PagerDuty Operations Cloud vs ServiceNow comparison

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3,598 views|2,545 comparisons
97% willing to recommend
ServiceNow Logo
17,450 views|10,561 comparisons
91% willing to recommend
Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between PagerDuty Operations Cloud and ServiceNow based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about PagerDuty, Atlassian, Everbridge and others in IT Alerting and Incident Management.
To learn more, read our detailed IT Alerting and Incident Management Report (Updated: March 2024).
768,415 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Q&A Highlights
Question: What are the differences between PagerDuty and ServiceNow?
Answer: ServiceNow ServiceNow is a platform-as-a-service provider of IT service applications. The company provides a range of pre-built ITSM products to automate and manage numerous IT enterprise services. Using the single software, you can automate processes and create custom applications to meet all your IT service needs. ServiceNow can be used for cloud and virtualization lifecycle management, change orchestration, infrastructure discovery, and IT governance. You can also use the software to report on all applications, as well as to generate reports on KPIs and benchmarking and create executive dashboards. Key benefits of using ServiceNow IT Service Automation: One solution for asset management, change and release management, configuration management, incident management, IT cost management, problem management, and a service catalog. On top of that Custom Application Development: Build and deploy custom applications in days, integrate your existing and new apps, and require minimum to zero coding knowledge. Service Automation: Standardize service processes and implement automation to replace manual tasks. Service now offers custom workflows, apps, and forms. PagerDuty PagerDuty is a cloud software that connects people, systems, and data into a single view - creating visibility and actionable intelligence across their operations. PagerDuty's SaaS alerting and incident tracking system helps IT operations and DevOps engineers resolve critical errors in their IT systems as quickly as possible. Key benefits of using PagerDuty Alerting that works (and wakes you up)- When your systems go down, PagerDuty will wake you up. You choose how you want to be alerted - via phone, SMS, or email, to multiple numbers, with retries. Integrate all your existing monitoring tools- PagerDuty works excellently with almost all monitoring tools including Nagios, Icinga, Keynote, New Relic, Pingdom, Cloudkick, Circonus, Splunk, Zenoss, Monit, Munin, SolarWinds, and many others. If it can send an email, it works with PagerDuty. Reliable, distributed architecture- PagerDuty's infrastructure is fully replicated in multiple data centers with fast failover when problems occur. PagerDuty can easily set up schedules to share on-call duty responsibilities with your team.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"The initial setup is a simple process.""The product has valuable on-call scheduling, escalation, and incident workflow management features.""The most valuable feature is the phone app that allows us to send notifications without the additional fees when sending by SMS or phone calls.""The initial setup is straightforward.""The most valuable features of PagerDuty are customization, access, policies, and different rules regarding the path of escalation. Additionally, it's easy to use and create overrides. For example, if you all are on a call for one week each, but somebody wants to go on PTO, the team needs to swap shifts in PagerDuty. This is easy to do by creating overrides to switch up the set schedules. It's very user-friendly in that aspect. It works well for monitoring and alerting.""The most valuable feature is definitely the flexibility of the schedule. The mobile app is quite also good for what we do: for receiving alerts, acknowledging, assigning, adding new responders. It has rich features for our needs.""PagerDuty's notification process is the most valuable feature.""Notification is the most valuable feature."

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"Very good incident management, chain management and problem management features.""What I like the most is the functionality, it's features are rich, and there is a high degree of compliance with IT standards.""It's great to do statuses or to review tasks.""ServiceNow is an industry leader in multiple areas and provides an excellent ROI.""Remote access is most valuable.""The most valuable aspect of the solution is the possibility of the application development cap so that we can digitize workflows.""The feature that I have found most valuable from ServiceNow is the ability to assign sub-tasks to different teams, including problem tickets and the regular and chain tasks.""SPM and ITSM features are the most helpful."

More ServiceNow Pros →

Cons
"The solution does not code all alerts correctly so sometimes you get false positives or multiple alerts for the same issue.""I am not a direct end user of PagerDuty. It's hard to consider its shortcomings in that sense.""The solution's analytics are okay. I don't think the features, at this point, give you a lot of insights. We have actually been trying to get insights from it but it hasn't really given us a lot of extra points to explore. We were looking at the number of alerts to see where many of the alerts were coming from. We never managed to get many insights on this.""The biggest area for improvement with PagerDuty is noise suppression. There have been a handful of incidents through our use of PagerDuty over the years where one incident may lead to 30 to 50 pages because you're monitoring all these different things, and each thing is an individual page. There should be the ability to set up paging tiers and group correlations between some of the different pages. That is something that would be really valuable. We should be able to say this one page may have a group or a tree of effective other pages that may tier off of it. So, if you see those pages independently, go ahead and alarm, but if you see this plus that, don't do that.""The product can be improved by including out-of-the-box integration with other standard tools used in our fields such as Confluence, and Jira.""Because of the way you have to structure the rosters, if an engineer has to go on leave (or something), you can't just go in and reassign/take this person out of all of the different rosters that they're in. You have to go into each of the rosters and take them out. There might be a roster for business hours, after hours rotation, and monitoring deployments. Each time we need to take an engineer out of the pool, e.g., if they're sick or on leave, then we have to go and touch all of those rosters, updating and replacing them. Whereas, if we could just take the person out and have it automatically fill in the rostering, then that would make life a lot easier for managing it.""PagerDuty should be integrated with other tools, so it can import the IT roster automatically. Our other rules continue to work once they're configured, but the roster must be added manually.""They could include incident merging and alert grouping features in the product."

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"We would like to have an Asset Management and/or Project Management feature enabled in this version and in the IT Service Management edition.""There is a need to enhance ticket details visibility on the portal, such as displaying SLA information, which currently requires development effort.""We do a lot of relatively advanced stuff for the size that we are, but ServiceNow itself is so big and to some extent, there is a significant amount of complexity that you have, a big learning curve I would say, in order to really get on board.""The major area for improvement for our needs would be monitoring the metrics of the times to acknowledge and resolve issues and escalations.""Making a mobile version would be helpful.""The utilization of AI in ServiceNow needs enhancement.""The solution’s user interface could be improved and given a better design.""I would like the reporting aspect to be better, including the graphs. It could have some way for us to easily to export to a csv or spreadsheet so that if a graph cannot be provided by ServiceNow itself, we would be able to use other applications to create them. Also, if there was a feature that enabled us to interact with end users directly from ServiceNow, like an instant-messaging type of feature, that would be great."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "Licensing costs are around $700 a month, and the only additional costs, are phone costs in some instances."
  • "The cost is quite high. But if you want to get a full-featured application and you have a big team..."
  • "If you add more people, then you have to pay more, which is always a thing with the SaaS solutions."
  • "If we wanted phone calls or additional SMSs, we would have to pitch up for those. They give us so many per month per user, then we have to pay extra if it goes over that."
  • "They're very good in pricing compared to the competitors in the area. I would rate them a five out of five in terms of pricing."
  • "The solution is paid on a monthly basis and represents about 1% of the platform's budget."
  • "There is a license needed to use PagerDuty."
  • "PagerDuty has monthly and yearly licenses available, the costs of which can get quite high if you have a large number of users."
  • More PagerDuty Operations Cloud Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "The first impact for the customer is that it is expensive, but do not forget that it is a solution that includes infrastructure; a single cost, easy to justify."
  • "It has a higher cost compared to local/regional solutions."
  • "We know that ServiceNow is not cheap, it's more expensive than other solutions. But we are trying to increase our ability to handle tickets so that the cost per ticket is less."
  • "It's sold as a less expensive solution, but it has to be highly modified. That's where you get into the cost."
  • "ServiceNow pricing is an art, not a science. The deal depends on how commercially savvy you are, which does make it something that is quite difficult to get right. It is most definitely an opportunity area for ServiceNow to improve and have more visibility around pricing of the different products within the platform."
  • "ServiceNow is a leader and its pricing is quite good, quite competitive... Sometimes some plugins are not priced reasonably but, generally, the platform itself, its modules, are priced reasonably."
  • "Isn't pricing always too much? We really do chafe at the ITIL licensing. ITOM is also pretty expensive."
  • "Initially, the licensing model ServiceNow came up with was very good. But now, from a licensing perspective, they are changing their model day by day. It is becoming a bit expensive for customers."
  • More ServiceNow Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:The product easily integrates with other solutions.
    Top Answer:The price is very high. I rate the pricing a six out of ten. The license for stakeholders is very limited.
    Top Answer:It’s quite hard to reach the support team.
    Top Answer:The short answer is that OutSystems is far better for 2 main reasons. Firstly, with Service Now you are locked into that platform for good. The business model is to lock in and then keep pumping the… more »
    Top Answer:Hi Netanya I will choose ServiceNow because ServiceNow is a very good tool compared to Microsoft PowerApp.  Because ServiceNow has a very strong module (Performance Analysis) reporting which will… more »
    Top Answer:It is user-friendly and simple to use.
    Ranking
    Views
    3,598
    Comparisons
    2,545
    Reviews
    16
    Average Words per Review
    401
    Rating
    8.4
    Views
    17,450
    Comparisons
    10,561
    Reviews
    23
    Average Words per Review
    452
    Rating
    8.5
    Comparisons
    Learn More
    Overview

    The PagerDuty Operations Cloud is the platform for mission-critical, time-critical operations work in the modern enterprise. Through the power of AI and automation, it detects and diagnoses disruptive events, mobilizes the right team members to respond, and streamlines infrastructure and workflows across your digital operations. The Operations Cloud is essential infrastructure for revolutionizing digital operations to compete and win as a modern digital business.

    PagerDuty Features

    PagerDuty has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

    • 650+ integrations
    • Alerting
    • Native apps with push notifications
    • On-call duty scheduling
    • Automatic escalation of alerts
    • Reliable, distributed architecture
    • Incident reporting
    • Real-time monitoring
    • Network analysis
    • Issue tracking
    • Access controls/permissions
    • Service Level Agreement (SLA) management

    PagerDuty Benefits

    There are many benefits to implementing PagerDuty. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

    • Ideal for developers: With the PagerDuty solution, developers can spend more time focused on code. The solution’s powerful automation and noise reduction capabilities minimize interruptions and mobilize the right team in seconds.
    • Security incident response: Because of its integration ecosystem, PagerDuty enables you to respond to threats faster, tighten up security vulnerabilities, and get better cross-team visibility.
    • Critical event management: The solution makes it possible for your organization to get your crisis management team up and running quickly, keep all your business leaders and stakeholders informed in critical moments, and limit any disruptions that could impact your reputation or core business.
    • Service ownership: PagerDuty’s service ownership allows you to give everyone more autonomy, boost accountability, and minimize the impact of issues by quickly pulling in the right responder every time.
    • CollabOps: With this solution, you can integrate with chat and video tools like Slack, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams. Doing so makes it easier to contain incidents quickly, avoid manual errors, and streamline work across DevOps, CSOps, BizOps, and ITOps organizations.

    Reviews from Real Users

    Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by PeerSpot users currently using the PagerDuty solution.

    Brandon J., Director of engineering at a wellness & fitness company, says, "The SMS pages and the mobile application are pretty much the top two features."

    PeerSpot reviewer Pramodh M., DevSecOps Consultant at a tech services company, comments, “The inbound integrations that PagerDuty provides with most of the DevOps tools are valuable. There is a flexible and easy way of integrating with monitoring tools. It allows us to configure the integration with APIs and plugins as well.”

    Syed Mohammad A., Vice President - Operations and Client Services at a financial services firm, mentions, "PagerDuty let us set up rosters based on our shifts. We could assign a hierarchy for how the calls should be escalated and the number of times the call will be transferred between people before it is answered. It makes it easy to access an agent via mobile phone."

    A Principal Architect at an energy/utilities company states, “The most important feature that is used is call scheduling. We are also able to actually call IT folks in the case of an emergency.”

    ServiceNow is a cloud-based task-management platform that specializes in IT operations management (ITOM), IT services management (ITSM), and IT business management (ITBM). ServiceNow allows users to manage their teams, projects, and customer interactions using a variety of different plugins and apps with which it easily integrates.

    ServiceNow offers prebuilt applications to support any process, as well as a framework and tools that allow you to build your own.

    ServiceNow’s service management solutions include change, request, incident, problem, and cost management, as well as HR, IT, field service, and facilities management solutions. They also cover business management solutions such as vendor performance management, financial management, performance analytics and project portfolio suite, as well as governance, risk, and compliance.

    “The Smarter Way to Workflow”

    ServiceNow’s activities, processes, and tasks are overseen as part of a comprehensive managed workflow that supports such features as real-time collaboration, communication, and resource sharing. ServiceNow’s suite of products allow for operation using serverless computing, and include the categories of Business Apps, Customer Service, HR, IT, and Security.

    ServiceNow can be used to support most workflows because of the wide range of tools it offers. These include on-suite ticketing tools, predictive modeling to manage workflows, and benchmarking for the tracking of progress. ServiceNow can assist with artificial intelligence and machine learning processes and can be used to organize the cases of a help/service desk as well as for instance management and problem management. It also smoothly integrates with many legacy systems.

    ServiceNow offers service management software for industries including:

    Cloud services
    Education
    Financial services
    Government
    Healthcare
    Manufacturing
    Telecommunications

    Reviews from Real Users

    PeerSpot users prefer ServiceNow to its competitors because of its scalability, stability, and ease of use. It helps everyone in the company to be on the same page by creating a single source of record across all departments. One user stated that “I’ve definitely used over 20 project management solutions, but they can't be compared with ServiceNow.” Another said that “ServiceNow is an industry leader in multiple areas and provides an excellent ROI.

    Sample Customers
    40% of the Fortune 100 TrustPagerDuty. Customers include: Slack, Intuit, Zendesk, Panasonic, Pinterest, Airbnb, eHarmony, McKesson, Comcast
    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    
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm30%
    Comms Service Provider13%
    Computer Software Company13%
    Printing Company9%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Computer Software Company21%
    Financial Services Firm13%
    Manufacturing Company7%
    Retailer7%
    REVIEWERS
    Computer Software Company17%
    Financial Services Firm15%
    Manufacturing Company10%
    Healthcare Company8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization22%
    Computer Software Company11%
    Financial Services Firm10%
    Government7%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business30%
    Midsize Enterprise25%
    Large Enterprise45%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business21%
    Midsize Enterprise13%
    Large Enterprise66%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business20%
    Midsize Enterprise15%
    Large Enterprise65%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business15%
    Midsize Enterprise30%
    Large Enterprise56%
    Buyer's Guide
    IT Alerting and Incident Management
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about PagerDuty, Atlassian, Everbridge and others in IT Alerting and Incident Management. Updated: March 2024.
    768,415 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    PagerDuty Operations Cloud is ranked 1st in IT Alerting and Incident Management with 35 reviews while ServiceNow is ranked 1st in IT Service Management (ITSM) with 211 reviews. PagerDuty Operations Cloud is rated 8.8, while ServiceNow is rated 8.4. The top reviewer of PagerDuty Operations Cloud writes "Effectively generates alerts for incidents, making it suitable for 24/7 monitoring of infrastructure". On the other hand, the top reviewer of ServiceNow writes "A stable and scalable solution that has excellent features and is useful for collecting data and building KPIs". PagerDuty Operations Cloud is most compared with Opsgenie, JIRA Service Management, Splunk On-Call, Everbridge IT Alerting and xMatters , whereas ServiceNow is most compared with BMC Helix ITSM, Microsoft Power Apps, Pega BPM, IBM Maximo and ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus.

    We monitor all IT Alerting and Incident Management reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.