Likelihood to Recommend For small companies, Graylog is the best solution possible. It's easy to configure and "just works." Above everything else, it's free. The only thing I hold against it is the fact that it's Linux-based. [This] makes sense because Elasticsearch is Linux-based. But Linux adds a layer of complexity that we don't need for something basic as a logging server. I'm pretty sure that we would have had a logging server years earlier if I had to convince quite a few decision-making people to go ahead with it anyway.
Read full review Splunk is excellent when all your data is in one location. Its ability to correlate all that data is intuitive (once the hurdle of learning the query language is overcome). It is also easy to standardize the presentation of information to the company. When data is siloed/standalone, other systems can be cheaper and faster to implement.
Read full review Pros Graylog does a great job of its core function: log aggregation, retention, and searching. Graylog has a very flexible configuration. The backend for storage is Elasticsearch and MongoDB is used to store the configuration. You have to option to make your configuration as simple as possible by storing everything on one box, or you can scale everything out horizontally by using a cluster of Elasticsearch nodes and MongoDB servers with several Graylog servers pointed to all the necessary nodes. Graylog does a good job of abstracting away a fair portion of Elasticsearch index management (sharding, creation, deletion, rotation, etc). Read full review This SIEM consolidates multiple data points and offers several features and benefits, creating custom dashboards and managing alert workflows. Splunk Cloud provides a simple way to have a central monitoring and security solution. Though it does not have a huge learning curve, you should spend some time learning the basics. Splunk Cloud enables me to create and schedule statistical reports on network use for Management. Read full review Cons Support for more log sources Event alerts/emails - Some cases where unable to separate data from multiple clients, and no easy fix API - Limits results to 10,000 and can cause server to lockup on queries that exceed the limit Read full review The SPL programming language that the queries are built in is not very intuitive. There should be a better repository of pre-built queries for what I would think of as common Active Directory usage monitoring. I would like to see more free training/familiarization information made available. Read full review Usability Overall, it is very usable. I would like if recent searches were saved for longer because I always have to refer to my notes when I'm looking for something specific and it's been a few weeks. But that's a small issue, and the actual search and browsing interface is easy to use and powerful.
Read full review Support Rating Community support does not give simple straightforward answers; simply search up Graylog Issues and look at some of the responses on the forums. The documentation is your only hope if you are on the free version, as you can NOT purchase only support. The few times I have worked with Graylog Enterprise support they were great though.
Read full review Splunk Cloud support is sorely lacking unfortunately. The portal where you submit tickets is not very good and is lacking polish. Tickets are left for days without any updates and when chased it is only sometimes you get a reply back. I get the feeling the support team are very understaffed and have far too much going on. From what I know, Splunk is aware of this and seem to be trying to remedy it.
Read full review Alternatives Considered In terms of log aggregation, the free product fully stacks up with the competitors listed. Full control over the data ingests for flexible configuration. Graylog even better on that front than
AlienVault USM because you cannot configure the variable mapping. We haven't used the threat exchange stuff or correlation. But with regex searches, we have created function dashboards that show threat theater pictures of our network based on logs from our firewall.
Read full review Splunk Cloud blows
Sumo Logic out of the water. The experience is night and day. We went from several highly stressed IT security professionals who were unsure if the data they were getting was valuable, to very happy IT security professionals who can now be more proactive and get all the information they need.
Read full review Return on Investment Graylog is just less expensive than some other options which meant it fit into our budget otherwise we might not be able to justify a higher cost. Being able to track issues that we normally couldn't track using other tools is a bonus to help us know of any issues we have and can fix before an outage or failure that could potentially cost money. We have had to spend more time than I would like to understand and customize Graylog which has taken time away from other tasks and projects. Read full review End-end visibility across your departmental silos Strengthen the overall global monitoring posture Move from Reactive to Proactive Monitoring Highly secure environment at your finger-tips Takes you away from managing infrastructure/administration, allows saving time & money. Reduce the overall TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) Read full review ScreenShots