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OpenText ZENworks Configuration Management vs Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Feb 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

Microsoft Intune
Sponsored
Ranking in Configuration Management
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
384
Ranking in other categories
Remote Access (3rd), Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) (1st), Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) (1st), Microsoft Security Suite (1st)
OpenText ZENworks Configura...
Ranking in Configuration Management
25th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Red Hat Ansible Automation ...
Ranking in Configuration Management
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
73
Ranking in other categories
Release Automation (4th), Network Automation (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Configuration Management category, the mindshare of Microsoft Intune is 4.2%, down from 9.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenText ZENworks Configuration Management is 1.7%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is 10.6%, down from 14.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Configuration Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform10.6%
Microsoft Intune4.2%
OpenText ZENworks Configuration Management1.7%
Other83.5%
Configuration Management
 

Featured Reviews

HA
Senior Business Development Executive at Digitaltrack
Centralized device management has automated onboarding and improves remote security compliance
One thing I feel Microsoft Intune could improve is troubleshooting visibility. In many cases, when a policy or application deployment fails, the error messages are a bit generic. So, admins still spend time checking logs manually or testing on devices one by one. Compared to the simplicity of deployment, troubleshooting sometimes feels less mature. I also think reporting and real-time monitoring could be stronger. The dashboard gives useful information, but in large environments, many teams still depend on additional tools or scripts for deeper reporting and analytics. If I had to focus on one area first, I would probably choose troubleshooting and reporting. Deployment through Microsoft Intune is generally straightforward, but when something fails, identifying the exact root cause can still take more time than expected. Error messages are sometimes too generic, and admins often have to dig through logs, sync status, or multiple portals to understand what actually happened. I think user experience and policy management could also improve further. Microsoft Intune has become much better over the years, but sometimes the admin portal still feels fragmented because certain configurations open in different sections or redirect to older interfaces. For new admins, especially, it can take time to understand where everything is located. Another thing is policy conflict handling. In larger organizations, multiple device policies, compliance rules, and configuration profiles can overlap. When conflicts happen, the visibility is not always very clear, so admins spend time figuring out which policy actually won or caused the issue.
it_user1272306 - PeerSpot reviewer
Chief Technology Officer at DoITWise
Helpful impact analysis and the discovery capability is quite good
This tool works hand-in-hand with RPA technology. RPA will allow you to control your servers by deploying the server automation agent. You don't have the discovery, but then you can deploy the policies that maintain the authorized versus current state. On top of that, you can use server automation to deploy patches or remediate configuration issues on the operating system. My advice to anybody who is implementing this solution is to ensure that the process is set up properly, first. Once the process is set up, the tool will do the rest for you. Overall, this is a comprehensive tool that works well, and I wouldn't touch it other than to enhance the UI and make containerization work without the CDF. I would rate this solution a nine out of ten.
Manas Kashyap - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Dev Ops Engineer at 11 East Capital
Automation has transformed server patching and has reduced months of work to minutes
The best features that Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform offers is that it does not require any additional resources inside the servers. Python is the only requirement, and since Python is already present inside the servers, we can run it from our location and it automatically deploys things and does the work for us. The minimal requirements and easy deployment have definitely impacted my daily work and my team's efficiency. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is one of the best features that we depend on. We have evaluated other options, but Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform was the best choice because it has saved us a tremendous amount of time. We do not need to manually intervene in the servers or install third-party software to maintain these things. It is very easy to write playbooks for Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform. Ansible Galaxy contains many playbooks that are readily available and ready to be used. It is highly configurable with Jinja templating, making it easy to maintain. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform has positively impacted my organization. Previously, we needed to go into the servers and maintain them manually, which used to take a lot of time. For 200 to 300 servers, the maintenance took about one to two months. New patches would arrive and we would have to repeat the process. Now, it is a one-night work or a 10 to 15 minutes task. We write a playbook, maintain an inventory, and roll out the updates and it starts working for us. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform uses conditional clauses and has rollback options, functioning like a standard coding language that is simple to use. There is definitely a reduction in errors with Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform because we have playbooks written with all the necessary clauses and rollback options. Manual work automatically creates more errors, whereas in automation, we have written sets that we do not forget every time we run it. We have protected written sets that we execute consistently.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"With on-premises Active Directory, the main challenge was that we had no control when a user was working from home. We didn't know what exactly a user was doing and whether the AV was up to date or not. Intune provides better control of their machines."
"The overall user experience is quite nice. I have no complaints from end users regarding their devices enrolled in Intune."
"The Mobile Device Management in Intune is a valuable feature."
"One of the biggest advantages of Microsoft Intune is not only the management itself, but also how well it integrates with other Microsoft technologies."
"We can manage identity, devices, email security, Exchange security, and data protection all under one umbrella."
"Microsoft Intune helps secure hybrid work by allowing organizations to manage and secure devices remotely."
"No one can compete with Microsoft when it comes to price, and the features it is offering."
"There are so many features, but Windows Autopilot is one of the features that are very valuable for most customers."
"We use it for managing our desktops; we have 350,000 desktops and it allows us to manage and control them relatively easily."
"Overall, this is a comprehensive tool that works well, and I wouldn't touch it other than to enhance the UI and make containerization work without the CDF."
"The most valuable feature is the impact analysis."
"Helps me perform changes in connected infrastructure thanks to the discovery features."
"Automatic Spiral Discovery: This feature enables deep and dynamic configuration and change management."
"We can now go to a customer and deploy all software in a few minutes instead of hours."
"Ansible automation has benefited our organization."
"Ansible makes it easy to maintain configuration across environments and to maintain and execute the code through playbooks."
"It allows control over thousands of servers, whether virtual or physical."
"RBAC is great around Organizations and I can use that backend as our lab. Ingesting stuff into the JSON logs, into any sort of logging collector; it works with Splunk and there are other collectors as well. It supports Sumo and that helps, I can go create reports in Sumo Logic. Workflows are an interesting feature. I can collect a lot of templates and create a workflow out of them."
"One of the most valuable features is that Ansible is agentless. It does not have dependencies, other than Python, which is very generic in terms of dependencies for all systems and for any environment. Being agentless, Ansible is very convenient for everything."
"Installing it is a PIP command. So, it's pretty easy. It is a one liner."
"Ansible provides great reliability when coupled with a versioning system (git). It helps providing predictability to the network by knowing exactly what's being pushed after validating it in production."
 

Cons

"The initial setup of Microsoft Intune could be more simplified, but apart from this, everything is outstanding and performs well as per our expectations."
"Technical support is not great. If you open up a case, it may remain there for a long time."
"If we can not seem to get even half a dozen users working with the product in a way we consider stable, the scalability is in question."
"Microsoft Intune could improve its reporting depth and make some policy configurations less complex, especially for hybrid environments."
"In Microsoft Intune, error messages are an area that has room for improvement. Regarding error messages, I would like to see more detailed logs added."
"They should make it easier to order it, however, that's generally true for everything from Microsoft."
"They need to add more group policies. Intune currently does not have many group policies that you can deploy. Its reporting, which is very limited at the moment, also needs improvement. It will be great if they can add report customization. Its stability needs to be improved. Sometimes, when you register a device in Intune, it doesn't show up instantly on the engine portal on the admin side. They need to provide better support for complicated issues. They also have a long turnaround time."
"There are challenges with Intune, specifically in reporting. Many third-party companies offer single-pane-of-glass reporting that shows you what your update environment looks like, how your patch is doing, application status, etc., but Intune's reporting is not intuitive. You can connect to Azure, monitoring, and the workbooks, but it's not streamlined."
"The native UI should be simplified because it is outdated and a little bit over-complicated."
"It needs dashboards."
"The infrastructure itself is stable, but the agent has a lot of problems."
"Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform is not the best at server provisioning. Terraform is better."
"A little slow."
"I believe that a native integration with CMDB vendors could be useful to integrate and automatically create an inventory inside Ansible. I would also like to mention the pricing; I believe it is an expensive tool."
"There needs to be improvement in the orchestration."
"It would be good to make the solution more user-friendly,"
"The web GUI can be a little bit better. There should be a couple of more features."
"Because Ansible is establishing SSH sessions to perform tasks, there is a limit on scalability."
"The communication on it is not probably where it could be. We could use some real life examples where we could point customers to them and say, "This is what you are trying to do. If you follow these steps, it would at least get you started a bit quicker.""
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Microsoft Intune is more expensive than other solutions, but it offers a wider range of features and control."
"Our Office 365 Business Premium license, including Office 365 and Intune Management, offers excellent value."
"The pricing is not cheap, especially with inflation. They've had to increase their prices. It's not excessive, but alright."
"Microsoft Intune's costliness stems from licensing fees and the overhead associated with its management, user experience, and device remediation."
"The licensing is on a yearly basis."
"Its licensing model is not complex, but it is very expensive compared to other solutions. They can bring more models and reduce the pricing. They should allow customers to select the features they want and price it accordingly."
"Every customer used to purchase licenses based on their needs."
"Microsoft's licensing is more flexible and adaptive than its competitors."
"This is a really good tool for the money."
"I am using the community edition of the solution which is free."
"We're charged between $8 to $13 a month per license."
"We went with product because we have a subscription for Red Hat."
"Ansible Tower is pretty expensive."
"Everything is generally fair. No one ever likes to pay a lot of money, but we are getting the value. We also get support with it. It has been fair and worthwhile."
"You don't need to buy agents on servers or deploy expense management when using the solution, which affected our decision to go with it."
"It is a little pricey but it is affordable. It is not that bad."
"Red Hat's open source approach was a factor when choosing Ansible, since the solution is free as of right now."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
University
31%
Construction Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Transportation Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business195
Midsize Enterprise64
Large Enterprise190
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business25
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise53
 

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Also Known As

Intune, MS Intune, Microsoft Endpoint Manager
Micro Focus ZENworks Configuration Management, HPE CMS, HPE Configuration Management, Micro Focus Configuration Management
Ansible, Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform Subscription on AWS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Mitchells and Buzzers, Callaway
Tech Mahindra, NNIT, ASIC
HootSuite Media, Inc., Cloud Physics, Narrative, BinckBank
Find out what your peers are saying about OpenText ZENworks Configuration Management vs. Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
921,148 professionals have used our research since 2012.