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Cherwell Service Management vs Clarity SM vs Zendesk 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

As of April 2026, in the IT Service Management (ITSM) category, the mindshare of Cherwell Service Management is 1.7%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Clarity SM is 2.0%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zendesk is 4.9%, up from 3.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
IT Service Management (ITSM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Zendesk4.9%
Clarity SM2.0%
Cherwell Service Management1.7%
Other91.4%
IT Service Management (ITSM)
 

Featured Reviews

Thobile Moeketsi - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager at Sasria SOC Ltd.
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.
Türker Kara - PeerSpot reviewer
Application & Software Architect at Turkiye Finans Participation Bank
Quite good back-end architecture for end users but the API is very, very bad
Our company uses the solution for system, program, service request, change, and knowledge-based management.  We perform CMD authorizations and use a lot of integrations for our in-house or third-party applications. We also use Salesforce automations and Microsoft orchestrations.  We have about…
AmandaSanchez - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
Macros and automation have streamlined workflows and reduced manual effort across support teams
The ability to communicate on the Zendesk ticket through the actual user software, so TOPs, would have been helpful. Somehow seeing a user's ticket history within our app would have been beneficial. That is the only thing that I do not think existed at the time that might have been helpful. Some people struggled with Zendesk, but it was always easy enough to show them how to use it and what they were missing. The only times we really had people report concerns about it was when they did not understand that it could do that or how to use it in that way.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The dashboard and the reporting functionality are the solution's most valuable features."
"The most valuable features are problem management and change management."
"We use the solution every day and quite extensively."
"The dashboard is very useful to get a quick overview of current tasks."
"Clear processes with transparent responsibilities led to more efficiencies within the teams."
"The most valuable features are problem management and change management."
"All our activities are carried out in the one place."
"Its integration features, orchestration features, and discovery tools are the most valuable."
"Clarity is flexible to implement and integrate, giving the developer or consultant a broad space to work and customize based on what the customers want."
"It brings a maturity of collaboration and support, facilitating the work of analysts, and benefits end users in service."
"Service Desk Manager price is not very high and the benefits are considerable."
"XFlow (Temperature) and Service Point together provided an extremely user-friendly and collaborative experience to the point of making it easy for all users of the product, whether end-users or analysts."
"The major improvement in functions is their ability to track, report incidents, problem, changes and configuration management."
"Now, it is all there and stuff does not get lost."
"The value for the clients is that you can save information in the application and get reports with that information."
"What I like about it are the features that allow me to integrate with Service Desk Manager and Process Automation, and to build creative solutions based on the integration with other CA products."
"Zendesk saves us over $50,000 per year and can be maintained in-house by our staff."
"To be honest with you, I thought Zendesk was a very good product."
"The ability to easily create macros, quickly see past correspondence from a recent sender, and view analytics are incredibly helpful features that are invaluable business tools."
"It is easy to use, highly customizable and makes our work faster."
"It's an amazing product, it really helps out in organizing all our tasks."
"Zendesk is a great product but find a software package that will work best for your team and company."
"The stability and performance have been perfect."
"The most valuable features of Zendesk Support are collaboration, reports, and a self-service portal. The customer and team can see all the information needed from the portal."
 

Cons

"Access is only available if we're on VPN."
"We need to be on VPN in order to set up and access the solution, and that has created some challenges."
"Agile delivery should be supported."
"The solution could be more user-friendly."
"Areas for improvement would be the service catalog and customer catalog, which is not very user-friendly."
"The support from the actual manufacturer is poor."
"Application service mapping, GRC, SecOps, and things like that need improvement."
"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."
"The upgrade was pretty complex."
"The monitoring tool is in need of improvement."
"If you're looking comparably and relatively across Service Catalog that runs in the process management space, CA fell behind."
"The setup was complex. Out-of-the-box was definitely a difficult configuration because a lot of manual configuration needs to be done."
"UI is not perfect, but maybe with Jaspersoft."
"Ticket event and notification creation and management is cumbersome and has not improved over the many versions I have worked with."
"In some cases, I receive late information."
"The SDM administration and customisation needS deep information about architecture and vendor support continuously."
"The more customization you do, the slower it will be. Maybe this could be improved."
"They have something called Zendesk Explore, which isn't as good as what they had in place previously."
"The solution itself wasn't easy to set up."
"Ticket forwarding and the ability to add subscribers to tickets as some back and forth correspondence needs to be brought to attention of several team members, sometimes across different departments."
"My experience with Zendesk's customer support has not been positive. When I open a ticket for a bug, it often does not expedite the resolution process."
"You couldn't give administrative access to new hires."
"It needs to have a more intuitive application of macro’s in changing ticket statuses."
"Zendesk Guide's customization could be improved. I would like it to be easier and maybe open-sourced, so that if you have a developer in your company, you can do it yourself. Right now, that isn't allowed, so you need to have it done via the integrator. Another improvement—this is nit-picking—is that it could be less easy to make changes. Some things are so easy that they sometimes look a little amateur-ish. Most of the templates are built-in so they can be used directly, so they are very simple."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"For an ITIL user, the cost is probably about 50 bucks a month."
"The pricing is based on a subscription model."
"I don't see anyone other than large companies being able to afford this system."
"It is a bit expensive, but you definitely get what you pay for. It is worth it!"
"There is a subscripted needed to use Clarity SM. The price of the solution could be less expensive. ServiceNow is less expensive and BMC Helix is priced similar to Clarity SM."
"The solution is quite reasonable compared to other solutions in the market."
"Pricing is simple, as it’s per concurrent analysts."
"I think pricing of this model is suitable for growing corporations."
"Clarity offers a perpetual license. Customers purchase the license once and then pay for maintenance. CA provides a subscription model as well. Both models are available for our customers."
"There are different plans that are offered. We are using the entry-level plan. The overall price of the solution should be reduced. The price is too high."
"The price is very competitive."
"We pay for the solution on a yearly basis and my understanding is that the cost is about $30,000. That's the cost for 24 to 25 agents."
"Zendesk's licensing is not cheap. For Enterprise, we are paying $200 per agent. It's a per-month cost, so it's pretty steep. There are some services you need to pay extra for. For example, with Zendesk Guide, we had to buy the most expensive offering in order to get Multibrand and everything. We also had to pay a lot of money for themes."
"You have to pay extra for better support. So it's not only the license that you pay for, but you have to pay extra for the support as well."
"From what I hear, Zendesk's pricing is a little expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
11%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Energy/Utilities Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
30%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
Construction Company
6%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Construction Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Outsourcing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise66
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business36
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise11
 

Questions from the Community

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zendesk Support?
From what I recall, the experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Zendesk was quite expensive and that i...
What needs improvement with Zendesk Support?
I wish there was a more easily dynamic tool. Currently, it is quite difficult because not all the tools are labeled. ...
What is your primary use case for Zendesk Support?
I have been using Zendesk for approximately five years now. I use Zendesk for keeping track of emails and customer ti...
 

Also Known As

No data available
CA Service Desk Manager, Clarity Service Management, CA Service Management, Unicenter Service Desk, CA SDM, CA Service Catalog, CA Business Service Insight
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Ausenco, Highlights for Children, B/E Aerospace
Banco G&T Continental City of Perth, FEMSA, Fujitsu, Manpower, Muslim Commercial Bank - MCB, Punjab National Bank, Santa Clara County Social Services, Stefanini
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about ServiceNow, Atlassian, ManageEngine and others in IT Service Management (ITSM). Updated: April 2026.
892,383 professionals have used our research since 2012.