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Cherwell Service Management vs Freshdesk comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 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

Automation Anywhere
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
661
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (2nd), Robotic Process Automation (RPA) (2nd), Process Mining (1st), Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) (1st), Agentic Automation (1st), Business Orchestration and Automation Technologies (2nd), AI Legal & Compliance (1st), AI Finance & Accounting (1st), AI Procurement & Supply Chain (1st)
Cherwell Service Management
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Help Desk Software (29th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (26th)
Freshdesk
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
Customer Experience Management (3rd), Field Service Management (3rd), Help Desk Software (5th), Knowledge Management Software (4th)
 

Featured Reviews

Venkat Sivaprakash - PeerSpot reviewer
Management Consultant at Accenture
Has significantly improved document-driven workflows and reduced processing time across finance and HR functions
Automation Anywhere has evolved significantly and upgraded itself to provide agentic AI and AI-based automation solutions for document automation. The product has matured considerably over time. We can create workflows that can call an API. We can include prompts in particular workflows for ChatGPT-related functions, connecting to an LLM and RAG to perform tasks. For document automation, modern features are available to train documents, ensuring high accuracy and repeatability over time. The system is very easy to use. I recently completed a course in document automation, typically designed for people involved in coding and technical aspects. Though I understand coding comprehensively, I don't do actual coding. The course was very accessible. Currently, extensive coding isn't necessary due to the hybrid model incorporating GenAI aspects, low-code, no-code capabilities, APIs, and numerous pre-built objects in Automation Anywhere. The features include GenAI-driven prompting methods and workflow creation capabilities. In these workflows, we can create decision boxes and call APIs without coding. We simply pull objects, drop them, connect them, and add minimal coding when needed. The most crucial aspect isn't coding but rather sizing the automation and fleshing out the details. Automation Co-pilot takes notes and performs automated analysis. It can extract details from videos, summarize conversations, and provide detailed information. During calls, it identifies instructions and performs tasks such as preparing reports and reconciliation. Automation Anywhere can also connect with Microsoft Co-pilot. Through Co-pilot, real-time operations can be executed, allowing direct interaction between vendors and automation through this component.
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.
Gauri Thakur - PeerSpot reviewer
Director, Portfolio Projects at Microland Limited
Integrated support workflows have provided a unified view but need broader enterprise flexibility
Freshdesk's scalability could be improved for larger businesses across departments. Its intuitive interface is appealing for small to medium-sized businesses. However, when you look at larger enterprise levels, ServiceNow operates more efficiently. This scalability is an area where Freshdesk could expand its offerings. Additionally, I don't have too much hands-on experience with Freshdesk ticket routing. I need to check with the service desk team if they've used it. Similarly, for analytics capability, I haven't explored much on Freshdesk, but I have done it for ServiceNow. I have seen a lot on ServiceNow and the BMC Remedy, so I can speak better for them. I haven't had the chance to look at it so much that I can do a comparison. I haven't had much experience with Freshdesk's reporting. Within its paradigm of customer service management, Freshdesk is quite scalable. But I've said that inter-department and the interoperability is better off in ServiceNow than in Freshdesk.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It helps to improve and optimize processes. It eliminates some of the manual tasks, so we can save costs."
"Removing manual tasks has been beneficial. It works effectively."
"Of the bots which work, they have automated three of the most time consuming tasks and completely freed up one person to do real work."
"We have saved customers 400% in terms of time saved by implementing this product."
"Having no restriction for any single programming language is very useful."
"The main thing is the simple UI, easy to use commands, and it's very easy to learn compared to other tools in the market."
"Security is a top priority for us. To be allowed to automate different processes, we need to have a good set of controls around who is allowed to do what, and what credentials people can and can't use. It allows us to manage access make sure that we have full control."
"With the rebate processing automation that we did, it has provided us a savings of around an hour or two a person on a daily basis, which is quite a lot of savings."
"The most valuable features are problem management and change management."
"Implementing CSM has made us very efficient and we're now able to plan changes and the steps required for implementation."
"We use the solution every day and quite extensively."
"All our activities are carried out in the one place."
"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 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 dashboard and the reporting functionality are the solution's most valuable features."
"Freshdesk provides a plain vanilla solution, making it user-friendly and less complex."
"Freshdesk has allowed us to measure and track the response and resolution time of tickets which has been reduced from seven to eight hours down to 30 minutes to one hour."
"Their knowledge base is phenomenal. The way that it learns from our users is awesome, and responses are really awesome as well. It does a pretty good job of picking up what's needed. The knowledge bases are great."
"Freshdesk significantly improved our customer issue resolution process. We can now easily record and track all customer requests, ensuring that no tickets are lost."
"The organization that is possible with other departments is the solution's most valuable aspect."
"We have made use of the training academy and the technical support team from Freshdesk. Both have been very good resources."
"Technical support is outstanding."
"Freshdesk offers way more flexibility, the people there are really dedicated and human, they want you to be happy with the product, and it is much more affordable than Zendesk."
 

Cons

"Having better documentation that is more openly available would help. Often, it feels necessary to contact someone or search for documentation that is stored behind a login or in another location. It would be beneficial to have one centralized place for everything."
"There could be improvement in the reporting and insights into the ROI. The ROI tool that shows the performance and the return on investment is not very accurate."
"I would suggest going with Microsoft Power Automate rather than Automation Anywhere because Power Automate's cloud flow is easier to use."
"The version that we are using has been difficult for us to code. As changes are very frequent, we have to make sure the code can be updated automatically so we don't have to make a change every time a user makes a change. Then, the user doesn't have to update us and we don't have to push a change to production. We have found a workaround with the help of the Automation Anywhere support people for this."
"When comparing the code under version checks, although there is a change done, it doesn't say so because the change is done at the variable level and not in the line of code."
"Sometimes, the ESX services will stop. We are working with IT to resolve this, as it's not our fault. Automation Anywhere is stopping the service, and during that time, the bot will be stopped. Right now, we are logging into the client machine and restarting/rebooting them, then restarting the services. As some of our processes run at night, we won't know that the service is down since our processes run 24/7. This issue is then escalated to the manager. This is the current challenge that we are facing, and we would like them to improve this."
"We have done some automation of incoming documents, but it has been somewhat hard."
"In A2019 the dependencies that are being downloaded take a longer time that should be reduced. Migration utility should be provided so we can easily migrate from lower versions to higher versions."
"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 shopping cart experience is also terrible - you submit and go straight to the cart, you can't continue shopping or see your overall cost."
"We need to be on VPN in order to set up and access the solution, and that has created some challenges."
"The stability, specifically in the on-premises deployment model, could be improved."
"Application service mapping, GRC, SecOps, and things like that need improvement."
"The support from the actual manufacturer is poor."
"Access is only available if we're on VPN."
"More automation would be beneficial, as it could greatly improve our efficiency and reduce manual tasks."
"It would be helpful to pull reports or schedule them based on agents, users, ticket numbers, or responses."
"Freshdesk's scalability could be improved for larger businesses across departments."
"If Freshdesk had forms in it so that I could go to the portal and fill out a service request, that would improve it immensely and make it more valuable for enterprise customers, but that's not a current functionality. You can't have a certain catalog of any type. You can't be like, "Hey, I want to just go submit a ticket," and then type in. You can't prompt them to ask anything. It is just a blank form."
"While it's good for a small number of tickets, definitely in the future, we will require something more powerful."
"There are some restrictions where you need automations and sometimes there is just no way to achieve what you need - but this is common with other tools."
"I would like to see a little bit more color in the solution."
"For integrations, we need to write code that communicates with their system in order to enable certain functionality in the system. This is a lot of work for their customers."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I don't agree with the IQ Bot licensing costs, which depends on the consumption of the document rather than per bot or user. This is confusing for me, because most of the cases for us in a possible future scenario, there would be a lot of invalid data to be scanned to get to real data. E.g., we would have to supply approximately 100 pages of scanned data to extract two pages of original data. In these type of cases, the IQ Bot might be a costly venture."
"We have seen a return of investment because it takes less time to market in our current process. I would estimate a times savings between 20 to 30 percent."
"Approximately, for a developer, it is around $750 for a license a year. For Bot Runners, it is about $550."
"No one is balking at the cost. They are market rates and will change, but no one is saying, "That is ridiculous or impossible." They are saying, "Show me the ROI and prove that the cost is accurate.""
"I would rate the cost of Automation Anywhere as a six out of ten, with ten being the most expensive."
"Licensing for Automation Anywhere (AA) is paid on a yearly basis. Out of all the RPA tools, it has the most value for money, e.g. what you pay is what you get."
"We are a partner of Automation Anywhere and find the pricing to be reasonable."
"I have heard that Automation Anywhere is expensive."
"For an ITIL user, the cost is probably about 50 bucks a month."
"Freshdesk was the best solution with the best price. It was cost efficient and included all the features that we needed."
"The price could be better, but it's okay. Compared to ServiceNow and JIRA, Freshworks offers a competitive price. There are also additional licensing costs because you need Microsoft Outlook. Each new email account costs around $15 to $19."
"It was definitely not expensive. It was two grand or maybe three grand total for a year. It has just straight and simple standard licensing fees. There is no additional fee."
"It is costly."
"The pricing is pretty manageable and acceptable."
"We use a combination of Freshdesk, Freshservice, and Freshchat. We use the whole suite. Weirdly enough, we pay more for Freshdesk than we do for Freshservice. I would rate it a three out of five in terms of pricing. You can get different bundles, and you can always move to different plans that are standard. Freshservice can go anywhere from $19 up to $120 per agent, per month. There is such a wide range, and it is very customizable to your needs."
"The best system plan is enterprise. It costs basically 79 Euros per agent per month when it's billed annually and 95 Euros per agent per month when it's billed monthly."
"We use a licensing model only so we pay for the number of agents we have configured in the system only."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Construction Company
11%
Outsourcing Company
9%
Construction Company
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Energy/Utilities Company
8%
Construction Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business159
Midsize Enterprise81
Large Enterprise553
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business29
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It depends on your use case. Is it simply to automate a couple of processes? Is it to augment a human team? AA is ver...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
From my experience using AA tool, it depends on the applications that you want to automate, because there some applic...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It is a highly preferred RPA tool. You can check my Automation Anywhere Review to know more.
Ask a question
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What needs improvement with Freshdesk?
I think the main problem with Freshdesk is the deep settings, interface, and analytics. When you need complex cross-f...
What is your primary use case for Freshdesk?
My main use case for Freshdesk is customer support tickets. A specific example of how my team uses Freshdesk for cust...
What advice do you have for others considering Freshdesk?
My advice for others looking into using Freshdesk is to consider that compared to Zendesk or Salesforce, where the se...
 

Also Known As

Automation Anywhere, Testing Anywhere, Automation Anywhere Enterprise, Agentic Process Automation System (Now Certified for WorkSpaces)
No data available
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Google, Linkedin, Cisco, Juniper Networks, DellEMC, Comcast, Mastercard, Quest Diagnostics
Ausenco, Highlights for Children, B/E Aerospace
Honda, 3M, Hugo Boss, Petronas, Sony Pictures, The Atlantic, goodreads, Clear Channel Radio, Penn University of Pennsylvania, unicef, Kuoni, Movember
Find out what your peers are saying about Cherwell Service Management vs. Freshdesk and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
904,899 professionals have used our research since 2012.