Announcing the Top Rated System Monitoring Software for 2019

TrustRadius Top Rated

Today, we awarded the 2019 TrustRadius Top Rated badges for System Monitoring Software. The TrustRadius Top Rated awards are the most trusted in the industry because they are an unbiased reflection of customer sentiment, based solely on user feedback and satisfaction scores. Top Rated awards are the voice of the market and are not influenced by analyst opinion, the vendor’s company size, popularity, or status as a TrustRadius customer.

System Monitoring Software

System monitoring software is an umbrella term for many types of IT management tools. Products in this category monitor network hardware and software, notify technicians when problems occur, and generate performance reports. Many system monitoring products include system management features such as inventory tracking, patch management, risk analysis, data backup and recovery, task automation, and antivirus management. System monitoring software may also include remote monitoring and management (RMM) features, which use lightweight software agents to monitor IT systems from off-premises.

Buyers looking for a system monitoring solution should consider their available IT resources. A business with a smaller, or less experienced IT team might prefer to take advantage of the existing infrastructure and knowledge offered by a remote, cloud-based monitoring service. Companies with more resources available might get more value out of a custom-made onsite solution. Additionally, some products are focused on serving end users, while other products are suitable for managed service provider (MSP) businesses to use in their delivery of remote IT services.

Here are the winners:

Solarwinds RMM

Solarwinds RMM is a remote monitoring and management solution. Its system monitoring features include performance alerts, support for monitoring mobile devices and virtual machines (VMs), user roles and permissions, task automation, and bulk actions. Solarwinds RMM also offers patch management tools, data backup and recovery, virus protection, IT ticketing, and risk assessment for new devices. A mobile app lets administrators run remote control sessions and view problems, tasks, and asset information. A majority (61%) of Solarwinds RMM users on TrustRadius are from small businesses. Reviewers value Solarwinds RMM’s helpful system dashboard, powerful remote access tools, and task automation capabilities.

“RMM makes it easier for us to proactively monitor our customer’s servers and workstations. The ‘take control’ feature helps us assist all the users with their IT problems. The automated tasks are helping us automate most of our daily\weekly tasks…Solarwinds is always trying to improve its platform and the range of products it offers which helps companies like us.”

– Adrian Takacs | Infrastructure Engineer | Information Technology and Services Company

[easy-tweet tweet=”RMM makes it easier for us to proactively monitor our customer’s servers and workstations.” user=”trustradius” template=”qlite”]

ConnectWise Automate

ConnectWise Automate is an RMM solution. It offers asset discovery, both agentless and agent-based monitoring, VM monitoring, automated agent deployment, and remote control sessions. As its name implies, ConnectWise Automate can automate IT tasks such as patch application, desktop and server management, report sending, and password generation. The software can also automate some agentless network devices, including routers and switches. User from small businesses make up a large majority (83%) of ConnectWise Automate reviewers on TrustRadius. Reviewers consistently highlight that ConnectWise Automate’s extensive scripting features allow them to automate complex IT actions.

“Scripting in Automate is very comprehensive and flexible…Being able to automatically add systems to groups based on some criteria (almost anything) and then run scripts or commands against those groups is a huge benefit.”

– David Wertz | President | Computer & Network Security Company

[easy-tweet tweet=”Scripting in Automate is very comprehensive and flexible!” user=”trustradius” template=”qlite”]

SCCM

From Microsoft, System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) is a system monitoring and management tool. SCCM can run on a variety of environments to monitor system and network health, manage patches and updates, send data to a centralized dashboard, and automatically discover new machines in the network. The software also offers scripting tools to automate IT workflow, resource creation and deployment, and service requests. Self-service features let businesses create customer portals for submitting IT requests. A majority (56%) of SCCM users on TrustRadius are from enterprises. Reviewers appreciate SCCM’s remote device imaging capabilities, patch and update management tools, and overall breadth of functionality.

“In our current environment, this System Center Configuration Manager had replaced several standalone solutions for patching, imaging, remote assistance, [and] reporting…Tons of different options to configure systems, to manage software inventorying and deployments, patch management, systems imaging, etc.”

– Valery Mezentsau | IT Department Manager | Financial Services Company

[easy-tweet tweet=”SCCM: Tons of different options to configure systems” user=”trustradius” template=”qlite”]

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor

SolarWinds Server & Application Monitor (SAM) is a dedicated system monitoring tool. It can monitor Windows and Linux machines, virtual servers, applications, and cloud-based services. SolarWinds SAM also includes hardware and software dependency mapping, monitoring alerts, and customizable reporting. Its data visualization tools help technicians and administrators correlate performance metrics to identify data relationships. Users from midsize companies and enterprises make up almost equal parts (48% and 47%, respectively) of SolarWinds SAM users on TrustRadius. SolarWinds SAM’s central monitoring dashboard, extensive library of application monitoring templates, and user-friendly UI are some of its reviewers’ favorite features.

“Canned displays allow us to get immediate results about our services without having to learn how to design a UI or add dozens of widgets. It’s all prebuilt…I don’t have to build out low-level agents to gather the information I want. SAM makes it as easy as checking some boxes in the UI.”

– Verified User | Administrator in Information Technology | Education Management Company

[easy-tweet tweet=”SAM makes it as easy as checking some boxes in the UI.” user=”trustradius” template=”qlite”]

Nagios

Nagios is an open-source IT infrastructure monitoring solution. It provides a centralized view of IT systems, sends email or text alerts to technicians in the case of a failure, and facilitates communication by allowing users to reply to alerts. Nagios also provides detailed historical reporting and can show performance trends to help plan for infrastructure upgrades. As a widely used open-source tool, Nagios has a robust community of developers and a large library of user-developed addons. These include remote management, distributed network processing, and integration with MySQL databases. A significant portion (45%) of Nagios users on TrustRadius are from midsize companies. Reviewers value Nagios’s extensive customizability, strong community support, and proactive resource usage alerts.

“Upon an alert, Nagios’ ability to fire off scripts allows us to either fix problems automatically or gather data about an issue as soon as it happens…I know when I’ve got an outage before the phone rings. We often have dispatched techs and are working to resolve our issues long before our customers notice.”

– Verified User | Engineer in Information Technology | Hospitality Company

[easy-tweet tweet=”Nagios: I know when I’ve got an outage before the phone rings!” user=”trustradius” template=”qlite”]

Congratulations to the winners of the Top Rated System Monitoring Software Award!

Top Rated Criteria

Products included in the 2019 Top Rated System Monitoring Software list must have been in the top tier of their category TrustMap as of March 15th, 2019. To qualify for the System Monitoring Software Top Rated Award, products must have at least 10 reviews written within the past year, a TRScore of at least 7.5 out of 10, and must receive at least 1.5% of the traffic in their category.  Every reviewer is verified and every review is vetted before publication. Products are plotted on the TrustMap based on end-user data, including users’ likelihood to recommend scores as well as buyer research patterns. To learn more about TrustMaps and Top Rated methodology, check out this page.