System requirements for Paessler PRTG

For our on-premises PRTG products, the hardware required for the PRTG core server installation depends very much on the number of sensors you are running and the number of remote probes in use.

Here you find all requirements for the PRTG core server system, remote probes, various PRTG extensions, and for running PRTG in virtual environments.

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General setup Probes Extensions Virtual environments More considerations

Recommended setup for most PRTG users

There are many parameters that influence the user experience of PRTG, but for the majority of PRTG users,
the following sizing recommendations for the hardware of the PRTG core server work fine.

We recommend that you run your PRTG core server installation:

directly on x64 server hardware or in a properly configured virtual environment (for more information, see section Running PRTG in virtual environments).
on Windows Server 2022, Windows Server 2019, Windows Server 2016, Windows 11, or Windows 10.

Note: .NET Framework 4.7.2 or later must be installed on the core server system. For new PRTG core server installations, we recommend .NET Framework 4.8

Note:

Most PRTG users have 10 sensors per device on average. In most cases, a license for 1,000 sensors is therefore enough to monitor about 100 devices, for example.

If you exceed any of these recommendations, please contact the Paessler Presales team.

prtg Core server installation recommendations	Up to 500 sensors Up to 500 sensors	Up to 1,000 sensors Up to 1,000 sensors	Up to 2,500 sensors Up to 2,500 sensors	Up to 5,000 sensors Up to 5,000 sensors	Up to 1,0000 sensors Up to 10,000 sensors
CPU cores	Up to 500 sensors 4	Up to 1,000 sensors 6	Up to 2,500 sensors 8	Up to 5,000 sensors 8	Up to 1,0000 sensors 10-12 *
RAM	Up to 500 sensors 4 GB	Up to 1,000 sensors 6 GB	Up to 2,500 sensors 8 GB	Up to 5,000 sensors 12 GB	Up to 1,0000 sensors 16 GB
Disk space	Up to 500 sensors 100 GB	Up to 1,000 sensors 500 GB	Up to 2,500 sensors 750 GB	Up to 5,000 sensors 1,000 GB	Up to 1,0000 sensors 1,500 GB
Concurrently active administrator sessions	Up to 500 sensors < 30	Up to 1,000 sensors < 30	Up to 2,500 sensors < 20	Up to 5,000 sensors < 20	Up to 1,0000 sensors < 15
Number of remote probes	Up to 500 sensors < 30	Up to 1,000 sensors < 30	Up to 2,500 sensors < 30	Up to 5,000 sensors < 60	Up to 1,0000 sensors < 80
Virtualization	Up to 500 sensors yes	Up to 1,000 sensors yes	Up to 2,500 sensors yes	Up to 5,000 sensors yes	Up to 1,0000 sensors yes **
Cluster	Up to 500 sensors yes	Up to 1,000 sensors yes	Up to 2,500 sensors yes	Up to 5,000 sensors not recommended	Up to 1,0000 sensors no ***
Recommended license SIZE	Up to 500 sensors PRTG 500 BUY now BUY now	Up to 1,000 sensors PRTG 1000 BUY now BUY now	Up to 2,500 sensors PRTG 2500 BUY now BUY now	Up to 5,000 sensors PRTG 5000 BUY now BUY now	Up to 1,0000 sensors PRTG 10000 BUY now BUY now

* If you use more than 10 CPU cores, you might need to apply a CPU-splitting configuration in the Windows registry.

** For more information, see section Running PRTG in virtual environments.

*** Not officially supported: please contact the Paessler Presales team.

For more than 10,000 sensors: We recommend that you set up additional PRTG core server installations or contact the Paessler Presales team for more information on scaling with PRTG Enterprise Monitor.

System requirements for Paessler PRTG

Here you find all requirements for the PRTG core server system, remote probes, various PRTG extensions, and for running PRTG in virtual environments.

download pdf

Recommended setup for probes

Classic remote probe

We recommend that you run classic remote probes:

directly on compatible x86 hardware or in a properly configured virtual environment
(for more information, see section Running PRTG in virtual environments).
on Windows Server 2022, Windows Server 2019, Windows Server 2016, Windows 11, or Windows 10.

Note: .NET Framework 4.7.2 or later must be installed on the core server system. For new PRTG core server installations, we recommend .NET Framework 4.8

Classic remote probe recommendations	Up to 5,000 sensors Up to 200 sensors	Up to 5,000 sensors Up to 2,000 sensors	Up to 5,000 sensors Up to 5,000 sensors
CPU cores	Up to 5,000 sensors 2	Up to 5,000 sensors 4	Up to 5,000 sensors 6
RAM	Up to 5,000 sensors 2 GB	Up to 5,000 sensors 4 GB	Up to 5,000 sensors 6 GB
Disk space*	Up to 5,000 sensors 40 GB	Up to 5,000 sensors 40 GB	Up to 5,000 sensors 40 GB

* A classic remote probe system does not have any special disk requirements (< 1 GB). In general, we recommend at least 40 GB.

For more than 5,000 sensors: We recommend that you set up additional PRTG core server installations or contact the Paessler Presales team for more information on scaling.

Multi-platform probe

We recommend that you run multi-platform probes:

directly on compatible x86 hardware or in a properly configured virtual environment
(for more information, see section Running PRTG in virtual environments).
on Ubuntu Linux, Debian Linux, RHEL, or Rasperry PI OS.

multi-platform probe recommendations	Up to 200 sensors Up to 200 sensors	Up to 2,000 sensors Up to 2,000 sensors	Up to 5,000 sensors Up to 5,000 sensors
CPU cores	Up to 200 sensors 2	Up to 2,000 sensors 4	Up to 5,000 sensors 6
RAM	Up to 200 sensors 1 GB	Up to 2,000 sensors 2 GB	Up to 5,000 sensors 2 GB
Disk space*	Up to 200 sensors 8 GB	Up to 2,000 sensors 8 GB	Up to 5,000 sensors 8 GB

* The required disk space will vary depending on which operating system you use. For concrete examples of hardware and architecture setups, see the the manual: Multi-Platform Probe for PRTG.

For more than 5,000 sensors: We recommend that you set up additional PRTG core server installations or contact the Paessler Presales team for more information on scaling.

System requirements for Paessler PRTG

Here you find all requirements for the PRTG core server system, remote probes, various PRTG extensions, and for running PRTG in virtual environments.

download pdf

Recommended setup for PRTG extensions

PRTG OPC UA Server

We recommend that you run PRTG OPC UA Server:

directly on compatible x86 hardware or in a properly configured virtual environment
(for more information, see section Running PRTG in virtual environments).
on Windows Server 2022, Windows Server 2019, Windows Server 2016, Windows 11, or Windows 10.

PRTG opc ua server recommendations	Minimum Minimum	Recommended Recommended
CPU cores	Minimum 2	Recommended 4
RAM	Minimum 2 GB	Recommended 4 GB
Disk space	Minimum 40 GB	Recommended 40 GB

PRTG SLA Reporter, PRTG Data Exporter, and PRTG Database Observer

We recommend that you run PRTG SLA Reporter, PRTG Data Exporter, and PRTG Database Observer:

directly on compatible x86 hardware or in a properly configured virtual environment
(for more information, see section Running PRTG in virtual environments).
on Windows Server 2022, Windows Server 2019, Windows Server 2016.

Note: .NET Framework 4.7.2 or later must be installed on the core server system. For new PRTG core server installations, we recommend .NET Framework 4.8

PRTG extension recommendations	PRTG SLA Reporter PRTG SLA Reporter	PRTG Data Exporter PRTG Data Exporter	PRTG Database Observer PRTG Database Observer
CPU cores	PRTG SLA Reporter 4	PRTG Data Exporter 4	PRTG Database Observer 4
RAM	PRTG SLA Reporter 8 GB	PRTG Data Exporter 8 GB	PRTG Database Observer 8 GB
Disk space*	PRTG SLA Reporter Dependent on the number of SLAs	PRTG Data Exporter Dependent on the amount of exported data	PRTG Database Observer 150 MB**

* The required disk space depends on the amount of exported data. For an example on how to calculate the required disk space of your setup, see the respective manual.

** If you install a MS SQL Server Express instance, the required disk space is 3 GB.

System requirements for Paessler PRTG

Here you find all requirements for the PRTG core server system, remote probes, various PRTG extensions, and for running PRTG in virtual environments.

download pdf

Running PRTG in virtual environments

PRTG is an all-in-one monitoring solution with lots of different components that all rely on the performance and the stability of the system on which the PRTG core server runs. Here, virtual environments add even more layers of complexity. This needs to be considered when you want to set up your PRTG core server installation in a way that you can achieve the same level of performance as on a physical server.

Most PRTG core server installations from 500 to 5,000 sensors do not need any specific optimization regarding your virtual infrastructure.

If you run larger installations of PRTG with more than 5,000 sensors, please follow the instructions in our
Best Practice Guide: Running large installations of PRTG in a virtual environment.

Note: Particularly for virtual systems, make sure that you have a unique Windows security identifier per system.

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More considerations and requirements

Minimum requirements for special use cases

If you run PRTG with a limited use case, for example, if you only use Ping sensors and SNMP v1 or v2c sensors with long scanning intervals, your installation can work fine with lower system requirements.

We have seen PRTG installations that work well with the minimum requirements for the PRTG core server installation and remote probes (only special, low-resource use cases) as described here: System Requirements for Paessler PRTG (PDF), page 11.

Note: Keep in mind that you might encounter performance issues with certain sensor types or when you set short scanning intervals. If you are in doubt, please see section Recommended setup for most PRTG users.

Note: The recommendations for the hardware architecture, the operating system, and the software requirements that we previously specified apply here as well.

Performance considerations

Please note the following aspects that can affect performance:

As a rule of thumb, we can say that typical PRTG installations almost never run into performance issues when they stay below 5,000 sensors, below 30 remote probes, and below 30 user accounts.
In a cluster, the monitoring load doubles with each cluster node. The performance is accordingly divided in half with each additional cluster node. Therefore, in a single failover cluster setup that consists of two PRTG core servers that each work as a cluster node, we recommend that you stay below 2,500 sensors for best performance. More than 5,000 sensors are not supported. For each additional failover node, divide the number of recommended sensors by two.
When you have more than 5,000 sensors, you should set 5-minute scanning intervals or longer instead of using 1-minute scanning intervals.
Some sensor types create much more load than others. For example, Ping and SNMP sensors create much less load than complex sensors like flow (NetFlow, jFlow, sFlow, IPFIX) sensors, VMware sensors, Sensor Factory sensors, WMI sensors, or Syslog/Trap Receiver sensors, to name just a few examples.
Try to use sensors with less than 50 channels. Note that sensors with more than 50 channels are not officially supported and can have a high impact on system performance.
We recommend that you stay below 30 active user accounts for each PRTG core server. You can have more users if these do not all use the PRTG web interface at the same time (including public dashboards or 'Maps').
Try to keep the usage of the following features down: many quickly refreshed dashboards (or 'Maps'), frequently generated, huge sensor reports, heavy usage of packet sniffing, Sensor Factory sensors and Toplists, frequent automatically scheduled auto-discoveries for large network segments, and constant queries of monitoring data via the application programming interface (API).
Load balancing is possible using remote probes. To distribute load, you can set up multiple remote probes on different computers. For more information, see the PRTG Manual: Remote Probes and Multiple Probes and watch the video tutorial Distributed Monitoring with PRTG.

Stability considerations

Please note the following aspects that can affect the stability of PRTG:

Remote probes require a stable network connection between the PRTG core server and the remote probe. Unstable connections, for example via 3G or via satellite, might work. However, there have been situations where stable monitoring was not possible.
Our general recommendation is to stay below 30 remote probes on one PRTG core server. PRTG still scales well up to 60 remote probes as long as you have less than 100 sensors per probe.
The quality of your network also plays an important role. When monitoring via the User Datagram Protocol (UDP), for example, a high packet loss rate can lead to frequent timeouts. Remote probes that connect via unstable WAN connections can lead to delays as well.

Note: An internet connection is required for the license activation via HTTP or email.

Supported Windows versions for the PRTG core server and remote probes

The following Windows versions are officially supported for the PRTG core server service and the PRTG probe service. We recommend 64-bit (x64) operating systems.

Microsoft Windows Server 2022
Microsoft Windows Server 2019
Microsoft Windows Server 2016
Microsoft Windows 11
Microsoft Windows 10

Note: Windows Servers in Core mode or Minimal Server Interface are not officially supported.

System requirements for user interfaces of PRTG

PRTG web interface

The following browsers (in order of performance and reliability) are officially supported for the web browser based primary user interface of PRTG at a screen resolution of 1024x768 pixels (more is recommended):

Google Chrome 75 or later (recommended)
Mozilla Firefox 67 or later
Microsoft Edge 79 or later
Safari 11 or iOS (Safari) 11 or later

Note: Other browsers and older browsers might not be able to access the PRTG web interface at all.

PRTG apps for Android and iOS

We provide free apps for Android and iOS devices. For detailed system requirements, see PRTG app download.

PRTG MultiBoard

PRTG MultiBoard runs under all supported Windows and Mac versions. Supported systems are:

Windows Server 2022/2019/2016
Windows 11/10
macOS 10.13+

Requirements for monitored devices

Monitoring via the Simple Network Protocol (SNMP): The monitored devices must be equipped with SNMP v1, v2c, or v3, and an SNMP-compatible software must be installed on the device. SNMP must be enabled on the device and the machine running PRTG must be allowed to access the SNMP interface.
Monitoring via Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI): To use WMI monitoring, you need a Windows network. Host computers and client computers with Windows operating systems as specified above are officially supported. Do not use Windows Vista or Windows Server 2008 on host computers for WMI monitoring because both have WMI performance issues.
Flow-based monitoring (NetFlow, jFlow, sFlow, IPFIX): The device must be configured to send NetFlow (v5, v9, or IPFIX), sFlow (v5), or jFlow (v5) data packets to the probe system.
Monitoring via packet sniffing: Only data packets that pass the network card of the local machine can be analyzed. Switches with so-called 'monitoring ports' are necessary for network-wide monitoring in switched networks.

Need further assistance?

Planning an installation with thousands of sensors?

Our Presales team is happy to assist you! Please write to [email protected].
If possible, describe your monitoring requirements in detail so that we can find the best person to help you.
For larger installations, see Paessler PRTG Enterprise Monitor.

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