Full Network Activity Monitor

Monitor traffic, bandwidth, devices, and data flows across your entire network. From one place.

How Do You Monitor All Network Activity Across Devices, Sites, and Traffic Types in One Place?

A network activity monitor pulls data from routers, switches, firewalls, access points, and servers, then reports what is actually happening across them: traffic volumes, device availability, response times, network usage. Getting that data into one place requires support for multiple collection methods, since different device types and hardware generations speak different protocols. The mix typically includes flow exports, SNMP polling, packet header analysis, and availability checks.

Paessler PRTG handles all of these with dedicated sensors for each method, configurable polling intervals, and up to 12 months of stored data per sensor. Results land in dashboards, per-sensor graphs, and exportable reports. Cross a threshold and PRTG fires a notification via email, SMS, or push, whichever channel you configure.

PRTG monitors network activity via: NetFlow v5/v9 · IPFIX · sFlow · SNMP v1/v2c/v3 · Packet Sniffer · Ping v2 · QoS Round Trip · DNS · Routers · Switches · Firewalls · Wi-Fi Access Points · VPN Gateways · Linux/Windows/Docker hosts

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What you will find on this page

Complete Network Visibility
How PRTG Monitors Network Activity
Manual Network Activity Monitoring vs. PRTG
FAQs

PRTG is compatible with all major vendors, products, and systems

Complete Network Visibility, From Traffic to Trends

What's Using Your Bandwidth and How Much

PRTG's network traffic monitoring breaks down traffic by type and protocol. Not a raw utilization number.

Flow data comes in from routers and switches through the NetFlow v5 Sensor, NetFlow v9 Sensor, IPFIX Sensor, or sFlow Sensor. PRTG reports it per interface, by traffic type and protocol. IPv4 and IPv6 both work for NetFlow and IPFIX. The sFlow Sensor is IPv4 only. If your hardware doesn't export flow data, the Packet Sniffer Sensor steps in and analyzes packet headers directly on the probe's local network adapter. Header analysis only, no payload inspection. One thing worth knowing: your router or switch does the exporting. PRTG receives that data. It doesn't generate it.

Receives flow data via NetFlow v5 Sensor, NetFlow v9 Sensor, IPFIX Sensor, and sFlow Sensor from compatible routers and switches
Supports IPv4 and IPv6 traffic
Identifies bottlenecks by breaking traffic down by type and protocol per interface
Packet Sniffer Sensor covers local adapter traffic where flow export isn't available (header analysis only, no payload inspection)
Displays bandwidth and data usage by protocol per sensor over time

Know About Network Issues Before Your Users Do

Set your thresholds, and PRTG handles the watching.

For routers, switches, and firewalls, SNMP Traffic sensors report inbound and outbound traffic volumes alongside error and discard counters. The Ping v2 Sensor tracks availability, response time, and packet loss per device. Warning and error thresholds are configurable at the sensor channel level. Worth knowing: PRTG scans at set intervals. It's not a real-time streaming system, so a spike that resolves within a single scanning interval may not show up.

SNMP Traffic sensors: interface utilization, error counters, discard counters
Ping v2 Sensor: availability, response time, and packet loss per device
Configurable warning and error thresholds per sensor channel
Notifications sent via email, SMS, push, and other channels
Alerting is threshold-based. No AI-based or predictive detection

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PRODUCT OVERVIEW

Monitor Every Site From One PRTG Instance

Install a remote probe at each location. All data reports back to the central PRTG core server.

Remote probes extend monitoring to networks separated from the core server by firewalls, or in other locations. Classic probes run on Windows and give you the full sensor set. Multi-platform probes cover Linux (Debian, Ubuntu, RHEL), Docker, and Raspberry Pi, but with areduced sensor subset. Before rolling one out at a site where you need specific sensor types, check the PRTG manual for current limitations. Each probe needs a local host and a network path back to the core server. Not zero-touch, but once it's running, everything feeds into one interface.

Classic remote probes (Windows): full PRTG sensor range supported
Multi-platform probes (Linux, Docker, Raspberry Pi): subset of sensors, with feature limitations
All probes report to one central PRTG core server
Configuration managed centrally; all monitoring data visible in one interface
Requires one system per site for probe installation and connectivity back to core

Review What Your Network Was Doing at Any Point in the Past

Every PRTG sensor records data at each scanning interval. Reports pull from up to 12 months of stored data, on demand.

A WAN link creeping from 40% to 75% utilization over several weeks shows up clearly in per-sensor trend graphs. Same goes for last week's slowdown or last month's spike: pull the sensor graph and the data's there. Retention depends on your Historic Data Purging settings and available disk space, so there's no unlimited retention by default. PRTG shows you how performance looked over time. Root cause analysis isn't part of it.

Per-sensor historical data from 1 day up to 12 months
Exportable as HTML, PDF, CSV, or XML
Per-sensor graphs available without additional configuration
Useful for network performance monitoring, incident documentation, capacity planning, and trend review
Retention governed by Historic Data Purging settings and available disk space

How PRTG Monitors Network Activity

PRTG collects network data through several different methods. Which ones apply depends on your hardware and where your probes are installed.

Packet Header Analysis

The Packet Sniffer Sensor monitors traffic on a local network adapter by analyzing packet headers. No payload inspection. It identifies traffic by protocol, including FTP, HTTP, SMTP, DNS, RDP, SSH, UDP, and TCP, and reports each as a percentage of total traffic.

No upstream flow export required. That makes it useful where routers or switches don't support NetFlow or sFlow. The sensor runs on the probe host and sees only the traffic passing that adapter, not the rest of your network. IPv4 and IPv6 work fine. One thing to watch: each Packet Sniffer Sensor adds load to the probe, and the PRTG manual suggests keeping the count per probe low.

Latency and Jitter

The QoS (Quality of Service) Round Trip Sensor measures latency, jitter, and round-trip time between two PRTG probe locations. UDP packets travel between probes; PRTG reports on what that path looks like.

That makes it practical for checking link quality between two specific segments, like a data center and a branch office. It won't measure performance to arbitrary internet endpoints or third-party hosts. Scope is always the two probe locations involved.

Wireless Network Monitoring

PRTG monitors Wi-Fi access points via SNMP. Signal strength, connected client count, channel utilization: what's actually reportable depends on which OIDs the access point hardware utilizes.

SNMP has to be supported and enabled on the AP. PRTG reads what the device makes available. Active wireless scanning, RF analysis, and spectrum monitoring aren't part of it.

Dashboards and Device Tree

All monitored devices and sensors appear in a structured device tree. From there, you can build custom dashboards that pull sensors from different devices, sites, or sensor types into one view: by site, by technology, or across everything.

Dashboards are user-configured, not auto-generated. PRTG includes a the Maps editor for visual topology views, but maps need manual setup. Auto-discovery finds devices on a subnet; it stops there and doesn't assign sensors or wire up a full topology on its own. Every monitored metric gets a sensor-level graph with no extra configuration needed.

DNS and IP Monitoring

The DNS Sensor queries a hostname against a specified DNS server and checks whether the response matches an expected result. It reports resolution time and whether the answer was correct. For IP-level work, PRTG tracks availability of individual addresses or ranges using ping-based sensors.

DNS record management isn't part of it. PRTG checks resolution and response accuracy. That's the boundary. On the IP side, tracking is ping/SNMP based. PRTG isn't an IPAM tool and doesn't touch IP allocations or DHCP leases.

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What You Get With PRTG Network Activity Monitoring vs. Doing it Manually

FEATURE	Without PRTG Without PRTG	With PRTG With PRTG
Traffic breakdown by type & protocol	Without PRTG Manual flow export + separate collector required	With PRTG Built-in NetFlow v5/v9, IPFIX, and sFlow sensors
Interface & device health alerts	Without PRTG Issues noticed after user complaints	With PRTG Threshold-based; notification sent via email, SMS, or push
Remote site visibility	Without PRTG No central view; checked per site individually	With PRTG Remote probes at each site, reporting to one core server
Historical performance data	Without PRTG Manually exported logs, if collected at all	With PRTG Up to 12 months per sensor, on demand
DNS & IP address monitoring	Without PRTG Separate tools or manual checks	With PRTG Native sensors in the same PRTG interface

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“I would recommend PRTG because it has helped us significantly improve service uptime by highlighting important alerts that would otherwise result in a system failure or service disruption if action was not taken. Thanks to PRTG, we can ensure that The Ritz London’s network and IT systems are five-star, just like the hotel.”

Richard Isted, IT Manager

The Ritz London

Ultimately, people do better when they focus on the solution, not the tool. This is the mantra we live by at Skyscanner. Without PRTG, we’d still be spending half a day or more on monitoring our internal tools.

Barry Kelly, Systems Engineer

Skyscanner

Adopting PRTG has been like going from being in the dark to being in the light. Before, we had limited visibility into what was happening in the infrastructure and in the network. Now, however, thanks to the comprehensive dashboard and real-time notifications, we receive constant updates on the status of facilities and services, and our way of working has gone from passive to proactive.

Luca Meneghesso, senior IT infrastructure and security specialist

Banca Profilo

Paessler PRTG Network Monitor licenses & pricing

Choose the PRTG Network Monitor subscription that's best for you.

License Name	Price	License Details	Get started	Pricing Details
PRTG 500	^$200	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 50 devices
PRTG 1000	^$358	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 100 devices
PRTG 2500	^$742	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 250 devices
PRTG 5000	^$1,300	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 500 devices
PRTG 10000	^$1,642	per month paid annually	Buy now Buy now	Enough to monitor multiple aspects of 1000 devices

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Network Activity Monitoring with PRTG: Frequently Asked Questions

Does PRTG monitor both IPv4 and IPv6 network traffic?

Yes, across all the main collection methods. NetFlow v5, v9, IPFIX, and the Packet Sniffer Sensor handle both. The sFlow Sensor is IPv4 only. SNMP polling and ping availability checks do too.

How does PRTG compare to Wireshark for network traffic analysis?

Most engineers use both and don't think of it as a competition. PRTG runs in the background: continuous polling, stored metrics, alerts when something crosses a threshold. Wireshark comes out when you need to look at specific traffic right now. You run a capture, analyze what you see, move on. Nothing gets stored, nothing alerts.

Can PRTG detect malware or security threats on the network?

Traffic volumes and bandwidth metrics are what PRTG tracks. A threshold on a flow or SNMP Traffic sensor will fire a notification if something spikes hard enough. Worth looking into or not. That call is yours. Payload inspection, threat signature matching, behavioral analysis: dedicated security tooling does that job. PRTG doesn't.

Can PRTG monitor VPN tunnels and remote network connections?

The gateway itself is straightforward. SNMP and ping cover availability, interface utilization, and response time. Tunnel status OIDs can be polled too, if the device exposes them. Past the gateway gets harder. Standard approach is a remote probe on-site. It monitors the local segment and reports back to the core server independently. What moves through the tunnel isn't visible to PRTG, and VPN configuration isn't something it touches.

What's the difference between PRTG and open-source network monitoring tools?

Zabbix and Nagios don't cost a license fee. That's the easy part of the comparison. Setup, configuration, ongoing maintenance, figuring out what broke when something stops working: that's your team's problem. Community forums are typically the support option. PRTG costs money and ships with pre-built sensors and a vendor support contract. Most of what you're buying is time.

How does PRTG help with network troubleshooting and root cause analysis?

When something went wrong, the sensor data from that period is already logged. Open the graph, pick the timeframe, and you can see when a metric shifted and by how much. PRTG doesn't interpret the data or point to a cause. That part's still on the engineer. But having up to 12 months of readings on hand beats reconstructing events from memory.