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BMC Helix Client Management vs ManageEngine Endpoint Central comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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 Helix Client Management
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
Mobile Device Management (MDM) (11th), Endpoint Compliance (8th)
ManageEngine Endpoint Central
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
69
Ranking in other categories
Client Desktop Management (1st), Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) (6th), Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Endpoint Security solutions, they serve different purposes. BMC Helix Client Management is designed for Mobile Device Management (MDM) and holds a mindshare of 4.8%, up 3.2% compared to last year.
ManageEngine Endpoint Central, on the other hand, focuses on Client Desktop Management, holds 19.5% mindshare, down 32.4% since last year.
Mobile Device Management (MDM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
BMC Helix Client Management4.8%
Jamf Pro11.9%
NinjaOne6.8%
Other76.5%
Mobile Device Management (MDM)
Client Desktop Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
ManageEngine Endpoint Central19.5%
Symantec Client Management Suite13.1%
KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA)12.3%
Other55.099999999999994%
Client Desktop Management
 

Featured Reviews

AA
Senior Account Executive at FDS
Efficient remote control capabilities; compliance features greatly reduced customers' licensing costs
The on-premises version of BMC Client Management has powerful remote control functionality and decent compliance features, but these features both rely on the discovery tool in order to gain a complete set of insights about the endpoint's environment. Now, BMC's discovery solution depends on having an agent installed in each endpoint and sometimes the agent doesn't work properly, making it difficult to get an accurate understanding of the environment (including special topologies) even with BMC's discovery tool. This can be a pain when it comes to the area of compliance, since you might not have full access to everything running in the organization, including important infrastructural components such as servers and databases. For example, some endpoints may have gotten their software updates from servers not visible to the discovery tool, and this can further impact operations when it comes to patch management. Compare this scenario with the way Red Hat handles patch management: their software is always updated from the main patch providers, so you will always know what is running on the endpoints in this kind of environment. Although their endpoint management has its pros and cons, this is where BMC Client Management is at a bit of a disadvantage and I believe they need to improve on this area. Another area BMC could look into improving is the mobile device side of client management. It has lots of support for Microsoft products in terms of client management, but lacks comprehensive mobile device management support, such as for Android devices.
MS
Solutions Consultant at Team Computers
Experience improves with intuitive setup and comprehensive features but needs enhancements for Apple integration
From a ManageEngine perspective, there is room for improvement regarding the Platform SSO technology introduced by Apple, which allows you to integrate your hardware with your identity providers. It used to be only a few selected ones via OIDC protocols or some other protocols, which are not necessary anymore. If a customer is already using Microsoft 365, they can integrate with any MDM for Platform SSO, which essentially hardens their device identity with the person logging in for the first time. It also helps automate enrollment and provide a zero-touch experience. Currently, while some MDM tools InTune and Jamf support this feature, ManageEngine still does not fully support Platform SSO via Microsoft or Google. I have customers using ManageEngine who are looking forward to this solution, and if ManageEngine can provide it, it would enhance the overall product value. For enterprise users, the solution needs improvement. For SMB, it is straightforward; if it is a small company of 100 to 500 users, anything below 1,000, they do not have much of a compliance or security requirement—they just want to manage their devices and push applications. Simple tasks are easier to accomplish. However, when it comes to enterprise-grade deployment, many complex configurations need to be considered, such as Wi-Fi configurations, network configurations, VPN configurations, and advanced certification deployment, such as ACME certification deployment practice introduced by Apple. These are a few things that can be improved on that side, but from a basic user perspective, if someone is in the SMB market or a company just starting off pre-IPO, without going into compliance, they typically find Zoho and ManageEngine to fit their needs. For enterprise-grade deployments, it is more than enough for Windows, but for Apple, it is still in development and not up to the mark.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"BMC Client Management is a stable solution and one of the best in the market. It allows me to manage all recipe endpoints, including iOS, Android, Linux, Unix, and Windows, all within the same solution."
"It's a scalable solution. We have deployed it for customers using 3000 nodes to those using 300,000 nodes."
"The inventory and patch management tools are very valuable."
"The most valuable features of the solution are patch management and software license management."
"One of our customers is a financial institution with more than 15,000 endpoints, and we use BMC Client Management to manage their regulatory compliance needs, manage the endpoints from a security perspective, and integrate it with service management as well."
"BMC Client Management has helped us be able to patch our OS or any software to the latest version."
"One feature I like, that was especially valuable during the pandemic, is remote control. Remote control grants administrators and support personnel access to the laptops and PCs of employees (who might be working from home) in order to fix any issues that come up as and when they come up, even without having to wait for a support request."
"The solution provides multiple features in one place."
"What is great about the patch management solution, is that it patches OS, applications, browsers, plug-ins, and firmware updates."
"One of the benefits of Desktop Central is it made the provisioning process simpler because now we have a provisioning package. We have around 1,500 laptops at the moment and all these PCs were provisioned by a provisioning package. In the provisioning package, we have integrated every aspect of renaming, deploying applications, patching, etc., so we simply execute the provisioning package and as soon as it's executed, it will install the management agent. Once the agent is installed, it will take care of all the tasks, so we don't have to sit in front of the computer to prepare the machine. This really helps us to provision the PC quickly with our agent."
"The centralized control of all of our Windows hardware that this solution offers has been most valuable to our organization."
"The ROI was three months for us."
"The product makes it very easy to connect to clients."
"We have seen a lot of benefits in reporting, we are able to pull a lot of information."
"ManageEngine's support is one of the best, I would say."
"Everything is easily centralized and managed under this one product."
 

Cons

"BMC Client Management supports only iOS devices. It would be good if they would support Android as well."
"In BMC Client Management, I would like to see more features for executing commands remotely. For example, with SAP, there isn't the capability to execute all the commands available in the console. The latest version includes more endpoints, but they do not cover everything the operations team needs. Additionally, I think improving the hierarchy for managing endpoints is crucial. Extending the endpoint capabilities would be highly beneficial."
"The solution does not offer the functionality of remote access to users."
"The solution needs to add whitelisting because many customers request it."
"It would be good if BMC Client Management can perform vulnerability assessment scanning at the endpoint on its own and mitigate that. Then, we wouldn't have to rely on a third party VA tool. I would like to see this application move to being a web-based one."
"BMC Client Management could improve in the area of integration."
"The on-premises version of BMC Client Management has powerful remote control functionality and decent compliance features, but these features both rely on the discovery tool in order to gain a complete set of insights about the endpoint's environment. Now, BMC's discovery solution depends on having an agent installed in each endpoint and sometimes the agent doesn't work properly, making it difficult to get an accurate understanding of the environment (including special topologies) even with BMC's discovery tool."
"At one time, they delivered an agent that ate up your CPU and your memory."
"The reporting analytics could improve in ManageEngine Desktop Central. However, there are some third-party add-ins or modules you can purchase to do reporting analytics."
"The support could be faster."
"Tech support is mediocre at best."
"The OS deployment could be better."
"We would like to see an option to decline Windows 7 ESU patches in a bulk. For now, we have to decline them one by one which is not an easy process."
"There are occasional glitches."
"The tool's security can be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"BMC Client Management is a very affordable solution. There is one main server license which I believe is around $1,000 per year, and then there is the license for the actual solution. With the solution license, you can opt for a suite license where you get access to all the features and benefits, or alternatively you can buy any of the five main components of the suite license individually."
"BMC Client Management is a high-priced solution, but given its performance and capabilities, I think it offers great value. I don't have the exact number for the yearly licensing costs. I believe there is an additional cost of around two hundred dollars."
"The solution is low cost."
"To use BMC Client Management they charge annually per node."
"The licensing is very easy to understand and pricing is right for what you get."
"The price is moderate."
"We pay about $250 a year for our license."
"Affordable for any customer."
"There are multiple flavors of the app. They have a distributed version for enterprises. It depends on your size. They price it on a per machine basis. 250 or 500 is probably their least amount."
"We had perpetual licenses. The cost was around 36,000, and then you'd have the yearly maintenance fee of 2,000 or 3,000."
"The pricing is very low, compared to other products. Compared to Intune or SCCM, it's much less. I can say it's a good product for less of a price."
"The pricing is average."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Retailer
10%
Government
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business26
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise35
 

Questions from the Community

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How to choose between ManageEngine Desktop Central and Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (formerly SCCM)?
ManageEngine Desktop Central is very easy to set up, is scalable, stable, and also has very good patch management. What I like most about ManageEngine is that I can log on to every PC very easily a...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ManageEngine Endpoint Central?
I would rate the pricing as seven; it is quite expensive from my point of view for ManageEngine Endpoint Central.
What needs improvement with ManageEngine Endpoint Central?
It would be great to see some additional options within ManageEngine Endpoint Central. A better monitoring tool to analyze network traffic related to patch management would be something good to see...
 

Also Known As

BMC Helix Client Management, Helix Client Management, BMC Fromdistance Mobile Device Management
ManageEngine Desktop Central, Desktop Central, ManageEngine Desktop Management MSP
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Charter Manufacturing
Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Strathallan School, BMI Healthcare, Comercial Kywi, First Priority Federal Credit Union, Gerab National Enterprises
Find out what your peers are saying about JAMF, Microsoft, Kandji and others in Mobile Device Management (MDM). Updated: August 2026.
908,858 professionals have used our research since 2012.