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ServiceNow vs SolarWinds Web Help Desk comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 2024

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 Help Desk Software
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
228
Ranking in other categories
IT Asset Management (1st), IT Service Management (ITSM) (1st), Rapid Application Development Software (2nd), No-Code Development Platforms (1st)
SolarWinds Web Help Desk
Ranking in Help Desk Software
19th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of ServiceNow is 11.2%, down from 22.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SolarWinds Web Help Desk is 1.0%, down from 1.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Help Desk Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
ServiceNow11.2%
SolarWinds Web Help Desk1.0%
Other87.8%
Help Desk Software
 

Featured Reviews

Hemanthreddy Vakiti - PeerSpot reviewer
Data engineer at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Structured workflows have improved SLA compliance and now support prioritized incident handling
I think the licensing and pricing of ServiceNow is quite expensive compared to other tools. For large organizations, it is acceptable, but specifically for small and medium organizations to track incidents or change requests, ServiceNow is quite expensive. Sometimes performance can be slow when workflows and integrations are configured for complex tasks. For advanced customizations or advanced features which we rarely use, the documentation is not up to standard. The documentation needs to be improved for advanced customization features. However, the platform is stable overall and the features are quite good. The user experience and performance concerns I mentioned are areas I want to be improved. When many workflows and interactions are configured, performance is slow. For the features it is providing, it is quite expensive. If these performance features are improved, we can easily pay that price and get the return on investment.
GANESAN K - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Technical Engineer at Safezone Secure Solutions Private Limited
Has supported daily operational workflows and improved approval management across departments
We actually do the reselling. We created a self-service portal for the customers, and this particular function does impact reducing IT staff workload overall. From technical standpoints, comparing SolarWinds Web Help Desk with TeamViewer, we need ease of configuration and ease of allocating, creating new fields or creating new layouts for many specific use cases. An organization can have a number of use cases when it comes to a ticketing tool. It's not a security solution; it's more of a service solution where you will be configuring the needed categories and needed fields for each department. On a scale of 1-10, I rate SolarWinds Web Help Desk an 8.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most recent addition of SAM Premium is a game changer for many organizations."
"For our work, ServiceNow's service catalogs and SDK integrations are the most valuable features."
"The analytics - we like to keep track of how much work everyone is doing."
"The solution has very good automation tools."
"What I like the most is that it's a common service data model and the fact that everything is available on one platform."
"We consider the integration capabilities of the solution with other tools to be a valuable feature."
"I like the incident module, which is useful for tracking your incidents and other things."
"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."
"Once installed, it runs like a charm and doesn't ever crash."
"It has a pretty good search function, and if you do the advanced search, you can basically search for anything in any field."
"The solution scales well; currently is working for 60 help desk technicians (IT and non-IT) for over 2,000 users."
"SolarWinds is a very good application that provides you with a detailed monitoring capability of your network and assets."
"It is easy to use."
"SolarWinds is scalable as far as adding devices and servers."
"A person who is not in IT, but has some good ITSM knowledge will be able to configure it directly on SolarWinds, and Manage Engine."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the assets management module."
 

Cons

"Needs additional software titles and easier normalization."
"The Express edition does not allow the option for scripting."
"Their debugging tool. Sometimes it's hard to debug some of the scripts because once Javascript fails, it doesn't really tell you why."
"There is a need for bug or error tracking in ServiceNow."
"The price is a huge barrier in the Portugese market when it comes to implementing ServiceNow."
"The only complaint that I would have is just the interface itself is not always user friendly."
"The solution should offer better security when it comes to storing data."
"On the flip side, until very recently the overall UX experience was very poor as everything is either based on a form or a list."
"A little outdated compared to newer products that include protection and detection."
"The interface feels clunky to me compared to some other systems that I've used. I used ManageEngine Service Desk prior to this at my previous job and that had stuff like categories that we use that I don't see in SolarWinds."
"Dashboards need some amount of work to be done. Ease of customization is desired."
"It would be good if there were training and tutorial videos on the Web Help Desk."
"The working part, the deployment part, and the configuration part was a little bit complex."
"This solution needs to have mobile application support added."
"We would like to see automation included in the next release. We would like to eliminate the L1, and L2 support, by at least 80%. To do this, we need automation with AI (Artificial Intelligence) in combination with ML (Machine Learning)."
"The technical team is not competent, or available, and they do not know the product."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive."
"The licensing cost is based on your partnership with ServiceNow and what you have selected for implementation. There is an annual license cost which is calculated based on your number of devices."
"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."
"I am from Brazil. For Latin American markets, ServiceNow is very expensive as compared to other vendors, such as VMware."
"We are happy with the pricing."
"The setup cost is high compared to others, especially when the scope is not fixed."
"The CapEx version is great."
"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."
"They charge by the technician. It costs $117 per technician per year."
"When you compare with ManageEngine and ServiceNow, SolarWinds is reasonable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Construction Company
11%
Retailer
11%
Performing Arts
9%
University
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business55
Midsize Enterprise35
Large Enterprise171
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise3
 

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.
What needs improvement with SolarWinds Web Help Desk?
Areas of improvement can be enhanced regarding configuration. We had the deployment metrics and usability, ease of use, and ease of access. These were the three functionalities we were looking for ...
What is your primary use case for SolarWinds Web Help Desk?
For Zoho, we did OP Manager, Audit Security, AD Security and Asset Management, Patch Management. These things we are dealing with Zoho. We are not dealing with solutions such as Zoho Mail or Zoho P...
What advice do you have for others considering SolarWinds Web Help Desk?
We actually do the reselling. We created a self-service portal for the customers, and this particular function does impact reducing IT staff workload overall. From technical standpoints, comparing ...
 

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 vs. SolarWinds Web Help Desk and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
892,868 professionals have used our research since 2012.