We compared Nagios XI and Zabbix across several parameters based on our users' reviews. After reading the collected data, you can find our conclusion below:
Features: Nagios XI received positive feedback for its versatility and adaptability. It offers a diverse selection of plugins and scripts for monitoring needs. Zabbix is highly regarded for its user-friendly interface, scalability, and reliable performance. It provides customizable dashboards, trigger dependencies, SNMP monitoring, and problem tracking.
Room for Improvement: Users have suggested Nagios XI could improve integration, simplify configuration, and make the platform more user-friendly. Nagios XI users also suggest improvements to network visibility and cloud discovery. Zabbix could reduce false positives and improve integration, cloud monitoring, and reporting.
Service and Support: Some Nagios XI customers complained about the lack of chat or phone support options. Users had mixed opinions about Zabbix customer service. Some found it helpful, while others feel it needs improvement. Customers generally rely on online documentation and community forums for assistance.
Ease of Deployment: Some Nagios XI users found the setup to be relatively simple, while others considered it challenging. Deployment can take a few months to complete, and there’s a steep learning curve. The complexity of Zabbix's initial setup varies, and it may require an experienced group of administrators and engineers.
Pricing: Nagios XI’s pricing is considered reasonable and transparent, with no extra charges. Zabbix is a free, open-source solution, but users can purchase support services and additional features.
ROI: Nagios XI users reported positive outcomes overall, but some said visibility limitations lower the solution’s ROI. Users say that Zabbix provides a cost-effective solution.
Comparison Results: Nagios XI is an affordable, flexible solution with a broad feature set and a selection of helpful plugins. At the same time, users say the setup can be complex, and some expressed a desire for more convenient ways to contact support. Zabbix is a highly customizable open-source solution with a wide range of monitoring capabilities, including the ability to monitor virtual machines and databases. However, Zabbix’s setup can be complex and may require technical expertise.
"We can manage the entire system across the network and troubleshoot the pain points."
"The most valuable feature is its support for different types of devices, where it can use all of the equipment that you need."
"Nagios XI is a simple monitoring tool with performance management."
"Since this is an open source technology, if we are capable of writing the plugins in any scripting language, this product allows us to monitor anything we want."
"It's great for monitoring IT services infrastructure."
"The dashboard allows you to see what's going on in the overall system."
"Though I downplayed the administrative NCC GUI, this is by far the strongest aspect of the Nagios XI product."
"It's a monitoring agent. It's designed to do one thing. Its most valuable feature is its monitoring."
"BPI: It allows defining peripherals to map business criticality for efficient monitoring, as required."
"The initial setup was not complex."
"The most valuable features of Zabbix are flexibility and a single interface for different types of monitoring."
"We detect problems before the customer does and before it actually happens using the predictive functions in Zabbix."
"It meets my organizational needs. It's pretty easy to use."
"We are able to monitor our virtual infrastructure, virtual machines, windows servers, databases, and the network using a simple network management protocol. We are able to pull almost all the metrics that we want, receive notifications, and have them integrate with telegrams for certain devices that are critical, such as UPSs."
"The most valuable feature is the protocol to manage anything."
"I like being able to use proxy servers for different locations. The agents are pretty cool. They're easy to roll out. The standard out-of-the-box templates are also pretty easy to use. The integration with other learning products is also good. I have, in the past, used Slack, but we've integrated it with Microsoft Teams. We also use it for SMS with a service called Redcoat. It is very flexible. It does what I need it to do, and my manager is very happy because it doesn't cost anything. We are nearing 4,000 hosts inside Zabbix, and we've got another 6,000 access points to add to it. We've thrown everything at it, and it has managed to keep going. I am very impressed with the tool, and I'd shake their hand very hard if I got to say the compliments to the Zabbix team. They keep improving it and doing refreshes, which is one good thing about it. There is also online information as well as books that you can purchase if you're willing to read enough. There is a lot to pick up, but it is a pretty complete solution."
"Our customers also like that they don't have to use multiple modules. Micro Focus and major vendors typically require you to buy several modules and plugins. Our customers do not like that. We offer them a single product for all their monitoring needs."
"The Wi-Fi side needs improvement."
"We'd like to see more integration capabilities."
"The way Nagios displays information isn't easy for a new user to understand. It's not intuitive enough. You need to read some tutorials or be trained to understand what it's displaying. Also, I think it needs more features to improve network visibility because there are some things you can't detect."
"I would like to see more customization in the network map because it is a bit tricky to use it."
"Technical support is an area that needs improvement. It is not available 24/7."
"Open-source software is usually not user-friendly."
"Nagios XI can improve network and hardware monitoring, these parameters should be simplified to allow usage for monitoring. Additionally, if there was automatic reporting it would be helpful."
"It can be quite difficult to know which drivers and agents to use when setting up."
"The installation and monitoring need improvement."
"Its UI needs to be improved a little bit more so that an end-user is also able to handle it. I can handle it, but others should also be able to handle it in a better way. It becomes complex when we are growing and need to add proxies. We need more scalability features and documentation for different use cases. A lot of articles are available, but they need to be in proper documentation. For example, when you have thousands of servers that have to be monitored in different regions of the world, there should be some kind of documentation to describe how you can create proxies and add them. Sometimes, when you are using the database, it can get overloaded. When the network is growing, the number of transactions becomes very high, and the database gets overloaded. There should be information about how to reduce the load on the MySQL database, which is what Zabbix is using. The market is growing a lot, and it should be enhanced for a lot more things. We are currently bringing enhancements at our end for different use cases. For example, when dockerization is going on, how can we check the logs inside the Dockers. We should also be able to monitor and check the number of logins and add features such as SSO login and two-factor authentication as a protocol. These are the security features and concerns that we have to deal with. Currently, we are developing modules to add features to Zabbix, but they should also work on these features."
"The dashboard and the graph section could be a little bit more professional."
"The event correlation could be better."
"The only improvement I would suggest, revolves around its AI and ML capabilities."
"If Zabbix had a better dashboard then it would be nice."
"I had problems using Zabbix when working with SUSE Enterprise; many companies use SUSE."
"Even though it’s such a powerful monitoring system, it would be more helpful if it had a flexible UI."
"The documentation gets a bit messy between versions and is not too detailed, which is a bit painful for first-timers, especially when they run into issues."
Nagios XI is ranked 8th in Cloud Monitoring Software with 54 reviews while Zabbix is ranked 2nd in Cloud Monitoring Software with 96 reviews. Nagios XI is rated 8.2, while Zabbix is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Nagios XI writes "Great for monitoring IT services infrastructure with nice tools and helpful notifications". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Zabbix writes "Allows any number of customizations but lacks functionality for finding root causes". Nagios XI is most compared with Nagios Core, PRTG Network Monitor, Icinga, Wireshark and SCOM, whereas Zabbix is most compared with Centreon, Checkmk, SolarWinds NPM, Nagios Core and Amazon CloudWatch. See our Nagios XI vs. Zabbix report.
See our list of best Server Monitoring vendors, best IT Infrastructure Monitoring vendors, and best Cloud Monitoring Software vendors.
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ZABBIX ... of course :)
We are working with this wonderful monitoring tool since 2008
ZABBIX ... of course :)
We have been working with this wonderful monitoring tool since 2007 (before we had used Nagios, Openview, Whatsup, Hobbitmon, etc) and until now we haven't seen any limitations in our projects.
If you need to learn a little bit more about 'how to customize ZABBIX' you can search about:
- ZABBIX UserParameters;
- ZABBIX pluggable modules;
- ZABBIX LLD;
- ZABBIX API;
I think this things will help a lot to know how to extend/customize ZABBIX.
Luciano