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Cisco DNA Center vs IBM Tivoli NetCool comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 2, 2025

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

Cisco DNA Center
Ranking in Network Management Applications
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (18th), Network Automation (2nd)
IBM Tivoli NetCool
Ranking in Network Management Applications
10th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Network Management Applications category, the mindshare of Cisco DNA Center is 8.7%, down from 24.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Tivoli NetCool is 3.7%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Management Applications Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Cisco DNA Center8.7%
IBM Tivoli NetCool3.7%
Other87.6%
Network Management Applications
 

Featured Reviews

Mahir Öztürk - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Engineer at NGN Bilgi ve İletişim Hizmetleri
Client history has helped resolve past network issues more efficiently
I mostly use the client history feature of Cisco DNA Center. I didn't use the real-time monitoring capability of Cisco DNA Center because I primarily used it for client history regarding issues and problems. I don't use it for real-time monitoring. If there is a problem, I can inspect the situation and see what is happening, which is beneficial.
Petar Ganev - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Enterprise Monitoring Engineer at Commerzbank
Reliable for enterprise monitoring but no longer actively developed
There are problems with the latest security requirements because many things have changed in recent years, and now the security audits are very strict. And we need to switch to something else. We need to patch it constantly. Moreover, it is a very old tool and a little bit difficult to support. Otherwise, they work okay.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I like that we can easily configure any new hardware. It's also easy to deploy and easy to troubleshoot."
"It does a lot of things automatically, and that's the big thing with it. They're making the software so that you don't need to be as knowledgeable as me on the switching and routing side to get your work done. If you want, you can have DNA troubleshoot your problem for you and give you solutions or fix it itself, if it was something that's just a configuration issue."
"Application Assurance works very well."
"The most valuable features include AI-driven insights which make troubleshooting much easier."
"What's most valuable in Cisco DNA Center is the ability to manage any Cisco infrastructure and device through it. Setup was straightforward."
"The price is really high, but it's worth every single dollar you pay."
"We have many people from the team who manage a lot of devices. By using Cisco DNA Center, it has taken some of that burden away, we are impressed with it. We did the investment in CAPEX, but in the OPEX was very low."
"The biggest lesson that I have learned from working with this solution is that this technology is much easier now."
"The solution is very fast, there's no lag or delay between the IBM solution and the other solutions like Huawei and Nokia."
"The scalability of monitoring, the breadth of supported network components, the scale of the number of monitoring events, and the flexibility in customization make this a well-rounded product."
"Tivoli NetCool allows us to grasp a lot of data that can be applied toward predictive analytics and auto-remediation."
"Anything is possible with Tivoli. It's quite a robust system."
"Support is one of the best aspects of this solution. NetCool is a good product that has good flexibility. There are a lot of documents available online which is one of the best features of IBM Tivoli Suite. Whenever an issue happens, rather than going to technical support, if you find the exact issue in Google, you can get tech notes for that particular issue."
"It's very easy to use."
"Full featured - event/fault management, performance management, topology map, discovery, RCA, event enrichment, Proviso will chart data from almost any source with a variety of aggregation options."
"The solution is a complete package; it has various useful elements including inventory management and incident management packaged inside it, and anything is possible with Tivoli since it is quite a robust system that offers a lot of useful integration capabilities."
 

Cons

"There should be an option for automation of template deployment by using the stored data."
"The tool's deployment is complex. It also needs to improve its GUI."
"Cisco could improve the security side of their solutions."
"What could be improved is the licensing cost of Cisco DNA Center. It's a little bit expensive."
"The cost is very high."
"There should be an option for automation of template deployment by using the stored data. It is not easy to save configuration information for lots of devices without using other tools. There should be a tighter, better repository of information that can be merged with the templates."
"From the recent DNA point of view, there are some stability challenges with Cisco, but very minor."
"The features of Cisco DNA Center and Cisco Prime could have more parity."
"IBM's technical support takes a long time to do root cause analysis, and we have to go through several levels of help before getting a solution."
"The product is pretty costly. It's definitely not the least expensive option."
"Tivoli NetCool is based on a Linux platform, it would be beneficial if they moved it to Windows because not everyone is acquainted with Linux."
"This is another one of those suites glued together from a myriad of acquisitions and it shows once you get under the hood."
"Customization and integration that you need to do to make the product fit your needs is very complex. It is not a product that somebody could easily pick up without any prior training or experience."
"The solution is not user-friendly."
"The solution is too expensive."
"Tivoli NetCool's has medium scalability - there are some problems with its replications not being mature."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is very costly."
"The partnership price is notably high, but it ultimately depends on the chosen business model."
"The solution is expensive."
"It is an expensive solution."
"I do know that Cisco does offer some really good promotions for DNA Center to bring the costs down."
"We have a three-year license with them."
"The price could be better. It's a very expensive tool."
"I would rate the pricing a six out of ten, with ten being expensive."
"The price of the product is too expensive."
"Customers are required to pay a licensing fee."
"It costs around 100k for every ten servers, which is lower than similar products from other vendors."
"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
13%
Government
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Educational Organization
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise9
Large Enterprise24
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Cisco DNA Center?
After evaluating other solutions, we will provide feedback.
What needs improvement with Cisco DNA Center?
The deployment of Cisco DNA Center was complex due to the fact that on the data center side, we have a Juniper infrastructure, which created some complexity, though not significant. The deployment ...
What is your primary use case for Cisco DNA Center?
In my organization, we currently have some Cisco devices such as access switches, and we also have infrastructure, but that is not part of our responsibility. We do not manage that infrastructure. ...
What is the best network monitoring software for large enterprises?
I have worked from 1973 with all kind of systems in large enterprises across the world. And have experience with all kind of software in monitoring from infra to end to end, it depends on the funct...
What needs improvement with IBM Tivoli NetCool?
The main challenge is its licensing model, which is very complicated.
What is your primary use case for IBM Tivoli NetCool?
NetCool is the manager of managers in the stack. It basically combines the devices of the whole network. We are the mobile network operator, so we use it to assist us in cross-domain correlations a...
 

Also Known As

DNA Center
Tivoli NetCool
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Claranet, Consolidated Communications, Telus, €sterreichische Bundesbahnen (€BB), Telekom Srbija, Bendigo Community Telco, Capgemini, Schweizerische Bundesbahnen (SBB)
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco DNA Center vs. IBM Tivoli NetCool and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
899,125 professionals have used our research since 2012.