Documentation forSolarWinds Observability SaaS

Monitor IP addresses and DHCP servers

SolarWinds Observability SaaS provides visibility into IP address usage and DHCP server health across your network. This feature helps you identify IP utilization trends, detect DHCP scope exhaustion risk, and troubleshoot address-related issues.

How IP address and DHCP monitoring works

SolarWinds Observability SaaS collects IP address and DHCP data through Network Collectors or Platform-connected SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted deployments.

Data is collected using network discovery scans, DHCP server polling, and streamed IP management data. The collected data is displayed in IP Address Management views in SolarWinds Observability SaaS.

Requirements

To monitor IP addresses and DHCP servers, you need one of the following:

  • A Network Collector version 2025.2.1 or later

    You can also monitor DHCP Servers and IP addresses with Network Collector version 2025.1.1, but you must add the entities directly in the Network Collector web console. See Add DHCP servers and subnets in a Network Collector web console. Remote management support starts with version 2025.2.1.

  • A Platform-connected SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted with

    • A SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted license that includes IP address management

    • IP Management enabled during Platform Connect configuration

Add a DHCP server for monitoring

You can add a DHCP server for monitoring, or enable DHCP monitoring on an already monitored device. Use this workflow to add DHCP servers in SolarWinds Observability SaaS.

You can also add the devices on the Network Collector or in Platform-connected SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted and enable DHCP monitoring in the corresponding web console.

  1. In SolarWinds Observability SaaS, Click Network > IP Address Management > DHCP Servers tab, and then click Add DHCP Server.

    To open the wizard, you can also click Add Data > Network > DHCP Server Monitoring.

  2. Choose whether to configure DHCP monitoring on an existing monitored device, or to add a new device for DHCP monitoring.

    • To enable DHCP monitoring on a monitored device, choose Select an existing monitored device, then select a network device or host that is not already designated as a DHCP server and click Next.

    • To add a new device for monitoring, select Add new device:

      1. Click Next.
      2. Choose whether to use an existing Network Collector or to deploy a new Network Collector and click Next. For help with Network Collectors, see Network Collector and Add DHCP servers and subnets in a Network Collector web console.
      3. Enter polling details and click Next.

      The device will be added as either a network device or a host, depending on which polling method you select.

      • The ICMP and SNMP polling methods add new devices as network devices.
      • The WMI polling method adds new devices as hosts.

  3. On Create Device Summary, review the summary, and then click Next.

  4. On Credentials, select existing credentials or create a new set of credentials for DHCP monitoring. Available credential types may differ based on the devices you are adding.

  5. Review the settings.

  6. Review the Create DHCP Server Summary, and then complete the wizard.

    The DHCP server configuration is propagated to the Network Collector and the initial scan starts. DHCP scopes and subnets usually appear within 15-45 minutes.

Start an on-demand DHCP scan

To refresh DHCP data manually:

  1. In SolarWinds Observability SaaS, click Network > IP Address Management.

  2. Go to the DHCP servers tab.

  3. Click the vertical ellipsis for the server and select Scan Now.

    The DHCP server is updated automatically when the scan completes.

Configure DHCP server scanning

After a DHCP server is added, you can adjust scanning behavior and update the display name, VLAN IDs and locations, and DHCP monitoring credentials.

  1. In SolarWinds Observability SaaS, click Network > IP Address Management > DHCP servers.

  2. Click the vertical ellipsis for the server and select Edit.

  3. Update the server display name if needed.

  4. Under Settings, configure:

    1. Scan frequency for scopes and leases

    2. Automatic scope and subnet import

    3. Subnet scanning frequency

    4. VLAN ID and Location, if applicable

  5. Under Credentials, update credentials for polling DHCP server data.

  6. Click Save.

View data relevant for IP monitoring and DHCP servers

  1. In SolarWinds Observability SaaS, click Network to display the Network > IP Management.

    Review the IP address management overview:

    • To view subnets and DHCP scopes with highest percent utilization, review the Top 10 widgets.

    • Click a subnet/scope row to open the entity details view with more details.

    • Click a subnet/scope to go to the subnet/scope details page.

    • To view the aggregated utilization summary across your organization, review the IP Utilization widgets.

    • Click a widget header to navigate to the Entity Explorer for the relevant entity (subnets/scopes), ordered by usage.

  2. To view monitored subnets and scopes, open a dedicated view:

    • For subnets, go to the Subnets tab. The Subnets view lists all monitored subnets, with basic details, such as IP address, CIDR, Mask, IP utilization, and DHCP scopes.

    • For scopes, click Top 10 DHCP scopes by Utilization (the widget header). The DHCP Scopes view lists all monitored subnets, with basic details, such as IP address, CIDR, Mask, IP utilization, subnet, and DHCP server.

  3. To view DHCP server details, go to the DHCP Servers tab.

    Click a server to go to its details view. The details include:

    • Available IPs

    • IP utilization

    • Basic details, such as server name, host, IP address, ...

      If you defined VLAN ID and Location on the collector, you can see these in the Additional details section.

    • Historical cumulative totals since the server started or the server statistics reset.

      • Discovers: Clients searching for available DHCP servers on the network.

      • Offers: Servers offering IP addresses and configuration.

      • Requests: Clients requesting offered IP addresses from a specific DHCP server.

      • Acks: Servers confirming IP assignments to clients.

      • Nacks: Servers rejecting clients requests, for example in case of invalid IPs.

      • Declines: Clients informing the server that the offered IP address is already in use (detected via ARP).

      • Releases: Clients releasing the IP address when it's no longer needed.

Add subnets manually

Although subnets are discovered automatically from DHCP scopes, you can add standalone subnets manually.

  1. In SolarWinds Observability SaaS, click Network > IP Address Management.

  2. Go to the Subnets view.

  3. Click Add Subnet.

  4. Select the Network Collector to be used for monitoring.

  5. Enter a subnet address and CIDR. The mask and range preview displays.

  6. Click Add. IP addresses are created automatically and scheduled for scanning.

    Subnets up to /19 (4096 IP addresses) are created automatically. For larger subnets, you must add IP ranges manually.

Add IP addresses

Use these steps to re-add removed IP addresses or to define scanned IP ranges within large subnets.

  1. In SolarWinds Observability SaaS, click Network > IP Address Management.

  2. Go to the Subnets view.

  3. Click a subnet to open the subnet details view with a list of all IP addresses in the subnet.

  4. Click Add IP.

  5. Specify the IP range (starting IP, the ending IP address), and click Add.

    New IP addresses in the range are enabled for monitoring. Existing IP addresses are unchanged.

Remove IP addresses

  1. In SolarWinds Observability SaaS, click Network > IP Address Management.

  2. Go to the Subnets view.

  3. Click a subnet to open the subnet details view with a list of all IP addresses in the subnet.

  4. Select one or more IP addresses and click Remove.

  5. Confirm the removal.

    The IP address is no longer monitored.

Remove subnets from scanning

  1. In SolarWinds Observability SaaS, click Network > IP Address Management.

  2. Go to the Subnets view.

  3. Click the vertical ellipsis for the subnet to remove and select Remove.

  4. Confirm the removal.

    The subnet is no longer monitored with SolarWinds Observability SaaS.

Alerts and dashboards

You can create custom alerts and dashboards for DHCP servers, DHCP subnets, and scopes.

Add DHCP servers and subnets in a Network Collector web console

  1. Log in to the Network Collector web console using an account with Administrator privileges.

  2. To add a DHCP server:

    1. Click Settings > All Settings > DHCP and DNS Management.

    2. Click Add and complete the Add DHCP Server wizard.

      The initial scan starts automatically and may take up to 30 minutes, depending on the number of scopes/subnets and the managed IP space. Discovered DHCP scopes and subnets are imported and displayed under Network > IP Addresses.

      The folders and hierarchy structure is not yet exported and represented. All is flat.

  3. To add a stand-alone subnet:

    1. Click Settings > All Settings > Manage Subnets & IP Addresses.

    2. Click Add > Subnet, specify the subnet details (name, IP address, CIDR notation), and save your data.

      Data appears in SolarWinds Observability SaaS after the initial scan and updates every 15 minutes.

Configure IP monitoring for Platform-connected SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted

To monitor IP addresses managed in SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted, configure Platform Connect to stream data to SolarWinds Observability SaaS.

To use Platform Connect, a commercial SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted license must be activated on your SolarWinds Platform server.

  1. Copy or create an API token (Ingestion type), found in the settings area of SolarWinds Observability SaaS. See API Tokens for details.

  2. In the SolarWinds Platform Web Console settings, open Platform Connect.

  3. Install and configure the SolarWinds Observability Agent, using the API token created earlier.

    See Connect SolarWinds Observability Self-Hosted to SolarWinds Observability SaaS with Platform Connect for details.

  4. On the Configure Agent screen, ensure IP Management items are enabled.

After Platform Connect setup, the data is available in SolarWinds Observability SaaS.

DNS data is not exported to SolarWinds Observability SaaS yet.