No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

ManageEngine Applications Manager vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor 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

ManageEngine Applications M...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
41st
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Monitoring Software (34th)
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
20th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Server Monitoring (8th), Active Directory Management (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability category, the mindshare of ManageEngine Applications Manager is 0.9%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 1.2%, down from 1.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor1.2%
ManageEngine Applications Manager0.9%
Other97.9%
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability
 

Featured Reviews

SN
Senior System Engineer at Qatar Petroleum
Managing application health has become simpler but new monitoring features still need faster delivery
I use application discovery and dependency mapping. It helps with managing application health What I like about ManageEngine Applications Manager is the ease of use and ease of deployment. I cannot remember anything specific for future updates of the product. The new features take a lot of time…
NikhilKalwint - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Specialist at ServiceIO
Monitoring over a thousand systems has improved decision making and operational visibility
From an advantage perspective, SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is comparatively cheaper from a commercial point of view. It is easy to install and configure, very user-friendly, and quick to get up and running, allowing you to see the early value adds in your organization. It is compatible with most technologies for monitoring with very few chances of incompatibility. Configuration also allows us to monitor all the technical parameters we are looking for, making it a very good experience for us. The alerting feature in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is a main advantage, as it alerts based on threshold breaches and can raise tickets to the ticketing system, send SMS, and email notifications, allowing engineers to work on those tickets to resolve issues and avoid further impact. The visibility into server health is a beneficial feature that I am utilizing. We widely use various application performance metrics in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor such as database monitoring and server monitoring, which are quite good enough for any monitoring solution. We utilize the customizable dashboards in SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The feature that I have found most valuable in ManageEngine Applications Manager is its dashboard."
"For a small organization, I think ManageEngine is pretty nice, I think it's enough."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to be able to monitor Kubernetes."
"ManageEngine Applications Manager maintains the historical data and it's easy for us to analyze the trends and patterns and fix them accordingly."
"The initial setup was straightforward, without complexity."
"Its price and the flexibility to deploy are the most valuable. Flexibility is very important, and you can scale from very basic to more complex. This solution is a part of a complete suite of management tools. So, it can be integrated with other solutions for monitoring networks, which is very important. You can expand it or interconnect it with many other tools, which is a powerful feature. We have a very good and long relationship with ManageEngine support guys. They provide very good support for us."
"The most valuable features are: Takes care of all IT monitoring in one console: Server, apps and business services."
"The features on the dashboard of ManageEngine Application Manager are much better than these other solutions, and I found that those solutions can be quite costly in comparison."
"I am impressed with the tool's AppStack feature which mainly helps us in the identification process. This feature can give an overview of the fault and help us identify the issues for performance degradation. Instead of looking at multiple places, we can look at a single place to identify the issues."
"We choose the Solarwinds based on the simplication of managing the tool itself."
"Hardware health: It allows for proactive monitoring of the hardware health and is a game changer."
"SAM has altered the way monitoring is being looked at - from just being able to monitor CPU, Mem, Disk and network utilization levels we have moved to the next levels of finding out process related issues, service related issues and specific application related issues to identify root cause of performance issues."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is its interface, which is used for monitoring."
"SolarWinds SAM has provided us with dynamic thresholds based on historical trends and requirements. The threshold gets configured automatically, so it's no longer necessary to configure it manually every time."
"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."
"The graphical interfaces, GUI customizations, and alert configurations are impressive."
 

Cons

"The information provided by ManageEngine is not deep-dive like IBM and CA provide."
"Even with the top-notch dashboard, it could be made stronger in order to have an additional plug-in for analytics."
"I assess the impact of real-user monitoring of this product on my application's performance as not good. I am not satisfied with monitoring."
"I would say that the implementation of ManageEngine Applications Manager is too detailed. You need some training to effectually use it."
"The information provided by ManageEngine is not deep-dive like IBM and CA provide."
"My suggestion for improving this feature is to also monitor the end-user experience for application clients and servers."
"Technical support can be problematic. They usually support us from India, but because of compliance requirements, that is not an acceptable support solution in Pakistan."
"Lacks an SIEM solution which can be found in other products."
"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."
"An additional feature that would improve this solution is the ability to complete root cause analysis."
"Mapping interactions between systems."
"PerfStack can be made more effective. I am sure SolarWinds already has a plan for the same in coming versions."
"It lacks a user experience for measuring things like the end-to-end time for which a user waits for a specific response in the system. In the application layer, it has some very basic stuff. You have to build your own with manuscripts and things like that."
"Reporting is the only thing with which we currently have challenges. They have this in two ways. There is the report writer, which is the backend, and we also have web reports, which are on the console. So, they have removed the report writer for the backend reports, and we are making use of the web console, but most of the users are not finding it very interesting to use the frontend reports. I would like them to bring back the report writer. That's the key area within it to improve on the reporting. If they can bring back the report writer, then most users will actually be comfortable. I have some customers who are trying to export their report to an Excel format, but it is not possible because they said any report that has been done from the web console cannot be exported to Excel, but most of the customers need to export their reports to Excel. That's one area they need to work on."
"The templates could use improvement. Currently, they are quite complex. They should have drag-and-drop functionality instead. It would make it easier to use."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing costs for ManageEngine Applications Manager are around $1,200 per year. For additional monitors, you have to pay extra."
"ManageEngine Applications Manager has reasonable pricing. It's more affordable than other solutions in the market. My company has an instance-based license for ManageEngine Applications Manager. You can purchase a yearly subscription or a perpetual license. The standard license covers most features, but you can still have some paid add-ons."
"It is a cost-effective solution."
"The solution is noted for its cost-effectiveness, a crucial consideration for potential users."
"Its price is good."
"Price-wise, it is a cheap tool...The solution's licensing model is subscription-based, in which yearly payments are to be made."
"The solution's licensing costs are yearly."
"The cost of this solution is not too bad, although it could be cheaper considering what you're getting for the price."
"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."
"When compared to other licensed models in the market, it stands out as one of the more cost-effective options."
"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."
"The solution's price is reasonable. Though it's on the higher side, the tool is worth the money."
"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."
"We are on an annual license to use the solution. The price of the solution is expensive. The price is based on a bunch of factors, such as the number of engines and elements."
"Its licensing is on a yearly basis. It is just the standard price, but it can vary depending on the current rate of the dollar."
"The solution is overpriced in terms of application management."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability solutions are best for your needs.
886,077 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Educational Organization
12%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise10
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ManageEngine Applications Manager?
I am satisfied with the licensing cost for ManageEngine Applications Manager.
What needs improvement with ManageEngine Applications Manager?
The new features take a lot of time to be implemented, and that could be improved about ManageEngine Applications Manager. If I were requesting a new feature that is not existing, making it availab...
What is your primary use case for ManageEngine Applications Manager?
I use application discovery and dependency mapping. It helps with managing application health.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor?
There is definitely room for improvement besides simplifying its setup. As a non-technical person, I believe the dashboards could be improved. Everything we use appears on video walls, and we need ...
 

Also Known As

Applications Manager
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Certis Europe, Financial Domain, SaaS Office Suite, On Demand TV, Parliament's IT Systems, Sastra Technologies, UniServity
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about ManageEngine Applications Manager vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
886,077 professionals have used our research since 2012.