ServiceNow Discovery Reviews

We are trying to discover the laptops, machines, network devices, and cloud inventory in our organization by using ServiceNow Discovery. We wanted to have a cross-check between the SCCM and Discovery, and are trying to decide which could be a better choice.

Basically, when we're talking about ServiceNow Discovery, we have our own instances, and we would be giving IP subnets into it. These IP subnets would contain the range of all the CI's, which are available in the network. Then, once we start the Discovery schedules, it can scan the network and fill in the data, whichever is available on the network. 

The initial setup is pretty easy.

The solution is fairly stable.

The security is very good. We have encryption supported from ServiceNow and therefore I haven't found any issues surrounding safety concerns. 

The solution lacks the capability of discovering the devices which are not in the network. That is an area where they could improve upon. In the next release, we are actually looking for a solution for the devices which don't come into the network. Nowadays, because of this pandemic, most of the users are logging in from home, and we don't have any way to discover those assets. We are looking for a solution that can help us to discover those kinds of user devices.

During the initial setup, we get some errors and the solution doesn't exactly understand what they mean or how to fix them. They need to have more of an explanation so that we can accurately go about fixing the errors as they arise.

Technical support has not been helpful when we have come across problems. They take too long to respond and then don't provide helpful information.

I've been using the solution for more than three years at this point.

The stability overall has been very good. It doesn't crash or freeze. There are no bugs and glitches. It's good.

We have been increasing pretty extensively. The users are running on a daily basis, and it is becoming one of the major sources for updating all the CI's that exist in the network.

We have an IT team of about 30 or more individuals that are on the solution.

We've had to reach out to technical support in relation to the errors we get during setup. They have not been very helpful overall. In most cases, when you raise a ticket, even when it is critical, they take two to three days to respond. Even then, the response really doesn't help us address the issue. We're not very satisfied with their level of support at this time.

It is not complex when setting up Discovery. It's pretty straightforward. That said, what happens is that after you set up the Discovery, there are different errors that you might get when you actually run the product, and that is something that needs to be improved. We get some errors and the solution doesn't give us the full information about what is causing the issue.

In terms of deployment times,  it has taken four months for the implementation of ServiceNow Discovery. The strategy was very straightforward. We just we activated the ServiceNow Discovery plugin and then we analyzed the data and started filling in the Discovery details.

We are implementing ServiceNow Discovery for our clients.

I do not know the exact cost, however, I do know that there is one particular subscription charge for the number of the CI spots we use.

We're also looking at SCCM and comparing the two solutions to see which would fit our organization better. The difference between the two, for the most part, is that ServiceNow is agentless, whereas, with SCCM, you need an agent.

We are an implementor. We implement this product for our clients.

We are using the latest version of the solution.

We use different deployment models - both on-premises and on the cloud.

This is one of the best tools for organizations looking for a tool with agentless applications. You do not need to install an agent in any of the CI's. However, if you go for the other solution like SCCM, that is an agent-based solution, where you need to install the agent on all your end-user computers. Therefore, if an organization is looking for an agentless solution, then probably ServiceNow Discovery is a great good option.

Users should have a thorough understanding of how CMDB data tables are structured, and they should also know how Discovery works. You should also have an idea whether you would be integrating asset management along with ServiceNow Discovery or not. If you are going with a flat ServiceNow Discovery, then later on, if you want to implement asset management, then it could be quite difficult. 

Overall, I would rate the solution at a seven out of ten. I would rate it higher, however, they aren't transparent when it comes to the meanings of errors we sometimes get during setup.

There are a lot of use cases with ServiceNow Discovery, as it's a huge platform. We mostly use the solution's ITSM and ITOM capabilities in most workflows.

Since I'm very much involved in the ITOM workspace, I like CMDB, CSDM, and Discovery. That's why I have been exploring ServiceNow Discovery versus Tanium. I'm quite excited about the future cloud integration potential that ServiceNow can provide.

ServiceNow Discovery should improve its cloud capabilities.

I have been working with ServiceNow Discovery for seven to eight years.

I am not aware of any stability issues we had with ServiceNow Discovery.

ServiceNow Discovery's scalability is quite good.

ServiceNow Discovery's technical support is fine.

ServiceNow Discovery's initial setup is not straightforward. However, once you get a grip on it, it's quite good and easy to work with.

ServiceNow Discovery's deployment took a couple of months.

ServiceNow Discovery's licensing is not a very small investment, but it definitely pays off.

I would recommend ServiceNow Discovery to others who want to use it. The solution is easy to maintain and integrates very well with ServiceNow CMDB.

Overall, I rate ServiceNow Discovery an eight out of ten.

I am a consultant and I work with IT service management solutions such as ServiceNow Discovery.

The best part about ServiceNow Discovery is that it is included in the ServiceNow suite. With other solutions, it is a separate product. You still have to pay an additional fee, but it is within the same framework.

The architecture is really simple and it is easy to use.

The service mapping component is less developed than it is in other solutions, and is in need of improvement. For example, BMC uses a more sophisticated mechanism to make the link between the services and the infrastructure.

This solution is a little more difficult to manage because you have two CMDBs.

We have experienced no stability problems or technical difficulties.

We do not contact technical support directly because technical issues are dealt with by our integrator.

I have experience with BMC and Micro Focus solutions, and they are the two best products in this space. ServiceNow discovery is younger than either of these two solutions and although it is good, it is not as good as the others. The advantage of ServiceNow Discovery is that it is totally included in the ServiceNow Suite.

It is worth noting that the BMC and Micro Focus products are more than 20 years old. By comparison, ServiceNow is only about seven years old.

We work with an integrator who takes care of the installation. We describe what we want to see and the integrator does the job.

This solution is a paid option within the ServiceNow framework.

With most clients, we spend perhaps a week testing and evaluating different solutions before a decision is made on which one to implement.

ServiceNow is a fully cloud-based solution, but for the Discovery component, you are going to have a local server to perform discovery in the network. In fact, you need to have one discovery server in each local network area, within the secure zone.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

We are primarily using Discovery to make sure that we have a single record in the CI, or a primary source of truth. Most of our customers are buying ServiceNow from the CMDB perspective as well as Discovery. Very few have moved on to the next level, which is the service mapping. Our primary use case is definitely in terms of the CMDB because they have all the processes working in silos including the SS or the CIs, it's all managed in silos. That is our biggest problem. Everybody has access to the CMDB so anybody can actually update the records. 

The other thing is that we wanted to make sure that they capture the CI, the relationship between the CIs. That is our other main objective and focus.

We are an elite partner of ServiceNow and I'm the solution architect for IT operations management.

The advantage of the solution is that it's a single system of record and it captures the relationship. I need to be able to enable the plugin for DRCOG data certification.

The patterns are the biggest area where improvement could be made. If there's no pattern for application X, then you can't discover that particular application. That is a drawback of the product. ServiceNow gives the URL or specifies an application they can discover and devices they can discover. But if the customer has something else, then it's a challenge. One of my customers had an NAS device and it couldn't discover it. If you don't have the back end of ServiceNow, then unfortunately it doesn't work.

None of this applies to iPhones. ServiceNow claims it can discover iPhones but the data is very limited. It's really not applicable.

I've been using Discovery for more than six years. 

I haven't had any issues with stability. 

I think the initial setup is more complex than it initially appears. 

Our client uses Qualys so I was comparing that with ServiceNow. The client already has Qualys in their infrastructure. They were hoping to continue using Qualys and ingesting the data into ServiceNow. That is not a helpful integration but I wanted to evaluate it so I will suggest they use ServiceNow separately. 

The advantage of ServiceNow is that it's a single system of record which allows you to build other modules on top of it. That's the advantage of ServiceNow, 

I would rate this product an eight out of 10.