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At a Glance
Market Segments
Mid-Market (41.1% of reviews)
Mid-Market (42.4% of reviews)
Entry-Level Pricing
Starting at $18.00
$1,399.00 Per Year
IBM Instana
Star Rating
(435)4.4 out of 5
Market Segments
Mid-Market (41.1% of reviews)
Entry-Level Pricing
Starting at $18.00
Free Trial is available
Browse all 2 pricing plansSolarWinds Database Observability
Star Rating
(211)4.5 out of 5
Market Segments
Mid-Market (42.4% of reviews)
Entry-Level Pricing
$1,399.00 Per Year
Free Trial is available
Browse all 2 pricing plansSummary
AI Generated Summary
AI-generated. Powered by real user reviews.
- Users report that Database Observability excels in Multi-Site Monitoring with a score of 9.2, allowing for comprehensive oversight across various locations, while IBM Instana, although strong, scores slightly lower at 9.3 in Monitoring, indicating a more focused approach.
- Reviewers mention that Database Observability's Alerting feature is highly rated at 9.2, providing users with timely notifications, whereas IBM Instana's Alerting feature, while effective, scores a bit lower at 8.8, suggesting it may not be as responsive in critical situations.
- G2 users highlight the superior Data Visualization capabilities of Database Observability, scoring 8.8, which enhances user experience through intuitive dashboards, compared to IBM Instana's score of 8.3, where users feel the visual representation could be improved.
- Users on G2 report that Database Observability's Performance Analysis feature stands out with a score of 9.3, providing in-depth insights into system performance, while IBM Instana's score of 8.7 indicates it offers solid performance analysis but lacks some depth.
- Reviewers say that Database Observability's Incident Alerts feature is robust, scoring 8.9, which ensures users are promptly informed of issues, whereas IBM Instana's Incident Alerting feature, scoring 8.4, may not provide the same level of immediacy.
- Users report that Database Observability's Automation capabilities, with a score of 7.8, streamline workflows effectively, while IBM Instana's Automation features, scoring 8.5, are noted for their efficiency but may not be as user-friendly as those in Database Observability.
Pricing
Entry-Level Pricing
IBM Instana
Essentials
Starting at $18.00
Automatic discovery, mapping and monitoring of Infrastructure
- Includes All Infrastructure Monitoring Features
- Includes End User Monitoring
- Includes Unbounded Analytics
SolarWinds Database Observability
Flexible Database Performance Analyzer for virtualized environments or SQL Sentry license per instance
$1,399.00
Per Year
1-50 instances
Volume based discounting available
- One year subscription price, also includes maintenance and support.
Free Trial
IBM Instana
Free Trial is available
SolarWinds Database Observability
Free Trial is available
Ratings
Meets Requirements
8.6
344
8.8
190
Ease of Use
8.6
357
8.7
192
Ease of Setup
8.9
195
8.7
135
Ease of Admin
8.4
128
8.9
130
Quality of Support
8.6
309
8.7
179
Has the product been a good partner in doing business?
8.5
128
8.8
128
Product Direction (% positive)
8.4
330
9.2
187
Features by Category
Functionality
9.2
20
Not enough data
9.4
20
Not enough data
9.3
20
Not enough data
9.2
19
Not enough data
9.3
19
Not enough data
8.8
18
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Website Monitoring
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Experience
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM)
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Management
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Performance
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Functionality
9.4
13
9.3
75
8.8
13
8.9
75
8.7
13
9.0
74
8.6
13
8.9
75
8.8
12
8.6
75
8.5
13
8.7
74
Agentic AI - Database Monitoring
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Monitoring
8.9
131
Not enough data
8.4
121
Not enough data
8.9
129
Not enough data
8.7
133
Not enough data
9.7
6
Not enough data
Administration
8.6
126
Not enough data
8.7
104
Not enough data
8.5
100
Not enough data
9.4
6
Not enough data
Analysis
8.5
114
Not enough data
8.5
131
Not enough data
8.3
99
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Cloud Infrastructure Monitoring
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
AI Automation - Cloud Infrastructure Monitoring
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Functionality
8.7
27
Not enough data
8.4
25
Not enough data
9.0
34
Not enough data
Issue Resolution
9.1
34
Not enough data
8.9
32
Not enough data
8.7
33
Not enough data
Management
9.0
33
Not enough data
8.9
33
Not enough data
8.7
30
Not enough data
Generative AI
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Agentic AI - AIOps Platforms
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Visibility
7.3
5
Not enough data
8.0
5
Not enough data
7.7
5
Not enough data
Monitoring and Management
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Hardware Monitoring
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Visibility
9.7
5
Not enough data
9.0
5
Not enough data
8.3
5
Not enough data
Monitoring and Management
7.3
5
Not enough data
6.7
5
Not enough data
7.7
5
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Log Monitoring
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Visibility
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Monitoring and Management
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Cloud environment support
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Server Monitoring
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Functionality
10.0
5
Not enough data
10.0
5
Not enough data
10.0
5
Not enough data
9.7
5
Not enough data
Management
10.0
5
Not enough data
10.0
5
Not enough data
10.0
5
Not enough data
10.0
5
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Enterprise Monitoring
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Monitoring
8.5
164
Not enough data
8.6
175
Not enough data
8.9
174
Not enough data
7.6
123
Not enough data
8.5
157
Not enough data
Response
8.5
169
Not enough data
8.4
165
Not enough data
8.1
154
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Application Performance Monitoring (APM)
7.0
10
Not enough data
8.0
10
Not enough data
7.3
10
Not enough data
7.3
10
Not enough data
7.2
10
Not enough data
Performance
8.3
139
Not enough data
8.4
154
Not enough data
Functionality
8.1
133
Not enough data
8.4
128
Not enough data
8.2
130
Not enough data
8.5
149
Not enough data
Management
Not enough data
8.3
17
Not enough data
8.1
16
Not enough data
8.4
16
Not enough data
8.4
16
Not enough data
9.3
17
Maintenance
Not enough data
7.3
17
Not enough data
7.8
17
Not enough data
8.4
18
Security
Not enough data
8.3
15
Not enough data
8.8
17
Automation
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
8.7
5
Not enough data
7.7
5
Not enough data
Not enough data
Functionality
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
8.7
5
Not enough data
8.0
5
Administration
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
8.3
5
Not enough data
9.0
5
Agentic AI - Data Warehouse Automation
Not enough data
Not enough data
Alerts management
8.1
40
Not enough data
8.1
44
Not enough data
8.4
56
Not enough data
Monitoring
8.3
56
Not enough data
8.8
61
Not enough data
8.2
56
Not enough data
8.9
55
Not enough data
Automation
7.9
35
Not enough data
7.9
37
Not enough data
Analysis
8.2
54
Not enough data
8.1
45
Not enough data
8.6
60
Not enough data
8.5
41
Not enough data
Issue Resolution
8.5
52
Not enough data
7.6
44
Not enough data
8.2
46
Not enough data
Generative AI
8.7
10
Not enough data
Agentic AI - IT Alerting
8.3
5
Not enough data
8.3
5
Not enough data
8.3
5
Not enough data
8.0
5
Not enough data
8.3
5
Not enough data
8.0
5
Not enough data
8.3
5
Not enough data
Telemetry Collection & Ingestion - Observability
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Agentic AI - Observability Software
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Visualization & Dashboards - Observability
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Correlation & Root Cause Analysis - Observability
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Scalability & Ecosystem Integration - Observability
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
AI Features - Observability
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Not enough data
Response
8.8
7
Not enough data
8.6
7
Not enough data
7.9
7
Not enough data
8.3
6
Not enough data
Records
8.9
6
Not enough data
8.9
6
Not enough data
8.3
6
Not enough data
Management
9.4
6
Not enough data
8.6
6
Not enough data
8.6
6
Not enough data
Generative AI
8.3
5
Not enough data
8.3
5
Not enough data
Categories
Categories
Shared Categories
IBM Instana and SolarWinds Database Observability are categorized as Database Monitoring
Unique Categories
IBM Instana is categorized as Observability Software, Enterprise Monitoring, Hardware Monitoring, AIOps Platforms, Website Monitoring, Cloud Infrastructure Monitoring, IT Alerting, Container Monitoring, Incident Response, Application Performance Monitoring (APM), Log Monitoring, Digital Experience Monitoring (DEM), and Server Monitoring
SolarWinds Database Observability is categorized as Database Management Systems (DBMS), Data Warehouse Automation, and Other Analytics
Reviews
Reviewers' Company Size
IBM Instana
Small-Business(50 or fewer emp.)
Mid-Market(51-1000 emp.)
Enterprise(> 1000 emp.)
SolarWinds Database Observability
Small-Business(50 or fewer emp.)
Mid-Market(51-1000 emp.)
Enterprise(> 1000 emp.)
Small-Business
(50 or fewer emp.)
Mid-Market
(51-1000 emp.)
Enterprise
(> 1000 emp.)
Reviewers' Industry
Information Technology and Services
19.8%
Computer Software
10.4%
Telecommunications
6.3%
Financial Services
6.3%
Retail
5.6%
Other
51.7%
Information Technology and Services
19.5%
Computer Software
5.9%
Hospital & Health Care
4.9%
Retail
3.9%
Financial Services
3.9%
Other
62.0%
Discussions
why use instana over another platform?
2 Comments
OG
If you compare those 2 only the price matters. Instana does not have the feature set of DataDog in any category.Read more
Is there a chatbot available?
2 Comments
OG
Best join a webinar or customer demo to learn more about it. It took me also a while to understand all the bits and pieces. Since IBM was acquired by IBM,...Read more
What is Instana?
1 Comment
SB
Hi,
Instana is a leading Enterprise Observability Platform, powered by automated Application Performance Monitoring. It discovers and maps all services,...Read more
What is the impact of running DPA on my production instances?
2 Comments
Official Response from SolarWinds Database Observability
Less than 1%. We are agentless and only monitor active sessions allowing us to keep our overhead on monitored database instances extremely low.Read more
How do I access DPA? Do I have to install anything on my PC to view the interface?
2 Comments
Official Response from SolarWinds Database Observability
Download and install your free trial using our Getting Started Guide, which is located in the Success Center.Read more
Is it recommended to have a DPA server located at each site you are monitoring?
2 Comments
RK
Yes, very much recommended to have your DPA server close to the DB instances being monitored.Read more
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