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Cisco DNA Center vs Zabbix 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

Cisco DNA Center
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
13th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
Network Management Applications (1st), Network Automation (2nd)
Zabbix
Ranking in Network Monitoring Software
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
105
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (8th), Server Monitoring (1st), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (1st), Cloud Monitoring Software (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Network Monitoring Software category, the mindshare of Cisco DNA Center is 1.4%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zabbix is 12.6%, up from 11.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Network Monitoring Software
 

Featured Reviews

AvrahamSonenthal - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficiently manages our wireless network and provides valuable monitoring features
The platform's biggest benefit has been in managing our wireless network. Having a single pane of glass to control all wireless controllers and access points and to monitor activity has been a significant advantage. We're a small federal agency with around 300 network devices, so automation is a minor focus. It's more relevant for larger networks. The main benefits we've seen are in inventory management and the potential for configuration automation. However, I recommend using the DNA Centre only for larger networks with over a thousand devices; otherwise, it may not be cost-effective. Before proceeding, ensure that your devices are compatible with DNA Center, as not all Cisco devices are supported. Also, investing in proper training is different from plug-and-play. I rate it an eight.
ASM Naushad Alam - PeerSpot reviewer
Allows any number of customizations but lacks functionality for finding root causes
We have not yet purchased the commercial version so have a lack of technical ability. We do not yet fully know the key points or key features of the solution. We just use what we use along with WhatsUp Gold. Based on our use only, stability is rated a seven out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It offers automation, security enforcement, analytics, and integration with other Cisco technologies, making it a key driver for efficient network operations and compliance with security protocols."
"The most valuable features of Cisco DNA Center are wireless assurance and visibility."
"It is a stable solution."
"The solution helps in user microsegmentation."
"It is very versatile in terms of analytics."
"The solution helps with the management and orchestration of campaigns. It helps with visibility and analytics. I also like its SDA configuration."
"The product offers an intuitive and automated way to manage user networks. It gives me an insight into the network health."
"Automation helps configure devices without manual intervention, enabling zero-touch provisioning."
"We are able to monitor our virtual infrastructure, virtual machines, windows servers, databases, and the network using a simple network management protocol. We are able to pull almost all the metrics that we want, receive notifications, and have them integrate with telegrams for certain devices that are critical, such as UPSs."
"The product is very stable."
"It provides high scalability, alerting, notification, templating, and end-to-end security."
"It's a very reliable platform and we've never had any issues regarding the scalability or the stability of Zabbix."
"The level of discovery-based configuration that lets us auto-configure the monitoring for various systems is a valuable feature."
"The performance and bandwidth are valuable features."
"Zabbix can use old data to current data to set the threshold. We can use previous data to set the threshold."
"We use Zabbix to monitor our organization's IT infrastructure and workstations. We don't use Microsoft Intune since it's expensive. The tool's real-time alerting system has proved crucial for us, particularly when a new device joins a network that is not one of our own devices. It notifies us about the presence of this new device, allowing us to investigate further. Additionally, it alerts us about disk usage, memory usage, and the software installed on the machine."
 

Cons

"From the recent DNA point of view, there are some stability challenges with Cisco, but very minor."
"When it comes to deploying wireless fields, integrating defaults into the DNS interface can be challenging."
"Integration with analytic tools and API integrations would be ideal."
"As a user, it would be good if I could plug in controllers, suites, and devices from other vendors to Cisco DNA Center."
"The solution's setup process needs enhancement."
"The tool's deployment is complex. It also needs to improve its GUI."
"It seems to be a little bit more centered toward wireless than wired. You've got more options you can do wirelessly than you can with the wired switches, but it works for what we need it to do. We would like to see a little bit more about the traffic, and we're looking at what's out there to see about that. We are looking at something that might give us a bit more insight into the actual traffic. If they had the full functionality on the wired side, as they do on the wireless side in terms of being able to view traffic and everything, it would be good."
"The features of Cisco DNA Center and Cisco Prime could have more parity."
"Implementation is always tailored to the customer and the kind of information we need from the client to carry it out can make them very uncomfortable. Sometimes the clients are not ready to share it."
"Zabbix is powerful, but it is difficult to understand initially. There are many things that can be improved, but we might not be using Zabbix to its fullest extent. The software has more features than we need."
"There are some features of Zabbix that are not good for reporting. The DX Spectrum solution has better reporting."
"Zabbix does not draw automatic mapping of the network, this is something they should add in the future. There is a lot of effort that is involved in tailoring some of the settings which could be made easier."
"Zabbix is not easy to configure, and upgrading is also an issue."
"Zabbix isn't very good at automation just yet."
"Documentation terminology could be improved."
"​I would like to better be able to monitor Oracle processes.​"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution is expensive. The hardware is licensed on the device, but the hardware on the server is expensive."
"The partnership price is notably high, but it ultimately depends on the chosen business model."
"The price could be better. It's a very expensive tool."
"We get a yearly license at the time we buy the product."
"The tool is medium-priced."
"The solution is a little bit expensive but depends a lot on the customer's usage. If you use it in the right place, you can easily pay for it."
"The tool's licensing may not come across as something that may be friendly for users."
"The product is very costly."
"For pricing, it's free. We don't pay anything for it. They open-source the code, and people pay for support."
"I was using the free, Community Edition."
"It's free software released under the GNU/GPL license."
"If you have 20,000 hosts, the support costs around €95,000 for a year."
"It is free, which allows us to reduce costs."
"Zabbix is open-source so if one wishes to implement it in-house, they must have qualified professionals to set up and optimize databases, Linux/Unix OS, PHP, Apache, and depending on what is monitored, a full-stack network and systems administrator may be needed."
"We use the open-source version of Zabbix."
"We purchased Zabbix for a good price, including support"
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Comparison Review

it_user174738 - PeerSpot reviewer
May 31, 2015
Nagios vs. Zabbix vs. PRTG vs. Spiceworks vs. Solarwinds Network Performance Monitor
I have researched a quite a few network monitoring tools which can be used for various monitoring purposes of not only the servers, but the intermediate routers as well. There are majorly three types of these softwares. Ones which are completely open-source, you can do almost anything you want…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
17%
Government
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Educational Organization
37%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Manufacturing Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Cisco DNA Center?
The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that it gives some kind of ease in operations, especially since our company is moving from CLI to GUI-based configuration.
What needs improvement with Cisco DNA Center?
The system is working fine for me currently.
What do you like most about Zabbix?
The template system in Zabbix is very beneficial as it saves time in configuration.
What needs improvement with Zabbix?
For me, Zabbix is very straightforward. I cannot think of any improvements needed. It's a very mature product. The only issue I can note is that it's Linux-based, and Linux documentation is not the...
 

Also Known As

DNA Center
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
1. IBM 2. Dell 3. Cisco 4. HP 5. Oracle 6. Microsoft 7. Amazon 8. Google 9. Facebook 10. Twitter 11. LinkedIn 12. Netflix 13. Adobe 14. VMware 15. Salesforce 16. SAP 17. Intel 18. AT&T 19. Verizon 20. T-Mobile 21. Vodafone 22. Ericsson 23. Nokia 24. Siemens 25. General Electric 26. Honeywell 27. Philips 28. Sony 29. Samsung 30. LG 31. Panasonic 32. Toshiba
Find out what your peers are saying about Cisco DNA Center vs. Zabbix and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,388 professionals have used our research since 2012.