Freshservice vs IBM SmartCloud Control Desk comparison

Freshworks and IBM are both solutions in the Help Desk Software category. Freshworks is ranked #8 with an average rating of 8.3, while IBM is ranked #27. Freshworks holds a 3.9% mindshare in HDS, compared to IBM’s 0.7% mindshare. Additionally, 97% of Freshworks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 88% of IBM users who would recommend it.

Freshservice

Read 35 Freshservice reviews

1,535 Views
1,154 Comparison Views

97% willing to recommend

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

Read 9 IBM SmartCloud Control Desk reviews

401 Views
197 Comparison Views

88% willing to recommend

Freshservice

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 2024

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk and Freshservice compete in the IT service management domain. Freshservice has the advantage with its modern features and simplified integration capabilities, whereas IBM provides extensive customization for complex environments.

Features: IBM SmartCloud Control Desk offers robust ITIL-based capabilities, comprehensive asset management, and complex workflow customizations suitable for larger enterprises. Freshservice provides an intuitive experience with AI-powered automation, multi-channel support, and efficient incident management, ideal for small to medium-sized businesses.

Room for Improvement: IBM SmartCloud Control Desk could enhance its ease of use and reduce complexity in deployment. It may also focus on improving its user interface and streamlining integration processes. Freshservice could expand its customization options, provide more advanced analytics, and enhance certain automation features to better suit larger organizations.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM SmartCloud Control Desk's deployment is intricate, requiring dedicated IT support, but it offers deeper customization. Freshservice is noted for its cloud-based deployment and ease of setup, allowing quick operation and generally more responsive customer service during both setup and operation.

Pricing and ROI: IBM SmartCloud Control Desk typically incurs higher setup costs due to required infrastructure and customization but can deliver high ROI when fully utilized. Freshservice offers a competitive pricing model with lower initial costs, providing a cost-effective solution for rapid ROI and scalability.

To learn more, read our detailed Freshservice vs. IBM SmartCloud Control Desk Report (Updated: April 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Freshservice vs. IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

April 2025

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Helped 846,617 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

Freshservice

Ranking in Help Desk Software

8th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Project Management Software (12th), Cloud Management (15th), IT Asset Management (6th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (5th)

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

Ranking in Help Desk Software

27th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.8

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of Freshservice is 3.9%, down from 3.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is 0.7%, down from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Help Desk Software

Featured Reviews

Trilochana Gouda

IT manager at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees

Smooth incident management and easy to use while needing better escalation management

We are using Freshservice for the IT ticketing system for business users We use the ticketing system primarily, which is very easy to use for all users. Freshservice is helpful, especially in incident management. Incident management is very helpful, and the system is straightforward, making it…

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Jose Pedro Muñoz

Director of operations at Vetasi

Helps standardize our workflow, track client tickets, and it's very flexible

Initially we used HPE Service Desk. Then, Remedy (IBM SmartCloud Control Desk) version 5. When selecting a vendor, the most important thing for us is the flexibility of the tool. It must be very flexible to change the workflow or to add new workflows for the clients. It must have stability and scalability as well.

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

"What I have seen in Freshservice is there's no room for customization. Which works as an advantage in some cases and it works as a disadvantage in others. If you are someone that starts managing your IT services, it is a great solution, because there's no way to go out away from the direction of the system. You have to follow the process as it was intended for the designers of a solution because there's no room for customization or configuration."

"It is a stable solution. My company hasn't faced any problems with the solution."

"We use the ticketing system primarily, which is very easy to use for all users."

"It has a very easy, flexible model. You can open up a particular module and work on the next. That's what we did. Overall, it provides a simple way of getting your support teams up and running. That was one thing that I thought was quite easy to do."

"The solution facilitates a transition from an organizational structure that is function-based to a process-oriented approach."

"One of the things I liked about Freshservice was how easy it was to implement. While it doesn't have extensive customization capabilities, the available options are sufficient for certain sizes of companies. You don't need to customize your ticketing system much. Freshservice is a great solution because you can implement it very quickly. You can upload your catalog, and you're done in maybe a week or two."

"Depending on the size of your organization, is pretty standard and useful."

"With Freshservice in place, we have reversed the trend of creating tickets."

More Freshservice pros

"In the early stages of our company, all requests were done in notebooks, and none of it was centrally managed. But now we have a central tool which is an entry point for all requests that come in."

"The solution is very easy to work with."

"A feature I found most valuable in IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is the service request. Another feature I like most about the solution is IT asset management, which tells you who owns a specific asset in the company and from which date."

"The solution has been stable."

"What I like about the Control Desk is that everything is centralized. You have all the requests in one place, you know which ones are for whom and who is working on them."

"The workflow capability is useful. It's not a manual helpdesk operation. It's fully automated, even when an alarm has occurred. It covers the complete cycle of initiation to resolving the events. This is its most strong feature that is easily integrable with a monitoring solution. It creates tickets, and the workflow feature is the most important one."

"The brand name is the most valuable aspect of this solution for me. It's IBM. It's a global company that supports this product, it's not something open source or something like that."

"The most valuable are its flexibility and agility. It's quick to change it, to adapt it to your needs. That's the most important for us."

More IBM SmartCloud Control Desk pros

Cons

"I experienced some delay in response time for non-function critical queries."

"Asset management can definitely be improved because it doesn't pick up every single device on the network or every single piece of information. Some manual information still needs to be entered."

"I am not too happy with the page layout or screen layout since it always looks messy."

"The chat portal is not that great."

"I experienced some delay in response time for non-function critical queries."

"Freshservice could improve the delegation and workflow management features."

"Freshservice has issues around how assets get picked up, requiring a lot of parameter changes within to network to ensure the system discovers everything."

"The analytics could be better."

More Freshservice cons

"Overall the user experience, as opposed to the system and databases, could be improved. It does work as it should and it's good, but they should invest more in the user interfaces to be less data oriented and more appealing for the user."

"The solution lacks a graphical user interface."

"The time calculations can be improved. While working on reports, it was taking the time only in seconds, which was hard for me to work out. While creating some dialogs in the service portal, you have to use certain data types in some fields. It was very tricky to make them work. I was testing a certain type of input, and it didn't work. It didn't show me the domain that the fields have to show. I had to make the change to the database, and only then it worked. It was a tricky thing to make them work with the dialogs. Their technical support can also be improved in terms of response time."

"What needs improvement in IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is its graphical interface because it needs to be more user-friendly. IBM is a big company, but this solution is a little bit outdated. The most common comment I get from customers is that IBM SmartCloud Control Desk looks old and needs a refresh. Its frontend needs a little bit of work. The solution needs to be more modern. In the programming world, you see a lot of new technologies, but this particular solution is still on Java. IBM SmartCloud Control Desk isn't like web-based service request tools, and that's an area for improvement. What I'd like to see in the next version of the solution is a more upscale technology. IBM SmartCloud Control Desk has small issues with document links and attachments, and those could bother you when you're using it for a long time. A more user-friendly GUI is also another improvement I'd like to see in the next version of the solution, plus a better user experience, and it would be great if IBM could resolve the current issues I've noticed in IBM SmartCloud Control Desk."

"Support has been the biggest problem for us. I understand that because we use the product of a global company, some changes are not quick to deploy."

"The user interface is not very interesting. If you look at other products like JIRA and ServiceNow, they have made it much easier for the end-users. Maybe not ServiceNow, but JIRA is quite flexible. From a presentation point of view, IBM should make more user-friendly interfaces."

"The main issue that we hear from our customers is that the self-service user interface is a little bit old, possibly due to the fact that IBM is such a large enterprise company. People say that they think they're in the year 2004, because you can very clearly see that the technology is lagging behind modern trends."

"The reporting in relation to updating could be improved upon."

More IBM SmartCloud Control Desk cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing information is on their website. It's my understanding that their Pro Plan, for example, is around $89/month."

"It is good for the price you pay. It has different plans. If you need all features, you need to go for a higher plan. Currently, with the second tier plan, you cannot completely separate the group of agents. So, the agent in each group can see another person's ticket. You also cannot modify the rules based on the viewable, readable stuff and cannot have a custom role in this plan. If you want to do that, you have to go for a higher plan. It works in our case because it doesn't matter if the other group can see our ticket because it doesn't contain anything sensitive. We also didn't need the project or change management features. That's why we didn't go with a higher plan."

"The solution has an annual licensing model."

"It was a middle tier. It wasn't an expensive one. It was a tier model usage. Licensing costs varied between admin users and regular users."

"Our licensing fee for Freshservice is $2,500 a year."

"Freshservice is a fairly cheap solution. Though monthly payments can be made towards the licensing costs of the solution, my company prefers to make annual payments."

"I don't think it's expensive for the US or some European markets. Still, when I used Freshservice in Mexico, some customers found it a bit pricey, especially considering the platform's features. I think the pricing is fair for use in the European market, but it might be perceived differently in Latin America."

"One of the key benefits of Freshservice is license management. Asset management has the possibility to keep track of licenses and that's very useful. The price of the solution is very good."

More Freshservice pricing and cost advice

"The licensing we have for IBM Control Desk is on a yearly basis. They have a concurrent license and an administrative license. And with these, you get all the products. There aren't any additional fees for extra add-ons or anything like that."

"It's basically for a big company because of the costs. A small company can't afford the licensing cost. For medium and large companies, it's the best product. The price of the license is on the higher side compared to others."

"The license for IBM SmartCloud Control Desk is paid yearly and is on a per-user basis. You buy the product and pay for its license yearly. IBM is changing the licensing structure, but for now, it's a yearly license. There's no additional cost. It's just the license that you need to pay for to use IBM SmartCloud Control Desk."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

24%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Educational Organization

No data available

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Freshservice?

The solution has been very helpful engineering insights into the client's environment. We have been able to manage calls and incidence very efficiently which provides us with a clear understanding...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Freshservice?

The solution offers flat licensing and appears to be cost-effective.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Freshservice?

There is a need for improvement in terms of automatic escalation to the next level if an issue is not resolved. It should optimize and allow customization. Additionally, asset management needs impr...

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Comparisons

ServiceNow vs Freshservice

Compared 27% of the time

ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus vs Freshservice

Compared 11% of the time

JIRA Service Management vs Freshservice

Compared 10% of the time

Microsoft Project vs Freshservice

Compared 9% of the time

Zendesk vs Freshservice

Compared 9% of the time

More Freshservice Competitors

ServiceNow vs IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

Compared 100% of the time

More IBM SmartCloud Control Desk Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Freshservice

April 2025

Download Freshservice product report

Buyer's Guide

IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

April 2025

Download IBM SmartCloud Control Desk product report

Also Known As

Flint

SmartCloud Control Desk

Overview

Freshservice is an intelligent, cloud-native service management solution. It provides efficiency and agility through AI to create a contextual and intelligent experience. The solution also empowers employees to work whenever and wherever they need to work. Freshservice powers integrations and workflows at the enterprise scale, building upon an open platform and marketplace with connectors and APIs that you can extend and customize.

Freshservice Features

Freshservice has many valuable key features. Some of the most useful ones include:

ITIL-aligned processes
Intelligent AI/ML capabilities
Advanced CSAT
Extensible platform
Self-service portal
Smart automations
Service catalog
Effective monitoring and alerting
Out-of-box analytics
Mobile app
Marketplace apps

Freshservice Benefits

There are many benefits to implementing Freshservice. Some of the biggest advantages the solution offers include:

Intelligent service management and customized workflows: Freshservice offers powered bots, automation, and orchestration to help you make management more efficient and gives you the ability to customize all workflows.

Fast time-to-value: Freshservice’s out-of-the-box features help you quickly deploy it and enable easier adoption, at scale.

Minimizes downtime: Freshservice prevents critical issues by identifying the right alerts, collaborating with context, and delivering an enhanced end-user experience.

Extensible: The solution is extensible and allows organizations to access enterprise-scale tools to customize, integrate, and automate business workflows.

Support: Freshservice has 24/7 support so your issues can be addressed around-the-clock.

Boosts productivity: The Freshservice solution helps improve employee productivity. It helps you prioritize work better with real-time custom dashboards.

Reviews from Real Users

Below are some reviews and helpful feedback written by PeerSpot users currently using the Freshservice solution.

A Senior Helpdesk at a non-profit says, “I like the workflow automation capabilities, where based upon certain actions, it will automatically go and route tickets to a particular person. It is fairly user-friendly.”

PeerSpot user Cesar Q., CIO at Grupo Kasto, mentions, “The analytics are very good. The solution offers very nice incident management. The overall functionality of the product is excellent. The change management is helpful. They have an agent that we installed in every single asset. We have the inventory for all assets automatically. Contract management is very valuable for us as an IT department, as we have the information for every single computer across the company. We are starting to use the project management aspects right now. We have different projects and we have all the information in the same solution, in the same place. It makes everything more centralized and easier to access. The user interface is very nice and the solution is easy to use. You don't need to be an expert in order to navigate around and use the product. You don't need to read a lot of manuals in order to figure everything out. It's pretty intuitive.”

A Network Analyst at a real estate/law firm shares, "We find its ability to track what's going on with each request very valuable. We are also able to merge ticket requests and assign them to different groups in the company. We have another department that uses the same system."

Freshworks

IBM Control Desk on Cloud offer an access to a user friendly self-service, automated service management, and seamlessly-integrated, best-practice based service desk capabilities. IBM Control Desk provides the IT service management (ITSM) needed to simplify support of users and infrastructure. It also offers a unified IT asset and service management software provides a common control center for managing business processes for both digital and physical assets and enables control, governance and compliance to applications, endpoints and assets to protect critical data and prevent outages. Control Desk is IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL)-compliant, accessible through mobile devices and integrates with social media and development tools.

IBM

Sample Customers

Sinclair Broadcast Group, Western Carriers, Judson University, Golf Canada, Travix, Proxama, Paymentez, Ready Auto Transport

St Vincent's Health Australia, Kalibrate Pty. Ltd., Cognizant Technology

Buyer's Guide

Freshservice vs. IBM SmartCloud Control Desk

April 2025

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