Nagios vs Cacti

Struggling to choose between Nagios and Cacti? Both products offer unique advantages, making it a tough decision.

Nagios is a Network & Admin solution with tags like monitoring, alerting, uptime, server.

It boasts features such as Monitoring of network services (HTTP, SMTP, POP3, ICMP, etc), Monitoring of host resources (processor load, disk usage, etc), Simple plugin design for easy extensibility, Alerting and notification when problems arise, Web interface for viewing current network status, alerts and reports, Support for SNMP polling for switch/router monitoring, Remote monitoring capabilities with secure tunneling and pros including Open source and free, Highly customizable and extensible, Wide range of plugins available, Alerting helps identify issues quickly, Good community support.

On the other hand, Cacti is a Network & Admin product tagged with network, monitoring, graphing, statistics.

Its standout features include Graphing and monitoring tool for network devices, Supports SNMP polling for data collection, Customizable graphs and dashboards, Threshold-based alerting, Supports RRDTool for data storage, Web-based interface, Plugin architecture for extendibility, and it shines with pros like Free and open source, Easy to install and configure, Wide range of supported devices, Flexible and customizable, Active community support.

To help you make an informed decision, we've compiled a comprehensive comparison of these two products, delving into their features, pros, cons, pricing, and more. Get ready to explore the nuances that set them apart and determine which one is the perfect fit for your requirements.

Nagios

Nagios

Nagios is an open-source monitoring system that allows administrators to monitor network infrastructure like servers, switches, applications, and services. It can notify users when issues arise and help identify problems in a timely manner.

Categories:
monitoring alerting uptime server

Nagios Features

  1. Monitoring of network services (HTTP, SMTP, POP3, ICMP, etc)
  2. Monitoring of host resources (processor load, disk usage, etc)
  3. Simple plugin design for easy extensibility
  4. Alerting and notification when problems arise
  5. Web interface for viewing current network status, alerts and reports
  6. Support for SNMP polling for switch/router monitoring
  7. Remote monitoring capabilities with secure tunneling

Pricing

  • Open Source

Pros

Open source and free

Highly customizable and extensible

Wide range of plugins available

Alerting helps identify issues quickly

Good community support

Cons

Steep learning curve

Complex configuration

No native support for monitoring Windows systems

Difficult to scale to large environments


Cacti

Cacti

Cacti is an open-source network monitoring and graphing tool that provides easy monitoring of network devices and servers. It polls devices for utilization data, stores the data, and generates graphs and statistics to help analyze network traffic and utilization.

Categories:
network monitoring graphing statistics

Cacti Features

  1. Graphing and monitoring tool for network devices
  2. Supports SNMP polling for data collection
  3. Customizable graphs and dashboards
  4. Threshold-based alerting
  5. Supports RRDTool for data storage
  6. Web-based interface
  7. Plugin architecture for extendibility

Pricing

  • Open Source

Pros

Free and open source

Easy to install and configure

Wide range of supported devices

Flexible and customizable

Active community support

Cons

Steep learning curve

Complex interface

Manual configuration required

Limited scalability

No official support