No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

SCSM vs SolarWinds Service Desk comparison

Sponsored
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Automation Anywhere
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
660
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (2nd), Robotic Process Automation (RPA) (2nd), Process Mining (1st), Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) (1st), Agentic Automation (1st), Business Orchestration and Automation Technologies (2nd), AI Legal & Compliance (1st), AI Finance & Accounting (1st), AI Procurement & Supply Chain (1st)
SCSM
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
27
Ranking in other categories
Help Desk Software (13th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (16th)
SolarWinds Service Desk
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
IT Service Management (ITSM) (15th)
 

Featured Reviews

Venkat Sivaprakash - PeerSpot reviewer
Management Consultant at Accenture
Has significantly improved document-driven workflows and reduced processing time across finance and HR functions
Automation Anywhere has evolved significantly and upgraded itself to provide agentic AI and AI-based automation solutions for document automation. The product has matured considerably over time. We can create workflows that can call an API. We can include prompts in particular workflows for ChatGPT-related functions, connecting to an LLM and RAG to perform tasks. For document automation, modern features are available to train documents, ensuring high accuracy and repeatability over time. The system is very easy to use. I recently completed a course in document automation, typically designed for people involved in coding and technical aspects. Though I understand coding comprehensively, I don't do actual coding. The course was very accessible. Currently, extensive coding isn't necessary due to the hybrid model incorporating GenAI aspects, low-code, no-code capabilities, APIs, and numerous pre-built objects in Automation Anywhere. The features include GenAI-driven prompting methods and workflow creation capabilities. In these workflows, we can create decision boxes and call APIs without coding. We simply pull objects, drop them, connect them, and add minimal coding when needed. The most crucial aspect isn't coding but rather sizing the automation and fleshing out the details. Automation Co-pilot takes notes and performs automated analysis. It can extract details from videos, summarize conversations, and provide detailed information. During calls, it identifies instructions and performs tasks such as preparing reports and reconciliation. Automation Anywhere can also connect with Microsoft Co-pilot. Through Co-pilot, real-time operations can be executed, allowing direct interaction between vendors and automation through this component.
LuisSanchez3 - PeerSpot reviewer
Director Metropolitano de Gobierno Digital at a government with 10,001+ employees
Current setup enables smooth problem-solving but lacks comprehensive guidance and local support
More information about setup procedures and a more user-friendly front end would be beneficial. We need more information for setup processes. It is difficult to do the work independently, requiring us to hire external companies for maintenance hours to fix small issues that could be resolved faster in-house if we had better information. We have been looking for an upgrade version, but finding local service has been difficult. It has been challenging trying to get things done. Speaking with the Microsoft office, we found there are no local companies with substantial experience with SCSM. What we have now was installed five or six years ago. It has been difficult to change configurations and look for upgrades, even with all the manuals. Our office is considering moving away from SCSM and getting a service desk solution outside of Microsoft. For me, it has been a good tool to get help and solve internal problems in the office. It is a very good tool, but the difficulty in getting local service or more information is pushing us to look for another tool.
Vaibhav Patkar - PeerSpot reviewer
CISO at Orient Technologies Pvt. Ltd.
Improved service requests and network monitoring have increased efficiency but integration needs work
SolarWinds Service Desk is a recognized product across the world and a dependable product. Kaseya is somewhat dated, and SolarWinds Service Desk has better connectivity in terms of superior integration facilities compared to Kaseya. Additionally, SolarWinds Service Desk offers multiple options within the same tool, including ITSM as well as NOC and network monitoring capabilities. SolarWinds Service Desk has much greater acceptability in the market and a wide range of implementations and integrations with various tools and applications. Life becomes simpler when choosing a standard product, whereas Kaseya may not be as highly regarded in the market. SolarWinds Service Desk may have some flaws, but work is being done to address them. SolarWinds Service Desk is an affordable product. SolarWinds Service Desk is suitable for all customers ranging from small to enterprise. There are some small customers, and the primary usage is within the company itself, and then as customers require it, access can be provided to them.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The feature I appreciate the most about Automation Anywhere is the interface."
"The tech support for Automation Anywhere has been really good, so far. We haven't had to call them very much, but when we have, we have received a good response."
"The best features of Automation Anywhere are having a user-friendly interface and the ability to integrate AI, and APIs and services like OpenAI's ChatGPT can be integrated, enhancing its functionality."
"Because it reduced the time duration of our processes, our costs went down."
"The time savings are valuable."
"Automation Anywhere drastically reduces manual work for employees."
"From my perspective, the most valuable features in Automation Anywhere are the ability to connect to different systems of records."
"It can be used for customer service support, data extraction, data migration, and software installation."
"Improved time management, all the details logged (nothing missed), roles and responsibilities in tool are set according to policy/procedure."
"The most valuable feature is the reporting of incidents."
"For our cloud-based deployment of SCSM, the Autopilot is the best feature."
"The call logging is the solution's most valuable feature; it's very easy to use and isn't too resource-intensive."
"The remote access is one of the features I really enjoy. The pushing of email updates and things like that are very good."
"System Center Service Manager is a good product, and it is very easy to use."
"This solution is easy to use; you don't have to create a new process."
"SCSM is easy to learn because all of the material, including training videos, can be found online."
"SolarWinds Service Desk is a recognized product across the world and a dependable product."
"The solution is very stable."
"What I appreciate the most about the product is that, as per the name given, it brings better visibility to the client in terms of their infrastructure, application, and performance."
 

Cons

"I would like to see a global error handler introduced, which will explicitly handle errors over the entire project."
"We would like Automation Anywhere to have a way to run a capacity check on machines and show us what is available."
"Automation Anywhere is unable to connect to the database directly. What we are doing now is directly writing the PL/SQL scripts and trying to push the data from the database into Automation Anywhere. This feature is available in UiPath, but not in Automation Anywhere."
"If I want to do something that is more purely business-related and is somewhat complex to write or is nuanced, I sometimes have trouble implementing that inside of the Automation Anywhere script. I feel limited at times with some of the looping and some of the branching and some of the ways to make procedure calls when I have a complex business issue."
"The Automation Anywhere University courses have helped us, but it could improve some things, like how the courses are designed."
"AA sometimes poses compatibility problems with new web browser versions like Chrome."
"We are at an inflection point where we have automated so much that just keeping the lights on certainly takes 20% to 50% of the time, depending on the time of year. Being able to enable the stakeholders is one of my main focuses. If we are automating their process, I want them to continue owning that as much as possible. We are just expanding on the bot insights. From a security perspective, there have been some challenges for us getting our customers in there from a role-level security perspective and making sure that they have full access to the control room and their automation after it is automated."
"We had initial hiccups, like any new process. It took us six to eight months to sort the product out."
"It crashes our client's computers. Sometimes they get blue screens. It would be useful if SCSM could check the upgrades or patches before we implemented them to see if they are going to crash a client's system. Or, if it does install, and the client's system crashes, it would be good if the solution could revert back somehow."
"Look around as there are a lot of better solutions!"
"It has not helped reduce the burden on IT resources."
"The logs and reporting-related features of the product have certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
"Better integration with other services in Azure is needed because everything is moving from on-premises to the cloud, and as an integrator, we have to help our clients with the migration."
"I would like to have the ability to integrate with other systems from the back-end. I am using Orchestrator and it is a little bit difficult because there are too many constraints."
"The patch management aspect of the solution should be improved. It's quite complicated and not user-friendly. If your systems are not patched properly, you are unable to pull reports."
"They need more integration with open-source products."
"The integration with other applications can use improvement because, for example, it was nearly impossible to integrate SolarWinds Service Desk with monday.com because we had to get an add-on from Zapier."
"The only additional features I would like to see in the future, to make it closer to perfection, are intelligent features that are currently being developed on the cloud platform and not on the on-premise model."
"The primary concern so far is the integration part because of the APIs; this is the main area of concern."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"We have purchased licenses, but are trying to obtain more bot programmer licenses."
"It is fantastic. It has been great. It is perfectly priced for the quality received. When paying for quality, that is exactly what you get."
"It is expensive. Automation Anywhere has reduced the price slightly, as we have grown. However, the price is still excessive enough that we are engaged in PoCs on other tools."
"If it is saving FTE and Generating a good ROI then it is Worth Investing."
"Automation Anywhere offers a subscription-based licensing model for cloud, on-premises, and hybrid deployments."
"I find the license pricing to be competitive and reflective of the pricing models throughout the RPA space, and I believe there is a lot of value in continuing to maintain the free community edition platform."
"Our company is investing a lot of money in Automation Anywhere. They have saved money wherever humans are working. They invest a lot of money in FTEs and other logistics, so the money saving is very pretty good with Automation Anywhere. While I don't know the exact figure, the tool is saving us millions of dollars as well as saving about 40,000 hours in the last year."
"Whatever investment, licensing, and resource costs together are put in for development and delivery, we are still at an ROI of 250 percent."
"The pricing is reasonable."
"It is a lower price vs. other things on the market."
"It comes free with the enterprise agreement that we have, but the expense really is in having to buy another product to sit on top of it to make it work properly. You wind up having to buy additional support and additional product with their own support and maintenance costs on top of that."
"Licensing can be complex and confusing."
"I would rate the pricing as two out of five."
"It is an expensive solution."
"The license for SCSM is cheap."
"The price of the solution could be better. My organization has an enterprise annual license with Microsoft which provides us support."
Information not available
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which IT Service Management (ITSM) solutions are best for your needs.
910,005 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Outsourcing Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Construction Company
11%
Construction Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Government
10%
Outsourcing Company
9%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business157
Midsize Enterprise82
Large Enterprise558
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise14
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It depends on your use case. Is it simply to automate a couple of processes? Is it to augment a human team? AA is ver...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
From my experience using AA tool, it depends on the applications that you want to automate, because there some applic...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It is a highly preferred RPA tool. You can check my Automation Anywhere Review to know more.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SCSM?
I am not sure about the pricing as I do not have experience with it.
What needs improvement with SCSM?
More information about setup procedures and a more user-friendly front end would be beneficial. We need more informat...
What is your primary use case for SCSM?
In my job, I work for the city where we have an enterprise agreement with Microsoft. We have Office, Word, PowerPoint...
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Service Desk?
The primary concern so far is the integration part because of the APIs; this is the main area of concern. Currently, ...
What is your primary use case for SolarWinds Service Desk?
SolarWinds Service Desk is used for ITSM and network monitoring purposes. The major use cases being utilized are from...
What advice do you have for others considering SolarWinds Service Desk?
I think the pricing of SolarWinds Hybrid Cloud Observability is now comparative and suited to our business model, whi...
 

Also Known As

Automation Anywhere, Testing Anywhere, Automation Anywhere Enterprise, Agentic Process Automation System (Now Certified for WorkSpaces)
System Center Service Manager
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Google, Linkedin, Cisco, Juniper Networks, DellEMC, Comcast, Mastercard, Quest Diagnostics
Fibabanka, UMC Health System
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about SCSM vs. SolarWinds Service Desk and other solutions. Updated: August 2026.
910,005 professionals have used our research since 2012.