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ServiceNow vs SolarWinds Service Desk comparison

 

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

ServiceNow
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
222
Ranking in other categories
Help Desk Software (1st), IT Asset Management (1st), Rapid Application Development Software (2nd), No-Code Development Platforms (1st)
SolarWinds Service Desk
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
35th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
8.4
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the IT Service Management (ITSM) category, the mindshare of ServiceNow is 21.8%, down from 27.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Service Desk is 0.6%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
IT Service Management (ITSM)
 

Featured Reviews

Nikhil Gohil - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables effective incident management and seamless workflow automation with valuable mobile accessibility
I haven't thought deeply about improvements for ServiceNow or what might be missing right now. There are so many modules and features in ServiceNow that I haven't explored them all, so it's hard to say what might be missing or should be improved. I suggest making the cost more affordable for smaller companies.
BENDER BENEDICT - PeerSpot reviewer
A robust solution to automate and manage incidents and requests
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 add-on allowed us to integrate with Jira Cloud Service, but we couldn't integrate completely and can only integrate with the project. I would also suggest that the incident and request management be separated on SolarWinds Service Desk. The solution's incident and request management feature are one of the core reasons why we had to migrate to Jira Service Management. It was difficult to filter incidents and requests. They are all compiled together in a single dashboard, which is not convenient for most of the users, especially the IT support person.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I think the technical support is pretty good. They can be a little bit slow sometimes, but overall I think they're good."
"ServiceNow is very easy to set up."
"Change management is most valuable."
"Operations and maintenance costs have been reduced using this solution. We have been able to deliver faster solutions to our customers and track progress using live data."
"We have found the service easy to use, although, we have ended up customising a lot of parameters."
"For change management, I find the CAB workbench very useful. I haven't seen any other solution that has a CAB workbench or advanced automated solutions for a change advisory board. ServiceNow also has the Workflow Engine which works very well and is very intuitive."
"There are many expansions available."
"The most valuable features of ServiceNow for me are its ticketing and reporting capabilities."
"The solution is very stable."
 

Cons

"Direct support from ServiceNow is not very good. Most of the support comes from partners, and customers heavily rely on them."
"Their cloud management is also not that great compared to other products."
"They need to be providing vendors and implementation partners with materials and guidance on implementation."
"Vulnerability management could be improved. Also, integration with tools such as Microsoft Defender ATP needs improvement."
"We would like to have an Asset Management and/or Project Management feature enabled in this version and in the IT Service Management edition."
"The customization that we are doing for the needs of our organization are difficult to do and could be improved."
"The reporting, which also includes dashboards, needs to be improved, and there should also be the ability to turn on and off portions of Project Management. Currently, as soon as you install the new version, you've got to go back there and make all the tweaks. There should be just a configuration file that goes to the new version.  The Project Management module does not leverage the knowledge base the way it should, and there is no built-in ability to get to the articles. Resource management should be easier. It would be amazing if they can make resource management a little bit more graphical. There are other solutions that I've seen where resource management was a more visual experience."
"It's not very secure, it's web-based, and I prefer Remedy. Both the security and the web interface could be improved."
"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."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Isn't pricing always too much? We really do chafe at the ITIL licensing. ITOM is also pretty expensive."
"It is an expensive platform."
"The product cost is higher than that of other vendors."
"It is very expensive because it is a big organization. You have to pay for additional things."
"The licenses are 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."
"It has a higher cost compared to local/regional solutions."
"It's sold as a less expensive solution, but it has to be highly modified. That's where you get into the cost."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Educational Organization
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

Which solution is better for developing non-ITSM applications: OutSystems or Service Now?
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 th...
Would you choose ServiceNow over Microsoft PowerApps?
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 ...
What do you like most about ServiceNow?
The solution has a user-friendly interface.
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

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    
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Find out what your peers are saying about ServiceNow, Atlassian, BMC and others in IT Service Management (ITSM). Updated: June 2025.
861,524 professionals have used our research since 2012.