N-able N-central Reviews & Insights

Score8.9 out of 10

88 Reviews and Ratings

Community insights

TrustRadius Insights for N-able N-central are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, third party data sources.

Pros

Remote Tasks Feature: Users have found the remote tasks feature to be extremely beneficial, with many reviewers stating that it has saved them time and provided convenience in managing multiple devices without physical interaction.

Remote Support Functionality: The remote support functionality of the product has received high praise from users, who appreciate its efficiency in troubleshooting and resolving issues without the need for physical presence. Many reviewers have specifically mentioned how easy it is to remotely control user devices and initiate remote sessions.

Management Capabilities: The management capabilities of SolarWinds N-central, especially in terms of patch management and anti-virus management, are considered top-notch by users. Automatic approval and deployment of patches, as well as scheduling automatic antivirus scans, streamline the process and ensure device security without manual intervention.

N-able N-central Reviews

25 Reviews

N-Able N-Central - A Worthwhile Investment.

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

December 20, 2024

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

All our customers have the N-central client installed, so we can connect remotely and perform consistent monitoring for workstations and servers. The majority also have the 'pro' features enabled, allowing us to patch and perform additional tasks easily. The majority also use EDR, which is built into the interface and allows us to see if there are any problems in a single pane of glass - very helpful when you are managing a large IT estate.

Pros

Remote Connection.
Patching
EDR
Scripts/Automations.
Monitoring
Critical Event Alerting.

Cons

Configuration of profiles and linking to customers.
Standardisation and compliance levels.
Speed of execution when running tasks and reporting back to inform where it's at, if it's stopped running, etc.

Likelihood to Recommend

N-Able is perfect for an MSP environment. It gives all the standard functionality an IT professional needs out of the box and can be configured to show almost anything required. For example, we have configured a dashboard to show when our backups need attention for each customer. This is achieved by running a small script on repeat via N-Central everyday/evening, and the result gives us information on the dashboard to help us identify exactly what is working and what needs looking into.

Joe Cullen

Technical Manager in Information Technology at ICO Systems Ltd (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

View profile

2024 N-able N-central Review

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

December 19, 2024

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We used to employ N-Central MSP Manager for our corporate clients' IT asset and ticket management in conjunction with N-able N-central for monitoring, response, and remote operations.

We have since retained N-able N-central but moved to ZenDesk for our incident reposonse and ticket management.

A major pro to N-able N-central alone is its extensive functionality, monitoring, and remote control avalable for all endpoints. It's an extremely capable platform. Couple this with the native integration with other PSA services including their in-house MSP-Manager, and you havea very powerful, nearly all-in-one Managed Services technical platform.

We moved to ZenDesk for ticket tracking as it provided a smoother workflow overall for our clients and technicians.

Pros

remote control
remote monitoring and notification
remote configuration
remote installation
integration with SentinelOne EDR
integration with Microsoft 365

Cons

stability of some remote sessions
ad hock remote control (Enable Take Control app for Windows)
linking devices to particular client end users

Likelihood to Recommend

Remote control, management, notification, remote configuration, and SentinelOne integration is great in N-able N-central

Devices are not bound or associated to specific end-users. Client management and ticket creation through linked MSP-Manager is not end-user based... there should be a say to bind a particualr end-user to a particular device (and make this option editable somewhere in administrative management for N-able N-central and MSP-Manager.) Perhaps offer a more variety of integrations with N-able N-central with other popular ticket management systems such as ZenDesk, etc.

Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

3 years of experience

MSP Software that works for us

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

December 17, 2024

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

N-central is at the centre of our operation as it allows as to manage our client as MSP provider, automate tasks, assent inventory, remote access, patch management and so forth. Ease of management allows us to direct our resources elsewhere such as spend more interacting with customers, sales, project planning, etc.

Pros

Remote Access
Patch Management
Automated Tasks

Cons

Slow interface
Bad mobile app

Likelihood to Recommend

N-able N-central is well suited for large organizations for IT management as well as MSP providers who manage large amounts of customers. it will allow easy management of IT resources, networks, security assesments, etc.

It would be less appropriate for small/medium size companies that have IT on staff who can implement locally hosted technology and manage it in house.

Verified User

Account Manager in Information Technology (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

7 years of experience

N-Able? More like Dis-Able

Rating: 1 out of 10

March 30, 2023

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Ideally, we wanted to utilize N-able N-central's tools to provide RMM and remote access for client systems. We sought out an application that had privileged access available (PassPortal) that also let us script solutions. The $99 price was enticing, so we gave it a shot.

Pros

A tad easier to setup than DIY solutions
Easier to manage many customers than a few other options out there
Relatively inexpensive if options are disabled

Cons

Customer support just points to online guides and I feel they aren't helpful.
During the trial they turn on a lot of features. In my experience, if you play around with the features, they charge you for them. Keep this in mind if you move forward with N-Able - they will charge for "trialed" services.
In my experience, some services that you're being charged for can't be disabled or monitored by you or your team. You only see them on the monthly invoice.
In my opinion, the "Scripting Automation" doesn't provide value. You're either going to be writing your own batch or Powershell to make scripting work.
In my opinion, monitoring software deployments is painful.
The default monitoring template can't be duplicated, edited, or referenced. You'll find that the default monitors in an unusual way and will throw needless recurring alerts into your ticketing system. To avoid this, you need to create a template from scratch which takes many hours to set up.
In my opinion, they're more concerned about a quick buck than customer service. "Buyer beware" company.

Likelihood to Recommend

In my opinion, N-able N-central is a good "learn your lesson and move onto something better" tool. I've used many RMM tools over the years and I feel that this one is slow, does a terrible job with reporting, alerting, monitoring, software deployments, etc. The ability to turn on services like AV, backup, etc easily is cute, but you're not going to be able to use your own tools with this easily. In my experience, if you do turn those tools on for testing during the trial, you'll be charged later (despite it being a trial). They also turn off your ability to monitor these increased costs or to turn them off yourself. As a company, I found that they were impossible to work with. The sales team is right there if you want to buy something - but if you need anything other than to buy something, in my experience, they take days or weeks to navigate. I found that they are not a terribly ethical company and are more concerned with making a few dollars than creating a partnerships with MSPs. I can see value is in the advertised price of $99 for a hundred endpoints. However, you need to remember to not trial any other tools (like AV, backup, etc).

Verified User

Executive in Information Technology (1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

1 year of experience

N-Able is more like M-abye

Rating: 5 out of 10

March 16, 2023

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use N-able N-central to monitor our Windows servers in multiple data centers spanning Azure and 2 on premise data centers. We monitor things such as network connectivity, resource usage, and running services. We also use it to deploy Windows updates across the servers every month.

Pros

Easy to deploy
Easy to push agents to the servers
Has a plethora of features

Cons

Very convoluted patch management
Sometimes the agents seem to stop working and have to be restarted/reinstalled
Feels like it tries to do to many things so doesn't really excel in any one thing

Likelihood to Recommend

This seems to be better suited for MSPs and I can say after deploying and working with it, it does seem like it's a tool for MSPs as it uses terminology as such throughout the console. For a single business like us, I feel like we could have picked a better tool.

Verified User

Technician in Information Technology (10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

1 year of experience

Brilliant IT Management Portal

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

October 13, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

N-able N-central is used as a central Endpoint and individual PC management tool that allows me a global company wide view of all IT equipment within the company. It alerts me on non compliance of any user\PC on AV policy as well as Hardware policies such as Disk Space, overuse of memory or any other issues where thresholds are set

Pros

Remote Management of Multiple PC's in an organization
Scheduled AV Scan and Management of AV
Limits and Threshold alerts of specific requirements such as patch management or Disk space usage
Server Management

Cons

More Knowledge base articles
Lack of Online support

Likelihood to Recommend

N-able N-central is highly suitable for IT Admins within large organizations that need oversight of all it equipment. Ideal for managing organizations that need inventory and management of more than 10 IT devices. Highly inappropriate for smaller scale companies that mange less than 10 PCs

Mohammed Mitha

Information Technology Manager in Information Technology at CK Services (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

3 years of experience

View profile

Good product

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

October 6, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use it as our RMM solution and to assist with automation. It helps with remote access and monitoring of client environments.

Pros

Overall GUI
Functionality and tools
Automation platform

Cons

Terrible support, in my opinion
Bugs in software with no real answers from N-able N-central I've found.
Listening to its end users

Likelihood to Recommend

We chose N-able N-central because we felt it was more scalable than some of the other options out there as well as not being tied to some of the companies to avoid in our market. Its automation platform seemed the best for us to build upon. the base RMM features are the same across all platforms but we hoped to build our own automation and felt this gave us the best chance with most forgiving contracts.

Chris Wilkinson

Director of Technology and Operations in Information Technology at Biz Technology Solutions (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

View profile

Do not use N-Central. Do not use N-Able.

Rating: 1 out of 10

May 16, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We were using N-Able for N-Central, MSP Backup, M365 backup, AV-Defender, SentinelOne and MSP Manager.

We have recently moved away from N-Able for all of our services except M365 Backup.

The reasons are nearly endless however the primary reasons would be:
1. N-Able are seemingly just are an acquisition company who just buys software, tacks it on until it's at a 'working' state, then forgets about it indefinitely.
2. Support have been for the most part incompetent.
3. SentinelOne and MSP Backup are just terrible, the integration for SentinelOne is the worst part, but it is extremely resource hungry, not intuitive and produces many false-positives. MSP backup backs up to the cloud, then syncs locally for the local backup, try doing that with over 1TB of data and see how long it takes. Furthermore, local backups are effectively useless, all that happens is it copies the data from the local backup WHILST uploading and verifying all of the data with the cloud anyway - useless.
4. AV-Defender is just an older version of Bitdefender, missing a lot of the newer features of Bitdefender. Changes take a long time to take effect as well.
5. MSP Manager is a joke, it's extremely slow and takes an unecessary amount of steps to get anywhere in the software.
6. N-Central is scarily unreliable with no simple way to automatically backup the database for a quick recovery. Support will not assist with Azure deployments.
7. In the worst hack of history in 2021, seemingly the only change N-Able as a company made was to change their name to N-Able, which is ridiculous.

We have a 10 page document of font size 10, dot pointed issues that we supplied to our account manager - Not a single issue was resolved.

In all of our collective years and with all of the varying software that we use, N-Able has been the worst company to deal with and we will never recommend them.

Pros

M365 Backup

Cons

Expensive software
The support team are terrible
Sales team will promise the world to get you over the line
Subscription management is tedious
Old software with very little development and the support team will not provide any further information on this - no roadmap
Integrations galore - but none of them are effective

Likelihood to Recommend

N-Able are only useful for M365 Backups. I would not trust them with anything else.

Jason Stocker

IT Consultant in Information Technology at IT (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

3 years of experience

Solid performer for the MSP market

Rating: 8 out of 10

Incentivized

October 20, 2021

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We are a small MSP using and central on several thousand endpoints to manage remote access remote support patch management and other functions it is also one of our primary reporting tools for client data. We use it in both our project group and our helpdesk group. We use it regularly need to get a large amount of data from a variety of endpoints quickly.

Pros

Remote access.
Remote support data access.
Patch management.

Cons

User interface.
Security

Likelihood to Recommend

Good for small to medium MSPs. I think it would break down for larger groups.

Verified User

Vice-President in Information Technology (11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

SolarWinds N-central Review

Rating: 7 out of 10

Incentivized

March 3, 2021

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

It is used by multiple departments, but primarily by the service desk folks that use it day in and day out. Primary function is to provide quick remote access to the endpoints. The hidden features are the patching and alerting. The automation tool is fairly good, but there are some areas [for] improvement such as using MSI. The lacking support of mac products changes with each revision, but is slowly gaining some improvements. The trust in the platform was weakened with the breach, and the endpoint clients are a bit gun-shy.

Pros

Endpoint access.
Patching.
Some basic reporting.

Cons

Apple product support.
Scripting for apple.
Removal tool of the agent is hit and miss.

Likelihood to Recommend

Mid size msp, with limited budget - I have had a few too many un-needed calls for support for very easy fixes, but it needed a call to sort out.

Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology (201-500 employees)

Vetted Review

5 years of experience

Loading Reviews List....

N-Able? More like Dis-Able

Rating: 1 out of 10

March 30, 2023

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

A tad easier to setup than DIY solutions
Easier to manage many customers than a few other options out there
Relatively inexpensive if options are disabled

Cons

Customer support just points to online guides and I feel they aren't helpful.
During the trial they turn on a lot of features. In my experience, if you play around with the features, they charge you for them. Keep this in mind if you move forward with N-Able - they will charge for "trialed" services.
In my experience, some services that you're being charged for can't be disabled or monitored by you or your team. You only see them on the monthly invoice.
In my opinion, the "Scripting Automation" doesn't provide value. You're either going to be writing your own batch or Powershell to make scripting work.
In my opinion, monitoring software deployments is painful.
The default monitoring template can't be duplicated, edited, or referenced. You'll find that the default monitors in an unusual way and will throw needless recurring alerts into your ticketing system. To avoid this, you need to create a template from scratch which takes many hours to set up.
In my opinion, they're more concerned about a quick buck than customer service. "Buyer beware" company.

Likelihood to Recommend

Verified User

Executive in Information Technology (1-10 employees)

Vetted Review

1 year of experience