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Azure Network Watcher vs Plixer Scrutinizer comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 10, 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 Network Watcher
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
42nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Plixer Scrutinizer
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
75th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Network Traffic Analysis (NTA) (12th)
 

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 Plixer Scrutinizer is 0.5%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Azure Network Watcher0.5%
Plixer Scrutinizer0.5%
Other99.0%
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

Bijoyendra Roychowdhury - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
Ira Mulyanti - PeerSpot reviewer
Sales Director at ARGA SOLUSI
An affordable product with great integration capabilities
Plixer Core Platform is a valuable feature and a good software. Plixer Scrutinizer uses NetFlow analysis to monitor whatever is there in a network. Price-wise, Plixer Scrutinizer is not an expensive product. Basically, Plixer Scrutinizer is an affordable product. Plixer Scrutinizer is a tool that allows for customization, especially in scenarios where customers need new product features. Plixer Scrutinizer is a tool that can integrate with any other brand or product in the market, so it is not an area of concern.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of Azure Network Watcher is the cloud-native application firewall, which is helpful for securing databases."
"We use the solution to monitor network services. It helps to capture any network issues."
"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."
"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 solution is good for monitoring device behavior."
"The most valuable feature of Azure Network Watcher is using the gateways with the connections. The monitoring is useful for the logs and application insights into the data. The traffic filtering issues when it comes to deploying those applications are helpful."
"The solution is stable, there are no bugs or glitches and it doesn't crash or freeze, it's reliable."
"The most valuable features I have found are typology, visualization, and capture."
"The internal reputation of our IT to resolve historical bandwidth problems has 100 percent improved."
"The most valuable features of Plixer Scrutinizer are its ease of use, accessibility, and UI."
"It's agnostic as far as what your network gear is. As long as it supports an sFlow, JFlow, NetFlow, some kind of flow monitoring, Plixer will support it very well."
"We didn't experience any bugs."
"There are other tools out there that will do what Scrutinizer does. But what I have found with Scrutinizer is that it does it very quickly. I've taken 25 million individual data fragments from the different sensors, and it has graphed that and mapped it and presented a picture within 30 seconds. It has a very efficient database algorithm that I am really impressed with."
"It helps us determine what is going on with our Internet and who is hogging it all up. If we get a real high throughput or a throughput that's going over and getting dropped fairly quickly, we can tell who (or what device) is consuming that traffic."
"If you have a large network then this product is totally invaluable."
"If you really want to know what's happening on your network, this is one of the best tools that you can use."
 

Cons

"I would like to see in the future if we can troubleshoot as a firewall because it is equipment as a network player and some diagnostics."
"Sometimes, you encounter a VPN tunnel, network, or routing issue, but finding out more about the blockage is challenging."
"Azure Network Watcher needs to have better documentation and it needs to capture information accurately."
"Azure is good, however, the Fortinet GUI is more intuitive and I like it more than anything else."
"Technical support from Microsoft needs significant improvement compared to other product vendors."
"Azure Network Watcher could improve by having other built-in applications, for example, an application to log activities for inbound and outbound traffic."
"The initial setup and initial learning curve could be improved to be easier."
"There are some occasional downtimes, but these were based on Azure-specific issues."
"It would be useful if there was a way to back up the configuration information."
"Though Plixer Scrutinizer has network detection and response, it's an area that needs just a little more rounding out."
"From what I understand it is that the solution is not very scalable in a high volume traffic environment with a large number of flows."
"Data retention needs improvement. Data retention is a thing where we are looking for a better way to collect flow data for a longer time to do forensic research on security incidents."
"The reporting structure, the front-end GUI, also needs some work."
"The visual acuity of how it presents data can sometimes be confusing. It takes a bit for people to spin up how to look at the graphs."
"In Plixer Scrutinizer, scalability is an area with minor concerns where improvements are required."
"I wish the reporting side was easier to work with, but it does a decent job."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Price-wise, I have no information on how much Azure Network Watcher costs."
"The pricing is good. It's not too expensive."
"Azure Network Watcher is a little bit expensive."
"The price of the solution is reasonable."
"Our entire solution, amortized over five years, is in the vicinity of $40,000 to $50,000 a year."
"The license is per device. We have 50 devices."
"I rate Plixer Scrutinizer's price a three on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price or affordable, and ten is high price or expensive."
"We recently bought a license upgrade, so we will integrate more exporters. We upgraded from a 25 exporter license to a 50 exporter license. Therefore, there will be more flows, and this will be an extension. I don't know when we will purchase a faster server, because the server that we have is quite new."
"We just renewed. The pricing is 5,000 euro per year. This is the final price. All tax (20 percent) is included."
"There are no extra costs. It's about $8,000 a year. The bang for the buck (cost) is definitely a plus."
"It's about €10,000 a year for initial license and yearly maintenance costs. In addition, the hardware costs are about €10,000 once every five years."
"There is a recurring maintenance fee after the initial purchase or if we want the license upgrade."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
23%
Construction Company
9%
Government
6%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Real Estate/Law Firm
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise8
 

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.
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 ...
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...
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Oxford Networks, Squaw Valley Ski Holdings, UltiSat, Wipro, West Aurora School District 129, SUNY Geneseo College, Bloomington Public Schools, First National Bank of Pennsylvania, Kitsap Credit Union, Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County Houston Texas, Carilion Clinic, Banner Health, IDEXX Laboratories, Phibro Animal Health Corporation, Goodwill Industries, Parmalat, Armstrong Coal Company, Flybe, James Walker
Find out what your peers are saying about Azure Network Watcher vs. Plixer Scrutinizer and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
890,088 professionals have used our research since 2012.