Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

ManageEngine Endpoint Central vs N-able N-central 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

ManageEngine Endpoint Central
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
68
Ranking in other categories
Client Desktop Management (1st), Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) (4th), Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) (2nd)
N-able N-central
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Systems Management solutions, they serve different purposes. ManageEngine Endpoint Central is designed for Client Desktop Management and holds a mindshare of 30.4%, down 41.3% compared to last year.
N-able N-central, on the other hand, focuses on Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM), holds 8.9% mindshare, down 12.5% since last year.
Client Desktop Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
ManageEngine Endpoint Central30.4%
Symantec Client Management Suite16.4%
Clarity CA9.7%
Other43.5%
Client Desktop Management
Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
N-able N-central8.9%
Kaseya VSA18.2%
NinjaOne13.5%
Other59.4%
Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM)
 

Featured Reviews

Charles A - PeerSpot reviewer
Effective vulnerability, desktop, and patch management
We are using ManageEngine Endpoint Central primarily for desktop management. It allows us to deploy patches, manage antivirus, control endpoints like DLP, and more The most valuable feature to me is the vulnerability management. It also has effective patch management capabilities. The main issue…
Dimitri V G - PeerSpot reviewer
Maximizing operational efficiency with comprehensive monitoring and automation capabilities
There are areas in N-able N-central that could be improved. We always started it from the basic purpose of monitoring hardware, where vendors such as HP and Dell try to sell their own services which monitor and provide a dashboard, which is their logic. They want to make their own recurring revenue on that. We notice that SNMP has had a good run and still sometimes is used, but it's becoming an issue to maintain the same capabilities because HP makes it unreliable or even removes certain features that we used to be able to validate redundant array of independent disks. Our service that has been running for 15-20 years suddenly is not working anymore because HP decided in generation 10 plus and above, or generation 10 hardware in servers, storage controllers particularly, they just didn't put the SNMP OIDs anymore. We are now following that market change or business change in hardware monitoring and the future is Redfish, REST API, IPMI type of monitoring with the REST API and Redfish being most common. We have to do the effort ourselves because Enable is not really strategically going there because I assume there's not much money to make to improve that or to convince customers to start with their product. That issue could be better if they would be more prepared for that change and give us customers more tools, preconfigured, pre-available custom services for Redfish, REST API, where we just have to put a few items username, password and address and some dots and commas, but that we don't have to reinvent the wheel, which we are doing at the moment. We are using HP iLO commandlets and REST APIs for Aruba. Dell is making it very hard to monitor their hardware. If it has an iDRAC, I can manage it and monitor it, but if it's something that's less common or due to the portfolio, they have done a good job at not exposing information about health. We would just want to have a red or a green dot that indicates if this device is healthy or not healthy. Since nobody's investing in SNMP because it's a liability in security, they should invest in making a REST API and preferably also do the work on making it easy to pull or push information. That's something that the industry in general and Enable in particular could do a significant job to help us monitor.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"One of the benefits of Desktop Central is it made the provisioning process simpler because now we have a provisioning package. We have around 1,500 laptops at the moment and all these PCs were provisioned by a provisioning package. In the provisioning package, we have integrated every aspect of renaming, deploying applications, patching, etc., so we simply execute the provisioning package and as soon as it's executed, it will install the management agent. Once the agent is installed, it will take care of all the tasks, so we don't have to sit in front of the computer to prepare the machine. This really helps us to provision the PC quickly with our agent."
"The product works perfectly for patch management and software deployments."
"The setup is pretty simple."
"The most important feature we found to be useful in the COVID situation is the secure connection, which gives the IT support staff the ability to seamlessly connect with the users remotely and in a secure way."
"All of Desktop Central's features are valuable, especially its simplicity."
"We can scale the product."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the Patch Management."
"In terms of technical capability, it is doing very well. It is doing better than other industry products. It is at a place where we can compare it with Microsoft products. Its scalability is also good."
"It's a very robust product. They're continuing to invest and put new enhancements into the product. They're very open about what their roadmap is, which is very good for us because then as a business, we can plan."
"The support is at a good level. So normally, we can always get to a solution when we are stuck with some monitoring problems that we encounter."
"The solution's service is good."
"The most valuable features of N-central are its ease of deployment and ease of use."
"N-able N-central is very scalable."
"N-able N-central is an easy tool to implement with customers."
"N-able N-central has numerous good features. The asset tracking capability is powerful, allowing you to track hardware and software on devices connected to your network. The remote control is smooth, securely enabling remote access to servers and routers. It can be integrated with ticketing systems and other tools like CrowdStrike and N-able EDR for comprehensive network monitoring and security. The automation feature is handy, allowing you to schedule tasks, respond to system triggers, and automate problem resolution, such as handling disk space issues automatically."
"I like the remote connectivity, reporting suite, and patch management module."
 

Cons

"There are times when we have a particular software installed in our system, however, we do not receive patches for it from Endpoint Central."
"There are occasional glitches."
"Some difficulties with setup for multiple locations."
"I would like to have the option to install the agent remotely."
"Improvement should be done as per customer requirements."
"Computer imaging is powerful but breaks frequently. The reason for this breaking is not clear and requires heavy amounts of attention to keep operational. There is a lot of room for this tool to do more but the reliability of this process should be focused on first to ensure core competencies are being fixed before more features are added."
"Tech support is mediocre at best."
"The support could be faster."
"The industry has moved towards Redfish for out-of-band and in-band monitoring, yet N-able N-central still relies on older protocols like SNMP."
"The integration with other applications could be better."
"N-able N-central could improve the remote access, my technicians have complained about it. They have used other free tools instead to compensate, such as TeamViewer. Additionally, when using remote access on the web, it is lacking reports."
"Involving AI in the platform could improve it further."
"The support from our direct team is very good, but the support from their day-to-day ongoing help desk isn't that good. They have still got some work to do on that, but they have been focusing on that a lot over the last number of years. So, it has gotten a lot better than it was."
"We have to do the effort ourselves because Enable is not really strategically going there because I assume there's not much money to make to improve that or to convince customers to start with their product."
"It was previously expensive and tedious to manage different licenses."
"There is room for improvement in the development of custom monitoring services."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There are multiple flavors of the app. They have a distributed version for enterprises. It depends on your size. They price it on a per machine basis. 250 or 500 is probably their least amount."
"There is a freeware version of the solution available as long as you do not breach the number of licenses and users that are dictated."
"We had perpetual licenses. The cost was around 36,000, and then you'd have the yearly maintenance fee of 2,000 or 3,000."
"The product is not costly. The product is properly priced, especially for SMBs."
"The pricing of the product is not bad compared to the other similar solutions in the market."
"The licensing is very easy to understand and pricing is right for what you get."
"Compared to other products, ManageEngine Endpoint Central is a very cheap solution."
"The price could be cheaper."
"The pricing and licensing are average, almost six out of ten."
"N-able N-central is not an expensive solution."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Client Desktop Management solutions are best for your needs.
872,655 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
11%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Performing Arts
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business25
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise35
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise1
 

Questions from the Community

How to choose between ManageEngine Desktop Central and Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (formerly SCCM)?
ManageEngine Desktop Central is very easy to set up, is scalable, stable, and also has very good patch management. What I like most about ManageEngine is that I can log on to every PC very easily a...
What do you like most about ManageEngine Endpoint Central?
Well, what we like is that it catch actually a lot of features constantly upgrading. So all the three maybe there there were some features as the tenant on the earliest version. Now it's it's almos...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ManageEngine Endpoint Central?
Regarding the pricing of ManageEngine Endpoint Central, it depends on the region. In India, it is very cost-effective and provides great value. In other regions such as the UAE, US, or UK, the pric...
What needs improvement with N-able N-central?
The MSP part of N-able N-central has evolved over the years. They have been trying to move from professional or network server and desktop licensing to make it more comprehensive. With professional...
What is your primary use case for N-able N-central?
We have been dealing with Enable EDR and N-able N-central, which is a management center. It's the NOC solution that we are currently running our asset management on. We are managing tasks in that e...
 

Also Known As

ManageEngine Desktop Central, Desktop Central, ManageEngine Desktop Management MSP
SolarWinds N-central, SolarWinds MSP N-central
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Strathallan School, BMI Healthcare, Comercial Kywi, First Priority Federal Credit Union, Gerab National Enterprises
Premier Technology Solutions
Find out what your peers are saying about ManageEngine, Broadcom, Quest Software and others in Client Desktop Management. Updated: October 2025.
872,655 professionals have used our research since 2012.