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ServiceNow Security Operations vs Splunk Security Essentials comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 2, 2025

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

ServiceNow Security Operations
Ranking in Security Incident Response
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (5th), Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (10th)
Splunk Security Essentials
Ranking in Security Incident Response
10th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
5.9
Number of Reviews
4
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (18th), IT Alerting and Incident Management (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Security Incident Response category, the mindshare of ServiceNow Security Operations is 14.6%, down from 14.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk Security Essentials is 1.8%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Incident Response
 

Featured Reviews

George Devasia - PeerSpot reviewer
Communication and organization improve support teams and works well with enterprises
I use ServiceNow for ticketing purposes. Specifically, I raise tickets between the support team. This is used by internal teams within the company for managing support-related tasks ServiceNow is a convenient platform to raise tickets, and the respective support team will contact us to resolve…
Srinivas Prudhivi Reddy - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables us to examine the parameters of the events found and take appropriate actions as necessary
Once we've configured our logs, for example, if we need to monitor processes and IP addresses, we ensure these logs are being ingested into our Splunk instance. The logs gathered from various endpoints are then consolidated into our Splunk platform. Once the data is collected, we can create searches and dashboards to analyze it. With these searches and dashboards, we gain insights into events and can make informed decisions based on them. We'll examine the parameters of these events and take appropriate actions as necessary.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"ServiceNow Security Operations collects data from various sources and presents it in a single, respectable format for assessment and action, providing a unified user experience where all work and fixes can be managed from one location."
"​Integration to other security tools allows for a consolidated view of all vulnerabilities, incidents, etc. for all sorts of leverage in a single platform to assess governance risk and compliance as well as an enhanced, enriched intelligence.​"
"The product's most valuable features include the no-code capability for workflows and flow design, which makes it user-friendly, and the ability to perform advanced configurations."
"We refer to the setup and installation guide provided by ServiceNow. They have good documentation, which makes it easier to handle the process."
"It's stable."
"What I found most valuable in ServiceNow Security Operations is that it's very useful for any incoming vulnerability. For example, if my team finds any vulnerability on servers such as the CA and CMDB integrated with ServiceNow Security Operations, my team can make some changes. My team can map the vulnerabilities found on the CA server, make the changes required, and resolve the vulnerabilities before the system is attacked. You can avoid vulnerability attacks through ServiceNow Security Operations, so this is the best feature of the solution. ServiceNow Security Operations is beneficial mainly for vulnerability response and engagement purposes."
"The ease of use is great."
"Reduces time to closure and closure metrics for vulnerabilities."
"They have a good catalog of plans to use to resist the attacks."
"The network monitoring feature is particularly valuable for gathering information about users, login times, and other statistics."
"We are focusing on security to ensure incidents are reported efficiently. In addition to that, for reporting purposes, we are utilizing our dashboards or creating new ones. We will be using free visualization tools for this purpose."
"I would have to rate Splunk Security Essentials a 10 out of 10 because it's free and there's tons of usable content."
 

Cons

"Visibility and transitions between teams present significant challenges in the SecOps space, indicating that substantial training and hand-holding are required to improve usability, which is one observation I have had."
"There is room for improvement in terms of developer support and documentation."
"Customer awareness and understanding of ServiceNow's SecOps capabilities could be improved."
"An area for improvement I observed in ServiceNow Security Operations is the need to maintain correct CMDB data because if you're unable to do this, you can't perfectly maintain the vulnerability data. CMDB data in ServiceNow Security Operations needs to be accurate. As I've been working on ServiceNow Security Operations for only seven months, I still need more time to try all its modules before I can give recommendations regarding additional features I'd like to see in the solution."
"There are limitations for the third-parties that are providing the inputs. They should increase the robustness of the solution."
"The dashboard and playbook creation will need to improve"
"In future releases, I would like to add a follow-up and reminder feature. For the tickets in our queue, we could set reminders. This would help us prioritize older tickets before moving on to new ones."
"It doesn't interact with things very well."
"The price could be improved."
"The reporting feature needs to be more user-friendly."
"They could add more AI content or AI and machine learning."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is more expensive than BMC Remedy, the other ITSM tool available in the market."
"This product is a good value for the money."
"It is an expensive product."
"Compared to competitor tools, ServiceNow Security Operations is more affordable"
"If you're going to implement it on your own, there would be internal costs. If you're going to implement it through a contractor or consultant, you have to pay for that."
"The product is more expensive than other solutions."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
5%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about ServiceNow Security Operations?
The most valuable aspect of working with ServiceNow is its meaningful and feature-rich product.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ServiceNow Security Operations?
The product is more expensive than other solutions like Archer but offers more features, making the pricing justifiable.
What needs improvement with ServiceNow Security Operations?
In terms of improvements, there are several things that could enhance ServiceNow Security Operations in the future, especially regarding false positives or exceptions, which usually require filling...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Splunk Security Essentials?
Our SecOps manager and CISO were more familiar with Splunk, and the price was right. That was probably the primary driver, and we did evaluation as well with strict criteria and Gartner ratings.
What needs improvement with Splunk Security Essentials?
I have not used Splunk Security Essentials' customizable dashboards. I have not taken advantage of the pre-built security use cases in Splunk.
What is your primary use case for Splunk Security Essentials?
We use Splunk Security Essentials. We have projects, though not many projects per year. The solution is used to resist cyber attacks. They have a good catalog of plans to use to resist the attacks.
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

DXC Technology, Freedom Security Alliance, Prime Therapeutics, Seton Hall University, York Risk Services
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about ServiceNow Security Operations vs. Splunk Security Essentials and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
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