Pros and Cons of SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor 2025

Overview

What is SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor?

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities. SAM allows for self-service for easy setup, 1200+ monitoring templates, and customization options, as well as integrate with other SolarWinds products.

Learn from top reviewers

Big, but effective

Rating: 8 out of 10

September 14, 2022

IncentivizedVetted ReviewVerified User

We monitor servers and network gear to track uptime, and to alert when certain resource metrics are reached on a system (e.g., low disk space). My team does not use configurat...

Will Enestvedt

Manager - Information Technology

Unix Team Manager

Johnson & Wales University

4 years of experience

SolarWinds is a useful resource for IT Management

Rating: 9 out of 10

June 15, 2022

Vetted ReviewVerified User

We use SolarWinds as our inventory management tool and it is an invaluable resource that allows us to keep track of all of the computers and the software installed on our comp...

Connie Inman

Supervisor - Other

Senior IT Technologist II & Desktop Support Supervisor

University of Tennessee

6 years of experience

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Review

Rating: 9 out of 10

April 21, 2022

IncentivizedVetted ReviewVerified User

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) is part of my company's monitoring toolset which enhances the overall value proposition of our SolarWinds Orion investment. B...

Mike Hochstein

Director - Information Technology

Senior Director, Infrastructure Architecture & Standards

Cision

10 years of experience

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) is good tool to monitor your applications and make calls via APIs.

Rating: 8 out of 10

February 6, 2022

IncentivizedVetted ReviewVerified User

Little information about health and availability of applications. We need to better monitor our applications and handle applications in API format.

Fabio Silva

Engineer - Information Technology

Senior Network Engineer

Fexco

2 years of experience

Safe, robust and reliable.

Rating: 8 out of 10

February 1, 2022

IncentivizedVetted ReviewVerified User

The tool is used to monitor the entire technology infrastructure allied with other vendors. Here it is useful to identify outages, failures, and performance degradation, the s...

Rafael Santos

Administrator - Information Technology

Monitoring Specialist

Fleetcor

1 year of experience

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Pricing

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SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

N/A

Unavailable

What is SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor?

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities. SAM allows for self-service for easy setup, 1200+ monitoring templates, and customization options, as well as integrate with other SolarWinds products.

Entry-level set up fee?

No setup fee

For the latest information on pricing, visithttp://www.solarwinds.com/products/pric…

Offerings

Free Trial
Free/Freemium Version
Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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21 people also want pricing

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Features

Application Performance Management

Application performance management software monitors software to ensure performance and availability

8.6

Avg 7.7

8.9
Application monitoring
(266) Ratings
Application monitoring involves tracking response times and resource usage for applications, including highly-distributed applications
8.4
Database monitoring
(230) Ratings
Database monitoring means looking for database bottlenecks liable to slow response times
8.9
Threshold alerts
(271) Ratings
Alerts indicating when critical thresholds have been reached
8.2
Predictive capabilities
(215) Ratings
Data mining of log and other performance data to understand predictors of slowdowns or outages
8.2
Application performance management console
(239) Ratings
The management console is used to manage monitoring agents and et thresholds, etc.
7.7
Collaboration tools
(148) Ratings
Collaboration tools enable DevOps staff to collaborate by adding notes/comments and also integrating with external collaboration tools like ticketing systems
7.8
Out-of-the box templates to monitor applications
(256) Ratings
Built-in templates for specific applications
8.5
Application dependency mapping and thresholding
(216) Ratings
Mapping relationships between the application and its underlying infrastructure
8.9
Virtualization monitoring
(234) Ratings
Allows for monitoring of virtual applications and servers
9.8
Server availability and performance monitoring
(269) Ratings
Ability to monitor server availability
9.1
Server usage monitoring and capacity forecasting
(250) Ratings
Ability to assess server usage and forecast future needs
9
IT Asset Discovery
(199) Ratings
Discovery of hardware and software assets on the network

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Product Details

What is SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor?

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities for IT pros enabling them to diagnose and troubleshoot issues faster. The vendor’s value proposition is that this solution prevents slow applications and downtime from impacting end-users and business services. Users can use this tool to pinpoint the root cause of application issues across various layers of the IT stack.

The vendor says SolarWinds SAM is affordable, easy to deploy, use and customize. Users can automatically discover their systems environment and start monitoring in about an hour. No professional services or consultation needed.

SAM is built on SolarWinds Orion® platform enabling native integration with Network Performance Monitor and other IT management software from SolarWinds.

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Features

Supported: Single Web interface to monitor multi-vendor applications and server infrastructure.
Supported: Out-of-the-box monitoring templates for 200+ enterprise applications.
Supported: Easily extend monitoring to virtually any custom or home-grown applications.
Supported: Gain contextual visibility of relationships and dependencies between applications and physical and virtual servers.
Supported: Monitor server hardware health, perform capacity forecasting, and manage asset inventory. Remediate server issues remotely with built-in management actions.
Supported: Monitor VMware and Hyper-V environments to identify problems impacting application performance.
Supported: Centrally manage IT asset inventory and keep track of server hardware and software information.
Supported: Leverage the wealth of built-in alerts and reports, and easily customize them as needed.
Supported: SAM is an agentless monitoring software. Optional agent installation extends monitoring to the cloud.

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Screenshots

Screenshot of Multi-vendor application performance monitoring

Screenshot of Multi-vendor server monitoring

Screenshot of Application dependency mapping with AppStack™ dashboard

Screenshot of Microsoft Exchange performance monitoring with AppInsight™ template

Screenshot of Microsoft IIS performance monitoring with AppInsight™ template

Screenshot of Server hardware health monitoring

Screenshot of Built-in virtualization monitoring for VMware and Hyper-V environments

Screenshot of Easily extend monitoring to any custom or home-grown application

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Videos

An introduction to and a brief overview of SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

In this video, the TrustRadius team is going to take a look at Solarwinds Server and Application Monitor, a powerful tool that can help you monitor your systems and identify issues early. We'll explore the overview, user sentiment, pricing, top features, and use-case, and help...

Watch SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Training Videos

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Integrations

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Competitors

Progress WhatsUp Gold
Nagios Core
Tivoli Monitoring (legacy)
Microsoft System Center
ManageEngine Applications Manager
DX Application Performance Management (formerly CA APM)
SiteScope (formerly HP SiteScope)

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Technical Details

Deployment Types	On-premise
Operating Systems	Windows
Mobile Application	No
Supported Languages	English

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Downloadables

Frequently Asked Questions

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) delivers application and server monitoring capabilities. SAM allows for self-service for easy setup, 1200+ monitoring templates, and customization options, as well as integrate with other SolarWinds products.

Progress WhatsUp Gold, Nagios Core, and Tivoli Monitoring (legacy) are common alternatives for SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor.

Reviewers rate Server availability and performance monitoring highest, with a score of 9.8.

The most common users of SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor are from Enterprises (1,001+ employees).

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Comparisons

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Compare with

Reviews From Top Reviewers

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(1-5 of 278)

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Big, but effective

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

September 14, 2022

WE

Will Enestvedt

Unix Team Manager

Johnson & Wales University (Higher Education, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

Verified User

4 years of experience

Pros

Server uptime monitoring
SNMP monitoring
Reporting
Network device monitoring

Cons

The web interface reloads when certain options are chosen from pop-up menus, which interrupts quick page navigation.
Configuring custom SNMP alerting is onerous.
I wish custom reporting was easier to use.

SolarWinds is a useful resource for IT Management

Rating: 9 out of 10

June 15, 2022

CI

Connie Inman

Senior IT Technologist II & Desktop Support Supervisor

University of Tennessee (Higher Education, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

Verified User

6 years of experience

View profile

Pros

Inventory management
Software management
Computer age and refresh scheduling

Cons

Would like a Linux agent
Would love to be able to see when a device was first added to the database

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor Review

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

April 21, 2022

MH

Mike Hochstein

Senior Director, Infrastructure Architecture & Standards

Cision (Public Relations & Communications, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

Verified User

10 years of experience

Pros

Realtime monitoring of common OS and application metrics.
Visibility of past performance issues for server application events/issues.
Fast, out-of-the-box setup.

Cons

Provides basic monitoring/visibility. Visibility into detailed/fine-grained issues best suited for more specialized/expensive solutions.
Licensing per monitored application rapidly uses up purchased license count.
More out-of-the-box templates or easier setup of monitoring less-common applications would make the solution more appealing given the target audience of the product.

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) is good tool to monitor your applications and make calls via APIs.

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

February 06, 2022

FS

Fabio Silva

Senior Network Engineer

Fexco (Financial Services, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

Verified User

2 years of experience

Pros

Handling API requests.
Monitoring SQL thresholds.
Monitoring DHCP pools.

Cons

Cover non-windows based applications.
API Poller doesn't provide friendly messages when getting issues to retrieve info.
Unable to edit Authorization Poller settings.

Safe, robust and reliable.

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

February 01, 2022

RS

Rafael Santos

Monitoring Specialist

Fleetcor (Financial Services, 10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

Verified User

1 year of experience

Pros

Monitors windows and linux servers.
NETFLOW based data traffic.
Scripting and automating actions.
Integration with other tools.
Robust and well-distributed architecture.
Constant updates and specialized support center.
Training and educational content.

Cons

Capacity reports.
Modern interface.
Possibility to use other OS and DB as platform software, in addition to Windows and SQL Server.

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