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BMC FootPrints Service Core vs BMC Helix ITSM comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

BMC FootPrints Service Core
Ranking in Help Desk Software
32nd
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
30th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
BMC Helix ITSM
Ranking in Help Desk Software
6th
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
79
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the IT Service Management (ITSM) category, the mindshare of BMC FootPrints Service Core is 0.8%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of BMC Helix ITSM is 9.7%, down from 13.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
IT Service Management (ITSM)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer1765752 - PeerSpot reviewer
A flexible, comprehensive, integrated IT service and asset management platform with good technical support
We use BMC FootPrints Service Core to manage network issues, infrastructure issues, software issues, and ERP. We also use it to manage our facility. So, we do some work orders and also use it as an extra ticketing system Technical support is good. It would be better if it were more…
Ameet Darole - PeerSpot reviewer
Used for user ticket management, incident management, and event management
We had a manual event management process and a separate monitoring tool called Dynatrace. The alerts generated did not flow to the ITSM tool. With BMC Helix ITSM, the alerts flow and auto-route to respective technical support. If the alerts are resolved, the ticket will be automatically closed. So, the workload and automation are much better now. BMC Helix ITSM is a fast platform, so it is quite manageable. I would recommend BMC Helix ITSM to other users because it is a good solution. Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"It has helped the help desk team. We get our tickets in and are able to support our customers, the end-users, with this solution."
"Technical support is good."
"The discovery feature is very flexible."
"Having a one stop shop for linked assets and tickets has improved end user adoption and led to a reduction in phone/email tickets."
"I have used Tier II BMC support a few times. They were very responsive and recreated my environment in their lab to support me."
"I like the fact that FootPrints is a relational database, so every item in the database can be linked to another. This helps create history and audit trails for each CI."
"It is stable and its technical support is good and quick."
"This product solidly handles incident management, problem management, and change management."
"With service requests, we have been able to give visibility to the business users."
"The mobile features are the best part of the new version. It is easy to be notified and update your work from a mobile, which is great."
"The standards and the framework that it follows are most valuable. It has an ITIL and out-of-the-box framework."
"The solution is already aligned with the framework, so it is easy for us to proceed with any ISO 27K certification."
"The solution has good capabilities for analytics."
"I like the single sign-on and that administrators can customize."
"Reports have helped us to improve our IT processes. The main benefit is providing the right information to our decision makers."
"Technical support has been fine."
 

Cons

"Reporting could be improved along with the option to create more fine tuned reports and to create specific fields for each type of ticket."
"Hyphens are not allowed in the quick search bar. This has created a problem in our environment where we use hyphens in our asset names."
"The pricing could be a little lower and the product should cover more iTel versions."
"The workflow should be made to be more user-friendly. It should also have more granular scalability."
"We need more customizable reporting functionality. We could also use more collaboration of service desk tickets. This will allow for two departments to share the same information, track the progress of the total task scope no matter how complex the request is."
"It is pretty clunky and not very intuitive. Even though I have used it for many years, I don't think it is a very good ITSM platform in general. In the telecom space, a lot of telco providers use this solution, but from my perspective, it is not very user friendly. It is a bit more laborious. There are still too many human touchpoints. There can be a little bit more automation. It would also be good to integrate it with other tools. Integration is quite difficult, especially in the telco space."
"It would be better if it were more user-friendly. The reporting part in the version we have is a little complicated. It takes too long to build and report. It would also be better if there were another way to manage notifications."
"It would be nice if they added the ability to go directly to a form via a deep link URL."
"The Approval Central system needs to be refreshed."
"SmartIT could include PR. This would help us greatly in bridging the gap between Remedy's views and SmartIT."
"Helix needs to enhance some of its functionality with the latest technology. For example, Helix could improve its chatbot automation to automate more use cases."
"Our middleman provider limits the available functionality so we cannot even do our own analytics."
"They should add some of the bolt-ons into the initial setup, such as chat."
"Regarding reporting, when sharing information with leadership, we utilize BI support and data or more analytical tools. These tools provide accurate and comprehensive reports, covering various aspects. Reports are either sent directly through email or automated using scripts. It would be beneficial to integrate similar capabilities into BMC for future use. Many applications we work with already have a centralized virtual automation tool, such as Control M, but manual effort is still required. Improvements in automation for accurate and efficient reporting in BMC would be valuable."
"In User Group sessions held by BMC in India, I mentioned the challenges with vast documentation, making it difficult to find the right information quickly. However, we lack access to a sandbox for in-house development, which was very helpful for hands-on work with new features."
"It can have more features for hardware discovery and hardware information. The integration with IQ operations management should be streamlined. ITSM and ITOM should be more integrated, and there should be better integration from Helix Discovery to Helix CMDB. There were some issues regarding this integration, and they were difficult to resolve in big environments. We have a lot of devices and users to manage. Therefore, the integration should be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"This solution has good pricing."
"The licensing for FootPrints is a perpetual license with an annual support fee."
"Cost was on par with other service desk products, and well below Remedy, while still being a BMC product."
"Our costs are well over $250,000."
"BMC is a little bit cheaper than ServiceNow, but BMC doesn't have the same capabilities in its entry-level product at the moment. The basic version does not have the DWP features that most of our customers are requesting."
"I am not sure the exact price we pay for the solution but I know it is in the high seven-figure amount annually."
"We did not compare the price of BMC Helix ITSM to other vendors. However, it has a mid-range price."
"It is costly, but it is well worth it."
"It is too expensive for a small business."
"The solution's pricing should come down."
"The cost is relatively high, especially for the BMC Controller application. However, the expense is justified by the standard and reliable features it offers. This product's reputation in the market is strong, providing assurance in terms of data and other considerations."
"It's a yearly subscription but there are a couple of customers who go for the monthly subscription."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
11%
Healthcare Company
9%
Educational Organization
9%
Computer Software Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
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What do you like most about BMC Helix ITSM?
If we consider major players like Ford or BMW, their core focus is manufacturing products like cars. To ensure smooth operations, any arising issues, be it security concerns or issues within depart...
What needs improvement with BMC Helix ITSM?
In User Group sessions held by BMC in India, I mentioned the challenges with vast documentation, making it difficult to find the right information quickly. The recent move to a new platform is bene...
What is your primary use case for BMC Helix ITSM?
I am currently working as a BMC Remedy developer. I have been working for over ten years on the BMC platform. My company uses BMC Helix ITSM for IT service management processes.
 

Also Known As

FootPrints Service Core
Remedy ITSM, Remedy, Helix Remedy
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Cast & Crew
Brookfield, HealthSouth Corporation, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, Mercator, SAP, Stanford University
Find out what your peers are saying about BMC FootPrints Service Core vs. BMC Helix ITSM and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
861,390 professionals have used our research since 2012.