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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
6.8
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (6th), Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (10th)
Splunk Security Essentials
Ranking in Security Incident Response
10th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
8.3
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (18th), IT Alerting and Incident Management (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Security Incident Response category, the mindshare of ServiceNow Security Operations is 15.7%, up from 14.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk Security Essentials is 1.2%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Incident Response
 

Featured Reviews

KishoreKumar4 - PeerSpot reviewer
A low-cost and open-source tool for incident and change management
If we encounter challenges while deploying, we raise incidents. These incidents are categorized by priority: high, medium, and low. We assign an incident number and notify the relevant teams to address the issue. For instance, if we experience a problem with Cloud services or any other issue, we…
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

"Multiple projects use the ServiceNow tool because it is a low-cost and open-source tool."
"The most valuable aspect of working with ServiceNow is its meaningful and feature-rich product."
"ServiceNow is a convenient platform to raise tickets, and the respective support team will contact us to resolve any issues."
"It gives you the ability to bring data into the system. The workflows are out of the box, and it gives you the ability to auto-assign the incidents based on criteria and vulnerabilities."
"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 "follow" feature is really good. If the user is not responding, there's an option to "follow". Just click on the button, and it will automatically trigger an email to the end user."
"​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.​"
"My favorite feature is the application vulnerability scanner."
"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."
"The network monitoring feature is particularly valuable for gathering information about users, login times, and other statistics."
"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

"One area for improvement for the product is the need to tailor and alter some codes for customization, which can cause issues during upgrades. It does not support customized operations."
"It doesn't interact with things very well."
"The initial setup is difficult."
"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."
"The product is called SecOps, but it is not security operations in terms of SIEM solutions."
"The solution needs to make customization easier. You cannot do much customization immediately. It requires an extensive workload. If the customization process was user-friendly, it would be much better."
"They should stick to the roadmap and continue to build plugins and integrations with other third parties, enhance the UI, and enhance the reporting. It's all good. They should just continue enhancing the releases."
"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."
"The price could be improved."
"They could add more AI content or AI and machine learning."
"The reporting feature needs to be more user-friendly."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is more expensive than BMC Remedy, the other ITSM tool available in the market."
"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."
"This product is a good value for the money."
"It is an expensive product."
"Compared to competitor tools, ServiceNow Security Operations is more affordable"
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
19%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
8%
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 cannot say there is any room for improvement because it is free.They could add more AI content or AI and machine learning.
What is your primary use case for Splunk Security Essentials?
We use Splunk Security Essentials ( /products/splunk-security-essentials-reviews ) to create new Splunk searches, as it has many pre-canned searches for security detection.The advanced detection co...
 

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: June 2025.
860,168 professionals have used our research since 2012.