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Microsoft Sentinel vs SolarWinds Security Event Manager comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 18, 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

Microsoft Sentinel
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
109
Ranking in other categories
Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (6th), AI-Powered Cybersecurity Platforms (6th)
SolarWinds Security Event M...
Ranking in Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
34th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Sentinel is 4.0%, down from 7.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is 1.0%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Microsoft Sentinel4.0%
SolarWinds Security Event Manager1.0%
Other95.0%
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM)
 

Featured Reviews

Kallamuddin Ansari - PeerSpot reviewer
Cyber Security Consultant at ProTechmanize
Centralized monitoring has improved threat response but cost control still needs refinement
Based on real operations used in our corporate IT environment, the key features include log correlation and incident view. Microsoft Sentinel's biggest strength is how it correlates multiple related alerts into a single incident. This significantly reduces alert noise and helps the SOC focus on real threats instead of isolated events. Another valuable feature is KQL-based threat hunting with Kusto Query Language. The flexibility of this language allows us to build custom hunting queries based on our environment's behavior. This is extremely useful for detecting low and slow threats or hidden threats that default rules may miss. Cloud-native scalability and stability is another important feature. Being cloud-native, Microsoft Sentinel scales well for medium to large corporate environments without infrastructure management. Stability has been solid in day-to-day production. SOAR automation using playbooks is a feature we highly recommend. Microsoft Sentinel's SOAR functionality helps automate repetitive SOC tasks like alert enrichment and notification. This saves analyst time and improves response consistency.
Yashokanth Partkunan - PeerSpot reviewer
Managed Services Engineer at Loop1 Systems
Has supported client needs efficiently but requires deeper analysis features and faster support
The log analyzing capability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager should go into more depth than the current environment. More modification and enhancements are required on the dashboard side in order to make it closer to optimal performance. From observation and feedback from users, they need more functionality related to monitoring, and in-depth analyzing needs to be improved.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Azure Sentinel is actually quite handy, and very adaptive to the market trends."
"It is able to connect to an ever-growing number of platforms and systems within the Microsoft ecosystem, such as Azure Active Directory and Microsoft 365 or Office 365, as well as to external services and systems that can be brought in and managed. We can manage on-premises infrastructure. We can manage not just the things that are running in Azure in the public cloud, but through Azure Arc and the hybrid capabilities, we can monitor on-premises servers and endpoints. We can monitor VMware infrastructure, for instance, running as part of a hybrid environment."
"It has a lot of great features."
"By implementing the SIEM along with Security Center, we have improved security to a mature level, and we are able to meet the compliance reporting and client requirements for security within the organization."
"Once you get that familiarity, Sentinel is a valuable tool for your cloud security posture."
"Log aggregation and data connectors are the most valuable features."
"The most valuable features are its threat handling and detection. It's a powerful tool because it's based on machine learning and on the behavior of malware."
"Microsoft has done a great job of integrating everything into one place, and most services are on the cloud, so Sentinel makes it much quicker and easier to get up and running."
"It performs network behavior monitoring, log monitoring, and disaster recovery monitoring."
"The most valuable feature is the reporting."
"It's extremely easy to deploy."
"The reporting and alerting capabilities are really nice."
"The solution helps me to go back in time and search for different events. For example, if you wanted to know who activated an account; you could go back in time and find out."
"SolarWinds is easy to configure, and it provides timely alerts."
"The most valuable feature is the ease of use for the end user."
"The scalability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is good."
 

Cons

"We have opted for the pay-as-you-go model, which doesn't come with free support."
"Microsoft Sentinel should provide an alternative query language to KQL for users who lack KQL expertise."
"We'd like also a better ticketing system, which is older."
"The built-in SOAR is not really good out-of-the-box. The SOAR relies on logic apps and you almost need to have some kind of developer background to be able to make these logic apps. Most security people cannot develop anything..."
"We do see continuous improvement all the time, however, I haven't got a specific feature that is lacking or not well designed."
"Everyone has their favorites. There is always room for improvement, and everybody will say, "I wish you could do this for me or that for me." It is a personal thing based on how you use the tool. I do not necessarily have those thoughts, and they are probably not really valuable because they are unique to the context of the user, but broadly, where it can continue to improve is by adding more connectors to more systems."
"Multi-tenancy, in my opinion, needs to be improved. I believe it can do better as a managed service provider."
"Microsoft Sentinel's ability to correlate data from multiple sources does not enhance our threat detection capabilities beyond what a simple data lake solution could offer, as we are a developer, so it is not necessarily applicable."
"The main area that would mean a big improvement for me would be for the product to include multiple dashboards."
"It can be difficult for users who are inexperienced with the solution."
"The log analyzing capability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager should go into more depth than the current environment."
"It won't tell you when your backups are failing, but it will give you hints when your database is running on full recovery."
"The only issue is the pricetag. SolarWinds is a costly solution."
"We used the support from SolarWinds Security Event Manager and they are knowledgeable but challenging to get in contact with them."
"The company had to use a third party for the implementation of the solution."
"It is a very technical program. They can simplify it so that it isn't so hard to deal with."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I'm not happy with the pricing on the integration with Defender for Endpoint. Defender for Endpoint is log-rich. There is a lot of information coming through, and it is needed information. The price point at which you ingest those logs has made a lot of my customers make the decision to leave that within the Defender stack."
"Currently, given our use case, the cost of Sentinel is justified, but it is expensive."
"Azure Sentinel is very costly, or at least it appears to be very costly. The costs vary based on your ingestion and your retention charges."
"Pricing for Microsoft Sentinel could always be lower, but it's workable. The ingestion costs for the data analytics is usually the highest cost, but the licensing per Microsoft Sentinel is fairly straightforward and transparent."
"Sentinel is fairly priced and pretty cost-effective."
"The current licensing is based on the logs that are being ingested on the platform. Most of the SIEM solutions utilize that pricing model, but Microsoft should give us a customization option for controlling the kind of logs that we feed into Microsoft Sentinel. That will be much better. Otherwise, the pricing is a bit higher."
"Microsoft Sentinel is expensive."
"Microsoft Sentinel can be costly, particularly for data management."
"The price of SolarWinds Security Event Manager is reasonable."
"We do a yearly license renewal. For a year, the solution costs roughly $500,000 USD. There are no costs beyond this yearly fee."
"The tool is available at a good price for customers compared to other solutions in the market. I rate the product's price as an eight out of ten."
"It is in the appropriate mid-range. It is not as expensive as some of the other solutions. It is also not cheap."
"Licenses can only be purchased in blocks of fifty at a time."
"The pricing model would benefit from having package deals with other SolarWinds products."
"Licensing is on devices, so if you have many, then this may be high."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Construction Company
10%
University
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business45
Midsize Enterprise23
Large Enterprise46
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

Is there a common threat intelligence tool that aggregates multiple threat intelligence sources?
Yes, Azure Sentinel is a SIEM on the Cloud. Multiple data sources can be uploaded and analyzed with Azure Sentinel and its Threat Hunting functionality with AI available as templates or customized ...
What is a better choice, Splunk or Azure Sentinel?
It would really depend on (1) which logs you need to ingest and (2) what are your use cases Splunk is easy for ingestion of anything, but the charge per GB/Day Indexed and it gets expensive as log ...
Which is better - Azure Sentinel or AWS Security Hub?
We like that Azure Sentinel does not require as much maintenance as legacy SIEMs that are on-premises. Azure Sentinel is auto-scaling - you will not have to worry about performance impact, you will...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
The tool is available at a good price for customers compared to other solutions in the market. I rate the product's price as an eight out of ten.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
The log analyzing capability of SolarWinds Security Event Manager should go into more depth than the current environment. More modification and enhancements are required on the dashboard side in or...
What is your primary use case for SolarWinds Security Event Manager ?
I work with all SolarWinds products mostly, including Network Configuration Manager and NPM. I am a reseller. I usually recommend SolarWinds products for Loop1. It's for the bigger ones; we are the...
 

Also Known As

Azure Sentinel
SolarWinds LEM, Solarwinds SIEM, TriGeo, Log and Event Manager
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Microsoft Sentinel is trusted by companies of all sizes including ABM, ASOS, Uniper, First West Credit Union, Avanade, and more.
NetSuite, EasyStreet, Legacy Texas Bank, and Energy Federal Credit Union, to name a few.
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Sentinel vs. SolarWinds Security Event Manager and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,164 professionals have used our research since 2012.