SIEM vs MDR
In-house SIEM, MDR retainer, or agentic SOC?
Every security team faces this choice. In-house SIEM gives control but needs a 3-shift team. MDR gives coverage but costs $250K+ and gives you a monthly report, not your own data. ManySignal delivers both — AI-powered 24/7 coverage with full data ownership.
Three-way comparison
| Dimension | In-house SIEM | MDR / MSSP Retainer | ManySignal (SIEM + Agentic SOC) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Data ownership | You own all data | Vendor holds your data | You own all data |
| Detection control | You own rules | Vendor owns rules | You own rules + AI assistance |
| Transparency | Full visibility into every alert | Monthly report; no alert access | Full visibility + AI reasoning chain |
| Annual cost (5K assets) | $200K+ SIEM + $150K staff | $120K–$300K retainer | $85K subscription + existing team |
| 24/7 coverage | Requires 3-shift SOC team | Included in retainer | AI agents cover 24/7; human on-call |
| Triage quality | Analyst-dependent; variable | Analyst-dependent; variable | AI triage — consistent, 24/7 |
| Alert evidence | Analyst assembles manually | Not shared with customer | Auto-assembled before page |
| Response authority | Full control | Vendor requests permission | Full control + approval gates |
| MTTR | 2–8 hours (typical) | Variable; often not measured | 28 minutes (median) |
Total cost — 5,000-asset environment
Fully-loaded annual cost including tool licensing, professional services, and staffing for 24/7 coverage.
In-house SIEM + SOC team
$550K–$670K
- • $150–220K: SIEM license + SOAR
- • $300–450K: 6 FTE SOC analysts (fully loaded)
- • Not including: incident response retainer
MDR / MSSP retainer
$120K–$300K
- • $120–300K: annual retainer (varies by vendor)
- • Coverage: shared analyst pool
- • Not including: SIEM for raw log search access
ManySignal
$85K–$110K
- • $85–110K: per-asset subscription
- • Coverage: AI agents 24/7 + your team for escalations
- • Includes: SIEM + SOAR + UEBA + triage + response
Cost estimates are approximate. Contact us for an exact comparison based on your environment and staffing model.
SIEM alone, MDR alone, or agentic SOC + MDR
The three-way comparison above frames cost. This table frames capability — the seven dimensions that actually determine whether an option fits your program.
| Dimension | SIEM alone | MDR alone | ManySignal (agentic SOC + MDR) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Coverage model | Platform only — you build detections and staff the SOC yourselves | Vendor-run detection library and analyst pool; opaque to you | Prebuilt detections + your custom rules + AI triage on every alert |
| Alert triage | Human analysts work a queue; quality varies by shift and experience | Vendor Tier-1 analysts triage; you rarely see their reasoning | AI triage agent renders a verdict + evidence chain within 60 seconds |
| Response speed | MTTR 2–8 hours typical; longer overnight and weekends | MTTR 30 min–4 hours; slower for containment because vendor asks permission | Median MTTR 28 minutes; approval-gated response executes immediately after human OK |
| Cost model | License + storage + 6–10 FTE analysts for 24/7 = $500K–$700K/yr | $120K–$300K/yr retainer; adds up per case and per additional service | Flat $85K–$110K/yr for 1,000 assets; no per-case charges, no ingest overage |
| Staffing required | 3-shift SOC team plus SIEM engineers and detection engineers | You still need a security lead to manage the MDR relationship and IR | 1–3 person team for escalation review and program ownership |
| Transparency | Full — you built it, you see it, you own every query | Low — monthly PDF report; no direct query access to your own alert history | Full — every AI reasoning step, evidence artefact, and analyst action is inspectable |
| Evidence trail | Analyst notes in ticketing; audit reconstruction is manual | Vendor's internal case notes; you may or may not receive them at contract end | Immutable timeline per case: telemetry, agent reasoning, human decisions, signed hashes |
Five questions to reach a recommendation
Walk the questions in order. The answers narrow toward one of three recommendations at the bottom.
Q1
Do you have (or are you willing to hire) a 6+ person SOC to run 24/7 shifts?
YES
Continue → question 2
NO
You need managed coverage. Skip to question 3.
Q2
Do you have detection engineers who can write and maintain rules for every attack path in your environment?
YES
SIEM-only is viable. But consider whether AI triage would reduce your analyst burnout even so.
NO
You need triage help. Continue to question 3.
Q3
Is data ownership, custom rule authorship, and full alert visibility important to your program?
YES
MDR-only is the wrong fit — you will lose control of exactly the things you value. Continue.
NO
Traditional MDR may work if you accept the black box. Otherwise continue.
Q4
Do you need audit-grade evidence (SOC 2, FedRAMP, HITRUST, PCI) that shows every triage decision?
YES
You need agentic SOC. MDR summary reports will not survive an auditor asking for the reasoning behind a specific verdict.
NO
Either agentic SOC or MDR works; agentic SOC is typically cheaper.
Q5
Are you paying for a SIEM tool AND separately for MDR triage today?
YES
You are almost certainly double-paying. Agentic SOC collapses both budget lines into one platform.
NO
Cost comparison favours agentic SOC once you cross ~$150K combined SIEM + services spend.
Recommendations
SIEM-only
You have a mature 24/7 SOC, invested detection engineering, and strict data-residency needs.
MDR-only
You have zero security staff, are early-stage, and accept opaque triage in exchange for outsourced outcomes.
Agentic SOC + MDR (ManySignal)
You want 24/7 coverage, full data and rule ownership, audit-grade evidence, and a cost profile that scales with assets — not headcount.
SIEM vs MDR — common questions
What's the total cost difference between SIEM, MDR, and ManySignal for a 5,000-asset environment?
In-house SIEM: $150,000–$220,000 in tool cost plus $300,000–$450,000 in fully-loaded SOC analyst staff cost for 24/7 coverage. MDR retainer: $120,000–$300,000 per year. ManySignal: $85,000 subscription cost plus your existing team for escalation review. Most enterprises choose ManySignal because it delivers the detection quality of in-house plus the 24/7 coverage of MDR at a significantly lower total cost.
What does an MDR give us that ManySignal doesn't?
A traditional MDR gives you dedicated human analysts who are already familiar with your environment across thousands of customers. The trade-off: you lose visibility into your own alert data, lose control over detection rules, and pay for analyst labor whether incidents occur or not. ManySignal gives you the same 24/7 detection and response coverage with full data visibility and control — at lower cost, because AI handles the volume work.
Can we use both ManySignal and an MDR simultaneously?
Yes. Some customers use ManySignal for detection, triage, and automated response — and use an MDR for complex investigation and incident management on escalated cases. In this model, ManySignal delivers triaged escalations to the MDR's analyst team, dramatically improving the quality of cases the MDR receives.
What's the risk of replacing MDR with AI agents for overnight coverage?
The primary risk is incident types the AI has not encountered before. ManySignal mitigates this by: escalating any case with confidence below threshold to on-call immediately, including the full evidence package with the escalation, and continuously improving detection coverage. Customers who have replaced MDR with ManySignal report no degradation in incident detection rates — and significantly faster MTTR for detected incidents.
How does ManySignal handle an incident the AI doesn't know how to classify?
When the triage agent's confidence falls below the configured threshold — typically below 60 — the case escalates to an analyst immediately with the current evidence and the specific questions that remain unanswered. The analyst never receives a blank escalation; they receive the agent's partial work and the exact gaps requiring human judgment.
See your cost and coverage comparison
Share your current SIEM/MDR spend and asset count. We'll produce a three-way cost comparison and detection coverage analysis in 24 hours.