We compared Meraki Dashboard and PRTG Network Monitor across several parameters based on our users' reviews. After reading the collected data, you can find our conclusion below:
Features: Meraki Dashboard users like its centralized console, cable testing, firmware updates, and group policy features. The solution is also praised as user-friendly, stable, and scalable. PRTG Network Monitor customers like its user-centric approach, straightforward reporting, and customizability.
Room for Improvement: Users say Meraki Dashboard could improve its client VPN, hardware discovery, and integration with external solutions, Some users mentioned a need for more comprehensive documentation and granular control. PRTG Network Monitor could improve its performance and resource efficiency. Other pain points include usability and cross-platform compatibility.
Service and Support: Meraki Dashboard's customer service receives mixed feedback. Some users spoke fondly of the technical support they received, while others expressed frustration over long wait times and had a hard time finding the right person to help them. PRTG Network Monitor received mixed reviews for its customer service. Some users commended the support team’s prompt service, while others reported slow response times and noted the lack of remote session support.
Ease of Deployment: Users said Meraki Dashboard was effortless and intuitive to set up, noting that features like templates and configuration cloning saved time during deployment. PRTG Network Monitor’s setup isn’t considered to be overly complex. Deployment times may vary depending on the environment's complexity and device count.
Pricing: Opinions on Meraki Dashboard's pricing varied, with some users finding it pricey and others deeming it fair. PRTG Network Monitor is deemed reasonably priced and cheaper than its competitors.
ROI: Meraki Dashboard simplifies IT operations, and some users expect returns within a few years. Users said that PRTG Network Monitor has proven to save time and money through automation and proactive support.
Comparison Results: Meraki Dashboard is a scalable, user-friendly solution with a smooth, painless setup made easy by built-in templates and features like configuration cloning. However, some users complained that the solution is too expensive and needs better integration with non-Cisco platforms. PRTG Network Monitor is regarded as a simple, user-friendly, and cost-effective solution, but users would like to see improvements in performance, documentation, integration, and technical support.
"We can manage the entire system across the network and troubleshoot the pain points."
"It is very easy to manage. It has good security, and it is working well with our firewall."
"The most valuable feature is the single pane of glass that gives you multisite visibility."
"It's a simple, functional solution."
"It's really user-friendly."
"It can analyze the traffic that it is picking up from what may be a rogue access point, and it is able to identify those and send relevant notifications."
"I would say the ease of use is the most valuable feature. It's very easy to set up and get up and running."
"There are some whitelist blacklist capabilities in the MX dashboard, which is very helpful."
"The ability of the product to perform with simplicity of deployment make it a valuable solution."
"The most valuable aspect is the diverse range of features it offers."
"It is great for service level agreements and can comply fully with internet monitoring or any interface."
"Ease of set-up – it is quick and easy to add a probe and start collecting data from a device."
"Network Discovery is a feature that our customers like a lot."
"The email notifications are helpful, and the dashboards are user-friendly for people with little network monitoring knowledge."
"Stable and scalable network monitoring tool. Installation is simple and straightforward."
"It is easy to use and intuitive, which is really important. It does what it says on the box by giving you a visual of the state of what is going on at any one time."
"The bandwidth monitoring is a very attractive feature, it can tell you the bandwidth utilization while it is attempting to connect to the host for feedback."
"The Wi-Fi side needs improvement."
"Some features could be added."
"There is a bit of a problem when you try to log in and you don't have a fixed IP address. If you're granting access, you need to log in by using the IP address. If your administrator's IP address is not a fixed IP address and it has changed, you might need to update the changed IP address in the interface. For this, you need to log in to the interface to update the IP address. This issue might not have so much to do with Meraki interface."
"The one issue that we have had is that the VPN tunnel would go down unless you worked out with the ISP that you would be using a static IP address on the WAN interface."
"The cost of the solution is high and can be improved."
"Price could be reduced."
"It's a very complex system. Customers have told me that sometimes there are lots of advanced features that are available and that you can change in the dashboard, but sometimes it's very hard to know what they are."
"Third-party switches do not necessarily integrate easily with the system and this could be improved to allow for better adaptation."
"More integration would be an improvement."
"The dashboarding definitely needs improvement."
"The automation should be improved."
"The technical support service should be improved."
"We're using more cloud services now. It would be useful to be able to get information back from these cloud services in detail, and display any issues within PRTG for the rest of our systems."
"Sometimes, it is difficult to drill down further to get information, e.g., if we saw spike in traffic, then we would want to drill down and find out what is causing that spike in traffic."
"The licensing policy needs more flexibility."
"The only sort of limitation is the actual probes. So, if you don't have enough probes on there, you can over flip them and cause the WMI sensors and SNMP sensors to sort of overload. Sometimes, they might timeout for a minute, but they do come back."
"PRTG does not allow us to scan devices like we can scan software or another problem in it. Also, I cannot draw graphical graphs in Woodview/look. Another problem is that we cannot draw a good diagram in PRTG."
Meraki Dashboard is ranked 9th in Network Monitoring Software with 51 reviews while PRTG Network Monitor is ranked 5th in Network Monitoring Software with 96 reviews. Meraki Dashboard is rated 8.6, while PRTG Network Monitor is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of Meraki Dashboard writes "Incredibly easy to use, great troubleshooting and prevention of malicious events". On the other hand, the top reviewer of PRTG Network Monitor writes "It's an all-in-one solution, and net flow is included in the licensing ". Meraki Dashboard is most compared with SolarWinds NPM, ThousandEyes, Cisco DNA Center, Mist AI and Cloud and Nagios Core, whereas PRTG Network Monitor is most compared with Zabbix, Centreon, Nagios XI, SolarWinds NPM and ManageEngine OpManager. See our Meraki Dashboard vs. PRTG Network Monitor report.
See our list of best Network Monitoring Software vendors.
We monitor all Network Monitoring Software 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.
