IBM SmartCloud Control Desk vs LiveAgent comparison

IBM and QualityUnit are both solutions in the Help Desk Software category. IBM is ranked #26, while QualityUnit is ranked #37. IBM holds a 1.1% mindshare in HDS, compared to QualityUnit’s 0.7% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of QualityUnit users who would recommend it.

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

Read 9 IBM SmartCloud Control Desk reviews

499 Views
484 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

LiveAgent

Read 2 LiveAgent reviews

400 Views
328 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

LiveAgent

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 2024

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk and LiveAgent compete in IT service management and customer support. LiveAgent seems to have an upper hand due to its extensive range of features, although IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is valued for its integration capabilities and support options.

Features: IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is noted for its integration capabilities with enterprise systems, asset management, and robust service request management functions. LiveAgent is notable for its comprehensive customer support functionalities, including a universal inbox, automation tools, and extensive third-party integrations. The main difference is SmartCloud's focus on enterprise solutions versus LiveAgent's emphasis on flexible customer support.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM SmartCloud Control Desk deployment can be complex due to its enterprise-scale nature, needing more planning and support, but offers comprehensive customer service. LiveAgent offers a straightforward deployment model with user-friendly configurations, enabling quick installation and efficient onboarding, complemented by proactive customer service.

Pricing and ROI: IBM SmartCloud Control Desk requires a significant initial setup cost but may offer long-term benefits for businesses needing robust IT asset management. This is reflective of its enterprise-grade capabilities. LiveAgent provides a more flexible pricing structure, potentially attractive for smaller organizations or those needing immediate customer service enhancements, likely offering a quicker return on investment for businesses prioritizing customer support functionalities.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM SmartCloud Control Desk vs. LiveAgent Report (Updated: September 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk vs. LiveAgent

September 2025

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Helped 869,566 peers since 2012

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

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

Ranking in Help Desk Software

26th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

LiveAgent

Ranking in Help Desk Software

37th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

IT Service Management (ITSM) (45th), Knowledge Management Software (26th)

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is 1.1%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of LiveAgent is 0.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Help Desk Software Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
IBM SmartCloud Control Desk	1.1%
LiveAgent	0.7%
Other	98.2%

Help Desk Software

Featured Reviews

Jose Pedro Muñoz

Director of operations at Vetasi

Helps standardize our workflow, track client tickets, and it's very flexible

Initially we used HPE Service Desk. Then, Remedy (IBM SmartCloud Control Desk) version 5. When selecting a vendor, the most important thing for us is the flexibility of the tool. It must be very flexible to change the workflow or to add new workflows for the clients. It must have stability and scalability as well.

Read full review

Ogechi O.

Assistant customer support manager

Prioritizes tasks and easily organizes messages and responses

I've not really noticed anything that needs to be improved with the solution. Generally, I enjoyed everything. Every feature LiveAgent has was a seamless journey for me. Maybe there are others who might notice one or two flaws on LiveAgent. I use LiveAgent, but based on my position in the company as a live chat professional, there is a level that I am restricted to. There are other products that are more popular and effective than LiveAgent, like Zendesk and HubSpot. They are among the most popular live chat products, and they have more users. I will advise that LiveAgent should look at what these other people are doing and use it to improve themselves. LiveAgent should add more functionalities.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The workflow capability is useful. It's not a manual helpdesk operation. It's fully automated, even when an alarm has occurred. It covers the complete cycle of initiation to resolving the events. This is its most strong feature that is easily integrable with a monitoring solution. It creates tickets, and the workflow feature is the most important one."

"SLA integrations, reports, and integration with other applications are the most valuable."

"The brand name is the most valuable aspect of this solution for me. It's IBM. It's a global company that supports this product, it's not something open source or something like that."

"The solution has been stable."

"In the early stages of our company, all requests were done in notebooks, and none of it was centrally managed. But now we have a central tool which is an entry point for all requests that come in."

"The most valuable are its flexibility and agility. It's quick to change it, to adapt it to your needs. That's the most important for us."

"A feature I found most valuable in IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is the service request. Another feature I like most about the solution is IT asset management, which tells you who owns a specific asset in the company and from which date."

"What I like about the Control Desk is that everything is centralized. You have all the requests in one place, you know which ones are for whom and who is working on them."

More IBM SmartCloud Control Desk pros

"Provides service level optimization."

"The most valuable feature was how the solution helped us to prioritize tasks."

Cons

"It could use more facility or flexibility for reporting, and business intelligence in the tool."

"The reporting in relation to updating could be improved upon."

"What needs improvement in IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is its graphical interface because it needs to be more user-friendly. IBM is a big company, but this solution is a little bit outdated. The most common comment I get from customers is that IBM SmartCloud Control Desk looks old and needs a refresh. Its frontend needs a little bit of work. The solution needs to be more modern. In the programming world, you see a lot of new technologies, but this particular solution is still on Java. IBM SmartCloud Control Desk isn't like web-based service request tools, and that's an area for improvement. What I'd like to see in the next version of the solution is a more upscale technology. IBM SmartCloud Control Desk has small issues with document links and attachments, and those could bother you when you're using it for a long time. A more user-friendly GUI is also another improvement I'd like to see in the next version of the solution, plus a better user experience, and it would be great if IBM could resolve the current issues I've noticed in IBM SmartCloud Control Desk."

"Overall the user experience, as opposed to the system and databases, could be improved. It does work as it should and it's good, but they should invest more in the user interfaces to be less data oriented and more appealing for the user."

"The solution lacks a graphical user interface."

"The time calculations can be improved. While working on reports, it was taking the time only in seconds, which was hard for me to work out. While creating some dialogs in the service portal, you have to use certain data types in some fields. It was very tricky to make them work. I was testing a certain type of input, and it didn't work. It didn't show me the domain that the fields have to show. I had to make the change to the database, and only then it worked. It was a tricky thing to make them work with the dialogs. Their technical support can also be improved in terms of response time."

"The main issue that we hear from our customers is that the self-service user interface is a little bit old, possibly due to the fact that IBM is such a large enterprise company. People say that they think they're in the year 2004, because you can very clearly see that the technology is lagging behind modern trends."

"Support has been the biggest problem for us. I understand that because we use the product of a global company, some changes are not quick to deploy."

More IBM SmartCloud Control Desk cons

"Connection to other softwares could be improved."

"There are other products that are more popular."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's basically for a big company because of the costs. A small company can't afford the licensing cost. For medium and large companies, it's the best product. The price of the license is on the higher side compared to others."

"The licensing we have for IBM Control Desk is on a yearly basis. They have a concurrent license and an administrative license. And with these, you get all the products. There aren't any additional fees for extra add-ons or anything like that."

"The license for IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is paid yearly and is on a per-user basis. You buy the product and pay for its license yearly. IBM is changing the licensing structure, but for now, it's a yearly license. There's no additional cost. It's just the license that you need to pay for to use IBM SmartCloud Control Desk."

Information not available

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Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Large Enterprise	3

No data available

Comparisons

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Compared 17% of the time

ConnectWise PSA vs IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

Compared 17% of the time

Ameyo Fusion CX vs IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

Compared 16% of the time

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JIRA Service Management vs LiveAgent

Compared 48% of the time

Zendesk vs LiveAgent

Compared 30% of the time

Zoho Desk vs LiveAgent

Compared 22% of the time

More LiveAgent Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

September 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Help Desk Software

September 2025

Download LiveAgent product report

Also Known As

SmartCloud Control Desk

No data available

Overview

IBM Control Desk on Cloud offer an access to a user friendly self-service, automated service management, and seamlessly-integrated, best-practice based service desk capabilities. IBM Control Desk provides the IT service management (ITSM) needed to simplify support of users and infrastructure. It also offers a unified IT asset and service management software provides a common control center for managing business processes for both digital and physical assets and enables control, governance and compliance to applications, endpoints and assets to protect critical data and prevent outages. Control Desk is IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL)-compliant, accessible through mobile devices and integrates with social media and development tools.

IBM

LiveAgent is an AI-driven customer communication platform featuring a robust suite of tools designed to automate and optimize customer service operations.

LiveAgent accelerates response times and boosts productivity by leveraging AI technologies like the AI Chatbot and AI Answer Assistant. With easy integration, FlowHunt enhances FAQs handling, complex query escalation, lead generation, and multilingual support. These features are accessible on all current pricing plans, excluding legacy plans. AI Answer Assistant utilizes ChatGPT to craft polished email responses, significantly improving customer service quality.

What are the key features of LiveAgent?

AI Chatbot: Automates interactions, improves response times, reduces workloads.
FlowHunt Integration: Handles FAQs, escalates complex queries, supports multilingual interactions.
AI Answer Assistant: Utilizes ChatGPT for polished email responses, enhancing productivity.

What benefits should users consider?

Improved Efficiency: Streamlines operations, reduces agent workload.
Increased Satisfaction: Quick, personalized responses enhance customer experience.
Cost Reduction: Optimizes resources, lowering operational expenses.

LiveAgent is widely implemented across various industries, offering tailored solutions to enhance customer engagement and operational efficiency. Businesses in e-commerce, telecommunications, and healthcare benefit from its AI-driven automation, which streamlines communication processes and supports diverse client bases.

QualityUnit

Sample Customers

St Vincent's Health Australia, Kalibrate Pty. Ltd., Cognizant Technology

Orange, Huawei, T Mobile, eOn, Solid Trust Pay, G4S, Oxford University

Buyer's Guide

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk vs. LiveAgent

September 2025

Free Report: IBM SmartCloud Control Desk vs. LiveAgent

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