ITSM buyer’s guide: Top 21 IT service management tools

A long time ago, all it took to run an IT service desk was a couple of spare desktops, a phone line, and a bad sense of humor. Now, information technology is the backbone of the enterprise, and the job has grown with the responsibilities.

Many companies would take a significant hit if a sustained outage shut down just a small corner of their operations. When computers handle every step of every workflow, no computers mean no work gets done. That makes the IT service desk one of the most important functions for keeping a company running — and its revenue flowing.

Of course, the complexity of servicing the enterprise has grown considerably since the help-desk days of yore. The marketplace has responded with a burgeoning collection of products to manage the chaos. These IT service management (ITSM) platforms range from standalone products to full suites of tools that handle other chores, such as asset tracking, architectural planning, and performance measurement.

Ticketing portals are the core of ITSM, there to track requests and ensure no one forgets them. At the end of the month or quarter, ITSM platforms generate reports to help companies flag poor service and fix it before it endangers the bottom line.

Many of these packages highlight “self-service” features that save IT time and help the able user diagnose and even fix some problems without IT’s involvement. At the very least, they enable users to fill out trouble tickets and track their progress. Many also have a knowledge base where IT staff can fill out FAQs and how-to pieces for self-starters.

Some of the platforms even have integrated generative AI models that can convert scraps of knowledge into full-fledged help pages and manuals. They can assemble the information from code bases, trouble tickets, chat sessions, and more.

Some ITSM tools have various levels of sophistication for routing incoming requests and tickets to the right person, saving managers from having to funnel decisions. These usually work based on keywords, monitoring ticket queues to send the job to the least busy person who has some of the skills that best fit the description. Some platforms employ artificial intelligence to make the call.

Back-end reporting dashboards enable managers to make sense of the team’s overall performance. Are there slow spots? Are tickets waiting too long in some areas? Will hiring someone make a difference? The answers to these questions will be presented in charts and graphs.

An important consideration is whether a particular package is integrated with the software systems that power your business. Some offer marketplaces with hundreds or even thousands of modules that grab information from other packages. When these run smoothly, they can simplify the workload and even enable self-starting users to start fixing their issues.

The rise of AI has transformed the market. The best products now use some combination of AI models and predictive analytics to diagnose many of the trouble tickets. Occasionally they can even automate the response so that the user can get some resolution without waiting for a human on the IT team.

Many also use large language models (LLMs) to help write summaries of events and draft emails or text messages to the user. These add a layer of professionalism to the entire process.

The AI can also be found in other places in the stack. Many products offer customizations and lately these offer a low-code or no-code interface. AI is increasingly enabling ITSM platforms to simplify customization. Smart engineering coupled with some amount of intelligence means that customizing the platform doesn’t require extensive programming teams.

Here, in alphabetical order, are 21 of the top ITSM tools available today. At the end of the day when many of the tickets are cleared, a good ITSM tool will make the difference between order and chaos. If they can’t help an end-user fix the problem themselves, they can at least provide a stable, predictable path to getting things working again.

Atera

The agents in the Atera stack are said to be “autonomous” and designed to solve problems such as controlling deployment or resetting passwords without waiting for IT staff. The CoPilot helps human IT support techs find the right answers to questions, and the AutoPilot can solve many problems without human involvement. The platform is meant to help both in-office and home-based workers in the modern enterprise. Integrations with communications platforms like Teams and security platforms like BitDefender emphasize the importance of creating a secure space for cooperation.

Atlassian Jira Service Management

Developers created Jira to track software creation but then Atlassian management noticed that some teams were adapting Jira to handle service desk requests. Since then, the company has created a separate product line called Jira Service Management with a basic architecture that’s more accessible to average users while focusing the workflows and adding more hand-holding automation for self-service. There are several levels of service that range from a free introductory version up to a premium or enterprise level tool with more advanced options for integration and extra features such as an Incident Command Center for managing big problems. The product also has a dozen or so modules for jobs such as analytics, asset tracking, or SLA management. Teams can enable or disable as needed. AI starts with virtual service agents but includes AIs to analyze requests, summarize the scope, and provide recommendations. The AI picks up details from similar approaches and starts to suggest them.

BMC Helix ITSM

Organizing trouble tickets collected by an omnichannel platform is one thing, but solving them faster is the real goal for the team at BMC Helix. Its combination of AI and predictive analytics are designed to make it possible for the system to identify the root cause quickly so the incident can be resolved. These are bundled into a comprehensive knowledge management system to help automate the interaction with the users. The “CHATOPS” section encourages the team to “swarm” a problem while coordinating their response.

EasyVista

The chores of discovering, tracking, and monitoring a big enterprise of people and machines are unified with the EasyVista approach. The goal is to integrate both ITSM with IT operations management, because many challenges straddle the line. The EV Discovery tool, for instance, will map out a network so that any trouble tickets are connected to a central reference. In some cases, AI and predictive statistics offer users projections about how and when a problem might be fixed. Integrations and codeless configuration can speed adoption. 

Freshworks Freshservice

The goal for Freshservice is to help each team “deliver delight” to users, according to Freshworks. The ticket-based system is one part of a larger group of tools for managing IT operations and assets. The Freshservice ticketing system is designed to be “omnichannel,” which means tickets can be created and handled with either phone, email, text, or other messaging platform. It’s integrated with various discussion boards (Slack, Teams, etc.) so the problem can be discussed, assigned, or maybe even deflected to a standard set of documentation. The tool’s AI engine, known as “Freddy,” can help automate the workflow and speed resolution by answering some questions, raising alerts for some tickets and guiding everyone to the right resources.

HaloITSM

The focus of Halo ITSM is organizing the assets under the control of IT and tracking all problems as it evolves. Artificial intelligence plays an important role in organizing the department’s knowledge and using it to orchestrate problem-solving. In the best cases, users can fix their own issues through the self-service portal. The customizable workflows ensure the AIs can generate good recommendations and help the IT team close tickets faster. Halo also markets the same platform to many other industries such as education, healthcare, and financial services so you can expect that the foundation is very general.

InvGate Service Desk

The Service Desk tool from InvGate is designed to offer ticket management and change tracking in a user-centric system that encourages self-help. Workflows are designed and can be automated with a no-code IDE with pre-built templates and integration with all the major tools, such as Slack or Google Workplace. AI options include a module that will summarize activity on a ticket or generate potential responses. A new option tracts conversations on a chat service, such as Teams, and provide answers. The idea is to provide instant help where users are gathering so they don’t need to fill out some official form. These actions can be turned into articles for a knowledge base as well as actions for the virtual service agent.

Ivanti Neurons (was Cherwell)

Ivanti offers a big collection of workflow management systems that includes one part for managing IT. At the core of the ITSM corner is a low-code configuration model that can model workflows that range from simple to complex without requiring scripting or general programming skills. When a ticket is created, the automation detects common problems and offers various forms of “healing”: Generative AI can offer self-help agents and write up answers. In time, the “knowledge generation” will provide training materials and manuals for common processes. 

IFS Assyst (formerly Axios Assyst)

Enterprises offer services to both employees and customers. Assyst is here to help with managing all services whether they’re IT-based or not. Requests for IT, HR, Finance, or Facilities are ticketed, tracked and, ideally, resolved. A unified self-service portal simplifies problem solving for everyone and every problem, not just forgotten passwords. Reports follow up so managers can keep track of everything. An emphasis on collaboration and “gamification” is meant to make the daily slog a bit more fun.

NinjaOne (formerly NinjaRMM)

Development shops and tech companies sometimes need a deeper level of support for their challenges. NinjaOne’s ITSM platform offers options for organizing endpoints, patches, and mobile devices. Remote monitoring and management software gives IT teams direct access and control over the hardware and software platform. The marquee integration are DevOps platforms such as PagerDuty or CrowdStrike.

ProProfs Help Desk

The omnichannel help desk from ProProfs enables the service team to watch incoming requests, assign them to individual agents, and track team performance through a dashboard-like collection of reports. Tickets can be triggered by email, social media, chat, or webforms. Some important jobs such as assigning incoming requests can be automated to ensure work is spread out as evenly as possible. The AI can summarize long request and detect the emotion of the sender. A built-in knowledge base can offer suggestions for help or even provide automated solutions. The platform encourages mixing the speed of AI with the human touch from a help desk professional. 

Rezolve.ai

The goal of the team at Rezolve.ai is to replace L1 support teams with Agentic SideKick 3.0, a chatbot that is given more power to resolve problems autonomously. The AI is designed to integrate with traditional ITSM platforms like ServiceNow and extend them by troubleshooting tickets and resolving issues where possible. When problems demand more, it will deploy multi-agent teams that coordinate and converge on a solution using a retrieval augmented generation (RAG)-based reasoning architecture. It will also learn and adjust constantly, ensuring it remains current. It aims to be aware of the emotions of end-users so it can provide context-aware and emotionally-sensitive assistance.

ServiceNow

The collection of applications from ServiceNow handle all the workflow chores of the modern office, including CRM, field service management, and HR Service for guiding “employment journeys.” Many of the subcomponents are focused on IT desk chores such as asset tracking, access governance, and service desk operations. At its core, ServiceNow’s ITSM product is designed to be a single place of engagement for everyone to file tickets and track their progress. Its combination of mobile and web-based portals relies on predictive intelligence to route tickets and push for quick resolutions. Many of the workflow steps are tracked, triaged, analyzed and sometimes resolved by AI agents. Managers can use an “AI Control Tower” to track actions and watch to ensure the agents perform correctly. Generative tools can track patterns in the data and produce human-readable answers. A wide range of integration options enables automated connections to other tracking systems such as Jira.

SolarWinds Service Desk

The Service Desk platform is part of a larger product line from SolarWinds that handles many common DevOps chores such as monitoring a cloud filled with databases and servers. User-facing chores such as multichannel incident management or asset tracking are found under the ITSM umbrella, but the larger product line can help with many of the back-office tasks. Chores such as Microsoft license auditing or hardware inventory management are tracked with a comprehensive dashboard. A knowledge base and a collection of good AI guide the users to come up with more self-help. Deep integration with many cloud services simplifies much of the work of tracking hardware and software. Connections with communications channels such as Slack or Teams speed resolution.

Spiceworks

ITSM workloads are just one corner of the Spiceworks ecosystem, which includes tools for contract management and inventory management. The main cloud-based help desk is a purpose-built ticketing system that tracks requests. The interface is browser-based, but it also responds well to either email or the custom smartphone app making it simpler for IT staff to move tickets along the workflow. All these responses can be added to the Knowledge Base to assist with future problems. There are some useful integrations with other packages in the ecosystem so, for example, a help desk event can trigger changes in inventory management.  A business intelligence connection can produce reports for high-level analysis of the help-desk experience.

SysAid

Automation and artificial intelligence are big features for SysAid. At its core, it’s a ticketing tool for tracking workflow, but it has been designed to automate repetitive chores such as assigning tasks or closing out finished tickets. Help-desk professionals can create and train their own agents with the no-code platform and then deploy them to automate common and not-so-common tasks. The product is split into various levels with the standard level for managing user-facing help desks. More capabilities such as more complex routing rules or alerting are found in the Pro and Enterprise level. 

TeamDynamix

Sometimes it doesn’t make sense to segregate ITSM into a separate corner. The ITSM product from TeamDynamix integrates typical IT service chores with general project management. Its goal is to curate change because the work on creating new projects can often solve old issues. A comprehensive knowledge base and generous conversational AI ensure incidents can be tracked and resolved quickly with the help of the platform itself. The work of tracking hardware and software assets is well integrated to simplify reporting and tracking. 

TOPdesk

The ticketing products from TOPDesk are built to manage a wide range of domains such as building maintenance, fleet tracking, asset management, or generic operations workflows. The tool for the IT service desk is optimized for tracking problems and change requests for tech support. The knowledge base and self-service front-end can help users create, track, and maybe even close tickets on their own. A Kanban board and other planning dashboards help the team react with agility. The system is designed with multiple interfaces for omnichannel support through an open portal and email tracking. A dashboard tracks progress with customizable reports and KPIs.

Wrike

Wrike is a general tool for organizing and tracking all workflows from ideation to resolution that can be customized for IT tasks. The team’s progress is tracked with full reporting tools filled with Gantt charts, Kanban boards, and a visual collaboration “infinite whiteboard.” Its customized template for ITSM focuses on help requests and change tracking with flexible workflows. Generative AI can act like a copilot that can organize a project and turn short inputs into full plans.

Zendesk

The AI Agents platform for Zendesk is filled with low-code and no-code opportunities for customizing the workflow for IT tasks. When deployed, these establish routines and protocols for solving common and not-so-common issues. The user gets a simplified UI built to gather information and allow some self-care with the help of these agents. In the background, professional staff can get full access to track the resolution and curate tickets. The goal is to create omnichannel conversations that unites the web, voice, and text messaging. If the features aren’t enough on their own, the Zendesk marketplace has more than 1,200 plugins and modules to extend and integrate the tool with other workflows in other systems.

Zoho ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus

Zoho ManageEngine offers a collection of tools for juggling all the problems a user-facing IT desk might encounter, and they’re all under the name ServiceDesk Plus. The Standard version tackles ITSM issues such as incident management or self-service through a customizable ticketing system coupled with a knowledge base for self-service. The Professional edition adds asset tracking, and the Enterprise version includes all the tools for organizing change through project management. All these roles are assisted by various LLMs and AIs that can track requests, offer some automatic approvals, and generate text that might be used for communication. Virtual support agents can often speed the process and deliver answers.