Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk vs ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus comparison

 

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

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk
Ranking in Help Desk Software
28th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus
Ranking in Help Desk Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
70
Ranking in other categories
IT Service Management (ITSM) (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is 1.3%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus is 3.8%, down from 7.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Help Desk Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus3.8%
IBM SmartCloud Control Desk1.3%
Other94.9%
Help Desk Software
 

Featured Reviews

KM
Computer System Engineer at Informatika d.d.
Has centralization and asset management features, and a helpful and knowledgeable technical support team
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 IBM is a big company, but this solution is a little bit outdated.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.
Mostafiz Miah - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Presales & Technical Lead at Elitbuzz Technologies Ltd
Automation has transformed daily request handling and now tracks every customer interaction
ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus helps my team manage and resolve requests compared to previous methods as we previously managed things through paperwork and diaries. After deploying ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus, whenever any customer request comes, we provide the customer a product demo if they ask about the products. We then convert that request to a lead, which is converted to a demo, and then to the product POC, allowing us to follow up every stage of the requests. Everything can be tracked from ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus, whether at the closing stage or the initial stage. I use ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus daily in a unique way because previously everyone managed their own tracking system through their diary, but now everyone inputs data into this solution so that at the end of the day, we can get reports on how many leads we have taken care of and when they need to be taken care of. This information is visible from the ServiceDesk tool, and using the dashboard, we can easily identify it, providing an at-a-glance view. The best features ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus offers for my team include automating manual tasks, which allows whatever tasks we previously did manually to be converted into automatic tasks. Currently, they have also introduced Zia, a very helpful solution for us. Using Zia, we can search for anything, not only inside the tool but also outside, integrating it with ChatGPT and Teams, and it can integrate with other ManageEngine solutions as well as solutions such as Jira and ServiceNow. When we integrate our network monitoring solutions with ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus, it automatically raises an incident ticket and assigns it to the right team whenever any incident has occurred, which saves us time and reduces manual tasks. Previously, we had to communicate to the right people through mail or phone calls after an incident, but now the incidents are automatically converted and assigned to the relevant support groups along with the SLA. The integration with Teams allows us to raise tickets without logging into the portal, and we can see the ticket status and add comments through Teams, which is very helpful. Additionally, mail integration can automatically convert emails into tickets, adding further efficiency. ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus has positively impacted our organization, particularly in customer satisfaction. Previously, customers managed service requests, incidents, changes, and problems manually, but after integration, most of these processes are automated. This includes change requests that now follow a workflow based on organizational needs and ITIL best practices, making tracking incidents and requests much easier for end customers through scheduled reports.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"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."
"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."
"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 solution is very easy to work with."
"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."
"SLA integrations, reports, and integration with other applications are the most valuable."
"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."
"The most valuable feature is the ticketing system which is working well."
"The most valuable feature of ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus is change management."
"The most valuable features are project management, change management, and the flow according to the mail chain."
"The software deployment we find quite valuable - being able to deploy software to multiple endpoints without having to worry about getting in touch with the end users."
"I like how it can be integrated and expanded with other ManageEngine products."
"It's a very user-friendly tool with good performance."
"While I see the normal features of a ticketing system in ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus, a good workflow engine is definitely present."
"When somebody wants to follow up with a problem from the past, the solution makes it easy. It keeps everything in one system and updated."
 

Cons

"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 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 reporting in relation to updating could be improved upon."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"It could use more facility or flexibility for reporting, and business intelligence in the tool."
"The solution lacks a graphical user interface."
"The product's asset management tool needs improvement."
"For ITIL functions, it should be more complex, including financial functions. We are expecting it to be easier for customization within workflows and templates."
"The service delivery could be improved."
"The product needs to allow for implementation for other departments besides the IT help desk."
"There's no native integrations between the systems."
"The self-service feature for end users and the knowledge base need to be improved."
"The solution needs to integrate with the telecom system in more depth. Currently, the feature is limited to the SMS level for notifications."
"We should be able to monitor the performance of assets, not only documents. For example, printers. We should be able to monitor ink levels and get notifications when the ink is low. In another operation manager I use, they send me a notification when the device is off, or has something to perform."
 

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 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."
"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."
"ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus has reasonable pricing because my colleagues mentioned that the solution is more cost-effective than the previous one the company used."
"For our 500 assets that are using the professional version of the solution, we pay somewhere between $4,000 and $5,000 per year."
"ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus is much cheaper than many of its competitors. We pay about nine dollars per agent and one dollar per device. There are no hidden costs."
"The licensing is around $10,000 per year."
"Its price is very lucrative. It would be great if the price can come down, but overall, its price is great. It is half or maybe one-third of the price of other market leaders."
"The prices are attractive. Customer can use a subscription if they do not have enough budget."
"It is not an expensive solution."
"We use the cloud model, which is subscription-based, and each year, the subscription fees seem to go up, making it a more expensive solution."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Help Desk Software solutions are best for your needs.
881,114 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business32
Midsize Enterprise24
Large Enterprise19
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What do you like most about ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus?
The platform's most beneficial features are incident management, change management, request management, and asset management.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus?
Regarding pricing, ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus offers three editions: Standard edition, Professional, and Enterprise. The Enterprise edition is the full suite, and the Professional edition has in...
What needs improvement with ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus?
Currently, ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus is a mature solution, and I do not think major improvements are needed, as it already covers most ITIL features such as incident, change, problem, service r...
 

Also Known As

SmartCloud Control Desk
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

St Vincent's Health Australia, Kalibrate Pty. Ltd., Cognizant Technology
Tranter IT Infrastructure Services Limited, Sterlite Technologies, averda, Radiology Associates
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM SmartCloud Control Desk vs. ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
881,114 professionals have used our research since 2012.