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KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) vs Pulseway comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 1, 2026

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

KACE Systems Management App...
Ranking in Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM)
11th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
Client Desktop Management (2nd), Endpoint Compliance (6th), Patch Management (11th), Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) (12th)
Pulseway
Ranking in Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM)
17th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Network Monitoring Software (77th), Server Monitoring (28th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2026, in the Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) category, the mindshare of KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) is 2.6%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Pulseway is 3.0%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA)2.6%
Pulseway3.0%
Other94.4%
Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM)
 

Featured Reviews

AdityaJain - PeerSpot reviewer
Security Administrator at EbixCash
Centralized software deployment has simplified endpoint control but needs stronger security alerts
What I like best about KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) is that it allows pushing custom-made applications to all computers that have KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) endpoint installed. This makes it easier for the organization to push patches and updates. If I need to push EDR updates, I can use KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA), as it automatically updates the EDR on that endpoint, and that is a great feature. Overall, KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) helps streamline my processes by allowing me to check the uptime and downtime of machines, whether they are connected to the internet or not, and how long a machine has been switched off. I can also gather hardware details and software inventory from it. I can show a live demonstration if a video conference can be arranged. Incident resolution capabilities with KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) have improved operational efficiency for system administrators, as it makes it easier to track machines with KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA), gather their IP addresses, and push several updates, patches, or software deployments at once. I can design compliances as per my requirements, such as ensuring passwords are reset after 45 days.
reviewer2132892 - PeerSpot reviewer
Owner at Hogan's Systems Consulting, LLC
Great notifications, a wide variety of features, and excellent monitoring capabilities
It would be nice if it also had a desktop application, similar to the phone app, which would allow me to monitor and control computers from my desktop. It's nice to be able to do things remotely using my phone; however, in many cases, it would be very helpful to be able to do things from a desktop or laptop computer. This would be especially useful for things like remote access to computers. It's too hard to do much on a Windows computer using a tiny phone screen. Being able to do things from a desktop or laptop computer would be much more productive.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"You don't have to be an advanced user. Rather, in terms of ease of use, this product is right where it needs to be."
"The solution definitely saves us time; we used to have four people putting in 40 hours, and now we have one person doing it in 16 hours."
"There is ease of use, and its pricing was a driving factor."
"We're able to deploy software and push out fixes to endpoints faster than ever."
"My primary use case of this solution is to help us obtain accreditation in the UK of Cyber Essentials Plus, a program sponsored by the UK government which encourages UK companies to obtain a certain level of cyber-security within their cyber environment."
"Using Quest KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA), we have been able to manage three times the amount of machines as other groups while having half the staff, which has positively impacted our organization."
"By using the KACE solution, we are able to provide endpoint management for our customers, it filled a critical gap for us, contributes to more than 30% of our revenue, and based on customer feedback it has saved more than 50% time through automation."
"There is one place for a lot of different things. If somebody has a problem with their computer, they will put in a ticket. From there, we will know who it is and the assets assigned to them, because there is one place to go look for what we are talking about and with whom we are talking. Just having one place for everything is really convenient. For example, we are able to deploy software to hundreds of computers. We don't need to go to each individual device."
"It has made life a lot easier for the administrators."
"One of the applications I have used the most was to troubleshoot users and I've never faced difficulties or issues with the application itself."
"So this solution allows for 24/7 support and is very handy."
"The setup is simple."
"Using this platform has allowed us to reach and assist our remotely based clients, regardless of their location provided they have an internet connection."
"It gives you remote control and has a mobile app."
"It has been very helpful to get notifications about various issues with my servers and network to help me take action to resolve problems before they become major issues."
"They provide a lot of features; it's good and easy software."
 

Cons

"With KACE, you have to use smart labels and groups, and it can be annoying."
"My biggest complaint is that almost every time they send out a new version, it fixes something and breaks another. Something that wasn't working in the last version now works, but something else stops; or they'll remove some dashboard that I really found to be nice and replace it with something totally different that I could care less about."
"There is always room for improvement. An example will be the implementation of granulated permission to run Scripts."
"It is a little bit difficult to use the license compliances because you need to decide when you are using the software catalog if you are using it with their license compliance or the normal software part."
"The problem is that it's harder to directly emulate a lot of the stuff that the group policies do, using the KACE solution. With regular group policies, you just specify the various settings you want to change on the workstations, and then you specify the workstations and—while it's kind of an ugly mess—it does it. Whereas on KACE, you really have to know what you're doing with scripting to effectively script those exact same changes."
"There should be a mini toolbox, like the competitors of KACE have, with the small features for KACE administrators."
"The labeling process should be more streamlined. It should be easier to do. It gets confusing at times."
"There are some of the patching solutions that it doesn't take care of for us, so we have to do those manually on the devices, and that's really the biggest thing."
"It would be nice if it also had a desktop application, similar to the phone app, which would allow me to monitor and control computers from my desktop."
"Support needs to be improved because we've sometimes had to wait 24 hours to get a response."
"There are some bugs or glitches."
"GUI needs to be improved and the solution lacks a process for monitoring VOIP calls."
"They have good technical support but it's not excellent."
"However, the solution does not allow you to make a script for just one customer, so it would be great if that is improved."
"Remote Desktop Assistance for Mac endpoints - not having this functionality is a major inconvenience in having to have two systems for clients using this platform."
"Sometimes the speed is a problem. When I've been remote controlling people, from time to time, there were some issues with people in Hong Kong."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It may be more expensive, but you get what you pay for."
"Licensing is done on a per device basis, so it's dependent on how many agents you've got installed."
"Its pricing model is good for what it offers. Nobody here gives me a hard time about renewing the contract every year. It might be a little cost prohibitive for a smaller company who has to stand up a virtual environment as well as have virtual environment licensing and the hardware. If you have a smaller environment, it might be cost prohibitive. If you only have a couple of hundred computers, you might be more willing to do those manually. In our environment, the cost savings of having KACE far outweigh the licensing costs. We are okay with its pricing model."
"Licensing is very straightforward. They don't overcomplicate it. This is not a Cisco product where you have to have 30 different licenses just to open the box. It's pretty much set-and-forget. You pay an annual license... The cost is in the mid to upper range, but the ROI exceeds the outside cost, especially once you've had the system for a while."
"The product is reasonably priced."
"It was a very attractive price. This is a huge feature of this product. If you would "credit score" this product versus others out there on the market, this one has a very attractive price."
"We buy consulting fees from Software Factory, then we pay extra for it."
"There are no costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
13%
Construction Company
10%
University
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Construction Company
13%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Comms Service Provider
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise16
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Quest KACE Systems Management?
In terms of cost-effectiveness, considering a situation where I want to deploy KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) for just pushing updates, it is completely fine. However, apart from that, I d...
What needs improvement with Quest KACE Systems Management?
For improvements in KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA), I would want to see it become a standalone software agent. I am curious about why it does not offer EDR functionality. Additionally, the...
What is your primary use case for Quest KACE Systems Management?
I have deployed KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) around 230 plus PCs, and I use it to push Windows updates and scripts. I have designed various scripts for tasks such as password resets afte...
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Also Known As

Dell KACE Systems Management
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Waypoint, Mattos Filho, Meetic, Gems Education, Green Clinic HealthSystem, Service King
Dell, Canon, Siemens, Harvard University, Northwestern University
Find out what your peers are saying about KACE Systems Management Appliance (SMA) vs. Pulseway and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
915,341 professionals have used our research since 2012.