2025: The year momentum became a competitive advantage for DDI Central
2025 is the year DDI Central’s momentum became a market reality.
Not because we shipped “more features,” but because we shipped with an even stronger customer-focused objective: releases that translate real customer demand into real operational outcomes—stronger DNS-layer security, deeper visibility across hybrid environments, tighter resilience, and intelligence that helps teams act quicker and more efficiently.
If 2024 was the year of firsts for DDI Central—where we introduced breakthrough capabilities and laid the foundation—2025 is where that foundation proved itself. DDI Central delivered as a disruptive new entrant in the enterprise DDI space which propelled it from a promising newcomer to a recognized strategic alternative to established stalwarts in DNS, DHCP, and IP address management.
And the industry noticed! In 2025—in only the solution's second year serving this market segment—we reached milestones that typically takes far longer to achieve: meaningful analyst recognition across the DDI landscape. In the 2025 EMA™ Radar for DNS, DHCP, and IP Address Management, DDI Central was named a “Strong Value” vendor in a comparative evaluation spanning 12 leading DDI products from 10 vendors, including BlueCat, Infoblox, EfficientIP, SolarWinds, and others.
In parallel, the 2025 GigaOm Radar for DDI recognized DDI Central as both a “Challenger” and a “Fast Mover,” reflecting not only capability growth but increasing strategic mindshare among IT buyers and decision-makers.
That’s what our momentum looks like: direction, relevance, and readiness. And this is exactly why customers are increasingly viewing DDI Central not as “another tool,” but as a strategic replacement for legacy DDI platforms—chosen on its own merits.
Read on, and you’ll see what’s powering that momentum: the releases, the use cases, and the recognition behind them.
1) Security: From DNS management to DNS-layer defense
DDI Central in 2025 didn’t just help you run DNS and DHCP—it helped you defend them.
Threat intelligence, built-in
Block malicious domains in real time using live threat feeds from prominent vendors—powered by reputation scoring for stronger DNS-layer protection.DNS detection and response
Automatically quarantine suspicious IPs that query threat-flagged domains—so response isn’t delayed by manual triage.AI-powered anomaly detection across DNS and DHCP
Built-in anomaly rules plus ML-driven domain generation algorithm (DGA) pattern detection—so early signals surface before they become incidents.DNS over TLS (DoT) and DNS over HTTPS (DoH) support
Strengthen DNS privacy and integrity for modern environments that demand encrypted DNS.
What this meant for users: Fewer blind spots, faster containment, and a in-grained DDI security stack that doesn’t wait for downstream tools to tell you about potential security threats.
2) Integrations: Back-to-back expansion into the systems you already rely on
This year, DDI Central kept expanding its perimeter—so DDI doesn’t live in isolation.
ManageEngine suite integrations
Endpoint Central (cloud and on-premises)
Correlate DHCP leases with endpoint identity and security context—so IP activity becomes endpoint-aware.
Correlate DHCP leases with endpoint identity and profiles; achieve deeper asset visibility in terms of patch status and vulnerability diagnostics.
OpManager integration (on-premises)
Bring core network services and infrastructure monitoring into one troubleshooting flow—reducing swivel-chair diagnosis.
Unified visibility between core network services and infrastructure monitoring to streamline troubleshooting and performance analysis.
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Cloud observability and network device integrations
AWS cloud observability
Unified IP visibility across VPCs, subnets, ECS, RDS, and EC2—making hybrid IP planning and tracking dramatically clearer.
Cisco IOS-XE / IOS-XR DHCP integration
Centralized DHCP management for Cisco devices with real-time DNS and IPAM sync— providing more infrastructure control within the management UI console.
What this meant for users: Faster root cause analysis, richer context, and fewer “DDI-only” investigations.
3) Resilience: High availability for both services and the management plane
Operational continuity is not just “DNS is up.” It’s also: can you still manage, recover, and govern when things fail?
In 2025, DDI Central strengthened resilience at every layer:
High availability for DNS/DHCP services
Automatic redirection to secondary servers during failures to keep connectivity uninterrupted.Failover for the management UI console
Continuity for the core management plane—not just the underlying servers.Zone versioning and backup/restore across Windows and Linux clusters
Practical rollback and recovery when changes need to be reversed quickly.Operational safety controls
Server suspend mode for controlled sync behavior during downtime or inconsistencies, plus Windows failover cleanup fixes for smoother failover lifecycle management.
What this meant for users: Fewer high-stress recovery moments utilizing a DDI platform that remains stable and manageable during failovers and infrastructure disruptions.
4) AI and Forecasting: From reactive dashboards to proactive planning
One of the clearest signals of “modern DDI” is this: You don’t just observe—you anticipate.
In 2025, DDI Central introduced predictive intelligence that helps teams plan ahead:
ML-based DNS forecasting
Predict query loads cluster-wide or by zone—so you can plan capacity before performance degrades.DHCP lease trend forecasting
Forecast lease usage per subnet to identify IP exhaustion risks well in advance, instead of discovering them only when addresses run out.Deeper analytics visibility
Per-server DNS analytics in addition to cluster views—so hotspots and outliers become obvious faster.
What this meant for users: Better capacity decisions, earlier warnings, and fewer “we didn’t see that coming” moments.
5) Operations: The day-to-day wins that reduce fatigue
These are the upgrades that quietly change everything—because they shorten the path from “something feels off” to “fixed.”
Faster detection and response
Dedicated Alerts page with configurable thresholds and clearer UI cues.
Rogue DHCP server detection alerts via in-app and email.
DNS record monitoring using TCP and PING to verify continuity and health.
Bulk actions and efficiency
Bulk import support for subnets, reservations, allow/block lists, MACs, etc.
Bulk deletion for DHCP reservations/hosts.
Quick “Check Status” refresh for single or multiple servers.
Guardrails that prevent mistakes
Prompt-based admin permission to auto-generate PTRs during A/AAAA imports.
Duplicate IP detection scans across records with dedicated exports.
Improved views (subdomain context, last modified timestamps) for faster troubleshooting.
What this meant for users: Less manual grind, fewer errors, and smoother admin workflows under real operational pressure.
6) Core DNS/DHCP/IPAM improvements: Deeper control, clearer visibility
Alongside the big themes, 2025 also strengthened the foundations.
DNS improvements
Per-server and cluster DNS analytics (hosted and non-hosted domains, response codes, error trends).
Quickly search records (A/AAAA/CNAME/PTR) using IP/hostname inside zones.
Associate PTR while creating A/AAAA records both via UI and API.
Enable/disable individual DNS records (Linux) from the UI.
Enhanced subdomain view shows record values and last modified time for quicker troubleshooting.
Windows stub zones and forwarders for better resolution design.
What this meant for users: DNS became more observable, reversible, and easier to troubleshoot.
DHCP improvements
DHCP templates for Vendor Class Identifier/Client Class Identifier to group devices and import into client classes quickly.
IPv6 improvements that display lease history stats for DHCPv6, including DUID on leases pages.
Linux ISC BIND DHCP pool improvements:
Select relevant pool ranges at global/subnet level directly from client class
Pool range exclusion for subnets
Naming clarity to ensure Windows terminology consistency “Designated Addresses” vs “DHCP reservations”.
What this meant for users: DHCP management became more structured—from templates to IPv6 visibility.
IPAM improvements
Built-in subnet calculator for clear visibility into subnet boundaries and usable IP ranges.
Hierarchical nested supernets for scalable IP segmentation and visualization.
Available IPs associated with hosts directly from the lease view.
Automatic ping verification for delegated IPs to confirm ownership and accountability.
Support for overlapping IP address spaces with improved organization and reporting.
What this meant for users: IPAM became more design-aware, more searchable, and more accountable with fewer hidden details, stronger accuracy, and a faster path from “lookup” to “action.”
7) Governance and auditability: More trust, better collaboration, stronger compliance
DDI Central doubled down on the controls that matter when multiple teams operate shared infrastructure.
New complimentary roles for Auditor and Guest provide for safe, read-only visibility that enables restricted monitoring without config changes.
Audit trail improvements for AD domain controllers, including directory-integrated audit visibility, configurable retention policies, and quick audit exports (PDF/CSV).
Concurrency protections to prevent configuration clashes across users.
UI language recognition settings, and customizable notifications for email and in-app.
Rsyslog integration for central log pipelines that are ELK, Splunk, and SIEM-friendly.
What this meant for users in 2025: Governance was established without friction—and visibility without compromising integrity. Control became safer to delegate, easier to review, and more transparent.
Looking ahead: What to expect from DDI Central in 2026
If 2025 was about proving momentum, 2026 is about compounding it—with the next set of capabilities that help teams manage DDI aligned with the demands of modern infrastructure and its workforce:
Terraform and Salt support brings DDI fully into IaC workflows.
Advanced IPAM “Control Tower” view displays a single birds-eye view of IP footprint across every site.
Kea DHCP support delivers modern DHCP alignment beyond legacy ISC DHCPD.
High scalability via lightweight Windows agent applies collective policies across onboarded Windows servers in one click.
Cloud observability expansion beyond AWS to Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, and other cloud ecosystems aligns with the growing demand for unified visibility across multi-cloud networks.
Advanced device and endpoint discovery taps into deeper IP-to-device context so teams can troubleshoot faster, validate leases confidently, and respond to incidents with better precision.
Scope-level RBAC delivers tighter delegation and least-privilege control per scope
Fast-moving DDI for fast-moving networks
In the modern DDI landscape, customers don’t just buy features—they buy confidence. In 2025, we earned that confidence the right way: through consistent execution, meaningful outcomes, and recognition that reflects real momentum—not hype.
It was a year of compounding advantage—security-first depth, integrations that expand context, resilience that protects continuity, intelligence that forecasts demand, and operations that reduce admin fatigue.
That momentum is now our baseline.
2026 is where we scale it—multiplying the capabilities, integrations, and security-first innovations that help teams run DNS, DHCP, and IPAM with greater visibility, control, and speed. The direction is clear: make DDI Central the strategic replacement IT teams can trust—at every site, in every cloud, under every condition.
Ready to feel that shift in your own environment? Start your 30-day free trial or schedule a personalized demo to experience DDI Central in action.