ServiceNow vs SysAid comparison

ServiceNow and SysAid are both solutions in the Help Desk Software category. ServiceNow is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.6, while SysAid is ranked #25. ServiceNow holds a 12.9% mindshare in HDS, compared to SysAid’s 1.6% mindshare. Additionally, 91% of ServiceNow users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 90% of SysAid users who would recommend it.

ServiceNow

Read 224 ServiceNow reviews

23,781 Views
7,848 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

SysAid

Read 10 SysAid reviews

1,224 Views
894 Comparison Views

90% willing to recommend

ServiceNow

SysAid

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

ServiceNow and SysAid compete in the IT service management category. ServiceNow appears to have the upper hand due to its extensive configurability and wide range of features, offering substantial ROI, especially for larger enterprises, despite higher costs.

Features: ServiceNow is known for its extensive configurability, allowing seamless customization to match specific business needs quickly. It supports a wide range of ITIL-compliant processes and powerful workflow automation capabilities. The platform is enhanced by rapid development tools and a strong user community. SysAid, on the other hand, is simpler and known for its ease of use and intuitive configuration, making it suitable for organizations with less complex needs. It offers effective ITSM capabilities at a competitive price point.

Room for Improvement: ServiceNow needs to address its complexity and improve its user interface, which can pose challenges during version upgrades. Enhancements in debugging tools and a more user-friendly approach for non-IT users would be valuable. For SysAid, improvements could include a more comprehensive Knowledge Base, better automation features, and a native mobile application. ServiceNow should clarify its pricing model, while SysAid needs to manage cost increases to retain its price advantage.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: ServiceNow offers multiple deployment options, including Public, Private, and Hybrid Cloud, providing flexibility but often involving higher complexity. Customer service quality has been affected by its recent growth. SysAid's deployment is mainly On-premises or Private Cloud, which is straightforward for implementation. SysAid’s customer service is generally well-regarded for responsiveness, despite resource limitations during peak times.

Pricing and ROI: ServiceNow has higher costs, making it less accessible for smaller businesses, although its functionality and scalability offer significant ROI for enterprises that can utilize its features fully. SysAid is priced competitively, offering good value and being more affordable for small to mid-sized enterprises, which can access essential ITSM features without extensive financial outlay.

To learn more, read our detailed ServiceNow vs. SysAid Report (Updated: January 2026).

Buyer's Guide

ServiceNow vs. SysAid

January 2026

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Helped 881,565 peers since 2012

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

Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)

1st

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

224

Ranking in other categories

IT Asset Management (1st), Rapid Application Development Software (2nd), No-Code Development Platforms (1st)

SysAid

Ranking in Help Desk Software

25th

Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)

25th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of ServiceNow is 12.9%, down from 24.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SysAid is 1.6%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Help Desk Software Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
ServiceNow	12.9%
SysAid	1.6%
Other	85.5%

Help Desk Software

Featured Reviews

Shafqat Paracha

General Manager at sPerception IT

Adopting flexible workflows with customized automation delivers measurable benefits

There are things that I would like to see improved in ServiceNow, such as the pricing, as it is a very costly solution compared to other tools. Additionally, its presence in the local market is very limited; in Pakistan, for example, I don't see any vendor or distributor of ServiceNow available. They need to increase their sales spectrum globally so people can easily access them and engage them for client meetings and more. From a functionality perspective, the features in ServiceNow are acceptable as, at the moment, the ITSM modules rank highly, being 13 plus Pink Elephant certified, which is a good aspect to have. When providing advice to users, I would suggest they consider making strategic decisions about their per user pricing since it is very high. In our region, people normally start with 5 to 10 users, but the per user price is quite steep. Moreover, ServiceNow does not charge based on data uploaded or downloaded, so they should reconsider their pricing and data policies to align better with the financial capabilities of the region.

Read full review

Todd Blake

Senior IT Specialist at COMMUNITY HEALTH CONNECTIONS INC

A solution that streamlines ticket creation for the staff members of a business and enables efficient issue resolution by the IT team

SysAid is similar to Nintex AssureSign. Some of the back-end configurations of the solution are very difficult. So, we always need SysAid's help. Also, there are almost too many features that we are not taking advantage of in our company since we don't even know about them. A little bit of a streamlining or simplification of the main features would be a good improvement. I would like to see SysAid present its solution more easily. There is a lot in the solution, and it is more than what we need in our company.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It is user-friendly and simple to use."

"Data in reports and dashboards are easily accessible."

"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."

"It is robust and very user-friendly."

"I have found many features that are important and that are easier when compared to Remedy; for example, the Scripted REST APIs and the Flow Designer... The Client scripts are simpler when you compare with Remedy."

"The most impactful feature in our day-to-day operations is the ticket status, which provides crucial visibility into the progress of each resource or incident."

"Great that it's knowledge-based and you can use the flows in ServiceNow."

"HR Case Management and Customer Service Management are two of the key areas which clients are using."

More ServiceNow pros

"It tracks everything that the technicians are doing. We can account for time and manage resources."

"The service desk orchestration, overall, is good. It allows an organization to build that service desk concept into its organizational and support strategy. And it allows an organization to digest that and create a support model very quickly around the tools. The fact that the tools are integrated within the system itself gives the organization a really robust way to integrate everything and have a complete support model."

"It's really customizable. It's very user-friendly to change very quickly. We've developed lots of custom forms and things, without any need for thousands of accounting consultants which was one of our main aims of it."

"The solution can scale."

"All our service management is integrated into one system. Our response time is much faster because we have a visual into what is going on."

"I would say the overall flexibility of the product is its most valuable feature."

"The simplicity of the solution is excellent."

"The service desk automation and orchestration are very good. We are implementing it at the moment. We implemented it for two of our applications already for our CRM. Whenever there's a change in the CRM, it will automate them into SysAid as well. We have two workflows from our CRM into SysAid, which is very helpful. Overall, we're very happy with the workflow."

More SysAid pros

Cons

"The utilization of AI in ServiceNow needs enhancement."

"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 level of complexity and the level of discovery are the two areas that can be improved. Its UI needs to evolve. They focus a lot on cool colors and other little things, which don't bring value in terms of functionality. They need to focus less on presentation and more on the functionality within the UI. Its discovery mechanism should be improved. There is a component in ServiceNow that discovers the assets, but it doesn't do an immediate discovery, and there is a lag. If I want to open a ticket for a laptop or an asset, that asset needs to exist within ServiceNow for me to be able to say that I need to have its disk space or memory increased. It is referred to as a CI or configuration item in ServiceNow. Sometimes, ServiceNow doesn't discover these items, and as a result, I cannot open a ticket and tag that system or asset. If a system was introduced to the environment last week and it is still not listed, it becomes a problem. I will either have to wait or manually enter that system or asset. So, if I have a laptop with only 8 GB of memory and I want to request 16 GB of memory, I won't be able to do that in ServiceNow because my system or asset hasn't been discovered yet. Discovery is not immediate, and there is a lag."

"There should be fewer clicks and faster integrations between solutions."

"Their user interface is old-fashioned and outdated, and it can be more friendly for the eye. They can improve the user experience."

"Most people are discussing UIs, but I'm a developer. I would say 80-90% of the people would appreciate that, that's easy for them, but from a developer perspective, it's hard for me, because for me it's clunky"

"There is a need for bug or error tracking in ServiceNow."

"Very expensive."

More ServiceNow cons

"One of the features that I'm hoping comes at some point is that currently you can only have one Knowledge Base instance within it. For me, it would be beneficial to have multiple instances for different purposes. I'd like to have a completely separate one for customers and the only way I can achieve that right now, where I can tag articles to only be viewed by customers, would be if I use its portal function."

"Some of the back-end configurations of the solution are very difficult. So, we always need SysAid's help."

"Currently, SysAid does not have a mobile application."

"The automation needs improvement. The workflow has some improvements to do. There's some stuff that they are working on like having cascaded fields. For example, we're categorizing tickets by location, by site and by building and then by data room within a data center. At the moment they're all separate fields."

"There is a learning curve for the users."

"SysAid has fewer AI features compared to other tools."

"The administrative side of the user interface could be a little more user-friendly. It is easier for me to export our reports into Excel, then do a server retrieval and get the information. Whereas, to do a report, you have to go through a configuration type of process, which is kind of difficult and complicated. I have been using this solution for two years now and I still haven't gotten the hang of the reports."

"We would like them to approve the security functionalities, e.g., management security features."

More SysAid cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution is comparable to industry standards. For the features that we received, it is reasonable."

"The licensing expenses are excessively high."

"The product cost is higher than that of other vendors."

"The price of this solution is expensive."

"The solution is priced for medium to enterprises sized businesses. However, it is expensive compared to competitors."

"The setup cost is high compared to others, especially when the scope is not fixed."

"ServiceNow is an expensive solution."

"The licenses are expensive."

More ServiceNow pricing and cost advice

"Once you're interested, talk with SysAid. You can have them come in and look at your company and advise you on the best solution. They will tell you what comes with each separate package and also advise you what application to activate. If you want something that they don't have, they have a department that can design something based on your unique requests."

"Though I am not really sure about SysAid's prices, I know that it is competitive compared to some of the other products that our company looked at, like ConnectWise and ServiceNow."

"We saw our investment back at the end of year one."

"The pricing of SysAid is less than its competitors."

"Overall, the price is good. It's all about what you get for the base amount. From my perspective, you want to look at what you're getting out-of-the-box. SysAid does a good job of putting key stuff in the box for you."

"SysAid is a good solution, especially from a pricing perspective."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

12%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Computer Software Company

Government

Computer Software Company

14%

Comms Service Provider

11%

Financial Services Firm

Performing Arts

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	55
Midsize Enterprise	35
Large Enterprise	166

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	1
Large Enterprise	4

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...

See all answers

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 ...

See all answers

What do you like most about ServiceNow?

The solution has a user-friendly interface.

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Comparisons

BMC Helix ITSM vs ServiceNow

Compared 6% of the time

IBM Maximo vs ServiceNow

Compared 4% of the time

JIRA Service Management vs ServiceNow

Compared 4% of the time

Zendesk vs ServiceNow

Compared 4% of the time

Pega Platform vs ServiceNow

Compared 4% of the time

More ServiceNow Competitors

ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus vs SysAid

Compared 15% of the time

HaloITSM vs SysAid

Compared 13% of the time

BMC Helix ITSM vs SysAid

Compared 6% of the time

Xurrent vs SysAid

Compared 6% of the time

Teamwork vs SysAid

Compared 5% of the time

More SysAid Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

ServiceNow

January 2026

Download ServiceNow product report

Buyer's Guide

SysAid

January 2026

Download SysAid product report

Overview

ServiceNow is a cloud-based task-management platform that specializes in IT operations management (ITOM), IT services management (ITSM), and IT business management (ITBM). ServiceNow allows users to manage their teams, projects, and customer interactions using a variety of different plugins and apps with which it easily integrates.

ServiceNow offers prebuilt applications to support any process, as well as a framework and tools that allow you to build your own.

ServiceNow’s service management solutions include change, request, incident, problem, and cost management, as well as HR, IT, field service, and facilities management solutions. They also cover business management solutions such as vendor performance management, financial management, performance analytics and project portfolio suite, as well as governance, risk, and compliance.

“The Smarter Way to Workflow”

ServiceNow’s activities, processes, and tasks are overseen as part of a comprehensive managed workflow that supports such features as real-time collaboration, communication, and resource sharing. ServiceNow’s suite of products allow for operation using serverless computing, and include the categories of Business Apps, Customer Service, HR, IT, and Security.

ServiceNow can be used to support most workflows because of the wide range of tools it offers. These include on-suite ticketing tools, predictive modeling to manage workflows, and benchmarking for the tracking of progress. ServiceNow can assist with artificial intelligence and machine learning processes and can be used to organize the cases of a help/service desk as well as for instance management and problem management. It also smoothly integrates with many legacy systems.

ServiceNow offers service management software for industries including:

Cloud services
Education
Financial services
Government
Healthcare
Manufacturing
Telecommunications

Reviews from Real Users

PeerSpot users prefer ServiceNow to its competitors because of its scalability, stability, and ease of use. It helps everyone in the company to be on the same page by creating a single source of record across all departments. One user stated that “I’ve definitely used over 20 project management solutions, but they can't be compared with ServiceNow.” Another said that “ServiceNow is an industry leader in multiple areas and provides an excellent ROI.”

ServiceNow

SysAid is a robust IT Service Management (ITSM) platform powered by Agentic AI, automating the repetitive, time-consuming work that keeps teams stuck in reactive mode. Adding a powerful new operational layer to IT, AI Agents take the first action, freeing IT teams to focus on optimization, innovation, and bigger challenges. Go live in weeks with fast onboarding, no heavy migrations, or steep learning curves. SysAid’s AI is purpose-built for IT, with security and governance built in. With our award-winning support, you’re set up for success. ITSM run by AI, and you. Whether you're an SMB or an Enterprise, SysAid offers a customizable IT service delivery platform tailored to your unique needs, ensuring optimal performance and ROI at every stage of growth.

SysAid

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

Disney, Sears Holdings Corporation, LAN Airlines, Schneider Electric, On Semiconductors, Toyota, Sky, KPMG, Georgetown University Law Center, Motorola, North York General Hospital, Volksbank, Xerox, Bacardi, Del Monte Fresh Produce, Manpower, Nucor, Ecobank

Buyer's Guide

ServiceNow vs. SysAid

January 2026

Free Report: ServiceNow vs. SysAid

Find out what your peers are saying about ServiceNow vs. SysAid and other solutions. Updated: January 2026.

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