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BMC Helix ITSM vs SysAid 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 Helix ITSM
Ranking in Help Desk Software
9th
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
78
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
SysAid
Ranking in Help Desk Software
27th
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
25th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of BMC Helix ITSM is 4.7%, down from 10.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SysAid is 1.6%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Help Desk Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
BMC Helix ITSM4.7%
SysAid1.6%
Other93.7%
Help Desk Software
 

Featured Reviews

KN
Senior Application Developer BMC at Balfour Beatty
Self-service portal significantly reduces resolution time and transforms service process with advanced features
We initially had a lot of tickets generated via the service desk through calls and emails. Now, we have almost moved out of email creations by introducing the DWP features on the Studio pages, with about 90% of the tickets coming in via our self-service portal. Recent upgrades offer different types of views for particular business lines, which was missing earlier. The new landing pages have allowed us to add banners, images, and internal videos, encouraging most customers to use these DWP self-service features. Resolution time has decreased significantly since implementing the self-service portal. Additionally, the availability of knowledge articles, chatbots, and the new Helix GPT feature has improved service processes.
Todd Blake - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior IT Specialist at COMMUNITY HEALTH CONNECTIONS INC
A solution that streamlines ticket creation for the staff members of a business and enables efficient issue resolution by the IT team
SysAid is similar to Nintex AssureSign. Some of the back-end configurations of the solution are very difficult. So, we always need SysAid's help. Also, there are almost too many features that we are not taking advantage of in our company since we don't even know about them. A little bit of a streamlining or simplification of the main features would be a good improvement. I would like to see SysAid present its solution more easily. There is a lot in the solution, and it is more than what we need in our company.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The service desk (incident management) function is the lion's portion of use and value, and it has been instrumental in aligning our service desk with the ITIL fundamentals and continuously improving the operating metrics of that area."
"Helix is more lightweight than these tools. It's a traditional tool that was developed more than 10 years ago. Ease of use is the operative word."
"The MyIT product has given our end users a much better perception of Remedy and made the product look more fluid. This has made people more likely to log calls rather than do work offline."
"Resolution time has decreased significantly since implementing the self-service portal."
"The way you can customize this product to adapt to the process the customer is already using is what sets this apart from other ITSM products out there. This helps customers to adapt to the tool pretty quickly."
"The versatility and customizability of the product is what I like most."
"Initial, out-the-box setup was easy with no problems."
"From what I've read BMC Helix ITSM has a lot of features and far more than the CA Service Desk."
"At our agency, people love SysAid."
"Overall the administrative side does save you costs in terms of resources and time."
"The service desk orchestration, overall, is good. It allows an organization to build that service desk concept into its organizational and support strategy. And it allows an organization to digest that and create a support model very quickly around the tools. The fact that the tools are integrated within the system itself gives the organization a really robust way to integrate everything and have a complete support model."
"It tracks everything that the technicians are doing. We can account for time and manage resources."
"The simplicity of the solution is excellent."
"The solution can scale."
"All our service management is integrated into one system. Our response time is much faster because we have a visual into what is going on."
"The solution provides us with multi-layered service management along with all our support pieces integrated in one system. Our entire system is run on SysAid, from Tier 1 to Tier 3. All the other IT department functionality is captured in SysAid, like development, warehousing, and application. So, it has vertical and horizontal coverage."
 

Cons

"Support could be more skilled. We are wasting too much of our time debugging.​"
"BMC Helix ITSM should have an easy-to-use user interface."
"In the next release, I would like to see AI used for classification or categorization."
"Log in process is unnecessarily complicated."
"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."
"Customer Service could use some improvement – while they are technically very good, some of the agents have poorer communication skills than others."
"It's expensive, particularly in the emerging market where you see a lot of customers that have a budget crunch over issues."
"Functionality-wise, it falls short of our expectations."
"This means the facilities people can see every ticket that is in the support queue, which is not great."
"So far, we're very happy with the new integration. The only thing that I would like to see is for them to improve asset management so that it's more usable. We looked at it once and we didn't find it quite usable for us. That's why we didn't use it. We haven't looked into the new one yet but the asset management is something that can be improved even more and patch management is not as good as it could be."
"The automation needs improvement. The workflow has some improvements to do. There's some stuff that they are working on like having cascaded fields. For example, we're categorizing tickets by location, by site and by building and then by data room within a data center. At the moment they're all separate fields."
"The automation needs improvement. The workflow has some improvements to do."
"Currently, SysAid does not have a mobile application."
"The only thing that I would like to see is for them to improve asset management so that it's more usable."
"There is a learning curve for the users."
"We would like them to approve the security functionalities, e.g., management security features."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"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."
"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."
"The price of BMC Helix ITSM is expensive."
"If Customer and IT agents are happy, that is one of the greatest ROI. However, one of the major factors is Leadership, because at the end they have to justify the cost."
"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."
"It is costly, but it is well worth it."
"We did not compare the price of BMC Helix ITSM to other vendors. However, it has a mid-range price."
"We saw our investment back at the end of year one."
"Though I am not really sure about SysAid's prices, I know that it is competitive compared to some of the other products that our company looked at, like ConnectWise and ServiceNow."
"SysAid is a good solution, especially from a pricing perspective."
"Overall, the price is good. It's all about what you get for the base amount. From my perspective, you want to look at what you're getting out-of-the-box. SysAid does a good job of putting key stuff in the box for you."
"Once you're interested, talk with SysAid. You can have them come in and look at your company and advise you on the best solution. They will tell you what comes with each separate package and also advise you what application to activate. If you want something that they don't have, they have a department that can design something based on your unique requests."
"The pricing of SysAid is less than its competitors."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
Government
5%
Construction Company
17%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise55
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise4
 

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 operations, any arising issues, be it security concerns or issues within depart...
What needs improvement with BMC Helix ITSM?
Although BMC Helix ITSM is a strong enterprise platform, there are areas where it could be improved. One key area is usability and simplification of configuration, especially for new administrators...
What is your primary use case for BMC Helix ITSM?
My main use case for BMC Helix ITSM is validating and automating core ITSM workflows, such as incident, change, and service request management. I focus on ensuring that these workflows function cor...
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Also Known As

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

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Brookfield, HealthSouth Corporation, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, Mercator, SAP, Stanford University
Disney, Sears Holdings Corporation, LAN Airlines, Schneider Electric, On Semiconductors, Toyota, Sky, KPMG, Georgetown University Law Center, Motorola, North York General Hospital, Volksbank, Xerox, Bacardi, Del Monte Fresh Produce, Manpower, Nucor, Ecobank
Find out what your peers are saying about BMC Helix ITSM vs. SysAid and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
886,510 professionals have used our research since 2012.