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BMC Helix ITSM vs Cherwell Service Management vs PagerDuty Operations Cloud 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:
 

Mindshare comparison

IT Service Management (ITSM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
BMC Helix ITSM8.1%
ServiceNow21.0%
JIRA Service Management8.7%
Other62.2%
IT Service Management (ITSM)
IT Service Management (ITSM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Cherwell Service Management1.3%
ServiceNow21.0%
JIRA Service Management8.7%
Other69.0%
IT Service Management (ITSM)
IT Alerting and Incident Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
PagerDuty Operations Cloud21.5%
Opsgenie13.0%
Rootly9.8%
Other55.7%
IT Alerting and Incident Management
 

Featured Reviews

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.
Thobile Moeketsi - PeerSpot reviewer
Having everything in one location has significantly improved our efficiency and reporting
We need to be on VPN in order to set up and access the solution, and that has created some challenges. Even though it uses our Windows login, we still have to be on VPN. The product should be able to log tickets directly from system to system. We haven't got there yet and I'm not sure it's possible but it would determine the product's capability to integrate with other systems.
JeremyEmmett - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized alert management with customizable routing and superior scheduling
Everything can always be better. Operations are somewhat limited by their integration package. For example, integrating with Jira was problematic until they updated to a better plug-in. The ability to build customized modules would be advantageous, allowing organizations to define their own integration modules. It would be useful to have a way to define all configurations in code that is similar to how Terraform operates.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The digital workplace is appealing."
"We use this tool for managing tickets, other employee related services, and reporting purposes."
"The solution can perform well for large-sized companies."
"We find the incident management module the best. The reporting part is also useful. We use a feature called smart reporting, and it is very beneficial for us."
"It has centralized all work orders and help desk ticket tracking."
"It is suitable for the present circumstances, providing reliability and adhering to the necessary procedures. Having ITSM and proper knowledge is essential for our work to be acknowledged and effectively contribute to the team's efforts. Utilizing ITSM ensures that our work, especially in chat windows and events from application support, is duly acknowledged. This is crucial for handling high-level events (HLEs) and maintaining accurate records. The system facilitates easy tracking, enabling managers and higher-ups to gather data for appraisals and other purposes efficientl"
"The most valuable features of BMC Helix ITSM are its customization ability and the addition of new features. As a built-in Suite, it covers all that is needed in the IT guidelines, which is good. Each customer has their own needs, and the customization the solution provides is beneficial."
"The solution is already aligned with the framework, so it is easy for us to proceed with any ISO 27K certification."
"Clear processes with transparent responsibilities led to more efficiencies within the teams."
"Its integration features, orchestration features, and discovery tools are the most valuable. It is also pretty stable, and it can be as scalable as you want."
"The most valuable features are problem management and change management."
"The dashboard is very useful to get a quick overview of current tasks."
"All our activities are carried out in the one place."
"The dashboard and the reporting functionality are the solution's most valuable features."
"The product has valuable on-call scheduling, escalation, and incident workflow management features."
"I'd rate the solution ten out of ten."
"It integrates with multiple applications and is highly customizable, with policies, escalation procedures, and an event routing tool that ensures contacting the right person."
"PagerDuty is very stable and very reliable."
"The alerts are immediate in this solution, which allows us to respond to errors quickly."
"The product easily integrates with other solutions."
"The SMS pages and the mobile application are pretty much the top two features."
"PagerDuty's best features are the dedicated application that allows me to reach my engineers immediately and the ability to directly assign specific tasks to individuals and have them report back."
 

Cons

"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."
"We found that there was numerous issues upgrading from 8.1 to 9.1 in that all our licenses were broken for almost a year and a half. We chased down a total of 14 hotfixes, patches, and service packs before things were finally resolved. During that time, said "fixes" also broke other things, so it was quite the sore spot with management for some time."
"Support could be better."
"Compared to ServiceNow, BMC Remedy is somewhat "closed." I can go to the ServiceNow website and learn everything there is to know about the product, and training is available. That really wasn't available with BMC Remedy."
"BMC Helix ITSM could improve by having a cloud version. They are working on it which is a good thing because their competitors, such as ServiceNow, already provide cloud services."
"Encountered issues with scalability and stability."
"The interface isn't that great."
"If I'm working with a client who wants to expand and move into other areas - they want to expand their workflow and other parts of the organization, they want to do some work with project management, they want to do some work with HR - I'm not sure that BMC Remedy is doing that. And it's because of their platform. Any software has a lifecycle. To me, BMC is a dated architecture."
"Application service mapping, GRC, SecOps, and things like that need improvement."
"The stability, specifically in the on-premises deployment model, could be improved."
"Areas for improvement would be the service catalog and customer catalog, which is not very user-friendly. The shopping cart experience is also terrible - you submit and go straight to the cart, you can't continue shopping or see your overall cost."
"Access is only available if we're on VPN."
"The solution's analytics are okay. I don't think the features, at this point, give you a lot of insights. We have actually been trying to get insights from it but it hasn't really given us a lot of extra points to explore. We were looking at the number of alerts to see where many of the alerts were coming from. We never managed to get many insights on this."
"The On-Call Teams feature could be better in terms of levels of conditions related to which team or member should get the responsibility of handling a matter or incident."
"This solution works best in conjunction with a proper logging system, which can be an additional cost to organizations."
"It is a very non-customizable product, so you cannot add things like root cause analysis or the classification of incidents based on the area where you are getting more incidents. For example, if you're getting a lot of database issues, that may be an are you want to probe."
"Operations are somewhat limited by their integration package. For example, integrating with Jira was problematic until they updated to a better plug-in."
"PagerDuty should be integrated with other tools, so it can import the IT roster automatically. Our other rules continue to work once they're configured, but the roster must be added manually."
"The solution does not code all alerts correctly so sometimes you get false positives or multiple alerts for the same issue."
"There is room for improvement with the time schedule. The way the schedule currently works is you assign all the team members in one schedule and it automatically spreads them around throughout the schedule... It would be better to be able to edit the schedule and place my team members where I want, or at least to have that option in addition to the automatic process."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"BMC Helix ITSM is a very cost-effective solution."
"It is not very expensive and not very cheap. It is somewhere in-between. Some of the features are more expensive. There are also additional costs. If you want to use most of the features, you need to pay more."
"There are licenses to use this solution."
"Please always get the latest quote from a BMC partner or from BMC. Check for the latest offerings."
"I rate the product price an eight on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. The solution is expensive."
"If you are looking for some kind of professional services form the OEM then you would have to purchase that."
"While purchasing, try to negotiate on per user licensing costs, associated maintenance, and purchase 20% more then what you think you should have. Bulk is always cheaper."
"I am not sure the exact price we pay for the solution but I know it is in the high seven-figure amount annually."
"For an ITIL user, the cost is probably about 50 bucks a month."
"If we wanted phone calls or additional SMSs, we would have to pitch up for those. They give us so many per month per user, then we have to pay extra if it goes over that."
"The price is very high."
"The solution is paid on a monthly basis and represents about 1% of the platform's budget."
"The cost is based on the package you select."
"There is a license needed to use PagerDuty."
"The cost is quite high. But if you want to get a full-featured application and you have a big team..."
"PagerDuty has monthly and yearly licenses available, the costs of which can get quite high if you have a large number of users."
"They're very good in pricing compared to the competitors in the area. I would rate them a five out of five in terms of pricing."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
15%
Legal Firm
13%
Energy/Utilities Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
15%
Performing Arts
14%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise54
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business12
Midsize Enterprise11
Large Enterprise19
 

Questions from the Community

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...
What needs improvement with BMC Helix ITSM?
Currently, we are not utilizing the AI functionality in BMC Helix ITSM as we are still in the roadmap and development...
What is your primary use case for BMC Helix ITSM?
We use BMC Helix ITSM for the complete end-to-end ITSM suite, mainly for ticketing and service management. BMC Helix ...
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Earn 20 points
What do you like most about PagerDuty?
The product easily integrates with other solutions.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for PagerDuty?
The solution was expensive, but if all its features were utilized, it was considered worth the cost. The tier-based p...
What needs improvement with PagerDuty?
Everything can always be better. Operations are somewhat limited by their integration package. For example, integrati...
 

Also Known As

Remedy ITSM, Remedy, Helix Remedy, BMC Helix IT Service Management
No data available
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Brookfield, HealthSouth Corporation, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, Mercator, SAP, Stanford University
Ausenco, Highlights for Children, B/E Aerospace
40% of the Fortune 100 TrustPagerDuty. Customers include: Slack, Intuit, Zendesk, Panasonic, Pinterest, Airbnb, eHarmony, McKesson, Comcast
Find out what your peers are saying about ServiceNow, Atlassian, BMC Helix and others in IT Service Management (ITSM). Updated: October 2025.
870,701 professionals have used our research since 2012.