The most valuable thing it has is the depth of historical data. You can dig in really deep. If there was a problem at any point in time in the past, we can use it to get an idea where it might have come from.
Systems Administrator
Hasn't given us the data we were hoping for though stability has been very good
What is most valuable?
How has it helped my organization?
Unfortunately, it hasn't done a whole lot in that regard. It's taken a lot of setup time to kind of keep it in tune. So, for us, it hasn't given us quite the data we were hoping for. We came from LogicMonitor. We got the data a lot faster and easier from there.
What needs improvement?
More globalized templates would be much better. Templates for different applications, for example, "this is a web server, so these are the things you're gonna want to monitor on the web server." You would just build from a template and it would apply nicely. The product should already come with 50-100; templates for a desktop, for an active directory server, and other generic server templates, so that you can just apply what you're probably going to want to monitor on any given server.
Also, it doesn't answer any question without you asking it first. I want it to say when it sees something out of whack. It should bring that up higher into the stack and let 99% of the stuff sit out and be ignored.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Stability wise, it's been good. I can't think of any crashes we've had with it yet. It's had some issues connecting to Horizon View, and keeping the connections alive, but other than that it's been good.
Buyer's Guide
VMware Aria Operations
March 2025

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What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We don't have enough scale for it to matter.
How are customer service and support?
I don't think we've used it on that product.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We needed some way to be able to see performance issues, particularly in the VDI environment. We had played around with using LogicMonitor, and we switched because it was cheaper.
Also important for us when considering a vendor is that it's a "set-and-forget" system. Just something that tells us when there's a problem and doesn't bother us when there's not.
How was the initial setup?
It's pretty complex. There's a lot of tweaking to get it to either report on something, or not report on something. There isn't a good set of templates built into the system to really make it go fast. You can install it quickly, you can get it logging quickly, but then it's just a glorified log system.
What other advice do I have?
Try to get it to actually install and run.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

Infrastructure Engineer at a comms service provider with 501-1,000 employees
Provides insight into our VM or environment, to see where it's trending
What is most valuable?
- Being able to troubleshoot specific VMs
- A high-level view for capacity planning
- Getting insight into our VM or environment, to see where it's trending
These features enable the business itself, the directors and managers, to use it.
We also use it to get inside our Cisco UCS environment. Those are the keys. It's been pretty valuable.
How has it helped my organization?
It was pretty outdated when I started, so I upgraded it. And we've just been dipping our toes into what it can do for us. But so far it's basically been trending, getting us a forecast of where we're going, and where we need to add resources.
What needs improvement?
As far as VMware's perspective it's got everything I'd expect. One thing that is not ideal is that I actually have to buy a third-party plug-in for things like NetApp. But that's more on the NetApp and Lumidor side of things. It would be great if there was native integration with vROps, with those storage providers.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Good. I have no issues with it at all. It's been very stable in our environment.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Right now we only have a single node, we haven't scaled a ton.
How are customer service and technical support?
I haven't been in touch with tech support. My contact at VMware is definitely knowledgeable and can help if need be, absolutely.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Just an older version. vROps wasn't heavily relied upon for trending, for capacity. But I think it will definitely be more so in the future, based on its reports, etc.
How was the initial setup?
I thought it was very easy. Easy to follow instructions. Got it deployed within an hour or two. Not hard at all.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
vROps is packaged with our licensing. So that made it a pretty short list. We already had it. We went with it because it's included. We didn't really do a competitive analysis.
Just the fact that it's a VMware product, and that means that product updates are going to coincide with other products. You're not going to fall behind when VMware updates a new hypervisor. Just the fact that it's in cadence with their other releases, that's a big selling point for it.
What other advice do I have?
The top criteria when selecting a vendor would likely be support and reliability. Also, that they're not just trying to sell us a product but, rather, it's something we can actually use and leverage in our day-to-day operations.
We haven't really dipped our toes into what it can do but so far I have been pretty impressed with the analytics we can get out of it. The high-level information we get out of it has been pretty valuable so far. We haven't even gotten into it, so it can do a whole lot more.
Try it out if it's in your licensing and you haven't deployed it. No reason not to.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Buyer's Guide
VMware Aria Operations
March 2025

Learn what your peers think about VMware Aria Operations. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: March 2025.
842,690 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Lead Consultant at Wipro - Cloud Transformation Services at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Tool for optimizing capacity and leveraging many benefits of SDDC
Pros and Cons
- "The vRO (using Functional Programming of Javascript) is a hand-down of the favorite component of this suite."
- "vRLI still needs a lot of improvement to even start comparing with the market leader, Splunk, in terms of data analysis and customized charts/reports generation."
How has it helped my organization?
Customers and non-technical managers and capacity managers love the reports and recommendations vROps generate. In one console, you can see both your Physical and Virtual Infrastructures merging together.
Using vRO, you can potentially get any user custom enhancements implemented in vRA and beyond.
What is most valuable?
The vRO (using Functional Programming of Javascript) is a hand-down of the favorite component of this suite. You can create your custom plugins to speak with any third-party application, not forgetting how many enterprise infrastructure product plugins are already available.
In addition, vROps is a brilliant tool for capacity optimization, assessment, and leveraging many benefits of SDDC.
What needs improvement?
vRLI still needs a lot of improvement to even start comparing with the market leader, Splunk, in terms of data analysis and customized charts/reports generation.
In addition, VMware is still essentially selling the vCAC, which was created by Credit Suisse's DynamicOps.
The CAFE part was created by VMware and it is pretty robust. However, I don't feel the same about the IaaS Windows part. They need to stop using these two loosely coupled components and probably migrate the whole thing to a SUSE-based appliance.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Version 6 of vRO did have its own issues, but the current version is pretty robust. Earlier, the Java client on reload lost flows, and the appliance needed to be started. This is no longer the case.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
There are no scalability issues at all.
How is customer service and technical support?
Customer Service:
Lately, it has been an issue with getting hold of the support team, but they generally are good.
Technical Support:
The juniors are strictly OK, but the escalation leads are brilliant with sound knowledge in troubleshooting.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Lead Specialist at a media company with 10,001+ employees
If an issue comes up and the product shows us there's a real problem, we can fix it before there's an outage.
What is most valuable?
The alerting is probably the most valuable feature of the product. If issues come up, we can tell right away to look in the system, dive a little deeper and see if there's a real problem and if so, we can fix it before there's an outage.
What needs improvement?
I definitely think some of the adapters could be enhanced.
When building out metrics, it would be better to have a more granular approach to that. Sometimes the metrics are all or nothing, and it would be better if you could adjust those to make it fit your particular needs better. On occasion, we can't even use some of the metrics because of the way our environment is set up; I can't turn it off for this pool and then have it on for this pool. It will give errors and then those errors don't mean anything. If you give errors that don't mean anything, then people stop listening to them and then bad things could happen. I would definitely like finer control of some of the metrics and how they work.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using it for about a year and a half now.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It is a stable product most of the time. Occasionally, the adapters will go down and I'll have to reboot them, but that's maybe once every few months.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We haven’t needed to scale it yet. We have about six nodes and it's been pretty solid.
How are customer service and technical support?
Technical support depends on the product. The people that work on the vROps side are definitely a lot more knowledgeable than some of the other support people I've worked with. Anytime I put a ticket in for vROps, it usually gets solved a lot quicker than a ticket for vSphere, Horizon or something like that. They've done a good job training their employees on the vROps part.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We switched from another solution to vROps because we weren't really happy with the first product.
vROps was attractive because it was part of our licensing deal so we figured if we don't have to pay for it, why not use it? Also, it does integrate a lot better with both vSphere and Horizon. We're big Horizon customers, so that was one of the big driving forces.
When I choose a vendor to work with, my criteria are that the product needs to be stable and easy to manage, but still be able to customize it to fit our environment; then, definitely, regular feature updates and bug fixes.
How was the initial setup?
Initial setup was pretty straightforward. The Horizon adapter had some interesting licensing part to it. You just had to follow the white paper but it was a little tricky at first. Once I got the hang of it, it was no big deal.
What other advice do I have?
My advice would depend on what you're trying to do with it. Our main goal was more of a monitoring solution, but obviously it does well in analytics, so I would ask what you're trying to do for it and then I could probably go into some of the details on what features would benefit you and if that was something you found useful, then yeah, great.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Cloud Solutions Architect at a tech company with 10,001+ employees
It integrates with vRealize and VMware solutions. We get operation-level understanding across the environment.
What is most valuable?
vROps is integrated with vRealize and VMware solutions, which helps us to get the best operation-level understanding across the environment; we get all the utilization reports.
By using vROps, you can actually automate your tasks, integrate it with vRO workflows, and amazing results can come up.
We have also used the integrations with DRS using the Site Recovery Manager, which are quite good. If anything happens at one site, another site immediately takes over; you can do that using vROps.
How has it helped my organization?
We have improved our understanding in terms of writing PoCs, and providing concrete examples of how vROps and vRA can get into the environment.
What needs improvement?
It should have some connectors in terms of showcasing third-party vendor's functionalities. For example, if some third-party storage that has been connected to the environment, this solution should actually be used instead of some third-party monitoring solution. This solution should work across the environment on its own, instead of relying on some trigger-pointed third party location and then acting it on it.
It should have some more functionality in terms of getting some more third-party vendor application-level integration.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The majority of VMware products are very stable, and I'm very happy with vROps.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I have not encountered any scalability issues.
For PoCs, we have set it up for a cluster of five servers to showcase the scalability of VMware products.
How are customer service and technical support?
I have used technical support, because the VMware solutions guidelines are quite complete and amazing.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I previously used a lot of freeware monitoring tools like Cacti, Nagios, and Ganglia.
We felt that we needed to invest in paying for a solution because it's amazing. The integration with the VMware family is amazing.
How was the initial setup?
Initial setup is 9/10; it was nearly flawless. Some minor configuration services were complex; how you connect it out across, or how you actually connect two different services.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Before choosing this product, I did not evaluate other options.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
VMware Admin at a government with 10,001+ employees
We can see where our strongest usage is and our clusters. It has helped us save on the compute side.
Valuable Features
Probably, the most valuable feature is being able to see what's going on in my environment.
We use a combination of homegrown scripts and vROps for capacity planning. With the two, we get a really good view of what our environment is doing.
Improvements to My Organization
Mostly, it has provided capacity planning benefits; we can see where our strongest usage is and our clusters.
It probably has not helped us save on storage, but probably it has helped us more on the compute side.
Room for Improvement
Honestly, I wish the reports were a little bit more snazzy, if that makes sense.
Stability Issues
Stability is good.
Scalability Issues
Scalability works great.
Customer Service and Technical Support
I have not used technical support.
Initial Setup
Initial setup was straightforward. I actually converted from version 5 to version 6. It worked well.
Other Solutions Considered
Before choosing this product, I did not evaluate other options.
Other Advice
Look at the price and the features together.
When we select a vendor like VMware, the most important criteria are completeness of the product and support. This product is fairly complete and it works.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Senior Infrastructure Administrator at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees
The most valuable features are the trending and analytics
Pros and Cons
- "It visualizes stuff better, so we can pinpoint or see problems"
- "When you deploy it as a single node, it's more stable than if you have multiple nodes. We've had some issues with this."
What is our primary use case?
We use it to monitor our system and optimize performance.
How has it helped my organization?
It visualizes stuff better, so we can pinpoint or see problems. However, I feel as though there is a lot of potential in the product that we haven't utilized.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable features are the trending and analytics.
For how long have I used the solution?
One to three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
When you deploy it as a single node, it's more stable than if you have multiple nodes. We've had some issues with this.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Scalability is good, but I haven't tested it that much.
How is customer service and technical support?
I have tried the technical support.
How was the initial setup?
It is pretty straightforward.
What other advice do I have?
I would recommend NSX. From my experience, the solution is pretty good.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Systems Engineer - VMware at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees
The custom dashboard, the management pack, reports, and policy are valuable.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable features are the custom dashboard, the management pack, reports, and policy.
How has it helped my organization?
vROps propose some scheduled reports on the resource consumption for each VM.
What needs improvement?
The policy and some few metrics are not very clear. More explanations would be great.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using this product for 2 years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I haven’t had any issues with stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I haven’t had any issues with scalability.
How are customer service and technical support?
Technical support was excellent.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We used vCOPS, but vROps is the new version of vCOPS. vROPS has more scalability and more features.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was very simple. Tuning it is harder.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
It’s better to buy vROps as part of the vRealize Suite package or vCloud Suite.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We evaluated VMTurbo and Foglight.
What other advice do I have?
The design is very important for flows and rules. It is better if you have good vSphere skills.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

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