Modern businesses generate an enormous volume of security event logs every single day — from cloud apps, networks, servers, and endpoints. For security teams, this firehose of data can quickly become unmanageable.
The good news? The Progressive SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) Sizing Calculator helps you cut through the noise. By converting events per second (EPS) into gigabytes per day (GB/day), it gives you clear visibility into what your SIEM needs to handle — without the guesswork.
How Crucial Is It to Optimize SIEM in Your Organization?
Your SIEM is the command center of your security operations. It brings together data from across your IT landscape, detects patterns, and helps you identify vulnerabilities before they turn into full-blown incidents.
But like any critical system, SIEM must run at its optimal capacity. If it’s undersized, it risks missing important alerts. If it’s oversized, you end up overspending. Optimization ensures your SIEM operates as an effective safeguard instead of becoming a bottleneck or a budget drain.
Why Do You Need SIEM Sizing?
Getting SIEM sizing right is not a technical detail — it’s a security strategy.
- Undersizing risks: Missed events, compliance gaps, and slower detection.
- Oversizing risks: Wasted resources, inflated licensing costs, and unnecessary infrastructure.
Proper sizing ensures you have full visibility at the right cost, making your SIEM efficient, sustainable, and ready to grow with your organization.
How Do You Measure the ROI for a SIEM Tool?
SIEM is a serious investment, but when sized correctly, the returns are significant:
- Lower breach costs — Avoid ransom payments, fines, and reputational damage.
- Operational efficiency — Analysts spend less time chasing noise and more time responding to true threats.
- Compliance confidence — Meeting retention and audit requirements without overspending on storage.
In other words, ROI is measured not just in money saved, but in risk avoided and resilience gained.
How Is SIEM Sizing Done?
SIEM sizing begins with understanding your environment:
- How many devices and endpoints are you monitoring?
- What type of logs are being generated?
- How detailed is the information from each source?
From there, the sizing focuses on two key metrics:
- EPS (Events per Second) — your log generation rate.
- GB/day (Gigabytes per Day) — your daily storage requirement.
The Progressive SIEM Sizing Calculator simplifies this process by translating your infrastructure details into precise sizing outputs.
Why Ingesting More Data Into SIEM Matters
The more data you feed into your SIEM, the better the visibility. Why? Because attackers often hide in plain sight, blending malicious activity with normal operations.
- More sources = stronger detection
- More diversity = richer insights
- More detail = faster investigations
As your IT environment evolves, your SIEM needs the flexibility to scale — and proper sizing ensures it’s ready for that growth.
How Do You Determine Which Rules Are Relevant?
Modern SIEMs often ship with hundreds of built-in detection rules. Activating them all might seem like better coverage — but it only creates noise for your SOC team.
Relevance is key. Your organization’s industry, compliance obligations, and IT stack determine which rules matter most. Refining these ensures your SIEM provides coverage against the right threats without overwhelming analysts.
How Does the Progressive SIEM Sizing Calculator Work?
Sizing a SIEM doesn’t need to be complicated. Our calculator is designed to make it easy:
- Input → number of servers, endpoints, firewalls, and devices.
- Output → estimated EPS and GB/day tailored to your environment.
- Extras → category-level breakdown (infrastructure, network, endpoints), growth projections, and compliance-ready retention sizing.
The result? A clear, actionable estimate you can trust for planning, budgeting, and deployment.
Final Word: SIEM Sizing Is Business Protection
Your SIEM is too important to be left to guesswork. A poorly sized SIEM risks blind spots in your defenses; an oversized one drains your budget.
The Progressive SIEM Sizing Calculator ensures your deployment is:
- Resilient against attacks
- Compliant with retention requirements
- Cost-effective and scalable
Because when it comes to cybersecurity, certainty is protection — and protection starts with sizing right.
Have questions or need cybersecurity support? We’re here to help—reach out today!