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IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) vs Wireshark comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

IBM SevOne Network Performa...
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
54
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (34th), Server Monitoring (17th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (36th), Log Management (36th), Cloud Monitoring Software (26th)
Wireshark
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
64
Ranking in other categories
Network Troubleshooting (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Network Management solutions, they serve different purposes. IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) is designed for Network Monitoring Software and holds a mindshare of 1.1%, up 1.0% compared to last year.
Wireshark, on the other hand, focuses on Network Troubleshooting, holds 18.4% mindshare, up 14.3% since last year.
Network Monitoring Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM)1.1%
Zabbix3.9%
SolarWinds NPM3.6%
Other91.4%
Network Monitoring Software
Network Troubleshooting Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Wireshark18.4%
AirMagnet Survey PRO9.1%
DX Spectrum7.0%
Other65.5%
Network Troubleshooting
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer1543041 - PeerSpot reviewer
Network monitoring engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Provides consistent infrastructure monitoring with excellent usability and support
The primary use case of IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) is network monitoring. It helps to maintain the infrastructure's availability and ensure that alerts are generated when needed The most valuable features of IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) are its stability,…
reviewer2837244 - PeerSpot reviewer
It System Engineer at a manufacturing company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Packet analysis has improved real-time troubleshooting and simplifies mapping complex data flows
The best features that Wireshark offers are everything. Every time I look into Wireshark, I find something new. The ability to capture real-time packets and understand how the packet is working and moving through how many hops and to how many points it reaches makes it a wonderful tool. The specific feature I use most is capturing packets of real-time communication and seeing how the packet is working. I rely on all the filters it has to check the protocols and see the communication between one end and another end and what the hops in between are, and if there is a proxy, how it behaves. Everything helps us check out the issue and troubleshoot it. I do not have anything additional to add about the features; everything looks really fine. The graphics are also good, and you can change its graphical features, making it a pretty nice tool. You can also use it with the PCAP file, which is really nice. Wireshark has positively impacted my organization by giving us the ability to capture packets and see into the network how it is working and what we can clarify about the network, specifically how we can remove many hops in the communication channels. A specific example of a measurable outcome is that we have a few switches in our network that, when we use Wireshark analysis, we find should not be needed or can be replaced with automatic switches instead of manual switches, such as switches which do not have any active features and only passive switches. That has saved us a lot of time.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Data Insight reporting tool is the most valuable feature. They came up with it a couple of years ago. The most pleasing factor is the dark theme. You don't have a white background. It has templates that you can create for all kinds of reports that you can hit on the fly. It's much better printing of the reports. If you want to send PDFs to people, the reports are actually decent. Whereas for years, the old architecture of the PDFs was rubbish and even our customers said, "We have to manipulate your PDFs because they all have bad margin breaks. SevOne fixed that a couple of years ago with the new Data Insight. It's fantastic."
"One of the solution's biggest strengths is its capacity management performance, with out-of-the-box reports through NMS, as well as its ability to collect NetFlow-related data from devices. The collection of network performance and flow data is important because we have many critical business applications."
"SevOne NPM helps our customers detect performance issues faster and, once it's properly configured, it will help you address some issues right away, cutting troubleshooting time by one to three hours and enabling you to proactively address potential performance issues before a failure occurs."
"It provides accurate data, which is critical, and I also like the very quick real-time reporting with one-minute polling, as I can pull up graphs and charts very quickly."
"Customer Service: Excellent, customer service is 10/10."
"It is a very good product, easy to stand up, and a good tool for network engineers."
"As an IT Manager this tool helps me sleep better knowing that SevOne is my eyes and ears watching the entire infrastructure."
"SevOne has rich API capabilities, giving us the flexibility to control what we collect and customize the collection, creation, and manipulation of now metrics as necessary."
"Wireshark is a dynamic software that has developed and adapted to the latest technology advancements and network challenges."
"The drill-down available for packet analysis is great, as it gives a network security engineer insight into what is going on at the packet level and enables better troubleshooting."
"Wireshark is incredibly powerful, user-friendly, and a free tool, which is capable of live capture and offline analysis of traffic on any size network."
"Wireshark is the world's most powerful network protocol analyzer tool."
"Wireshark helps us to understand network traffic."
"The best part about Wireshark, in my opinion, is its ability to analyze packet capture files."
"For example, while debugging through food issues, we can draw the graph of the data captured in the solution and see how the throughput is moving."
"This is a good product for quick and easy troubleshooting."
 

Cons

"The GUI: both the dashboard/user view and the admin tool."
"You need to plan integrations. That has been the biggest bug with SevOne so far. For the things that SevOne pulls directly, those are easy to understand, modify, and put into the database. For things that need to use the Universal Collector or xStats, you need to plan that stuff well in advance."
"Setup was very complex as there were issues with the device pipes. We needed a lot of intervention and technical assistance."
"The tool needs improvement in non-Cisco SD-WAN."
"As I mentioned before, there are cheaper solutions available."
"With the administrative management of the appliance, if some object appears from SevOne because something changed in the network or whatever, then as an administrator you will not be aware."
"The reporting of NMS is good, but it could be better."
"Features like SMS support and a faster way to create objects in calculation editor would be good."
"The decryption of encrypted packets could be better."
"Wireshark could be improved by adding more monitoring features."
"Wireshark is restricted when any sort of encryption is involved, such as XSL encryption or DLX."
"Bigger memory footprint."
"With Wireshark, you cannot download and utilize the packet in automation."
"The only thing that I don't like is sometimes there is an update, and something that I was using is either no longer there or it has changed."
"The speed of the Internet could be improved, especially its performance."
"Wireshark's UI isn't easy to handle and doesn't have as nice a view as Omnipeek."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"A blocking point is the high upfront cost because it is challenging to get it accepted and the purchase approved."
"Have a bank of licenses, because it is about the number of objects (RAM, ports, CPU, etc.)."
"The pricing has been fair."
"Although I don't have exact details in terms of cost, my experience has been that SevOne is willing to make a deal with the customer."
"The tool is not expensive. We were able to negotiate with SevOne on pricing."
"There are different options available for licensing, with the per-device option being more expensive but more flexible."
"Choose a SevOne partner who can provide SevOne as a service and can deliver professional services and maintenance."
"For the value that you get from SevOne, it's worth the price. There are a lot of cheaper alternatives on the market, and even free options. But they require more staff, more resources, and engineers with more advanced knowledge of monitoring. That's what makes SevOne worth the price."
"Wireshark is free software, so you don't have to pay any licensing fee. Individual people can use it and then donate to Wireshark."
"It is free to download and install. It runs on multiple platforms, so how can you go wrong?"
"It's a stand-alone tool. If there is a commercial license for it I am unaware of it."
"It is free."
"Wireshark is free of charge, and there's no license involved."
"Wireshark is open source and gives great value and functionality to the network investigation."
"I've never personally had to pay for it, making it a highly valuable internet resource that's accessible for use. While they offer some paid versions, our firm has utilized the free version for the past three years."
"The tool is free."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Construction Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
7%
University
11%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Construction Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise45
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise29
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with SevOne Network Data Platform?
There is room for improvement in the integration with different vendors and the reporting capabilities. It would be beneficial to have out-of-the-box integration with third-party vendors and improv...
What is your primary use case for SevOne Network Data Platform?
The primary use case of IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) ( /products/ibm-sevone-network-performance-management-npm-reviews ) is network monitoring. It helps to maintain the infrastru...
What advice do you have for others considering SevOne Network Data Platform?
To compete with custom-built tools, IBM SevOne Network Performance Management (NPM) should accommodate the desired features and be timely in the delivery of feature updates. I would rate the overal...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Wireshark?
Wireshark is priced at a medium range, not too high, not too low. The pricing could be more flexible, and they might make it more expensive. That said, compared to other products, it is competitive.
What needs improvement with Wireshark?
Wireshark can be improved if it provides the accessibility of capturing packets from one device that is installed in the network without needing the port-mirrored facility. They could provide somet...
What is your primary use case for Wireshark?
Wireshark's main use case is capturing packets and reviewing the data flow over the network. Regarding my main use case for Wireshark, it is a great tool and would be one of the best tools availabl...
 

Also Known As

SevOne
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ATOS, Devereux, Spark New Zealand, Access4, Rogers Communication, Lumen (formerly known as CenturyLink)
Comversion, ADP, Talbots
Find out what your peers are saying about Zabbix, SolarWinds, Auvik and others in Network Monitoring Software. Updated: June 2026.
902,495 professionals have used our research since 2012.