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Netwrix Auditor vs SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jul 9, 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

Netwrix Auditor
Ranking in Active Directory Management
3rd
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
GRC (11th), Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) (35th), Identity and Access Management as a Service (IDaaS) (IAMaaS) (16th)
SolarWinds Server and Appli...
Ranking in Active Directory Management
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
4.5
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Application Performance Monitoring (APM) and Observability (20th), Server Monitoring (8th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Active Directory Management category, the mindshare of Netwrix Auditor is 10.0%, down from 14.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is 2.3%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Active Directory Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Netwrix Auditor10.0%
SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor2.3%
Other87.7%
Active Directory Management
 

Featured Reviews

RishiPandit - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead - Technical Services at Impetus
Optimizing time and effort through comprehensive auditing features
Netwrix Auditor doesn't have many competitors at the level in which it is placed. All other companies provide auditing solutions but not up to the feature list; it is very broad and robust. The best features include flexibility to interact directly with MS-SQL. Real-time alerts help identify potential security threats. The ability to streamline audits with insights into configuration states is helpful, as the access reviews and audit reports are really insightful. This is a good tool. The search functionality is available, but comparative to other vendors, this is a bit slower. Reports are effective; the compliance reports and all the reports are very insightful. That is good.
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 most valuable feature is the real-time monitoring."
"It maintains audit logs for the duration of time that you wish, as long as you have the storage capacity to do so."
"I have found user behavior analysis and the ability to run risk assessments important features. Additionally, the interface and online documentation are very good."
"Without Netwrix, it's impossible to take control of things."
"I am impressed with the tool's reporting feature and notifications."
"What I find the most valuable about Netwrix Auditor is the way it shows risk. The reports are very clear."
"Netwrix Auditor doesn't have many competitors at the level in which it is placed; all other companies provide auditing solutions but not up to the feature list—it is very broad and robust."
"I have found user behavior analysis and the ability to run risk assessments important features, and additionally the interface and online documentation are very good."
"Features like monitoring and infrastructure dependency mapping are valuable to us."
"The most valuable feature of SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor is the network devices' performance monitor is the best."
"AppInsight for SQL: Enables us to see the relevant error log entries on the same page as performance parameters."
"This feature from Solarwinds SAM helped us to monitor and alert whenever the SSL cert is going to expire on the server to avoid any downtime of the services running on the server specially on ADFS platform where we have Video conference, Webex, Office 365 and single sign-on services."
"SSL Certificate Monitoring and Expiry Alerting"
"SolarWinds SAM has provided us with dynamic thresholds based on historical trends and requirements, so the threshold gets configured automatically, and it's no longer necessary to configure it manually every time."
"We manage SolarWinds ourselves without outsourcing its services."
"From a customers point of view, they get a good return on investment because they are not paying a lot of money when you compare to what they used to pay for IBM and other large vendors."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvements when it comes to the licensing."
"There is room for improvements when it comes to the licensing."
"When there are issues I would like remediation to be in one place."
"I expect usability features to become more refined over time. I'm interested to see how it evolves and continues to improve."
"An improvement would be if there was an another way to manage the logs besides email because it's not so practical."
"The Linux compatibility of this solution could be improved."
"If you buy direct, there is a minimum of 150 licenses that must be procured. The price point and barrier of entry is a little bit higher than it would be if you purchased the solution from an authorized reseller partner, rather than buying it and managing yourself."
"When there are issues I would like remediation to be in one place."
"I would like to see support for non-Windows or non-Microsoft domains, especially Apache and other non-Windows servers."
"One product area that could benefit from improvement is the synchronization of licensing periods across different modules"
"Application-based monitoring, such as monitoring within servers like Apache and IIS, has room for improvement."
"Downside of the tools is the web console are hung or crash. It need to improve the performance."
"In terms of the dashboards on offer, they should work to improve them. The types of dashboards that you get in terms of the graphs on offer aren't ideal right now."
"PerfStack can be made more effective. I am sure SolarWinds already has a plan for the same in coming versions."
"AppInsight needs to include more applications, the current list is very limited."
"It needs time-based functions for monitoring. Some things need to be polled on a specific schedule or only during a specific window."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is a license for this solution and we are on an annual license. The price is reasonable."
"This solution is reasonably priced. I would rate it a nine out of ten."
"The tool's price is fair."
"The product might cost you $30,000 USD to buy, but scaling this solution requires the purchase of additional polling engines at $20,000 USD each."
"The tool is available for my company at a good price point."
"The price is too high."
"Pricing and licensing is fair for what you get. It does have a great bang-for-the-buck appeal."
"The solution's price is reasonable. Though it's on the higher side, the tool is worth the money."
"Pricing is inexpensive, starting at 2440 euros. For that, you get the ability to monitor a couple of nodes and one year of maintenance and support."
"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."
"Price can always be lower. It is neither on the expensive side nor on the cheap side. We have worked with them for a lot of years, so we get a discount due to the size of the installation."
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Top Industries

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

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business3
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business17
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise21
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Netwrix Auditor?
I don't know about the pricing of this, but it is good at this price point because our organization has purchased it, which means it was in budget. We usually do not buy expensive solutions, so the...
What needs improvement with Netwrix Auditor?
The areas of improvement include the front end, as the UI should be more intuitive and there should be fewer bugs. In the UI, we have to adjust and resize our console many times, and sometimes it a...
What is your primary use case for Netwrix Auditor?
We use Netwrix Auditor for auditing, log centralizing, centralizing the logs, log management, and for permission access management, giving permission on shared folders and Active Directory groups.
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

No data available
SolarWinds SAM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

AT&T, SanDisk, Siemens, Verizon, Electrolux, Allianz, Societe Generale
Andr. L. Riis AS, NetSuite
Find out what your peers are saying about Netwrix Auditor vs. SolarWinds Server and Application Monitor and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
887,041 professionals have used our research since 2012.