. You can prepare your own dashboard by using custom query language, but the default interface is not good.
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

"The solution's most valuable features are its ease of use and support for multiple environments"
"Log analytics and log queries are the most valuable features of Azure Monitor."
"For me, the best feature is the log analysis with Azure Monitor's Log Analytics. Without being able to analyze the logs of all the activities that affect the performance of a machine, your monitoring effectiveness will be severely limited."
"The upside to the solution is if you are working in a Microsoft or Azure environment, it makes things easier."
"I use the solution to monitor the infrastructure and applications."
"You can scale the product."
"The most valuable feature is that it's stable. It hasn't crossed any thresholds."
"It has good troubleshooting features."
"The primary selling point of this product is its unparalleled transparency into the infrastructure."
"Instana is very fast to implement and deploy because the dashboards are automated and don't need configuration."
"It is user-friendly, but we encounter issues processing input and understanding the graphics, such as seeing a flatline without knowing the cause. When these problems occur, I have to contact my support team to address and fix them. Also, monitoring processing is good."
"The overall capabilities are the most valuable."
"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."
"We can easily perform root cause analysis using the tool."
"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."
"The platform’s most valuable feature is the ability to monitor the performance of containers for request and response analysis."
 

Cons

"We cannot use AI services with the solution."
"Lacks information including details related to where problems lie."
"The process of implementation needs to be easier."
"n comparison to New Relic, which I've used before, it's a bit more complicated. It's not as easy to use. It also took some time to get it working. The implementation needs to be simpler."
"I'd like the solution to do more around vulnerability assessment. It's lacking in the product right now."
"Azure Monitor's integration with applications could be improved."
"Setting up this solution is complex. It's also missing the functionality of assigning alerts."
"No improvements are needed from my perspective."
"We should be able to go back to scenarios during or before the issue. There should be something like a history playback. Such a feature or functionality would be good."
"Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring."
"New Relic has a better UI in terms of how it presents the data."
"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 auto-remediation features must be improved."
"The solution's monitoring is pretty weak and should be improved."
"The App Connect middleware does not integrate with or show corresponding sub nodes."
"We'd always like to see additional functionalities."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Customers of Azure Monitor must pay an amount that depends largely on how many services they need to integrate and the storage space required in terms of logs, etc. If they only have a few small services to monitor, the price won't be too high, but on the opposite side of the spectrum, it can certainly get pricey."
"The tool is expensive."
"The tool's pricing is very good. I could say that Microsoft offers different cost models, which are listed on the product's website."
"There is a monthly fee for the alerts triggered and the data stored."
"It's a costly solution"
"Azure Monitor is a competitively priced solution."
"Azure Monitor is cheaper compared to other third-party monitoring tools."
"The product offers a pay-as-you-go model to users. The charges are to be paid according to the usage of the product."
"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."
"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."
"The solution's pricing is comparable to other products."
"The pricing is $1,200 per year which is a bit high compared to other vendors."
"The solution is less expensive than one of its competitors."
"Instana Dynamic APM is more affordable for small and medium-sized companies compared to other vendors."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
28%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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...
What do you like most about Azure Monitor?
Azure Monitor is a very easy-to-use product in the cloud environment.
What needs improvement with Azure Monitor?
Azure Monitor could improve by adding capabilities for data observability and integrating more tightly with their data platform components.
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.
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Rackspace, First Gas, Allscripts, ABB Group
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 Azure Monitor vs. Instana Dynamic APM and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
832,138 professionals have used our research since 2012.