Network, refers to a group of interconnected computers to allow data exchange. And to make sure that network is constantly checked for slow or failing components, we need an adept Network Monitoring system in place.
Hence in this article, we have listed some of the best free network monitoring software in 2023.
Best Network Monitoring Software 2023
1. Microsoft Network Monitor –
Microsoft Network Monitor is one of the best free network monitoring software that allows to capture, view and analyze network traffic. This tool is very useful for troubleshooting network problems and applications on the network. The updated version is called Microsoft Message Analyzer.
Let’s have a look at the features of the same:
- It supports the latest protocol parsers to capture, display, and analyze the protocol messaging traffic, events, and other system or application messages in troubleshooting and diagnostic scenarios.
- It is a powerful tool for capturing and analyzing protocol messages.
- Message Analyzer also allows you to load, aggregate, and analyze data from a log and saved trace files.
2. OpenNMS –
OpenNMS is a freeware and one of the best monitoring software available in 2023.Let’s look at the features:
- It offers event and notification management, discovery and provisioning, service monitoring, and data collection.
- It provides path outage support and automatic acknowledgment of self-clearing problems
- OpenNMS includes a client app for the iOS which gives you the ability to view outages, nodes, alarms.
3. Advanced IP Scanner –
Yet another good tool for network monitoring for free and the best part is, it doesn’t require installation. Let’s look at its features:
- It is a reliable network scanner to analyze LAN and exports the scan results to CSV.
- The software shows all network devices, gives you access to shared folders, provides remote control of computers (via RDP and Radmin).
- It can also remotely switch the computers off.
4. NAGIOS CORE
Nagios Core is one of the best free network monitoring software which serves as the basic event scheduler, event processor, and alert manager for elements that are monitored. Let’s look at its features:
- It has the capabilities to monitor applications, services, operating systems, network protocols, system metrics and infrastructure components with a single tool.
- It shows trending and capacity planning add-ons to ensure you’re aware of aging infrastructure.
- It has escalation capabilities that make sure the alert notifications reach to the right people.
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5. CACTI –
Cacti is a network monitoring tool that enables you to collect data from nearly any network element, including routing and switching systems, firewalls, load balancers, and servers, and put that data into robust graphs. Let’s look at the features of the same:
- It contains a “data input” mechanism which allows you to define custom scripts that can be used to gather data.
- It enables you to get the tree view which allows users to create “graph hierarchies” and place graphs on the tree making it easy to organize a large number of graphs.
- It has user-based management which allows the administrators to create users and assign different levels of permissions to the cacti interface.
6. WIRESHARK-Network Monitoring Software
Wireshark is one of the best free network monitoring software which allows you to keep an eye on what is happening on the network at microscopic levels.
Let’s have a look at the features:
- It provides deep inspection of hundreds of protocols, with more being added all the time.
- It runs on Windows, Linux, OS X, Solaris, FreeBSD, NetBSD and more.
- It provides Decryption support for many protocols, including IPsec, ISAKMP, Kerberos, SNMPv3, SSL/TLS, WEP, and WPA/WPA2
7. ZABBIX
Zabbix is an open-source networking tool which also happens to be a freeware which enables you to monitor millions of metrics collected from tens of thousands of servers, virtual machines and network devices at real-time.Let’s have a look at the features:
- Though, it is very difficult to setup but very easy to manage due to its clear and clutter-free interface.
- It supports a number of databases, including MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite, Oracle, and IBM DB2.
- Zabbix VMware’s monitoring capabilities allow you to customize using any scripting or programming language.
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8. Capsa Free
One of the best network monitoring software, Capsa Free, is a network analyzer that allows you to monitor network traffic, troubleshoot network issues and analyze packets. Let’s have a look at the features:
- It provides support for over 300 network protocols (with the ability to create and customize protocols), which makes it easy for the admin to keep an eye on every network activity.
- It accurately detects DoS (DDoS) attack, Worm activity, ARP attack, TCP port scanning and suspicious conversation and locates the source and target in real-time.
- It captures all network packets transmitted on the network and displays detailed packet decoding information in Hex, ASCII, and EBCDIC.
9. NTOP
NTOP now called as NTOPNG(NTOP of new generation), is a network traffic probe that monitors network usage. Let’s have a look at its features:
- It supports a NetFlow-sFlow emitter-collector, a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) based client interface for creating ntop-centric monitoring applications, and RRDtool (RRD) for persistently storing traffic statistics.
- It can analyze traffic even at 10G speed. Moreover, it can report on IP addresses, volume, and bytes for each transaction.
- Ntop can integrate with external monitoring applications such as Nagios for alerting, and provide data for monitoring.
10. NMAP
NMAP (Network Mapper) is one of the best open source and free network monitoring software used for network discovery and security auditing. Let’s have a look at its features:
- It supports many advanced techniques for mapping out networks filled with IP filters, firewalls, routers, and other obstacles.
- It is multi-platform, it supports Linux, Windows, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, IRIX, Mac OS X, HP-UX, NetBSD, Sun OS, Amiga, and more.
- Nmap is the tool that you should use when you need to quickly map the hosts in your network.
These were some of the best and free network monitoring software we could list and hope you find it useful! If we have missed any good names that deserve to be here, please let us know in the comments section below.
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