Graylog Enterprise vs syslog-ng comparison

Graylog and One Identity are both solutions in the Log Management category. Graylog is ranked #15 with an average rating of 7.0, while One Identity is ranked #17 with an average rating of 10.0. Graylog holds a 6.0% mindshare in Log Management, compared to One Identity’s 2.4% mindshare. Additionally, 95% of Graylog users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of One Identity users who would recommend it.

Graylog Enterprise

Read 21 Graylog Enterprise reviews

8,356 Views
8,356 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

syslog-ng

Read 7 syslog-ng reviews

3,933 Views
3,933 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Graylog Enterprise

syslog-ng

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 8, 2025

Graylog Enterprise and syslog-ng are competitors in the log management and analysis category. Graylog Enterprise often has an advantage due to its user-friendly interface, while syslog-ng stands out for its extensive integration capabilities.

Features: Graylog Enterprise offers efficient search capabilities, scalable architecture, and customizable dashboards. Syslog-ng provides advanced log routing, parsing, and extensive integration options with various platforms.

Room for Improvement: Graylog Enterprise could enhance its integration capabilities and customization options, and improve performance under high loads. Syslog-ng might improve its user interface, streamline configuration, and offer more support resources to enhance user experience.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Graylog Enterprise is known for its straightforward deployment and responsive customer service. In contrast, syslog-ng is favored by users who prefer a detailed approach to installation and configuration, though this can be complex for less experienced users.

Pricing and ROI: Graylog Enterprise generally offers a lower setup cost and quicker ROI, benefiting from its efficient deployment. Syslog-ng may incur higher initial costs but yields a strong ROI due to its advanced capabilities when its full potential is leveraged.

To learn more, read our detailed Graylog Enterprise vs. syslog-ng Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Graylog Enterprise vs. syslog-ng

September 2025

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Helped 872,778 peers since 2012

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

Graylog Enterprise

Ranking in Log Management

15th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

syslog-ng

Ranking in Log Management

17th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

3.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Graylog Enterprise is 6.0%, up from 6.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of syslog-ng is 2.4%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Log Management Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Graylog Enterprise	6.0%
syslog-ng	2.4%
Other	91.6%

Log Management

Featured Reviews

Ivan Kokalovic

DevOps Engineer at Proton Technologies

Facilitates backend service monitoring with efficient log retrieval and API flexibility

Graylog is valuable because it bridges technical knowledge to non-technical teams, presenting complex backend processes in a simple timeline. It boosts the knowledge of sales and customer support teams by allowing them to see the backend operations without needing to read the code. Its API is flexible for visualization, and its powerful search engine efficiently handles large volumes of log data. Moreover, its stability, fast search capabilities, and compatibility with languages like ANSI SQL enhance its utility in IT infrastructure.

Read full review

RyanVargas

Senior Director and Senior Systems Engineer (Dual Role), IT Infrastructure and Security at a financial services firm with 51-200 employees

It's a user-friendly open-source solution that can replace or augment a commercial product in some cases

I rate syslog-ng 10 out of 10. It's free and easy to use. It has built-in tools that help us index the various logs sent to it. It's a solid log product. If you're looking for a SIEM solution, syslog-ng will work as a stopgap measure at beginning of the project. It can also work as an injector for a true SIEM solution. You can send all the logs to syslog-ng and forward all the data to the SIEM solution after you've cleaned up the data and got the pertinent information. It's a good front end for a commercial SIEM solution, which becomes more expensive as you load more data into it. I would highly recommend syslog-ng for that use case. However, if you lack the expertise, you might need to go with a cloud-based SIEM instead. You need some in-house expertise or an outside consultant to manage it and set it up.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Real-time UDP/GELF logging and full text-based searching."

"Graylog's search functionality, alerting functionality, user management, and dashboards are useful."

"Open source and user friendly."

"The Graylog features that have proven to be most beneficial for our data analysis in particular are that we tend to use it as a big data store, so we have the correlation rules that, if something matches under certain conditions, it raises an alarm."

"The solution's most valuable feature is its new interface."

"I like the correlation and the alerting."

"The product is scalable. The solution is stable."

"We're using the Community edition, but I know that it has really good dashboarding and alerts."

More Graylog Enterprise pros

"Syslog-ng provides easy access to all my logs. It helps me show managers and other clients precisely where an incident occurred. I also like it because you can integrate syslog-ng with multiple solutions to allow real-time monitoring."

"Syslog-ng has built-in features that we can use to create alerts for a SIEM solution. It isn't a true SIEM solution, but it's sufficient for the time being."

"We chose syslog-ng because it is easy to install, easy to maintain, easy to update, and due to the fact that all data arrive in raw format, we can manipulate it as we want."

"The ability to extract and store the logs is the most valuable feature of syslog-ng."

"For us, the most valuable feature is the use of compound search for searching logs at a specific time, by a specific user, or specific behavior."

"Syslog-ng has a separate config file in addition to the core configuration."

Cons

"It would be great if Graylog could provide a better Python package in order to make it easier to use for the Python community."

"There should be some user groups and an auto sign-in feature."

"The area in Graylog that needs to be improved or enhanced would be the integrations."

"Lacks sufficient documentation."

"I would like to see a date and time in the Graylog Grok patterns so that I can save time when searching for a log. I like how the streams and the search query work, but adding a date and time will allow me to pull out a log in a milli-second."

"More customization is always useful."

"Dashboards, stream alerts and parsing could be improved."

"Elasticsearch recommendations for tuning could be better. Graylog doesn't have direct support for running the system inside of Kubernetes, so it can be challenging to fill in the gaps and set up containers in a way that is both performant and stable."

More Graylog Enterprise cons

"In syslog-ng, I think a GUI would be beneficial. I am unsure if the premium module has a GUI to administer it."

"The filtering has room for improvement."

"Syslog-ng has built-in features that we can use to create alerts for a SIEM solution. It isn't a true SIEM solution, but it's sufficient for the time being."

"It's hard to find people who know how to use syslog-ng. I often find problems with configurations, and solutions aren't integrated correctly with syslog-ng. For example, there might be data with extra decimals, or the collector agents are incorrectly named. It isn't a problem with the solution; it's a lack of professionals."

"There is room for improvement in terms of observability."

"There is always the potential for additional integration and protocol extensions."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"You get a lot out-of-the-box with the non-enterprise version, so give it a try first."

"We're using the Community edition."

"It's open source and free. They have a paid version, but we never looked into that because we never needed the features of the paid version."

"It's an open-source solution that can be used free of charge."

"I use the free version of Graylog."

"There is an open source version and an enterprise version. I wouldn't recommend the enterprise version, but as an open source solution, it is solid and works really well."

"If you want something that works and do not have the money for Splunk or QRadar, take Graylog."

"Having paid official support is wise for projects."

More Graylog Enterprise pricing and cost advice

"Syslog-ng is open-source."

"Syslog-ng is a free open-source solution."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

16%

Comms Service Provider

10%

University

Educational Organization

Government

13%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	8
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	7

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	3
Midsize Enterprise	2
Large Enterprise	3

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Graylog?

The product is scalable. The solution is stable.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Graylog?

I am not familiar with the pricing details of Graylog, as I was not responsible for that aspect. It was determined that we didn't need an enterprise plan, which is more suited for clients with less...

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What needs improvement with Graylog?

An improvement I would suggest is in Graylog's user interface, such as allowing for font size adjustments. A potential enhancement could be the integration with Ollama to run large language models ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with syslog-ng?

We currently do not use that feature. We currently have just an open-source release, not a premium release. My boss has indicated that he wants to buy a premium syslog-ng version next month. I thin...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for syslog-ng?

In Italy, we have to be compliant with the Garante for privacy. We have to log every login, logout, or login failure made by a system administrator. We store all syslog data of the infrastructure. ...

See all answers

What advice do you have for others considering syslog-ng?

When it comes to parsing, I can parse both structured and unstructured data, though our data are only structured. Currently, we collect all data we receive as raw data. Each file is stored for each...

See all answers

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Compared 6% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Graylog Enterprise

October 2025

Download Graylog Enterprise product report

Buyer's Guide

syslog-ng

October 2025

Download syslog-ng product report

Also Known As

Graylog2

No data available

Overview

Graylog Enterprise, recognized for log collection, real-time search, and enriched data handling, offers an open-source framework that integrates seamlessly with Elasticsearch. Its user-centric interface streamlines data correlation and log aggregation, supporting both backend services and comprehensive monitoring needs.

Graylog Enterprise stands out for its stability and powerful log management capabilities, facilitating efficient log aggregation, real-time updates, and data analytics. Users benefit from its plugin-based alerting, user-friendly interface, and support for microservices, including Docker integration. The ability to search in detail, flexible API integration, and data enrichment features are highly valued. Challenges include collector application issues, desired visualization enhancements, and authentication integration improvements. Users seek advancements in UI customization, backup functions, and easier rule creation.

What are Graylog Enterprise's most important features?

Log Collection: Efficiently aggregates and handles diverse logs.
Real-Time Search: Provides immediate log data access.
Custom Alerts: Plugin-based alerting for tailored notifications.
Dashboard Enhancements: Improved visualization for data insights.
Data Enrichment: Adds value through detailed log analysis.

What benefits and ROI can users expect?

Audit Trail Support: Essential for compliance in financial sectors.
Security Event Correlation: Enables incident analysis and response.
Faster Issue Identification: Speeds up troubleshooting with detailed visualization.
API Flexibility: Seamless integration across systems and environments.
Comprehensive Monitoring: Centralized log management enhances oversight.

In industrial use, Graylog Enterprise is crucial for audit trailing in financial sectors, facilitating security event identification and error monitoring. Backend teams leverage real-time analytics for swift issue resolution, while developers appreciate the comprehensive log visualization enabled by Docker integration for microservice management.

Graylog

Optimizing SIEM
syslog-ng is the log management solution that improves the performance of your SIEM solution by reducing the amount and improving the quality of data feeding your SIEM.

Rapid search and troubleshooting
With syslog-ng Store Box, you can find the answer. Search billions of logs in seconds using full text queries with Boolean operators to pinpoint critical logs.

Meeting compliance requirements
syslog-ng Store Box provides secure, tamper-proof storage and custom reporting to demonstrate compliance.

Big data ingestion
syslog-ng can deliver data from a wide variety of sources to Hadoop, Elasticsearch, MongoDB, and Kafka as well as many others.

Universal log collection and routing
syslog-ng flexibly routes log data from X sources to Y destinations. Instead of deploying multiple agents on hosts, organizations can unify their log data collection and management.

Secure data archive
syslog-ng Store Box provides automated archiving, tamper-proof encrypted storage, granular access controls to protect log data. The largest appliance can store up to 10TB of raw logs.

One Identity

Sample Customers

Blue Cross Blue Shield, eBay, Cisco, LinkedIn, SAP, King.com, Twilio, Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Tecnocom, University of Victoria, University of Exeter, Datapath

Buyer's Guide

Graylog Enterprise vs. syslog-ng

September 2025

Free Report: Graylog Enterprise vs. syslog-ng

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