Expert industrial IoT monitoring for smart manufacturing
- Central overview of your entire IT, OT, and Industrial IoT infrastructure in a single tool
- Health and availability monitoring of IIoT hardware sensors and their connectivity
- Integrated support of common protocols and standards such as MQTT or OPC UA
5 reasons why experts monitor their industrial Internet of Things with PRTG
Industry 4.0, smart manufacturing, IIoT…the digitalization of production plants, particularly the factory floor, has revolutionized the industrial sector. The increased interconnectivity involved in all processes makes it crucial to have a central overview of your entire infrastructure.
- Get out-of-the-box support for industrial standards & protocols (OPC UA, MQTT, and more)
- Collect data about the smart factory floor with IIoT devices and industrial gateways
- Watch data collection, processing, and transmission from endpoint to endpoint
- Visualize your infrastructure in custom dashboards that bring together IT, OT & IIoT
- Analyze historical IIoT monitoring data to identify areas for saving energy and resources
Complex interconnectivity makes IIoT monitoring with a single solution essential
The Industrial Internet of Things is an integral part of the modern factory, which has IIoT sensors just about everywhere to collect data about machines, HVAC systems, and more. And, just like other components in your industrial infrastructure, the IIoT sensors and gateways that record and transmit data, as well as their interconnectivity, need to be monitored to keep everything up and running.
Manage energy consumption effectively
IIoT sensors can measure the power consumption of individual machines or even entire circuits. This data can be used to identify which aspects of the production process are not energy efficient, and where valuable resources can be saved through more effective energy management.
Monitoring such data and processes helps you collect a wealth of historical data for detailed analysis of resource consumption and for determining future trends.
Establish predictive maintenance strategies
Modern factories are moving away from reactive maintenance strategies (in other words, repairing and servicing machines once they malfunction) to more proactive strategies (using data collected by IIoT sensors to predict when a machine needs to be serviced to prevent malfunctions).
Monitoring this data with a single solution that sends out alerts even before there is an issue can help you establish a predictive maintenance strategy, which saves time and money.
Keep an eye on highly automated processes
Automation is driven by data: firstly, data is needed to understand current processes and to identify triggers for events, and secondly, it is needed to implement automation procedures. This data can be delivered by IIoT sensors from all areas of the manufacturing process.
To make sure that automated processes run without interruptions and flows correctly through various touchpoints in the infrastructure, it is necessary to monitor everything in real time.
Measure & analyze environmental metrics
Environmental conditions are a vital part in ensuring efficient and safe operations in a factory. Measured parameters can be the temperature and humidity on a factory floor, the operating temperature of a machine, dust levels, barometric air pressure, vibration levels, and much more.
Keeping an eye on environmental metrics helps ensure physical security in your manufacturing environment and in keeping machines healthy and working efficiently.
Discover our new product extension
Paessler PRTG OPC UA Server
Get an overview of OT network components in your supervisory and control systems
Do you want to have a full overview of your OT environment in your supervisory and control systems – including traditional IT network components like routers, switches, firewalls, and more?
PRTG OPC UA Server consolidates monitoring data from your OT network and the IIoT in your control system. View all your data in one place for centralized monitoring and alarms.
Start monitoring the health, status, and condition of IIoT devices as well as their connectivity from the smart factory floor to the industrial gateway to the upstream target with PRTG.
Our users give top ratings for monitoring with Paessler PRTG
Why PRTG is the industrial IoT monitoring tool of your choice
Watch the status & health of IIoT sensors
- Make sure that IIoT sensors are functioning and transmitting data
- Receive real-time alerts in case of an issue, for example, if an IIoT device is down
- Prevent downtimes with condition monitoring and predictive maintenance
Collect data from multiple sources
- Get support for M2M communication standards (OPC UA, MQTT, AMQP, CoAP…)
- Collect data directly from IIoT hardware sensors in the manufacturing environment
- Integrate data from edge gateways for easier processing and analysis
Ensure the security of your industrial IoT
- Use PRTG alongside common security tools and intrusion detection systems
- Continuously check for potential breaches or unusual and suspicious activity
- Keep track of what is generating traffic on your IIoT devices and gateways
Check the continuous flow of data
- Ensure that data collected from IIoT sensors moves without interruptions
- Monitor continuous communication, no matter what type of connectivity you use
- Watch data accumulation, processing, and analysis from a single dashboard
What Industrial IoT monitoring looks like in PRTG
Diagnose issues with your IIoT infrastructure by continuously monitoring the health and availability of your IIoT sensors, edge gateways, IT hardware, applications, connectivity, and more. Show monitoring data in real time and visualize it in graphic maps & dashboards to identify problems more easily. Gain the visibility you need to troubleshoot issues before they become critical.
Custom PRTG map for visualizing industrial IT and IIoT processes
Keeping an eye on your production line with PRTG
Preconfigured MQTT Round Trip sensor in PRTG
“Great interface, intuitive, full REST support. custom scripts, rest sensors add extra value. We have been using PRTG for 10 years now in multiple environments and use cases. it has by far the best interface and very easy to setup without prior experience.”
Dev Ops Manager, Industry: Manufacturing, Role: R&D/Product Development, Firm Size: 500M-1B USD
Start monitoring the health, status, and condition of IIoT devices as well as their connectivity from the smart factory floor to the industrial gateway to the upstream target with PRTG.
Success stories from our customers
Companies around the world trust PRTG when it comes to ensuring that their IT systems run smoothly.
F.T.P. relies on Paessler PRTG for high-performance monitoring
FTP has 20 years of experience providing IT consulting to the most established automotive companies in Italy’s Motor Valley. System integration, cyber security, managed services, and industrial technology are their main areas of expertise. From a strong focus on the enterprise environment to the world of SMEs: F.T.P. offers high-value monitoring services through PRTG and enters new markets, including OT.
Kennedy Industries helps keep communities safe & operational with Paessler PRTG
For more than 60 years, Michigan-based Kennedy Industries has helped municipalities across the state keep water clean and available to residents with its pumps, valves, repair, field service, controls and specialty products for water and wastewater facilities. They monitor more than 500 unique locations across the state with PRTG.
Carambar & Co Group increased productivity with Paessler PRTG
The food and beverage group Carambar & Co was founded in May 2017. To run this new company of more than 1000 employees, an Information System had to be created from scratch with an on-site SAP ERP and a number of applications in the cloud. To stabilize, improve the reliability, and optimize the performance of the system, the company decided to install PRTG as their IT monitoring solution.
Get your free white papers
White paper I
In modern industrial IT, the right teams need the right data. Our guide shows how to implement holistic monitoring that brings elements from IT, OT and IIoT into your dashboards.
White paper II
Our second guide gives you inspiration and ideas for dashboards that feature IT, OT and IIoT data – all in one place. We show you what truly convergent industrial dashboards look like!
Start monitoring the health, status, and condition of IIoT devices as well as their connectivity from the smart factory floor to the industrial gateway to the upstream target with PRTG.
Create innovative solutions with Paessler’s partners
Partnering with innovative vendors, Paessler unleashes synergies to create
new and additional benefits for joined customers.
Industrial IoT monitoring: FAQ
1. What is IIoT?
The IIoT, Industrial IoT, or Industrial Internet of Things, refers to IoT technology used in industrial environments. Its main goal is to collect data about the factory floor and facilities. This data can either be used to trigger manufacturing events, or be analyzed in external systems (like ERP systems) to further optimize and automate the production processes.
IIoT sensors can measure everything from vibration levels and the number of motor rotations to air temperature and the geographic location of equipment.
2. What types of IIoT sensors are there?
There is a broad range of IIoT sensor functionality that caters to many requirements or use cases. Here are some examples of IIoT sensor types and what they can be used for in manufacturing.
Environmental sensors
Used to monitor environmental conditions of machines, industrial enclosures, server rooms, and entire areas. These sensors can be used to maintain a safe environment for workers (for example by monitoring air quality or checking for dangerous gases), ensure optimal conditions for equipment (ensuring operating temperatures remain within reasonable temperatures or that humidity is not too high), or indicate when there was a failure (for example by checking for water leaks or rising temperatures).
Accelerometer sensors
Used to sense or measure changes in velocity. This can either be linear acceleration (velocity change in a single direction) or centrifugal acceleration (velocity change caused by an object moving in a circle). In manufacturing, these are commonly used to measure vibration of rotating equipment, such as turbines, bearings, or fans.
Gyroscopic sensors
Used to measure the rotation of an object as well as its angular velocity. These sensors can help to determine the object’s orientation without having to actually observe it.
Inertial measurement unit sensors
Although not a class of sensors on its own, the term “inertial measurement units” refers to measuring an object’s orientation and velocity using a combination of output metrics from various sensors, such as from accelerometers and gyroscopes.
Location tracking sensors
Used to track the geographic location of an object. This is useful for tracking shipments, vehicles, machines, and more.
3. What types of connectivity are used in the IIoT world?
Available connectivity options are cellular, Wi-Fi, LPWAN (Low-Power Wide-Area Network), LoRaWAN (Long-Range Wide-Area Network), Zigbee, and Bluetooth. The connectivity that is used depends on the requirements and the available resources. For example, if data needs to be transmitted over long distances, then cellular – which has a range of over 100 miles – could be used. Zigbee provides low-power, low-data transmissions within 400 feet, and LoRaWAN is good for low-power devices communicating at larger distances.
4. What does retrofitting in an IIoT context mean?
Retrofitting in this context means that IIoT sensors are used to make older equipment “smart”. Many factories have machines that are not capable of connecting with external systems, or they only offer analogue transmission possibilities. However, replacing these machines can be costly and often unnecessary if the machines still function well. In this case, retrofitting machines with IIoT sensors that communicate machine data to external systems can be a cost-effective solution.
5. What is an IIoT sensor in comparison to a sensor in PRTG?
An IIoT sensor is a specialized hardware sensor designed for industrial applications. These sensors are equipped with the capability to collect data from the physical world, such as temperature, pressure, humidity, vibration, and other relevant parameters, and then transmit this data to a central system for analysis.
In PRTG, “sensors” are the basic monitoring elements and as such, part of our monitoring software. One sensor usually monitors one measured value in your network, for example the traffic of a switch port, the CPU load of a server, or the free space on a disk drive. On average, you need about 5-10 sensors per device.
Get more deep-dive information about industrial IT monitoring
IIoT sensors: what they are, their purpose, and how to monitor them
Read about the Industrial Internet of Things as an integral part of Industry 4.0, typical IIoT architecture, what the IIoT is used for, and the monitoring of IIoT sensors themselves.
From hobby project to IoT cornerstone: the story of Mosquitto MQTT broker
Listen to our podcast in which Roger Light, the creator of Eclipse Mosquitto MQTT broker, speaks about how he started Mosquitto and how he watched it – and the IoT – grow exponentially over the years.
Retrofitting and Skysens - knowledge is power
Read about industrial retrofitting and how PRTG easily integrates with our Alliance Partner Skysens’s software platform, which works with endpoint and gateway devices from all the leading IoT/IIoT brands.
Start monitoring the health, status, and condition of IIoT devices as well as their connectivity from the smart factory floor to the industrial gateway to the upstream target with PRTG.
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PRTG |
Network Monitoring Software - Version 24.2.94.1400 (April 10th, 2024) |
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Download for Windows and cloud-based version PRTG Hosted Monitor available |
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