We compared Nagios XI and Nagios Core 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. Nagios Core is an adaptable solution praised for its integration, customizability, and ability to effectively monitor server availability and network connectivity.
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. Nagios Core users have requested better documentation, improved scalability, and a more user-friendly configuration process.
Service and Support: Some Nagios XI customers complained about the lack of chat or phone support options. Nagios Core lacks direct customer service, but users can generally find help from a supportive open-source community and large knowledge base.
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. Nagios Core's setup is generally seen as well-documented and straightforward.
Pricing: Nagios XI’s pricing is considered reasonable and transparent, with no extra charges. Nagios Core is free, but users may incur costs for installation and configuration.
ROI: Nagios XI users reported positive outcomes overall, but some said visibility limitations lower the solution’s ROI. Nagios Core users say they have saved money by replacing paid monitoring tools with this open-source 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. Nagios Core is a flexible open-source solution that is highly customizable and offers robust functionality commonly found in paid enterprise solutions. However, some users have said that Nagios Core becomes unwieldy when used at a large scale and that the documentation could be more thorough.
"We can manage the entire system across the network and troubleshoot the pain points."
"The single dashboard is a valuable feature."
"Nagios Core is stable."
"The most valuable feature of Nagios Core is the ability to check the availability of the server for network connectivity. Additionally, the interface is good."
"Provides timely notifications."
"Our customers like that Nagios Core is an open source solution. It can be customized to our customers' specific needs."
"The most valuable feature is the performance parameters of the system."
"Nagios monitors our servers, so we know if anything goes wrong and can solve the problem before it happens."
"I like that it's very simple to install, easy to manage and deploy, and easy to use for monitoring."
"Nagios Core is very configurable. Whatever you want, you can do it."
"Nagios XI helps us monitor the bandwidth of the internet connection, HTTP, DNS, active directory services, and exchange data availability. We have multiple servers to monitor databases, availability of servers, and ping."
"It's a monitoring agent. It's designed to do one thing. Its most valuable feature is its monitoring."
"Nagios XI is a simple monitoring tool with performance management."
"The solution is pretty stable."
"It's great for monitoring IT services infrastructure."
"Though I downplayed the administrative NCC GUI, this is by far the strongest aspect of the Nagios XI product."
"The ability to set up templates and groups of checks, as well as customize the checks themselves."
"The dashboard allows you to see what's going on in the overall system."
"The Wi-Fi side needs improvement."
"The technical support needs improvement."
"Nagios Core is limited in terms of distributed setups, and there is no central view for remote data centers."
"I would like to see a sensor that shows the traffic of a user and what they're doing on the network."
"There is room for improvement in the graphics."
"Cloud monitoring is an area for improvement because there aren't too many plugins available."
"Nagios Core can improve the graphical interface, it would make things a little easier."
"Nagios Core does not have a graphic display."
"The UI is a little outdated and graphics could be displayed in a better way."
"I would like to see more training videos."
"I would like to be able to extend it to all of our data centers, whether they are in the cloud or not. It would be helpful if I could connect everywhere."
"The reporting structure could be more streamlined."
"The product uses the backend as Perl and could be modified to a more lightweight solution like what's being offered by other vendors."
"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."
"We often need to develop custom plugins to get Nagios to work the way we want it to work because the features we need are not always available in Nagios."
"The pricing has recently risen. I know they've changed what is covered under the license, however, it doesn't change the way we use it and adds nothing to our experience, and yet we now have to pay more."
"The reporting part should be made simpler. While we can obtain all the reports we need, we always have to create work-arounds to get them."
"It can be quite difficult to know which drivers and agents to use when setting up."
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Nagios Core is ranked 7th in IT Infrastructure Monitoring with 46 reviews while Nagios XI is ranked 9th in IT Infrastructure Monitoring with 54 reviews. Nagios Core is rated 8.0, while Nagios XI is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Nagios Core writes "An Open Source Fully Featured Data Centre Monitoring Tool". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Nagios XI writes "Great for monitoring IT services infrastructure with nice tools and helpful notifications". Nagios Core is most compared with Zabbix, Icinga, Centreon, OP5 Monitor and LogicMonitor, whereas Nagios XI is most compared with Zabbix, PRTG Network Monitor, Wireshark, SCOM and Icinga. See our Nagios Core vs. Nagios XI report.
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We monitor all IT Infrastructure Monitoring reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.
Ultimately NagiosXI is the better solution than Core but shortlisting NagiosXI also definitely depends on the infra landscape, technology, network devices, and other scopes of activities in monitoring.
The biggest difference I see between Nagios Core and XI is the user interface, reporting, and onboarding any element for monitoring, and that onboarding is much easier in NagiosXI than Core. Nagios Core is little complicated where you have to use console called Nconf or editing conf files in Linux needs more technical knowledge than using NagiosXI.