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Freshservice vs Kayako vs ServiceNow 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 October 2025, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of Freshservice is 4.2%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Kayako is 0.4%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ServiceNow is 17.3%, down from 25.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Help Desk Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
ServiceNow17.3%
Freshservice4.2%
Kayako0.4%
Other78.1%
Help Desk Software
 

Featured Reviews

Trilochana Gouda - PeerSpot reviewer
Smooth incident management and easy to use while needing better escalation management
We are using Freshservice for the IT ticketing system for business users We use the ticketing system primarily, which is very easy to use for all users. Freshservice is helpful, especially in incident management. Incident management is very helpful, and the system is straightforward, making it…
reviewer1712472 - PeerSpot reviewer
Flexible, straightforward implementation, and helpful support
We are in the process of switching from Kayako to ManageEngine Desktop Central. We went through a full review of our service desk processing and one of the solutions we purchased was a ManageEngine Desktop Central. When we were looking at the integrations into the Kayako system and how it works, we found that ManageEngine Desktop Central did very similar things. It had better layers of classification, other templating, and additional features that we did not have with Kayako. Our service manager made the decision to switch at that time. My advice to others wanting to implement Kayako would be for them to plan out their service processes first, prior to trying to implement them in the tool. We made the mistake of jumping in too soon back 10 years ago. I started using it in a way that we could have tooled it in a different way to make it better. We could have had more implementation process information to make sure we received what we wanted to out of the solution. I rate Kayako an eight out of ten.
Nikhil Gohil - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables effective incident management and seamless workflow automation with valuable mobile accessibility
I haven't thought deeply about improvements for ServiceNow or what might be missing right now. There are so many modules and features in ServiceNow that I haven't explored them all, so it's hard to say what might be missing or should be improved. I suggest making the cost more affordable for smaller companies.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Freshservice's best feature is its user-friendliness."
"The portal is straightforward for the end-user, but that's not the best part of Freshservice. Integration is the part that's interesting because it's easy to set up a process. It's extremely simple to integrate. In one week, you can add change management. It's incredible."
"We use the ticketing system primarily, which is very easy to use for all users."
"The most valuable features of Freshservice are the notifications, customization, and flexibility."
"With Freshservice in place, we have reversed the trend of creating tickets."
"Depending on the size of your organization, is pretty standard and useful."
"The overall functionality of the product is excellent."
"We use the ticketing system primarily, which is very easy to use for all users."
"The most valuable feature of Kayako is its flexibility. We can do anything we want with it, which is nice."
"Remote access is most valuable."
"We used ServiceNow for change management, release management, and event management."
"I think the technical support is pretty good. They can be a little bit slow sometimes, but overall I think they're good."
"There are a lot of features within ServiceNow. There are plenty of add-ons that go beyond the typical core helpdesk operations, such as HR facilities, BRM functionality, and various compliance and governance capabilities."
"In terms of the most valuable features, it's nice to have everything in one place. Things are easy to follow up on. ServiceNow provides that workflow. I know at some level it is in the pipeline and then if I need to follow up, everything's there. Those are the key benefits of ServiceNow."
"HR Case Management and Customer Service Management are two of the key areas which clients are using."
"Will give us better control over asset management and technical debt once we can centralize all contract information."
"ServiceNow is very easy to set up."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvement in reporting for project management."
"Not integrated with Google."
"They can improve the search. While searching the inventory, when I cancel a selected category, the search box disappears, and I have to reload the page. It is a small glitch. Currently, we can have only one plan per subscription. All users have to be on the same plan. We can't have two users for plan A and five users for plan B. It might be good if there was an option to have different plans within one subscription so that you can assign each agent to the corresponding plan."
"There are some limitations in reporting. For example, I would like to have a report of conversations or replies."
"The round robin ticketing feature that they have is not ideal."
"Freshservice could improve the integration with Microsoft Outlook."
"Their analytics need improvement."
"I experienced some delay in response time for non-function critical queries."
"Some of the reporting in Kayako could be improved. It only has two levels of classification and if there were additional levels added for reporting purposes it would be awesome for our environment."
"Once a change request has been created once it's been approved and been submitted, there is no way to go in on that particular change request and submit an additional task."
"I have a problem with the way the solution's price is calculated."
"Its stability and pricing need improvement."
"It's a great platform, but there's still room for improvement. As the solutions stands now, you do need a lot of previous experience to use it. It would be great if they could develop some use case templates. This would be beneficial for a small and medium-sized businesses."
"The standard UI is very restricted. It doesn't look as good, compared to Remedy. Building your own UI requires some additional coding..."
"The high price is a huge barrier in Portugal."
"There is a need for bug or error tracking in ServiceNow."
"There are sometimes challenges with the portal being a bit confusing for new users."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There are some additional costs but not that many. For example, we have unlimited assets, which is something for which we pay extra. We also paid for additional orchestration. I would rate it a three out of five in terms of pricing. They are right in the middle."
"The pricing information is on their website. It's my understanding that their Pro Plan, for example, is around $89/month."
"Freshservice's licensing costs are pretty good, and it has different categories of pricing based on what modules and features you choose, which gives a lot of flexibility."
"It is good for the price you pay. It has different plans. If you need all features, you need to go for a higher plan. Currently, with the second tier plan, you cannot completely separate the group of agents. So, the agent in each group can see another person's ticket. You also cannot modify the rules based on the viewable, readable stuff and cannot have a custom role in this plan. If you want to do that, you have to go for a higher plan. It works in our case because it doesn't matter if the other group can see our ticket because it doesn't contain anything sensitive. We also didn't need the project or change management features. That's why we didn't go with a higher plan."
"The solution may be around 20,000 euros a year."
"It is $34 per license, per agent. Currently, we don't see any add-ons at extra fees."
"Our licensing fee for Freshservice is $2,500 a year."
"Compared to other tools, Freshservice is affordable."
"Kayako is a highly affordable solution."
"It is very expensive because it is a big organization. You have to pay for additional things."
"The CapEx version is great."
"The product cost is higher than that of other vendors."
"The price is okay for us. It's reasonable."
"For large-scale companies, the cost of ServiceNow is not expensive, but for small and mid-scale companies, it is higher."
"We are happy with the pricing."
"I rate the solution's pricing a six out of ten. The pricing for ServiceNow is based on a SaaS platform with annual contracts. However, it may not offer much flexibility for adjusting usage in the short term."
"The pricing is on the high side, but if you look at the stability and option to work, it's kind of justified."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
19%
University
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Educational Organization
7%
No data available
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise12
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business54
Midsize Enterprise36
Large Enterprise163
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Freshservice?
The solution has been very helpful engineering insights into the client's environment. We have been able to manage c...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Freshservice?
The solution offers flat licensing and appears to be cost-effective.
What needs improvement with Freshservice?
There is a need for improvement in terms of automatic escalation to the next level if an issue is not resolved. It sh...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
Which solution is better for developing non-ITSM applications: OutSystems or Service Now?
The short answer is that OutSystems is far better for 2 main reasons. Firstly, with Service Now you are locked into t...
Would you choose ServiceNow over Microsoft PowerApps?
Hi Netanya, I will choose ServiceNow because ServiceNow is a very good tool compared to Microsoft PowerApp. Because ...
What do you like most about ServiceNow?
The solution has a user-friendly interface.
 

Comparisons

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Also Known As

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Sinclair Broadcast Group, Western Carriers, Judson University, Golf Canada, Travix, Proxama, Paymentez, Ready Auto Transport
Toshiba Canada, Disney, Avast, Namecheap, Texas Tech University
AAA, AstraZeneca, Becton, Dickinson and Company, Broadcom, Christus Health, Epicor, Equinix, GE Capital, Intuit, KPMG, Loyola Marymount University, OshKosh, Quantas, RedHat, Royal Bank of Scotland, Swiss Re, U.S. Department of Energy, Safeway, Yale University, and Zillow    
Find out what your peers are saying about ServiceNow, Atlassian, ManageEngine and others in Help Desk Software. Updated: September 2025.
869,095 professionals have used our research since 2012.