Elastic Security vs Wazuh
A side-by-side comparison on deployment model, data residency, licensing basis and security coverage. Structural facts are verifiable against vendor documentation; the scored dimensions are our assessment.
Elastic Security
Elastic
8.1
Average across eight dimensions
- Deployment
- Self-hosted
- Licensing
- Free / resource-based tiers
- Time to value
- Complex
- Segment
- Mid-market / enterprise
- G2
- 4.5 (23)
Wazuh
Wazuh Inc.
8.0
Average across eight dimensions
- Deployment
- Self-hosted
- Licensing
- Free; paid support available
- Time to value
- Complex
- Segment
- SMB / mid-market
- G2
- 4.5 (72)
Score by dimension
| Dimension | EL | WZ |
|---|---|---|
| Data residency control | 8.5 | 10 |
| Pricing value | 7.5 | 9.8 |
| Detection accuracy | 8.5 | 8 |
| Response speed | 8 | 7 |
| Ease of setup | 6 | 6 |
| Management UX | 8 | 6.5 |
| Integration depth | 9.5 | 8 |
| Security coverage | 8.5 | 8.5 |
What the comparison says
Both platforms are self-hosted, so deployment model is not what separates them here. Elastic Security is described as complex to reach value, against complex for Wazuh.
Elastic Security licenses on free / resource-based tiers, Wazuh on free; paid support available. Neither bills on data volume, so the comparison is about what each licence includes rather than how much you send it.
Elastic Security leads on response speed, management UX and integrations. Wazuh leads on residency and pricing value.
Elastic Security
- +Fully self-hostable with no vendor lock-in on your own data.
- +Unified SIEM, endpoint and threat hunting on one searchable platform.
- +Very large integration library and an active open community.
- −Requires genuine Elasticsearch operational expertise to run well at scale.
- −Machine learning and several security features sit behind paid tiers.
Best for Engineering-capable teams wanting an open platform they fully control.
Watch out The licence may be free but the operational cost is not. Staff for it honestly.
Wazuh
- +Genuinely free and open source with no licence cost at any scale.
- +Mature rule engine, file integrity monitoring and configuration assessment.
- +Fully self-hosted and air-gap capable with a large community rule base.
- −The surrounding stack is where the real cost lands: indexer, dashboards and storage.
- −Operational burden falls entirely on your team unless a support contract is bought.
Best for Teams with platform engineering capacity and a strong preference for open source.
Watch out Budget for the indexing layer and the engineer who maintains it.
Evaluate nPro yourself
Free for up to 30 agents, no time limit, no credit card. Deploys on your own infrastructure in minutes.
More Elastic Security comparisons
More Wazuh comparisons
Data last verified 2026-10-06. nPro publishes this comparison. Where nPro appears as one of the platforms listed, its card is marked and its scores are our own assessment. Third-party review scores are sourced from public vendor profiles. Structural facts are verifiable against each vendor's documentation: deployment model, licensing basis and residency.