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Elastic Observability vs Instana Dynamic APM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 24, 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

Elastic Observability
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
11th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
IT Infrastructure Monitoring (15th), Log Management (16th), Container Monitoring (6th), Cloud Monitoring Software (11th)
Instana Dynamic APM
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
31st
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of Elastic Observability is 1.8%, down from 5.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Instana Dynamic APM is 1.0%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Elastic Observability1.8%
Instana Dynamic APM1.0%
Other97.2%
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

Mohammed-Abdelalim - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant Vice President at QualityKiosk Technologies Pvt. Ltd.
Has provided powerful customization for unique monitoring needs but needs more out-of-the-box capabilities
In my opinion, the best features of Elastic Observability are their flexibility to integrate with other existing systems and the ability to build a unified monitoring tool that can integrate with existing ones and end-to-end user journeys which require a lot of customizations. The greatest feature in Elastic is the ability to customize. This is similar to my comments about customizable dashboards in Elastic because it's visible to the analyst. However, it's very great. Customizing these dashboards can meet the customer's specific use cases and specific stories that they have in their environment, their special environment that doesn't look like other environments. The dashboarding in Elastic is highly customizable to the level of logos. If the customer wants his company logo in the dashboard, it can be done.
Muhammad Jawwad Hassan - PeerSpot reviewer
IT Consultant at Arcana Info
A really good GUI that is easy for non-technical users to understand
Our company uses the solution for one of our bank clients. We use App Connect middleware to monitor services and applications such as Docker, Kubernetes, MongoDB, and MS SQL Server. We also monitor the bottleneck for all servers.  We currently have 20 users at one of our branches. We plan to expand…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I recommend Elastic Observability for its completeness of vision and wide ecosystem."
"The price is very less expensive compared to the other solutions."
"It is very stable, and I would rate it ten out of ten based on my interaction with it."
"The product has connectors to many services."
"The solution has been stable in our usage."
"Elastic provides built-in features for queries and report generation. It's a very good tool for monitoring integration capabilities."
"From my experience with several major customers, the most valued feature of Elastic is its log analytics capabilities."
"Machine learning is the most valuable feature of this solution."
"We can easily perform root cause analysis using the tool."
"It's a good tool to implement across the board if you can make it into your images or as part of your configuration management tool."
"The most valuable features are the monitoring with granularity by one second, which allows real-time data generation, and the fast implementation."
"With auto-discovery, we didn't need to consider much. We just installed the agent on the host and it was able to detect everything from the host level up to the service level, for whatever stack was installed, and that includes containers and dockers."
"The overall capabilities are the most valuable."
"It is user-friendly, but we encounter issues processing input and understanding the graphics, such as seeing a flatline without knowing the cause. When these problems occur, I have to contact my support team to address and fix them. Also, monitoring processing is good."
"If a key monitored value has crossed a threshold, it sends out an alert. And the solution is able to intelligently find out if something is beyond the range that it normally resides in."
"The overall capabilities are the most valuable."
 

Cons

"It lacked some capabilities when handling on-prem devices, like network observability, package flow analysis, and device performance data on the infrastructure side."
"The solution would be better if it was capable of more automation, especially in a monitoring capacity or for the response to abnormalities."
"In the future, Elastic APM needs a portfolio iTool. They can provide an easy way to develop the custom UI for Kibana."
"Elastic Observability’s price could be improved."
"Simplifying the parsing of logs and manual efforts would also be beneficial."
"I am familiar with Azure Monitor, which I find more user-friendly compared to Elastic, which is a very technical tool."
"There's a steep learning curve if you've never used this solution before."
"They need more skills in the market. There are not enough skills in the market."
"The configuration of Instana Dynamic APM needs improvement because it requires quite a bit of work."
"Many managers, as well as our customers, used to ask for reports, such as "top X number of queries that are slow," or "top pages that have the highest number of issues." This is something that can be improved by Instana. Currently, they don't have that kind of reporting available out-of-the-box."
"The solution's monitoring is pretty weak and should be improved."
"The auto-remediation features must be improved."
"Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring."
"We'd always like to see additional functionalities."
"New Relic has a better UI in terms of how it presents the data."
"Maybe log monitoring could be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product’s pricing needs improvement."
"We will buy a premium license after POC."
"Pricing is one of those situations where the more you use it, the more you pay."
"So far, there are just the standard licensing fees. Several of the components are embedded in the license or are even open source. They're even free depending on what you use, which makes it even more appealing to someone that is discussing pricing of the solution."
"The product is not that cheap."
"Elastic Observability is cheaper than other similar solutions, such as Dynatrace. Its license calculation is based on various factors like data volume and physical infrastructure, particularly related to RAM capacity."
"Since we are a huge company, Elastic Observability is an affordable solution for us."
"Users have to pay for some features, like the alerts on different channels, because they are unavailable in different source versions."
"Its pricing isn't a big pain point. Its pricing seems to be better than some of the other competing products in the market, but they also have some of the features and functionalities that are better than Instana."
"The solution's pricing is comparable to other products."
"Instana Dynamic APM is more affordable for small and medium-sized companies compared to other vendors."
"The pricing is $1,200 per year which is a bit high compared to other vendors."
"Pricing is quite competitive. Dynatrace, AppDynamics, and New Relic were all several times more expensive than Instana, both the on-prem and the SaaS versions. Price-wise they are a lot more competitive than anyone else out there."
"It's reasonably priced and manageable, especially for individuals who grasp the significance of application monitoring."
"The solution is less expensive than one of its competitors."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
19%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Retailer
6%
Construction Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise16
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise5
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Elastic Observability?
The problem is their licensing model, which is a bit confusing. Many customers struggle to understand their total cost of ownership because Elastic licensing is not dependent on easy, quantifiable ...
What needs improvement with Elastic Observability?
After careful consideration about areas for improvement in Elastic Observability, aspects such as pricing, customization, implementation, and scalability could be improved. As a user of the system,...
What is your primary use case for Elastic Observability?
My use case for Elastic Observability is observability, as we upload our customers' data, including logs, and when there is an issue, we can analyze what went wrong.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Instana Dynamic APM?
I rate the pricing a seven out of ten. There are no additional costs associated with the product.
What needs improvement with Instana Dynamic APM?
Sometimes, the issue arises from user changes, such as adjusting firewall settings without proper consideration, leading to compatibility issues within the network monitoring.
What is your primary use case for Instana Dynamic APM?
We use the solution to monitor the platform. If an issue arises, like a user experiencing errors, we can identify general errors and investigate specific secure areas to ensure the application runs...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

PSCU, Entel, VITAS, Mimecast, Barrett Steel, Butterfield Bank
Daxko Lifts Fitness Studios Through COVID Regulations with Quick Engineering PivotsAltissia Meets SLAs to Support Student DeadlinesImmocloud Unlocks Observability to Modernize Real EstateEnento Group Boosts Service Reliability with Real-Time Visibility into Application Performance Instana’s Observability for Amazon EKS Helps Yara Deliver Digital Farming Solutions
Find out what your peers are saying about Elastic Observability vs. Instana Dynamic APM and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
896,692 professionals have used our research since 2012.