The 10 Best Server Monitoring Tools: Pros, Cons, and Pricing

Servers are the backbone of the internet, quietly handling requests, distributing workloads, and keeping everything online. But even the best infrastructures have breaking points.

Performance metrics like CPU spikes, memory leaks, overloaded disks, and network congestion can grind performance to a halt. A single unnoticed bottleneck can lead to slow load times, failed transactions, or a full-blown outage.

So, what’s the solution here? A powerful server monitoring solution that provides valuable insights into your infrastructure. The right monitoring system can help identify problems in real time, offering a more proactive approach to monitoring and management of your server infrastructure.

To dive deeper into why server monitoring matters and how it can prevent costly downtime, check out our comprehensive guide: What is Server Monitoring and Why It Matters

Here are the best of the best on the market today.

The 10 Best Server Monitoring Tools in 2025 and Beyond

1. Pinghome

As one of the best server monitoring software solutions out there, Pinghome makes performance monitoring feel effortless. Whether you're managing a fleet of Linux servers, a mix of Windows and Mac machines, or a sprawling cloud infrastructure, it brings everything into one clean, centralized dashboard.

Setup is ridiculously fast (just a few minutes), and suddenly you have real-time tracking of performance metrics like CPU usage, memory load, disk I/O, network performance, and more. Plus, Pinghome lets you create various custom monitors, such as SQL performance monitoring and SNMP monitoring, for deeper insights. No complicated configurations and no headaches, just instant visibility into your server environment.

It is like having a 24/7 watchdog, helping you spot potential issues before they become critical. Continuous monitoring with global coverage ensures your infrastructure is always monitored, no matter where they are. Live tracking keeps you in the loop, and instant mobile notifications ensure you will never be caught off guard by an outage, whether you are at your desk or grabbing a coffee.

Pinghome offers powerful analytics without the complexity, providing IT teams with the detailed data they need, while its simple setup and intuitive interface make it easy for anyone to use. From startups to large enterprises, Pinghome is a monitoring solution designed to work seamlessly, no matter the scale of your infrastructure.

Pinghome Pros

• All-in-one monitoring service and incident management solution
• Available as a cloud-based service
• Also offered as a self-hosted solution, installed in your data center and managed by the Pinghome team
• Powerful JSON response monitoring
• Incredibly fast setup
• Multiple status pages built into each offer
• Built-in keyword monitoring

Pinghome Cons

• Relatively new compared to others on this list
• Not yet as feature-rich as some of the more expensive tools
• No log management yet, but it is in development

Pinghome Pricing

Pinghome’s pricing is by far one of the most cost-effective of all the server monitoring solutions. The Starter package is only €8.75/month, and comes with 15 uptime monitors, 1 server monitor, and 3 heartbeats, with 1-minute check intervals.

However, if you go for the Basic package, you get 5 server monitors, 100 uptime monitors, and 10 heartbeats for only €25/month. That’s only €5 per server per month and includes multiple basic, advanced, and complex server metrics.

2. Datadog

Monitoring tools like Datadog are a go-to for massive corporations that need a comprehensive monitoring solution designed for application performance monitoring and tracking server performance. It provides a unified view of metrics, logs, and traces, with over 850 integrations that allow teams to correlate system health, network performance, and application monitoring across cloud and on-prem environments.

For large teams managing complex infrastructures, it is a dream come true with monitoring capabilities that deliver valuable insights into every aspect of your system.

All of that said, Datadog’s complexity and feature overload can be overwhelming for smaller companies. Its pricing structure can escalate quickly, especially if you do not need all those features. If your focus is cost-effective server monitoring, Datadog might not be the most practical choice.

Datadog Pros

• 20+ individual solutions with every feature you could think of
• 850+ integrations

Datadog Cons

• Ridiculously expensive
• Not ideal for anyone aside from massive enterprises
• User reviews complain about Datadog not meeting their expectations
• User reviews complain about Datadog being hard to use and navigate

Datadog Pricing

Datadog has 20+ individual solutions, and each one of those has its own dedicated pricing structure and add-ons, too. It can get a bit confusing, to say the least.

What we can do, however, is specifically talk about their infrastructure monitoring solution, which includes what is considered to be one of the top server monitoring softwares out there.

Datadog’s infrastructure monitoring solution starts at $15/month per host and can go up to $23/month per host, depending on what features you need. Again, it is quite expensive.

3. New Relic

New Relic is built for the big leagues with one of the most widely known analysis tools on the market today. With over 780 integrations and a suite of tools that cover everything from app performance monitoring to log management, it gives enterprises complete visibility across their entire tech stack.

Whether you're tracking microservices, databases, or servers, New Relic lets you zoom in on every detail, ensuring your infrastructure runs smoothly at scale. But here’s the catch: unless you’re managing a massive operation with a massive budget, New Relic can feel like a sledgehammer when all you need is a tack hammer.

The pricing can get steep, too, especially if you’re not using its full range of features. If you're just after basic server monitoring, New Relic may not be the most cost-effective option for you. It’s a lot to bite off if you don’t need the full feast.

New Relic Pros

• Hundreds of integrations
• Relatively lightweight, consuming few resources
• Built-in queries and ready-to-use monitors

New Relic Cons

• Expensive and not very transparent on pricing
• Multiple user reviews complain about the complex pricing structure
• User reviews complain about deployment issues
• User reviews complain about the learning curve

New Relic Pricing

At the top of New Relic’s pricing page, they claim to have simple and transparent pricing. However, after just a little bit of digging, you’ll find it to be the exact opposite.

In fact, they don’t even list their pricing at all. In the past, they had quite complex, per-seat pricing, but now, the only option is to fill out a form and reach out to them if you want any sort of insights into their offerings.

4. Better Stack

Better Stack is designed for teams that want a powerful, scalable monitoring solution without the steep costs of some of the bigger platforms. It provides high-speed log search and low-latency dashboards, all while keeping pricing relatively affordable.

With 13 months of default data retention, it’s easy to keep track of long-term metrics and analysis tools without running into costly storage issues. It’s built to scale with your team, making it a solid option for growing engineering departments.

What makes Better Stack particularly interesting is its focus on team collaboration. You can share dashboards in real time, letting you troubleshoot with your team without skipping a beat. The platform also offers flexible query options, allowing you to work with SQL or drag-and-drop widgets, so you're not confined to one method. Plus, if you’re already using Grafana, Better Stack integrates seamlessly so that you can get started with minimal friction.

Better Stack Pros

• Well-rounded, all-in-one monitoring tool
• Decently priced
• User-friendly interface

Better Stack Cons

• User reviews complain about SQL usage for complex queries, stating that it makes the process more complex than needed
• User reviews complain about a lack of customization options with status pages
• User reviews complain about a lack of pricing options

Better Stack Pricing

Better Stack actually offers a free package for up to 10 monitors, but it’s highly limited. If you want real visibility, you’ll have to opt for the paid tier, which is $29/month.

This package is good for up to 10 monitors, and you can add an additional 50 for another $21/month.

5. Dotcom-Monitor

Dotcom-Monitor offers a solid option for server monitoring software, covering everything from FTP availability to DNS performance and overall network health. It gives you real-time visibility into your infrastructure’s performance, letting you monitor key metrics across both public and private networks.

For more in-depth monitoring capabilities, it supports private agents to keep track of performance behind firewalls, expanding coverage without replacing your current setup. You can customize alerts to focus on specific issues, while detailed reports help with SLA compliance and troubleshooting, giving you a clearer picture of your network’s status and performance trends.

Dotcom-Monitor Pros

• Straightforward and easy-to-use interface
• Offers a diverse set of testing tools

Dotcom-Monitor Cons

• Relatively expensive per host/target
• User reviews complain about a lack of documentation and tutorials
• User reviews complain about issues when sending multiple requests
• User reviews complain about false alarms

Dotcom-Monitoring Pricing

As mentioned above, Dotcom-Monitor is a little pricey per host, coming in at $7.99 each. That said, you have to purchase a minimum of 5, which brings your minimum spend per month with Dotcom-Monitor to $40.

On top of this, their pricing page doesn’t make it super clear what features this package comes with. There are no mentions of status pages or exact retention periods.

6. LogicMonitor

LogicMonitor offers flexible, agentless monitoring tools for servers, tracking essential performance metrics like CPU, memory, disk usage, and network performance across various OS types. Setting it up is simple. You just input an IP range, and the platform automatically scans and starts monitoring your infrastructure, including databases, web servers, and VMware environments.

The platform also supports hybrid and containerized environments, giving you a unified view of your entire infrastructure. With built-in AIOps capabilities, LogicMonitor helps detect potential issues early, allowing you to address critical performance issues before they even start, all through effective continuous monitoring.

LogicMonitor Pros

• SaaS-based monitoring platform
• Easy to implement
• Highly flexible

LogicMonitor Cons

• Very expensive, per resource pricing
• User reviews complain about poor customer support
• User reviews complain about an un-intuitive interface
• User reviews complain about a steep learning curve

LogicMonitor Pricing

LogicMonitor offers a lot of different pricing options, but for their infrastructure monitoring specifically, it is considered to be quite expensive.

They do offer volume discounts, but the prices start at $22/month per resource and include servers, VMs, SD-WAN, storage, and network monitoring.

7. Sematext

Sematext uses agent-based server monitoring to ensure high availability and performance. It is definitely one of the more lightweight monitoring systems out there.

It tracks essential performance metrics like CPU, memory, disk usage, and network performance. The Sematext agent is efficient, using just 40 MB of memory, allowing you to monitor various environments without impacting system performance.

The platform is cloud-aware and works across major cloud providers like AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud. It also supports Kubernetes and Docker, making it ideal for containerized environments. Sematext enables you to monitor container resources and orchestrator events, providing flexibility for modern infrastructures.

Sematext also integrates real-time monitoring with log data, allowing you to track both critical infrastructure performance and application health in one platform. With automatic application discovery and an easy setup process, it provides a streamlined monitoring solution for businesses to monitor their entire infrastructure with pretty minimal effort.

Sematext Pros

• User-friendly and flexible
• Quick and knowledgeable support
• Cheaper than many other options on this list

Sematext Cons

• Dashboard configurations are a bit difficult to set up and navigate
• Basic plan locked at 24-hour retention
• User reviews complain about a complicated UI

Sematext Pricing

Sematext offers three different pricing options for their infrastructure monitoring solution. They start at as little as $2.8/month per host, but you are limited to 1 day of retention.

From there, prices can go up to $10.80/month per host, depending on your exact needs.

8. Dynatrace

Dynatrace makes infrastructure monitoring simple with its AI-driven platform that provides real-time insights into key metrics like CPU, memory, and network performance down to the process level. It automatically detects new virtual machines and offers a comprehensive view of virtualized environments, including the impact of vMotion events.

The platform learns application performance baselines and alerts you if resource consumption spikes after a code deployment. Dynatrace also delivers full visibility into cloud and container environments, using AI to identify dependencies and detect performance issues across your entire stack, helping you understand how problems impact user experience.

Dynatrace Pros

• Covers pretty much every solution and feature you can think of
• AI-powered

Dynatrace Cons

• Extremely expensive
• User reviews complain about data loss between tenant swaps
• User reviews complain about poor customer support
• User reviews complain about configuration complexity

Dynatrace Pricing

Dynatrace is smart, and they display their pricing in the smallest numbers possible to not seem expensive.

Infrastructure monitoring starts at $0.04 per host per hour, but let’s do the math on that. $0.04 x 24 = $0.96.

$0.96 x 30 = $28.80 per host per month.

9. AppOptics

AppOptics by SolarWinds is a performance monitoring tool designed for hybrid and cloud-native IT environments. It integrates seamlessly with AWS, Azure, and on-prem systems, providing a full view of network health and performance.

The platform’s auto-instrumentation maps service dependencies, making pinpointing issues impacting server performance easier. When a system runs into problems, AppOptics offers both real-time visibility and detailed trace-level insights to help quickly diagnose and fix issues.

With features like distributed tracing, you can track a request’s path across servers and containers, identifying bottlenecks that affect performance. Additionally, AppOptics supports live code profiling, so you can drill down into the server-side code and understand where performance dips are happening.

The error tracking and root cause analysis features are invaluable for resolving performance problems quickly, preventing downtime, and ensuring everything runs smoothly.

AppOptics Pros

• Part of the extensive SolarWinds ecosystem
• Easy to use
• Simple app integrations

AppOptics Cons

• Middle-ground pricing, but still more expensive than a few other options
• Zero recent reviews online

AppOptics Pricing

AppOptics has some pretty straightforward pricing, but they do sort of trap you into paying for more than you might need. Each host is $9.99/month, which isn’t cheap. But, on top of that, they force you to purchase packages of 10. This means that your minimum spend would be $99.99/month.

10. Zabbix

Zabbix offers powerful monitoring capabilities with built-in templates for key metrics like CPU usage, memory, network bandwidth, and disk health. It supports protocols like SNMP and IPMI, and lets you collect data flexibly with options for active/passive modes and autodiscovery of network devices.

With features like customizable trigger expressions, problem severity levels, and root cause analysis, Zabbix helps you stay ahead of performance issues. It scales effortlessly with distributed monitoring and ensures high availability through redundancy options. Plus, you can set up alerts, encrypt traffic for added security, and integrate with other systems using Zabbix’s robust API.

Zabbix Pros

• Open source
• Easy to implement
• Highly flexible

Zabbix Cons

• Self-hosting costs can be expensive
• User reviews complain about difficulties setting it up
• User reviews complain about a steep learning curve

Zabbix Pricing

Zabbix is open-source and one of the only free server monitoring tools out there, but that doesn’t mean that it won’t cost you anything. In fact, the cost of self-hosting any free version of an open-source monitoring software can often be just as expensive, if not more expensive than an out-of-the-box solution.

But, on top of that, they offer a turnkey solution, and it comes with a ton of bells and whistles. The problem is that they charge you to implement this upgrade, and it’s not cheap.

How much, you might ask? Well, are you sitting down?

Zabbix charges $1,500 per day for its upgrade services, with some packages reaching 10 days and $21,900 in total.

A Quick Overview of the 10 Best Server Monitoring Tools