Azure Network Watcher vs OP5 Monitor comparison

Microsoft and ITRS are both solutions in the Network Monitoring Software category. Microsoft is ranked #42 with an average rating of 8.5, while ITRS is ranked #39 with an average rating of 9.0. Microsoft holds a 0.5% mindshare in NMS, compared to ITRS’s 0.6% mindshare. Additionally, 92% of Microsoft users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of ITRS users who would recommend it.

Azure Network Watcher

Read 13 Azure Network Watcher reviews

1,082 Views
1,039 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

OP5 Monitor

Read 7 OP5 Monitor reviews

1,753 Views
1,367 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Azure Network Watcher

OP5 Monitor

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 10, 2024

OP5 Monitor and Azure Network Watcher are competing network monitoring solutions. OP5 Monitor leads in pricing and customer support, while Azure Network Watcher stands out with its advanced features.

Features: OP5 Monitor offers comprehensive alerts, detailed reporting, and flexible dashboards. Azure Network Watcher provides advanced network diagnostics, packet capture, and performance monitoring.

Room for Improvement: OP5 Monitor can benefit from enhanced network diagnostics, deeper integration capabilities, and more extensive performance analytics. Azure Network Watcher could improve its user interface, simplify setup processes, and expand its support for non-Azure environments.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: OP5 Monitor is known for its straightforward deployment process and responsive customer service. Azure Network Watcher integrates natively within the Azure ecosystem but has a complex setup. It offers online resources and support channels for Azure customers.

Pricing and ROI: OP5 Monitor offers competitive pricing and a quick ROI with efficient monitoring capabilities. Azure Network Watcher's pricing aligns with its comprehensive feature set, providing substantial ROI for enterprises committed to the Azure ecosystem.

To learn more, read our detailed Azure Network Watcher vs. OP5 Monitor Report (Updated: April 2026).

Buyer's Guide

Azure Network Watcher vs. OP5 Monitor

April 2026

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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

Azure Network Watcher

Ranking in Network Monitoring Software

42nd

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

5.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

OP5 Monitor

Ranking in Network Monitoring Software

39th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

4.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

IT Infrastructure Monitoring (38th)

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Azure Network Watcher is 0.5%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OP5 Monitor is 0.6%, down from 0.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Network Monitoring Software Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
OP5 Monitor	0.6%
Azure Network Watcher	0.5%
Other	98.9%

Network Monitoring Software

Featured Reviews

Bijoyendra Roychowdhury

Program Manager at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees

Network monitoring provides comprehensive analytics while the interface requires further development

The quality of Azure Network Watcher is quite good in terms of the in-depth analysis you can create from these matrices. There are other monitoring tools such as New Relic, AppDynamics, and Dynatrace which provide very detailed network tracing. Cloud providers such as Azure or AWS do not have that kind of GUI-based capability at this point, but using PowerShell or Python, you can develop it yourself. From the GUI perspective, it still needs to evolve in terms of quality and standard, though overall, it is quite good for troubleshooting. Regarding areas for improvement, when comparing to other network tools beyond Azure Monitor or Azure Network Watcher, those tools can identify single failed packets. This level of granularity is not currently possible with cloud providers as they only go to a certain level rather than the granular level needed for deep troubleshooting, though they do provide hints with available matrices.

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Sumanth Arshanapally

Senior Analyst at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees

Monitoring ease and cost-saving benefits enhance operational efficiency

The monitoring in OP5 Monitor is very easy because we can directly use custom plugins. We can write custom scripts and use those scripts directly. It's very low cost, open, and the dashboards are easy to see. We can extract the reports easily, and this is very easy to compare. Real-time monitoring in OP5 Monitor provides data every one minute or every five minutes, enabling us to get live data from the last one minute or last five minutes. OP5 Monitor gave us proper server availability, so we can always check whether a server goes down or the server CPU and memory decreases. Before reaching a particular bottleneck situation, we identified and fixed the issue, which helped us from a cost-saving business perspective. It helped us avoid application downtime.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Azure Network Watcher provides valuable features based on your specific requirements and use cases, helping you monitor network bandwidth, throughput, data flow consumption, and control costs by giving insight into egress and ingress traffic, total input and output operations, bandwidth, and threats through IP identification."

"The most valuable feature of Azure Network Watcher is the cloud-native application firewall, which is helpful for securing databases."

"The most valuable features I have found are typology, visualization, and capture."

"The solution is stable, there are no bugs or glitches and it doesn't crash or freeze, it's reliable."

"My advice to others looking into using Azure Network Watcher is to go for it, as you'll have the tool by default when you're subscribed to Azure VNet."

"This will help the company or the administrator, by helping them see how the traffic moves, to make sure that no entities are having any communication issues or different endpoints with task issues."

"The solution is good for monitoring device behavior."

"What I like most about Azure Network Watcher is that it's focused more on the architecture. I also like that it has a packet capture feature that tells you how the packet travels and whether it's exiting Azure, etc."

More Azure Network Watcher pros

"The API makes it pretty easy to integrate with any system."

"The best feature is that it is very relatable, stable, and scalable. The logger is a part of the software, but it's not the most important point of it."

"OP5 Monitor is a great choice due to its being built on an open-source monitoring tool and provides ample opportunity for customization based on specific support requirements. It is also user-friendly and easy to manage with a wide range of plugins available for use. In comparison to other enterprise tools, such as Micro Focus, OP5 Monitor stands out for its features and cost-effectiveness, making it the best tool in the market. Customization is one of the key strengths of the tool and provides a lot of capabilities. Additionally, it is easy to find support and plugins for the tool through online resources."

"Instead of checking the logs each Monday, or checking that applications are running, and checking your ticketing system for angry users, you put this system in place and it monitors and continuously tests everything that is of importance to you and your users."

"The monitoring in OP5 Monitor is very easy because we can directly use custom plugins; we can write custom scripts and use those scripts directly, it's very low cost, open, and the dashboards are easy to see."

"Its open-source environment is accessible to everyone."

"Especially with the API, where I can use the data with many other systems, it's great."

"With limited hardware or a virtual machine, you can address a huge network, hundreds of thousands of elements that need to be monitored. Other commercial software is not on that level."

More OP5 Monitor pros

Cons

"The solution could use some additional components of the network culture, not only VMs. I'd like to see some additional security features because what they currently have concentrates only on the network."

"The initial setup and deployment could be improved to be simplified."

"Azure Network Watcher could improve by having other built-in applications, for example, an application to log activities for inbound and outbound traffic."

"The solution could improve by limiting the need to clarify the logs. When the clarification is minimized, it is better for everyone involved."

"Sometimes, you encounter a VPN tunnel, network, or routing issue, but finding out more about the blockage is challenging."

"There are some occasional downtimes, but these were based on Azure-specific issues."

"Azure is good, however, the Fortinet GUI is more intuitive and I like it more than anything else."

More Azure Network Watcher cons

"IT environments today are in constant flux. This is driven by the newer cloud technologies such as Kubernetes and Docker, etc. The whole Nagios-based monitoring system that OP5 is created on top of, is based on a host-service model. There is a need for a strategy on what to do with more dynamic environments. There is some cool stuff going on in that direction."

"We do not get performance reports properly."

"The user interface is not what we are used to these days, and should be improved."

"The solution is useful for tweaking. However, there have been some negative experiences, such as limited report capabilities. The only report available is in PDF format, making it difficult for teams managing multiple servers to extract data in Excel format. The speaker recommends that the team improve the report capabilities to better serve users."

"The user interface is not what we are used to these days, and should be improved."

"OP5 lacks some visualization, a feature that makes some other products nice. Op5 is built for purpose, which is fine, but if you compare it with some new products, the visualization is not so appealing, especially for management... If you don't need fancy visualizations, OP5 is fine."

"They need to improve the dashboard interface."

More OP5 Monitor cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is good. It's not too expensive."

"Azure Network Watcher is a little bit expensive."

"The price of the solution is reasonable."

"Price-wise, I have no information on how much Azure Network Watcher costs."

"It was not expensive. And because it's less demanding in terms of hardware, you don't have to pay for another SQL or other database license, and you can have a huge installation on one machine..."

"The cost of the license and support are separate. If you want platinum call support, it will cost more than a regular call. I did not opt for it, as it is an additional cost."

"OP5 has a very low price as a solution, compared to many other solutions out there."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

23%

Construction Company

10%

Government

University

Financial Services Firm

13%

Manufacturing Company

12%

Government

11%

Construction Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Large Enterprise	7

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	2
Large Enterprise	5

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Azure Network Watcher?

I do not have the exact setup cost information on hand, but it is available in the public Azure portal. You can access the calculator there to get detailed pricing information.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Azure Network Watcher?

The main area for improvement is AI-based features. Currently, many intelligent tools are coming from third parties, and Azure Network Watcher needs to improve in this area. The focus should be on ...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Azure Network Watcher?

Azure Network Watcher is used for monitoring network traffic. It provides insight into egress and ingress traffic, which helps determine whether consumption can be controlled. Most Azure services c...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for OP5 Monitor?

The price for OP5 Monitor is fine, but we don't know the exact price because it was managed by us; the customer themselves bought it and gave it to us to monitor.

See all answers

What needs improvement with OP5 Monitor?

OP5 Monitor could include application monitoring in addition to infrastructure monitoring. If application business transactions were monitored, it would be helpful. For application-related issues, ...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for OP5 Monitor?

Our previous use case for OP5 Monitor was server monitoring.

See all answers

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Compared 7% of the time

PRTG Network Monitor vs Azure Network Watcher

Compared 6% of the time

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Compared 11% of the time

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Compared 9% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

Opsview vs OP5 Monitor

Compared 7% of the time

Splunk Observability Cloud vs OP5 Monitor

Compared 5% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Azure Network Watcher

April 2026

Download Azure Network Watcher product report

Buyer's Guide

OP5 Monitor

March 2026

Download OP5 Monitor product report

Overview

Azure Network Watcher is a comprehensive network monitoring and diagnostic service offered by Microsoft Azure. It provides a range of tools and capabilities to help users monitor, diagnose, and gain insights into their Azure network infrastructure. With Network Watcher, users can capture and analyze network traffic, monitor network performance, troubleshoot connectivity issues, and gain visibility into network topology. It also offers features like packet capture, flow logs, connection monitoring, and VPN diagnostics to ensure the smooth operation of Azure networks. Network Watcher enables users to proactively identify and resolve network issues, optimize network performance, and enhance the overall reliability and security of their Azure network environment.

Microsoft

OP5 Monitor - The Complete Monitoring Solution

OP5 Monitor is a flexible and highly scalable monitoring solution for all sizes of environments. Use just one product to monitor your IT environment regardless of location, whether on-premise, in dynamic environments, public cloud or a hybrid of these.

Digital transformation adds extra layers and complexity to the IT estate by creating a hybrid IT environment of both static and dynamic environments, that can be difficult to monitor efficiently. ITRS OP5 Monitor gives enterprises full visibility over their entire IT estate through a single pane of glass, allowing them to consolidate monitoring tools and cut down costs.

ITRS

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Svenska Spel, Carus, VGL, Tele2, Viking Line, Clas Ohlson, Vanderlande, Försäkringskassan

Buyer's Guide

Azure Network Watcher vs. OP5 Monitor

April 2026

Free Report: Azure Network Watcher vs. OP5 Monitor

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