ServiceNow Discovery vs Tanium comparison

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ServiceNow Discovery

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 18, 2026

Tanium and ServiceNow Discovery are competitors in IT operations management. ServiceNow Discovery appears to have the upper hand due to its comprehensive features and broader integration capabilities that justify its price.

Features: Tanium provides rapid data collection, real-time endpoint management, and offers robust security and asset tracking. ServiceNow Discovery is known for its extensive integration, automation capabilities, and excels in comprehensive network data mapping and service-aware configuration management.

Room for Improvement: Tanium could improve in offering cloud-based options, simplifying its integration processes, and reducing initial setup complexity. ServiceNow Discovery can enhance its troubleshooting tools, expand its automation capabilities, and better support complex customizations for advanced users.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: ServiceNow Discovery's cloud-based deployment simplifies setup but may require some learning. Its customer service is supportive and accessible. Tanium's on-premises deployment is more complex yet provides significant control once established, beneficial for security-focused environments.

Pricing and ROI: Tanium's higher initial setup cost brings substantial ROI through efficient IT asset management and threat protection. ServiceNow Discovery offers moderate setup costs with ROI through operational efficiency, reducing manual processes and enhancing integration capabilities.

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

ServiceNow Discovery vs. Tanium

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Helped 881,036 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 Discovery

Ranking in Server Monitoring

5th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

IT Asset Management (6th), Cloud Resource Discovery Services (1st)

Tanium

Ranking in Server Monitoring

3rd

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Vulnerability Management (23rd), Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP) (21st), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) (21st), Unified Endpoint Management (UEM) (7th)

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Server Monitoring category, the mindshare of ServiceNow Discovery is 3.3%, down from 5.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Tanium is 5.0%, down from 7.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Server Monitoring Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Tanium	5.0%
ServiceNow Discovery	3.3%
Other	91.7%

Server Monitoring

Featured Reviews

reviewer2759271

Manager, Solution/Service Delivery at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

Has supported enterprise needs well and addresses discovery across environments

Small companies will not be able to afford ServiceNow Discovery from the pricing perspective. Hence, they will not opt for ServiceNow Discovery as a solution, either as an ITSM solution or ITOM solution. It will not be affordable. I am specifically talking about the Middle East and Africa region. ServiceNow ITOM is particularly not very strong in terms of monitoring capabilities. They do not have any monitoring tool. They use event management from getting events from other tools. In that front, they had a roadmap for going for an open-source solution, but I have not seen that materialize. There is a lack of tools perspective for monitoring. Perhaps they do not have a plan because there are hundreds of tools available, and they prefer to focus on integration and event management.

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Vignesh K

Infra Vulnarability Manager at Rezilyens

Immediate results in patching promptly address vulnerabilities

When working with Tanium, there are some older devices that haven't been patched for a long time, and certain patches are not included in Tanium. I have to search outside to download patches, create bundles, and then perform the task. It would be easier if Tanium provided the patches directly. Some other brands provide the patch with a direct download link, which facilitates the process. Also, I feel that if there were more detailed documents and remediations readily available online for troubleshooting, especially more up-to-date information, it would be beneficial. Currently, some resources online are very out-of-date.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"They have a very good network in the infrastructure of Discovery."

"In the past, I found troubleshooting difficult in ServiceNow Discovery because I didn't have much exposure to the platform during that time, but then I explored some troubleshooting features, and I found that it wasn't that tough, so this is one of the qualities I like about ServiceNow Discovery. I also like that log reading in ServiceNow Discovery is much better than other tools. Another valuable feature of the tool is that you don't need to install many tools to deploy ITSM. You only need to subscribe to the modules to deploy the proper ITSM in your organization."

"I am impressed with the tool's incident problem change management."

"The solution finds public cloud infrastructures globally and updates the integration management database, service catalogs, and asset management details."

"ServiceNow's Discovery feature is quite significant because it allows for service mapping and integrates with VIN management. It involves adding a business context to servers, routers, switches, and data centers. This means understanding not only what's installed on these systems and how they function together but also recognizing their significance in terms of business applications from the business's perspective and how they impact business processes and capabilities. So when we delve into these aspects and connect them to the essential components, it can help you engage in more meaningful discussions to enhance capacity management practices. In essence, it contributes to the overall IT portfolio, almost functioning as a business platform. This platform is accessible to users who leverage the data to initiate incidents, implement changes, and resolve problems. Consequently, consolidating all configuration items or assets into a unified platform makes sense, especially considering you already have Discovery in place. If the cost is reasonable, the other two components might not provide much value, except for their user-friendliness, which is often less important to leaders compared to the desired outcomes."

"The product provides great scalability features."

"The initial setup is pretty easy."

"We can find servers or services we were unaware of and stumble on vulnerabilities from those devices."

More ServiceNow Discovery pros

"When I push a quick update, it's done right away, and I can rescan immediately to confirm completion within minutes."

"For incident response tasks, all these tasks can get done in minutes with minimal disruption to the end-user."

"Threat hunting is a very good feature on Tanium. We have just started using it and have not used it extensively."

"Tanium’s best features include support for any Windows, Linux, or Mac endpoint, regardless of where it is, and the ability to do IT operations and security operations."

"Tanium's most valuable feature is its instant discovery aspect."

"Tanium is a very good product and I would rate it eight or nine out of ten."

"The solution is scalable and helps to understand how infrastructure works. It helps to improve the health of the organization."

"When I push a quick update, it's done right away, and I can rescan immediately to confirm completion within minutes."

More Tanium pros

Cons

"The solution is too high priced."

"Debugging is a bit tough in ServiceNow Discovery, so debugging should be made very easy."

"The solution needs to improve the cost of the solution. There are a few different solutions and they do act the same and have the same types of capabilities, however, the cost is quite high."

"Discovery, while a bit pricey, integrates well with other tools and offers a centralized discovery solution. These aspects could be enhanced in the new release."

"I feel that credential-less discovery could be improved."

"ServiceNow has a constant development environment. Hence they get constant bugs which result in incorrect performance. It should also improve customer service."

"ServiceNow Discovery could improve the interface. The navigation bar could improve. It would be helpful to have a landing page to go to find all the elements in one place."

"We would like more flexibility with the licensing. Discovery is bundled with ServiceNow's ITOM license. It was more affordable when it was sold separately, but we bought a package license to get more functionality out of the CMDB. We'd prefer to buy only the pieces we need instead of taking things we don't want or solutions that aren't yet mature enough to use."

More ServiceNow Discovery cons

"The performance could improve in future releases. We have had performance issues in specialized web environments, but overall I think the problems are less than 2% of the computer systems being used."

"Tanium’s scalability could be improved."

"The solution can give a lot of false positives."

"It is not really additional functions, or the features that are needed, rather the complexity would be reduced based on the number of modules required to put together a comprehensive operational security and risk compliance model."

"The solution lacks mobility."

"Tanium's limitations should be improved because although it is a great tool, it is limited to only a few classes during a session."

"Most of the time, agent-relative issues have to be more equipped with self-healing features. At times, the agent is there, but for some reason, it doesn't report a status. It gives certain problems that are obviously agent-based."

"Any movement into a SaaS solution has challenges since the processes and data flows are not well defined. Hence, you need to build it at the same time."

More Tanium cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price could be better. It's a bit on the pricey side."

"The solution is not inexpensive so pricing is rated a three out of ten."

"The product is not cheap."

"You need a subscription to ServiceNow Discovery, so you can use its features. You can also use specific plugins with the tool, and some of the plugins are free. I don't have information on how much my company pays for the subscription to ServiceNow Discovery."

"It's a bit expensive compared to other products in the market, but it's worth the money you pay because it's far advanced in terms of features, automation, and capabilities compared to other products."

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

"It costs a lot. It is probably close to over a hundred thousand. It's an expensive platform, but you can't compare ServiceNow's Discovery functionality to other discovery tools. It's not an apples-to-apples comparison of ServiceNow to a configuration management tool to an asset management tool because it does those things, but it's not those things."

"There is a subscription for ServiceNow Discovery. It's expensive, but I think it's one of the best solutions on the market, so it's worth it."

More ServiceNow Discovery pricing and cost advice

"It is higher than some competitors in the market."

"The solution offers value for money."

"The solution is expensive but it's a good investment."

"There is an annual license required to use this solution."

"Tanium is a more expensive solution in Latin America than some of the competitors, such as BigFix."

"The product's pricing differs from region to region depending on negotiations and the number of endpoints."

"It's an expensive solution. It would be nice if the cost were lower."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

13%

Computer Software Company

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Financial Services Firm

16%

Government

11%

Manufacturing Company

Computer Software Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	16
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	23

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	6
Midsize Enterprise	3
Large Enterprise	11

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about ServiceNow Discovery?

The solution can prioritize the discovery of IP ranges. The product automatically places all Discovery CIs into the correct class within the CMDB.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ServiceNow Discovery?

The pricing information for ServiceNow Discovery was requested but not provided.

What needs improvement with ServiceNow Discovery?

A CMDB debugging tool to give indication about the errors that appear would be appreciated.

What needs improvement with Tanium?

While there is always room for improvement, I am pleased with Tanium.

What is your primary use case for Tanium?

The primary use case for Tanium ( /products/tanium-reviews ) is compliance, patching, and inventory as part of the core functions.

What advice do you have for others considering Tanium?

For smaller companies, Tanium is quite a big investment, and one needs to have a considerable setup to make it economically viable. I would recommend it to others with a similar use case. The solut...

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HPE Integrated Lights Out (iLO) vs ServiceNow Discovery

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Compared 9% of the time

Microsoft Defender for Endpoint vs Tanium

Compared 6% of the time

BigFix vs Tanium

Compared 5% of the time

Microsoft Configuration Manager vs Tanium

Compared 4% of the time

Trellix Endpoint Security Platform vs Tanium

Compared 4% of the time

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Product Reports

ServiceNow Discovery

Download ServiceNow Discovery product report

Download Tanium product report

Also Known As

No data available

Tanium Inc Cloud, Tanium XEM

Overview

ServiceNow Discovery finds applications and devices on your network, and then updates the CMDB with the information it finds. Discovery is available as a separate subscription from the rest of the Now Platform.

ServiceNow

Tanium offers robust endpoint protection, patching, and inventory management, consolidating the functions of tools like BigFix with capabilities in incident response, network security, and cloud or on-premise deployments.

Known for real-time capabilities, Tanium provides detailed analytics, security features, and device management. Users benefit from quick implementation, real-time updates, and patching campaigns. Despite its strengths, integration and custom plugin expansion remain areas to improve, along with data visualization and network optimization. Reporting enhancements and user training could advance its usability, and some UI elements may require updates for clarity and security.

What are the essential features of Tanium?

Detailed Analytics: Provides actionable insights for better decision-making.
Security Capabilities: Offers strong defense measures against threats.
Real-Time Queries: Facilitates immediate information access.
Patch Management: Streamlines software updates across devices.
Device Management: Efficiently handles comprehensive inventory and monitoring tasks.

What benefits should users expect?

Ease of Use: Simplifies complex IT tasks.
Scalability: Adapts to growing IT infrastructure needs.
Integration Flexibility: Merges with existing systems effortlessly.
Real-Time Updates: Ensures current data availability for informed actions.

Tanium's deployment spans industries focusing on endpoint protection and compliance, ensuring reliable device and server management in settings where safety and quick adaptation are critical. Organizations use it for application deployment, compliance checks, and integrating it as an EDR solution, enhancing overall security and operational efficiencies.

Sample Customers

York, National Grid, DXC Technology, experian, BEACHBODY

JPMorgan Chase, eBay, Amazon, US Bank, MetLife, pwc, Cerner, Delphi, MGM Grand, New York Life

ServiceNow Discovery vs. Tanium