# Graylog Reviews 2026. Verified Reviews, Pros & Cons | Capterra > Is Graylog the right Log Management solution for you? Explore 32 verified user reviews from people in industries like yours to make a confident choice. Source: https://www.capterra.com/p/183539/Graylog/reviews --- Graylog 4.6 (32) [View alternatives](https://www.capterra.com/p/183539/Graylog/alternatives/) Provider data verified by our Software Research team, and reviews moderated by our Reviews Verification team. [Learn more](https://www.capterra.com/our-story/) * * * Last updated March 13th, 2026 # Reviews of Graylog Ease of use 4.1 Customer Service 4.3 ## Pros and Cons in Reviews FA Fabrizio A TechnicianComputer & Network Security, 2 - 10 employeesUsed the software for: 1-2 years. “The interface is simple and you can create your own dashboard with tables, graphs and counter (you can view your logs and create tables also with graphana, using elasticsearch as data source).“ September 4, 2024 JB Joe B Software ResellerInformation Technology and Services, 11 - 50 employeesUsed the software for: Less than 6 months. “It was difficult to get started with Graylog because I mostly use software documentation to set up new software but apart from the basic "how it works", I got a little lost.“ April 8, 2023 FA Fabrizio A TechnicianComputer & Network Security, 2 - 10 employeesUsed the software for: 1-2 years. “Graylog server runs on a Linux Machine, installation is quite easy, there are lot of tutorials on internet.“ September 4, 2024 FA Fabrizio A TechnicianComputer & Network Security, 2 - 10 employeesUsed the software for: 1-2 years. “There is a huge community, so in case of need you will easily find the answer to your question/problem.“ September 4, 2024 Ranjithkumar P Principal Consultant Computer & Network Security, 10,001+ employeesUsed the software for: I used a free trial. “We were able to implement a centralized log management with GUI and sent filtered logs to SIEM which saved cost of SIEM license and enhanced security incident management.“ December 23, 2020 ## Showing most helpful reviews Showing 1-25 of 32 Reviews Sort by: Most Helpful Rating Company Size Reviewer's Role Length of Use Frequency of Use Chamroeunrith C. IT Manager Non-Profit Organization Management Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Graylog Enterprise Log for Business" September 12, 2021 5.0 prevously we using syslog server to centralize log, and when we have more server and network we can not put all those log into syslog server that store data in mysql, it perform slow search and not report correctly, i have try spend sometime to search and i found graylog, i try to setup a few day until success because its new related to elastic search, but finally i find out and keep using until now, its around 3 years already since i use graylog server to monitor all the network activity, monitoring server with nxlog agent, monitor cisco switch with syslog, linux with syslog, and can monitor the radius authentication log, each time users plug the network or connect wifi log generated and sent to graylog-server, and graylog server create alert message send by telegram to system admin. Pros \- Graylog is very powerful log, i have search around 50million of record in 3second only, very powerful log because it integrated with elastic search that perform log search very fast. - Telegram alert notification is what i like, i create the rule to let it send notification to telegram so i know what is going on on the network/server log. - enterprise license are free for one year, and make sure your traffic log not hit to 5GB/day. - support various log protocol, nxlog from windows, syslog from linux, and other such as aws. but i use only nxlog and syslog only. Cons its perfect already but the dashboard not so nice, not so flexible on the reporting yet. Reason for choosing Graylog normal log search server support only syslog protocol, its not enough and not detail information. well, graylog is enterprise class, license cost is cheaper than other, fast search, support multi protocol of log, from windows server, linux, aws, and more protocol, but based on my experience and real work with graylog is we use graylog to store windows log, linux, cisco, mikrotik, fortigate, unifi router, dell server, dell SAN storage, and dell core swithc only. currently we have around 300 devices that sent log to graylog server, and log traffic around 3GB/day, but graylog can perform search the log information well even the database of graylog is 500GB for 6months, as we always archive the database when it increase to 500GB of log. Switched from [Syslog-ng](https://www.capterra.com/p/156013/Syslog-ng/) syslog server when we have data store alot in mysql server it slow on search report, and not generate graph well. Review Source TE Tim E. Chief Information Security Officer Hospitality Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Great value to cost ratio for a solid log management solution" November 2, 2020 5.0 Graylog has been great to work with. Their sidecar implementations make client configuration and management very easy, and even with the free version, they provide reliable, albeit limited support (I’ve gotten good, live email replies to a couple of questions, versus only allowing you to access forums, etc). Pros Very low cost of ownership, particularly if you can get the Community (Free, Open-Source) version to meet your needs. I’ve implemented Graylog at multiple organizations for only the cost of hardware / storage. Cons Would love to have more plugins / content packs available in the Graylog Marketplace. With limited hands on a team for a smaller company, there’s often not enough time to write extractors and content packs. Alternatives considered [Sumo](https://www.capterra.com/p/175695/Sumo/)[Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/) Reason for choosing Graylog Again, of note, we didn’t purchase. While there’d be added value to enterprise plugins and support, we are meeting our needs with the Community (F.O.S.S.) version. Switched from [Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/) Cost associated with using the tool, based on data ingestion, was going to substantially increase our expenses to even maintain the solution as it stood. This was the case at multiple organizations, as well. Review Source Response from Graylog November 3, 2020 Hi Tim, Thank you so much for taking time out to write us a review. Glad you are happy with Graylog & the cost savings you are seeing. We have recently launched "Illuminate" which has a lot of ready to use content packs. You can check it out here - https://www.graylog.org/illuminate/illuminate-authentication. You can sign up for our newsletter too to get updated when we launch new content packs - https://www.graylog.org/newsletter . Thanks again, Team Graylog VR Verified Reviewer Admin Computer Software Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Main features of Grylog" April 2, 2020 3.0 test traffic and log DB (eg. MySQL ...) test all OS Unix/Linux system log and traffic test log and traffic Firewall fortigate and FortiWeb device F5 loadbalancer Docker machine LXC container ......... Pros 1- Understand how different equipment, operating systems, databases, services and processes and different teams work in the organization. 2- Detecting security threats (in-depth analysis to find the source of the threat) 3. Dealing with cybercrime, using logs and traces of intrusion 4. Improve the process of managing applications, servers and services in real-time 5. In-depth and accurate checking of incoming and outgoing traffic at the packet level 6. Identify the relationship and correlation between logs and events 7. Identify any anomalies in different layers of IT the organization 8. Automate the process of detecting and reporting errors and anomalies to relevant teams in the organization 9. Perform normalization and immediate correlations of events and traffic 10. Provide real-time field of view and capture Network Flow data events In close proximity to advanced analytics, the service status is revealed 11.Prioritize alerts 12. Excellent speed and quality 13. Ability to write proprietary Content Pack 14. And hundreds more wonderful possibilities 15............ Cons 1-Speed and quality 2-Access to Content Pack 3-Being a user of Friendly 4-Support most softwares and devices 5-Good doc on the main site and internet Review Source Adam "Abe" A. Regional Director Government Administration Used the software for: 2+ years ### "You can’t do better for building a Log Management Ecosystem" July 5, 2020 5.0 I’ve recommended it as a solution to many local governments during my conference presentations and they’ve listened. Pros Graylog is built on ElasticSearch and extends its functionality out into a great product with the System Administrator in mind. You stand up the platform, point logs at it and the rest is up to your internal processes. I also enjoy that the vast majority of intelligence and augmented data is built directly into the platform rather than an outside product. The community support forums are chock full of helpful folks. Cons For a long time the visualizations were quite lacking and we required additional tools to properly tell our data stories but this is improving drastically with each new release. Alternatives considered [LogRhythm SIEM](https://www.capterra.com/p/172899/LogRhythm-Enterprise/)[IBM Security QRadar](https://www.capterra.com/p/179511/IBM-QRadar-SIEM/)[Elastic Stack](https://www.capterra.com/p/149304/Elasticsearch/)[Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/)[Security Event Manager](https://www.capterra.com/p/182242/Log-Event-Manager/) Reason for choosing Graylog Cost and simplicity. Also, you can leverage any aspect of ElasticSearch that you desire as well making it a very versatile choice. Review Source RS Remi S. Enterprise Architect, IT Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Very strong on open source on-premise solution" June 25, 2020 5.0 Experience has been great, we started by using the free version, it has provided benefits early on to the dev teams to search through web logs without the need for downloading them and using a log parser application, or committing early to expensive paid tools. Since then we keep adding new sources and are looking at more enterprise features as usage grows. Pros Graylog has alot of flexibility and a mature feature set. We use it across all of our Windows as well as Linux servers. It has a strong community and alot of flexibility, does not impose restrictions on our applications, good documentation and generally receives regular updates and features. Cons I find some of the latest changes to the GUI (changes happen all the time with Graylog) are less user friendly - functionality to get count tables are still there but it is less dummy proof whereas before a novice user could click around in the side navigation and discover certain features. There are also less cloud offerings for Graylog so it fits more the on-premise model where you manage the graylog server/infrastructure. Alternatives considered [Loggly](https://www.capterra.com/p/148959/Loggly/)[Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/) Reason for choosing Graylog We had a senior team member that had experience with Graylog. Review Source VR Verified Reviewer Data Analyst Research Used the software for: 6-12 months ### "Incredibly flexible open source log management tool" October 7, 2019 5.0 I am a data analyst so I often deal with large amounts of data that are really complicated to parse and sort through. I used Graylog to aggregate and parse logs which I later analyzed for relevant information. Pros Graylog is a fantastic tool to summarize and aggregate data into simple and highly accessible visual depictions and dashboards. Although it is an open source log management solution, it is really flexible and agile, and helps me parse data rapidly and intuitively. I think it's one of the best alternatives to Splunk - and probably is a much better tool even for enterprises. Cons Learning curve is a little bit steep. You need a somewhat technical background to learn it, but once you grasp the basics, it is way less cumbersome than others such as Alienvault or Loggly. Alternatives considered [Loggly](https://www.capterra.com/p/148959/Loggly/)[Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/)[USM Anywhere](https://www.capterra.com/p/130785/AlienVault-USM/)[Mezmo](https://www.capterra.com/p/172632/LogDNA/) Reason for choosing Graylog Splunk conduces its searches via a formal query language. Since I didn't know it, it was really hard to extract meaningful insight from aggregated logs that spanned across many different categories. Review Source FA Fabrizio A. Technician Computer & Network Security Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Graylog the best syslog" September 4, 2024 5.0 I use Graylog for security and GDPR purposes. Speaking about security, it helps me a lot, I collect logs from firewall, nas, switch, windows (e.g. Domain Controller and Terminal Server) and linux server, especially if they are published on internet. If you have an exchange on premise you should collect the log files under inetpub directory (use the windows filebeat). I can download report in excel format. Updates are frequent. A great product you should try. Pros You can choose the free version and have all the features needed to collect and look for logs. There is a huge community, so in case of need you will easily find the answer to your question/problem. The interface is simple and you can create your own dashboard with tables, graphs and counter (you can view your logs and create tables also with graphana, using elasticsearch as data source). You need to add at least an input, it can be for example an UDP one or for windows and linux machine filebeat on port 5044 (via sidecar). You will see your sidecar devices on the Sidecars section. You can create and save queries using lucene language, they will help you to find any potential threat logged. Graylog server runs on a Linux Machine, installation is quite easy, there are lot of tutorials on internet. Cons some features are only on enterprise edition, the purge of inactive sidecar sometimes does not work (you have to restart graylog-server service) Review Source VR Verified Reviewer Engineer Computer & Network Security Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Graylog the king of syslogs" July 15, 2024 5.0 Graylog has a clean interface that I like very much. I keep monitored several devices and I created many queries that look for unusual activities. I run and keep updated many Graylog server installations and they work fine. Just remember to se the right number of indices and their rotation to avoid loss of data if disk becomes full. Collecting logs is also useful for GDPR purposes. Among Syslogs i think Graylog is the best one. Pros Graylog can be totally free, and you can collect logs from windows and linux systems and from other devices such as firewalls and switches (there are many more). You need a linux machine to install and run graylog server. With Windows and Linux you have to install Sidecar and Filebeat to collect data and configure the agent. You can create many indices and set their retention policies. Once you start collecting logs you can do searches with lucene query, and save your queries. Then you can download the results in .csv format. With Graylog you can create dashboards, set alerts (e.g. via email or via telegram) that help to keep your network safe, remember to set the right path of logs in your Winlogbeat and Filebeat. Cons Some installation guides are not really clear. Review Source Marc R. DevOps Engineer Internet Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Great piece of software" September 25, 2020 4.0 Great piece of software, all our applications and cloud provider logs are being sent to graylog. Very easy to filter and review the logs. Their staff is nice, they're always grateful to help with doubts and giving support to OSS contributors. Pros All in one product. Lot of inputs available so you can ingest logs from a wide range of applications. Pipelines are a powerful tool to normalize data before indexing. Cons UI used to look "old". Now is getting much better but it still needs more love. The "single" designated master is not very cloud friendly. I'd like some kind of automated cluster management (with quorum to elect the master node) so we don't have to manually set one node as master while keeping our scaling operations. Reason for choosing Graylog We considered ELK for this but the amount of available inputs made us to choose Graylog. Review Source Response from Graylog October 9, 2020 Hi Marc, Thanks so much for taking time out to leave us a review. Glad you find the variety of inputs useful. We have shared your suggestions with our product team and they will definitely consider them. Thanks, Team Graylog Luís Miguel C. System Engineer Computer & Network Security Used the software for: 6-12 months ### "Windows Servers Events Agreggation " July 28, 2020 4.0 My overall experience is very grafull, since i didn´t know anything about Graylog / Elastic Search, it´s been an adventures. Tears and Joy, may hours in deep community forum and documentation. Since then, audit active directory, filesharing, is been very easy to search. Pros We use graylog for Windows Server Events (Event Viewer) in one place, it´s very usefull. The Alert Setup and new features like Pipelines (For disclose unknown error codes) is one plus in the Graylog. The other Pro is the community forum and support. Theres a VDA version ready to use. (Ubuntu) Free Enterprise Licence with Traffic limitation ( normaly for one server / event aggregation) Cons If you need to custom setup with several graylog nodes is hard to get it running in the first try. Some nice features are only available in Enterprise Edition. No backup for Indexes is available , need to use external options. Very hard post-config and clean the logs for the right information (need work) Reason for choosing Graylog Main the only one with no limits for free edition in terms of traffic / machines ... The Dashboards and the query agreggation made the job very easy afterwords. Review Source sJ sunny J. Directory Incident Response Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Excellent Tool" June 16, 2020 5.0 Excellent. Highly recommend to folks looking for SIEM. Pros Ease of Deployment. Ease to Configure Rules. Very less overhead when Implementing. Cons Documentation can be improved. Speed of digestion can be improved further Review Source AL Abel L. CTO Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Logging done right" June 24, 2020 5.0 I love the product. I spread the word everywhere I go because I believe it has a future in the undustry. Pros Traditionally every IT/MSP business will use some sort of system to log data from all inputs. What I hated the most about other systems was that they really didn't improve on what was given to them (meaning logs). They either just held the logs or perhaps told me about errors I already knew. With graylog, we were able to get a wealth of additional info. Sure it requires some work writing extractors or pipelines, but at the end you get exactly what you are looking for. And with the available plugins, you can take what you had and improve. Simple example, in the past I would get an email of all errors but now I can get an email, Slack or push it as a ticket via API. Another great feature is the side-car addition. No more managing configs individually, you can manage and maintain the configs all from graylog. My wish is to introduce native plugins for other SaaS products. Recently they added ability to inject Okta logs. How about Cisco Duo or Umbrella. Both are in hot demand right now, might as well get that data too. Cons It's great at what it does but it does have some limitations. Dashboards and graphs are not as flexible as lets say Grafana. Not that it should be, but if someone wants a pure dashboard system then this may not be for them. Review Source MR Mbonjo R. Network Engineer Computer & Network Security Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Best and most popular open-source log management tool" March 9, 2023 5.0 Overall, Graylog is a powerful and an outstanding Software , I recommend it to users Pros I love this software for it's amazing performance, Graylog provides real-time log analysis, enabling you to identify and respond to potential issues quickly. Cons I haven't encountered any deficiency using Graylog Review Source NB Nathaniel B. Security Analyst Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Great features and a dedicated staff." June 16, 2020 4.0 I haven't used Graylog for logging of large enterprise systems so I can't how it performs in those cases, but I do like the DIY feel for smaller projects. It is very customizable and easy to configure things how you like. Pros I like Graylog because of how easy it is to get logs flowing into the platform. Most of my experience has been with the AWS Cloudtrail plugin, but syslog wasn't hard either. The documentation works for most typical cases. I also love the new update! The dashboards are beautiful and it's easy to get any statistic you want. It's come a long way which shows dedication and a want to always be improving. Cons Most typical use cases are covered by the documentation, but if it isn't it can take some searching to figure out if there's a way to accomplish your goal. I have no experience with the enterprise or community support so I can't say how much that might help. Alternatives considered [Elastic Stack](https://www.capterra.com/p/149304/Elasticsearch/)[Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/) Review Source SD Sinisa D. Network manager Education Management Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Enterprise grade log management" June 24, 2020 5.0 I started with free version several years back and grew the cluster into multiple nodes. Product itself is solid and easy to maintain. Keep the documentation in sync with new features. Pros Initial deployment is well documented but after that it's up to the admin to figure out how to utilize the software. Cons Complexity grows with deployment size, which is expected from such software. Adding more predefined dashboards would save time for new admins while providing examples how to best utilize graylog. Review Source RG Rahul G. CyberSecurity Manager Telecommunications Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Graylog support " December 24, 2020 3.0 Pros Its easy to use and deploy. We have installed it over centos and its easy to deploy and start working on. Cons The customer support structure needs to improve, we have been facing unknown issues for which rca was needed however there have been issues. The streams were showing running but they were struck. Also option should be there to easily search logs Alternatives considered [Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/) Reason for choosing Graylog Cost Review Source JB Joe B. Software Reseller Information Technology and Services Used the software for: Less than 6 months ### "Graylog software review" April 8, 2023 3.0 They do have one of the best log data visualization tools Pros I can customize the log data that will be visualized the way I want it and the analytics are mostly a true reflection Cons It was difficult to get started with Graylog because I mostly use software documentation to set up new software but apart from the basic "how it works", I got a little lost. They should improve on their documentation and provide support Review Source VP Viraj P. Senior Information Security Engineer Computer Software Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Great Solution for Log Collection" December 11, 2020 4.0 A complete solution when collecting log streams and alerting based on them. Pros Its a good solution when comes to log collecting and alerting based on the metrics. It can use for send notifications through mail, slack etc. Cons Implementation was hard. There were issues within the log retention setup and sometimes had to rotate manually. Review Source AA Ashley A. Consultant Computer & Network Security Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Find it, fix it.." July 23, 2020 5.0 Pros Fire as many log files in to Graylog as you can find across your infrastructure, whether it be Linux, Windows or hardware. Fine grain search, alerts and actions are at your fingertips in milliseconds 😁 Cons Not really any downsides.. as long as you have enough storage! Review Source FA Fabio A. Sysadmin Government Administration Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Excelente" July 28, 2020 5.0 Monitoreo de logs Pros La facilidad de uso y configuracion , las alertas. Cons Tal vez los gráficos , la configuración para HA Review Source RD Ray D. Security Consultant Education Management Used the software for: Less than 6 months ### "One of The Best Log Management Tools in Market " December 24, 2020 5.0 Pros Amazing documentation & really easy deployment made life easier for me. Data search also I found really easy & I have tried multiple products but graylog probably the most easiest one to follow Cons Nothing much so far. It has been great for our company Alternatives considered [IBM Security QRadar](https://www.capterra.com/p/179511/IBM-QRadar-SIEM/)[Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/) Reason for choosing Graylog Cost & better search. Also i found graylog better integrates with our current infrastructure too Review Source VR Verified Reviewer DevOps Analyst Computer Software Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Good tool for centralizing logs, but difficult to configure" May 28, 2019 4.0 Pros The possibility of centralizing logs, besides being able to create deshboards Cons Difficult to configure and manage, confusing Review Source NA Niazuddin A. Systems Engineer Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Great software that keeps improving" June 24, 2020 5.0 Pros Meets all of our logging needs and is very customizable. Community Edition is a great introduction to Graylog. Cons Catching up on the latest updates can be a pain. Review Source VR Verified Reviewer Technical consultant Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Graylog " July 1, 2020 4.0 Very good, we needed to collect our application logs for an audit, Graylog does the job perfectly! Pros Very easy to send logs to Graylog and collect them using sidecar. Cons Building dashboards takes some time to understand, check out the marketplace for them Alternatives considered [Splunk Enterprise](https://www.capterra.com/p/94317/Splunk/) Reason for choosing Graylog Splunk was way too expensive Review Source HH Houcem H. Information Security Manager Telecommunications Used the software for: 6-12 months ### "Excellent log management platform" August 27, 2020 5.0 Great log management platform, extremely flexible. Pros Multiple deployment options Powerful log parsing and dashboarding features Open source (for the most part) Cons Some great features are exclusive to the paid tier. Reason for choosing Graylog Pricing. Review Source Similar Products Featured