Dynatrace vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

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Dynatrace Logo
45,838 views|27,551 comparisons
95% willing to recommend
SolarWinds Logo
5,107 views|3,370 comparisons
87% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary
Updated on Jun 27, 2023

We performed a comparison between Dynatrace and SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor based on real PeerSpot user reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.

  • Ease of Deployment: Dynatrace has an easy and straightforward initial setup that requires minimal technical knowledge and configuration. SolarWinds, on the other hand, varies in setup time depending on the size of the infrastructure and can take anywhere from hours to two months to complete. While SolarWinds upgrades can be problematic and time-consuming, Dynatrace's maintenance is organic.
  • Features: Dynatrace provides real user tracking, AI automation, and Kubernetes topology visualization, while SolarWinds offers in-depth process and service monitoring, network device performance monitoring, and infrastructure dependency mapping. The two solutions differ in their monitoring capabilities and visualization tools.
  • Pricing: Dynatrace's pricing is unclear and can be confusing to determine the number of units to buy, and there is an additional charge for premium support. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor's pricing is based on the number of devices and modules, and it can fluctuate based on the dollar's current rate. However, some reviewers find SolarWinds' prices expensive.
  • Service and Support: While some customers have found Dynatrace's technical support to be responsive and helpful, others have experienced longer wait times and have suggested that the documentation could be improved. On the other hand, SolarWinds' support team has been praised for their knowledge and responsiveness, but some customers have still experienced long wait times and have noted a lack of initial knowledge from the engineers.
  • ROI: Dynatrace offers automation, continuous improvement feedback, and tool consolidation which can lead to significant ROI. On the other hand, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor focuses on improving performance, reducing downtime, and increasing productivity.

Comparison Results: Dynatrace is the superior product when compared to SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor. It has more advanced features including AI capabilities and better visualization capabilities. It also offers better visibility and scanning of services and applications, with the ability to analyze traffic.

To learn more, read our detailed Dynatrace vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor Report (Updated: May 2024).
771,157 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"The proactive monitoring that we can do with Dynatrace where it is 24/7 on with all the user experience indexed and everything coming into us.""We started monitoring our VMware hypervisors and that gave us valuable system specific metrics into our virtual environments.""Mean time to root cause analysis decreased drastically.""It prevents (together with performance testing) production performance issues which usually result in customer complaints or system downtime.""It is a robust solution that would help anyone get to the solution and resolution pretty fast.​""It seems to be very stable. We have not had any outages attributed to the product.""Simplified the way to monitor a medium to big environment.""We are quite happy with the support that they have been providing."

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"Monitoring the components on your devices with out of the box monitors or the ability to create new ones (SAM)""I'd rate technical support at eight out of ten. They are helpful and fast.""Management Console - Managing service to each server enrolled in the Solarwinds is much easier. Using a web base console, you can control your service much convenient way. There is no need to login remotely. It save a lot of time and effort.""The initial setup was relatively easy, and we didn't have to install anything. All we had to do was put on the devices we wanted to monitor.""The most valuable feature of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is the network devices' performance monitor is the best.""The more valuable feature of this solution is the Exchange feature.""SolarWinds is a very stable platform compared to others on the market.""Manage Groups: The capability to group appropriate devices gives better visibility of sites, categories, or critical regions. The same can be used to represent a dashboard for higher management."

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Cons
"It needs container log monitoring.""Make it easier to define applications. E.g., provide an API for applications defined by REST services.""More visibility into Python processes.""It definitely needs HA, because we have so many applications that are dependent on AppMon that it has been deemed critical. Any downtime, it just affects so many users. So that's one of our key asks for the future.""It could improve its GUI interface. The GUI design is too crowded and the icons are small. Sometimes I end up clicking on the wrong button.""If you want to see a month's data, it keeps on spinning. Here is an improvement which needs to happen, which is the case with all applications or tools. There is a lot of data, and either we have to change the way we are logging or the application needs to be enhanced.""I'd really like to see more dashboarding abilities. The ability to do workflows within dashboards, being able to start at a high level and click into it with custom dashboards. I think most of the time, we are creating our own custom dashboards, and I'd just like to see more ability with that.""As we move into using more AWS native architectures, it should support everything that we want to do. We don't want to adopt another tool."

More Dynatrace Cons →

"They should incorporate more artificial intelligence. There should also be more predictive features.""The tool's AppStack needs to improve in the storage monitoring part. It should also include an analytics and recommendation approach. If I have found a fault in a server or application, I would like to know what caused it and how do I recover from it.""I think they need to make reporting easier and more simple & dynamic.""A lot of times, we have to do a lot of manual cleanups.""SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor could improve the server monitoring and the web application monitoring features are not good. Microsoft SCOM has better server monitoring.""I would like to see support for non-Windows or non-Microsoft domains, especially Apache and other non-Windows servers.""When you implement SolarWinds on a larger scale my customers complain about the speed.""The tool’s report feature created issues for us. We needed to gain skills to use that feature. The tool’s customization is not easy since you have to reconfigure the whole system."

More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor Cons →

Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "Pricing is based on the number of servers monitored, so for big applications, it is a bit expensive."
  • "Licensing is a bit complicated for Dynatrace, and pricing is dependent on how much your organization invests."
  • "We found an issue within the first week of ownership that has been costing us more than the entire license cost."
  • "Product pricing can seem a little over complex, however this is minor and does not detract from the benefits of the solution."
  • "Getting the first agents installed, getting information, and coverage in a initial set of systems can be done in hours and with a low cost entry point."
  • "Price (of the product) is a major concern for all the clients I work with."
  • "The licensing model is confusing in solutioning clients for the number of hosts needed to deploy."
  • "The product is superior to others, but it comes with a price tag that is often difficult to position back to clients."
  • More Dynatrace Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "I have always said SolarWinds is very “proud” of their products, meaning they are expensive. I cannot afford to purchase all the licenses I need for all the SolarWinds products."
  • "When planning for the number of licenses to purchase, make sure you understand all of the elements within an application required to really understand performance well. In our case, we quickly came to the conclusion that an unlimited license for SAM was the way to go."
  • "Nagios XI, WhatsUpGold, Uptime Software, PRTG, Manage Engine, and SpiceWorks are the other tools that have lower pricing and licensing costs. However, they can't compete with SolarWinds when it comes to the features and functionality that SolarWinds can provide."
  • "I would advise potential buyers to wait until the end of the quarter, end of year, or other time to place orders. There are actually great deals to be had at those times if your budget cycle can match up."
  • "Pricing and licensing is fair for what you get. It does have a great bang-for-the-buck appeal."
  • "SAM is not per server so the pricing model can be deceiving. If you have an enterprise environment, you will quickly exceed your licensing quickly. You should know this before going in."
  • "Understanding the counts of objects to monitor will determine the licensing need. In terms of pricing, it’s not cheap but it’s not expensive as larger vendors whose products don’t have all the features or integrations."
  • "The product might cost you $30,000 USD to buy, but scaling this solution requires the purchase of additional polling engines at $20,000 USD each."
  • More SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor Pricing and Cost Advice →

    report
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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:The key is to have a holistic view over the complete infrastructure, the ones you have listed are great for APM if you need to monitor applications end to end. I have tested them all and have not… more »
    Top Answer:While the environment does matter in the selection of an APM tool, I prefer to use Dynatrace to manage the entire stack. Both production and Dev/Test. I find it to be quite superior to anything else… more »
    Top Answer:There are many factors and we know little about your requirements (size of org, technology stack, management systems, the scope of implementation). Our goal was to consolidate APM and infra… more »
    Top Answer:The price is too high. The tool is overpriced. We don't need all the features. The product must minimize the features and reduce the price. It all comes down to pricing. The customers find it pretty… more »
    Top Answer:The biggest pain point is root cause analysis. It is difficult to analyze, assess, and warn my IT department about what will happen in the next five hours. It is also difficult to use AIOps to reduce… more »
    Ranking
    Views
    45,838
    Comparisons
    27,551
    Reviews
    13
    Average Words per Review
    502
    Rating
    8.4
    Views
    5,107
    Comparisons
    3,370
    Reviews
    11
    Average Words per Review
    443
    Rating
    7.3
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    SolarWinds SAM
    Learn More
    Overview

    Dynatrace is an AI-powered software intelligence monitoring platform that accelerates digital transformation and simplifies cloud complexities. Dynatrace is an entirely automated full-stack solution that provides data and answers about the performance of your applications and deep insight into every transaction throughout every application, including the end-user experience. By modernizing and automating enterprise cloud operations, users can deliver an optimal digital experience with higher quality software to customers faster.

    Dynatrace offers an all-in-one automated artificial intelligence solution that brings together application performance, cloud and infrastructure, and digital experience monitoring. Dynatrace accelerates performance-driven results through operations, development, and business teams with a shared metrics platform. In addition, users are provided a full-stack monitoring experience with three patented technologies:

    • Smartscape - visualization mechanism that maps the totality of everything working in your environment and detects any casual dependencies between your applications, processes, websites, services, hosts, cloud infrastructure, and networks.

    • OneAgent - a technology that analyzes, gathers ,and unifies all business performance metrics throughout every layer of your technology stack.

    • PurePath Technology - code-level context and timings are captured from the mainframe to the cloud for all end-to-end transactions.

    What does Dynatrace offer?

    Dynatrace redefines how organizations monitor their digital ecosystems. The solution offers:

    • Cloud Automation: With AI engine Davis®, users can see the exact reason for problems and facilitate quick auto-remediation and intelligent cloud orchestration.

    • Application Security: With automated application vulnerability management, users can deliver applications faster and more securely.

    • Infrastructure Monitoring: Convenient broad visibility across your environments is provided with streamlined, automated infrastructure monitoring.

    • Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM): Optimize your applications, provide better support, and improve user experience with a combination of Real User Monitoring (RUM), Session Replay, and synthetic monitoring throughout your environment.

    • Applications and Microservices: For complex cloud environments, Dynatrace can automatically provide visibility and root-cause answers. It can also monitor microservices.

    • Digital Business Analytics: Get AI-powered, real-time answers to analytical business queries with KPIs and metrics that are already flowing through applications.

    Reviews from Real Users

    Dynatrace is the only solution that provides answers to organizations based on deep insight into each user, transaction, and organization's environment.

    Barry P., a managing performance engineer at Medica Health Plans, writes, "With Dynatrace, we have synthetic checks and real-user monitoring of all of our websites, places where members and providers can interact with us over the web. We monitor the response times of those with Dynatrace, and it's all integrated into one place."

    A consultant at a tech service company notes, "A feature that's one of the highlights of Dynatrace is the AI. The second most valuable feature is OneAgent. Between infrastructures, applications, operating systems, you can deploy with just a single agent and can practically install and forget about it."

    SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers powerful application and server monitoring capabilities for IT pros, enabling them to diagnose and troubleshoot performance issues faster. Do not let slow applications and downtime impact your end-users and business services. Pinpoint the root cause of application issues across various layers of the IT stack. SolarWinds SAM is affordable and easy to deploy, use, and customize. You can automatically discover your system's environment and start monitoring in about an hour. No professional services or consultation needed.

    Sample Customers
    Audi, Best Buy, LinkedIn, CISCO, Intuit, KRONOS, Scottrade, Wells Fargo, ULTA Beauty, Lenovo, Swarovsk, Nike, Whirlpool, American Express
    Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm28%
    Insurance Company9%
    Computer Software Company9%
    Manufacturing Company8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization28%
    Financial Services Firm18%
    Computer Software Company8%
    Manufacturing Company6%
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm20%
    Construction Company13%
    Recruiting/Hr Firm7%
    Energy/Utilities Company7%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization41%
    Computer Software Company10%
    Government8%
    Financial Services Firm6%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business17%
    Midsize Enterprise12%
    Large Enterprise70%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business11%
    Midsize Enterprise34%
    Large Enterprise56%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business36%
    Midsize Enterprise15%
    Large Enterprise49%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business11%
    Midsize Enterprise48%
    Large Enterprise41%
    Buyer's Guide
    Dynatrace vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor
    May 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Dynatrace vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: May 2024.
    771,157 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Dynatrace is ranked 2nd in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability with 341 reviews while SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is ranked 18th in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability with 38 reviews. Dynatrace is rated 8.8, while SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Dynatrace writes "AI identifies all the components of a response-time issue or failure, hugely benefiting our triage efforts". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor writes "We use this product for base and application monitoring. ". Dynatrace is most compared with Datadog, New Relic, AppDynamics, Splunk Enterprise Security and Sentry, whereas SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is most compared with Azure Monitor, AppDynamics, Prometheus, Nagios XI and ServiceNow Discovery. See our Dynatrace vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor report.

    See our list of best Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability vendors.

    We monitor all Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.