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Adobe Workfront vs ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management 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

Adobe Workfront
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
33
Ranking in other categories
Project Management Software (6th), Digital Asset Management (1st)
ServiceNow Strategic Portfo...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
Project Portfolio Management (2nd), Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (5th)
 

Featured Reviews

Graham Sprague - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized task management and simplified creative collaboration but interface is inconsistent
Adobe Workfront could improve its interface, which may benefit from an overhaul for better consistency between the web interface and the API. The current setup was not originally designed API-first, leading to some confusion and differences in available functions. Additionally, the low-code environment in Workfront Fusion is beneficial yet sometimes limiting, and it might be more powerful with enhancements.
Srinivasa Neelapu - PeerSpot reviewer
Strategies and goals are aligned with demands and partners, making it a strategic approach for the enterprise but the finance part needs improvement
SPM is definitely strong for project management, but its finance capabilities are not as robust. While there is a separate Financial Management product, it would be beneficial to have more out-of-the-box support for finance integrations within SPM. I’m not suggesting replacing systems like SAP for finance, but there should be better support for financial integrations. Currently, connecting to SaaS solutions is complicated, and getting into detailed financial calculations is challenging. Forecasting is manageable, but handling actual financials is not as straightforward. The finance area needs improvement, specifically making finance application integrations easier. Generic finance capabilities should be more user-friendly and integrated into SPM. Although they have started this journey, it hasn’t been fully released yet. There seems to be a roadmap, and once complete, it will be very useful. Additionally, incorporating a Q&A feature for entire strategies or project demands and enhancing text analytics within SPM would be beneficial.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Workfront centralizes the tasks, the assignment of tasks, and documents required to do the work, streamlining communication and information availability, thus improving organization and reducing dependency on decentralized methods like email or servers."
"Feature-wise, I would say that its overall ability to be infinitely customizable is valuable...My experience with the support team has been amazing."
"Workfront is innovative and these were plenty of features that I found valuable while working at Logitech. Workfront had this feature of Project Schedule Templatization. This saves time and effort and even leads to the standardization of processes that are well-assorted. The Intelligent Graphical Interfaces of Workfront allow one to look at a specific type of resource and a specific phase for a specific family of products. You can get quite granular with the data and even zoom in or out of the timeline. It also categorizes projects according to classes and portfolios so that over time, you can more easily understand what are the various metrics involved in producing a specific portfolio Another important feature is Workfront allowing you to validate milestones and investigate the project. This also helped me to understand which projects are performing well and whether it was beneficial to invest in the same. The IT and the app configuration is quite secure and it is one of the benefits. One more valuable feature is the integration of communication systems inside Workfront. This helps you differentiate between normal business emails and project-specific conversations. This is also known as ‘queues’ and I absolutely find this feature extremely powerful."
"The intake feature is the most valuable in Workfront."
"The tool is very user-friendly."
"I also like Workfront's integration. The solution integrates natively with other systems. It's easy to connect Workfront to any product that has a customer service database, such as a CRM or service ticket management solution."
"The solution is stable."
"Instead of following everything on email, business users can track everything on Adobe Workfront when the other systems are integrated with it."
"The interface is user-friendly. It's one of the most user-friendly on the market, and the most complete."
"As a product, the primary reason we like it is it gets integrated with our ITSM solution so that we don't have to go for an external product for project management like Jira."
"The solution offers a lot of opportunities for integrations. We can integrate with Slack, Azure, all the API alternatives, etc. There's a lot of integration modules provided."
"The demand management tool is very strategic because it helps assess risk, gives you a visual of different demands, and rates those values."
"The most important feature of ServiceNow IT Business Management is flexibility."
"We like the status report feature. It is something really valuable."
"The most valuable feature of ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management is its end-to-end processes, which enable us to manage strategies from start to finish. It covers idea management to implementation and beyond. Real-time analytics in ServiceNow SPM significantly supports our operational decision-making processes."
"Everything is valuable. It is tough to choose a particular feature, but project portfolio management along with agile 2.0 are two key product features that I would suggest for services companies like us."
 

Cons

"Sometimes, new users find it a bit difficult to handle Adobe Workfront."
"Our product and graphic designers are working with various Adobe products, but Workfront has a no-frills interface. It's a useful tool with everything we need, but it could be a little more attractive and present information in a polished way. It's a web interface, so it's accessible, but the appearance could be a little slicker."
"We were having some difficulties creating different kinds of reports and dashboards."
"Sometimes there are glitches when we are reviewing an interactive proof."
"I have used the product and instantiated it, almost seven years back. The process was fairly complex, however, I don't know if they have changed the same now. But this is something I think, if not addressed can be improved. Another area that needs a little attention, is the change of implementation lead. Back when we had Workfront instantiated, we often had our timeline delayed due to the change in the implementation lead. Now Workfront is under Adobe and, in case, this issue, isn't fixed it should be given due attention. Also, Workfront is a universal tool, which can pose a difficulty for small businesses and companies, who don't have the required time, effort, and knowledge to configure it periodically."
"The interface can also be customized to fit and accept many tools for better performance and customer service improvement."
"Workfront's reporting capabilities must be improved."
"I would say that the stability, honestly, has gone down since the Adobe acquisition, and the quality when they roll out their updates."
"The price is too high."
"The only issue for us is the pricing. It’s quite high in comparison with the competition."
"ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management must improve its interface, which is not very interactive or user-friendly compared to other tools like Zendesk. The real-time reporting feature doesn't help much in our decision-making process. It's quite complex to use and lacks the rich features needed for visualization. Overall, I find it to be very poor."
"The portfolio managed is good for IT, but it's not good for non it's not necessarily great for construction projects, such as the building of physical infrastructure."
"A major improvement we would like to see is definitely around agile management."
"SPM is definitely strong for project management, but its finance capabilities are not as robust."
"When we originally set it up, we had some kind of success manager free of charge, and now it's an additional charge over and above what we're paying."
"The main challenge we face with SPM is its flexibility, which can sometimes lead to lengthy discussions and slow down implementation. As for improvements, integrating IT finance management tools like AppTio or Nearos would be beneficial. We already have data mining capabilities, but continuous updates and enabling of new features would be great, considering the rapid pace of DevOps advancements in the market. In terms of forward-looking analytics and comparison to tools like Power BI, there are areas that could be enhanced, especially in drill-down reporting."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Adobe purchased Workfront in the past year, and they're putting work into developing the platform, so I expect the price to rise. It isn't cheap, but it's reasonable for the value it provides. It isn't Monday.com where you pick a license with a set price, and you've got a project manager."
"Adobe Workfront is an expensive solution."
"The pricing of Workfront is completely license based."
"The pricing is a barrier to implementation. It is expensive compared to other competitors. Speaking about licensing, they have a private manager license for $1000, which you can use for administration as well. Then they offer a worker license for $500, and then a reviewer or contributor license which is free."
"We are partners with Adobe, so we get the licensing at a cheaper rate."
"Speaking about pricing, I wouldn't recommend it to a smaller company because I do think the price point is higher than other solutions that can work."
"I would rate the cost as five out of ten."
"The solution is expensive."
"I rate the price of ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management a seven out of ten."
"The solution was quite expensive."
"We have a team of about 6,500 employees across the globe. So, the amount of money I'm going to save by putting the money on the table for the implementation and licenses is very high."
"The cost of the solution should not be more than $50,000 annually."
"The licensing is based on metrics and is tailored to customer's needs."
"The pricing is negotiable based on the contract and licensing perspective."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
70%
Financial Services Firm
5%
Computer Software Company
4%
Healthcare Company
3%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Government
9%
Healthcare Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Workfront?
I can say it is a powerful tool. We have everything in-house in that tool, like, creating reports, dashboards, creating various workflows, and everything we have inside one application.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Workfront?
Workfront incurs around a hundred thousand plus dollars per year. Licensing is strict, particularly with free accounts, however, it offers flexibility in project access, which could be enhanced fur...
What needs improvement with Workfront?
Adobe Workfront could improve its interface, which may benefit from an overhaul for better consistency between the web interface and the API. The current setup was not originally designed API-first...
What do you like most about ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management?
We mainly use the solution to support operations and align our ITSM operations with our business goals. This involves coordinating between our application development, support teams, and network en...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management?
The pricing is average. They always have some extra options to add. I rate the product’s pricing a six out of ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive.
What needs improvement with ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management?
If we have enough information, we can address issues from the cloud to the top level of the organization. This allows us to see if our resources are being allocated properly from an executive persp...
 

Also Known As

AtTask, Workfront DAM
IT Business Management, ServiceNow IT Business Management Suite, ServiceNow ITBM Suite, ServiceNow ITBM
 

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Advance Autoparts, Emerson, Covario, Cisco, Caroma, TREK, Sapient Nitro, ATB, LexisNexis, CarPhone Warehouse
Proximus, UNT SYSTEM, SAP SuccessFactors
Find out what your peers are saying about Adobe Workfront vs. ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,158 professionals have used our research since 2012.