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BMC Helix ITSM vs Zendesk comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
5.9
BMC Helix ITSM offers good value and time savings, with automation praised and high stability, despite costly licensing.
Sentiment score
6.7
Zendesk enhances organizational efficiency and productivity, reducing costs despite licensing fees, with varied but significant financial benefits.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.4
BMC Helix ITSM customer service varies widely, with premium support praised, but lower tiers face delays and inconsistent quality.
Sentiment score
6.3
Zendesk excels in responsiveness and issue resolution, though reliance on documentation may delay human support replies.
There are issues with misrouting and a preference for email rather than direct communication via phone calls.
Their support team from Zendesk is excellent, similar to what you have in Freshdesk.
The technical support provided by Zendesk has been very satisfactory.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.3
BMC Helix ITSM is scalable and robust, suitable for diverse organizations, though customization can limit larger implementations.
Sentiment score
7.4
Zendesk scales well for various team sizes; praised for customization, integration, though challenges include data backup and departmental customization.
The product's scalability is adequate for us, yet its complex customization sometimes restricts extensive adaptability.
Zendesk can scale from very small companies to very large ones.
The scalability of Zendesk is still in the same range as Freshdesk.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.2
BMC Helix ITSM is generally stable; initial issues may occur, but proper architecture enhances reliability over time.
Sentiment score
7.7
Zendesk is stable and reliable, despite occasional outages, making it ideal for small businesses and startups globally.
I find BMC Helix ITSM stable, and that is why we have been with the product for the past 15 years.
Over the past five years, we have experienced no major issues or downtime during upgrades.
The stability has been quite reliable.
 

Room For Improvement

BMC Helix ITSM needs a more intuitive, customizable interface, enhanced reporting, better performance, support, documentation, and streamlined customization.
Zendesk users face challenges with interface clumsiness, slow performance, customization, integration, and pricing, affecting overall usability and efficiency.
BMC Helix ITSM is difficult for us to customize, and most customizations require vendor support, which leads to extra costs.
We lack access to a sandbox for in-house development, which was very helpful for hands-on work with new features.
There could be improvements in integration, which can be achieved with APIs or tools like Zapier.
 

Setup Cost

Enterprise users find BMC Helix ITSM costly but cost-effective, requiring careful licensing analysis and negotiations to manage expenses.
Zendesk pricing varies, perceived as high, but offers value and flexibility; negotiation advised for larger teams to optimize costs.
The pricing of BMC Helix ITSM and its implementation costs are quite high, including subscription and maintenance costs per year.
It is not the cheapest solution nor the most expensive, but it provides value for money.
 

Valuable Features

BMC Helix ITSM is scalable, integrates easily, enhances management, and aligns with ITIL, offering advanced features and customization.
Zendesk offers user-friendly integration, robust features, and valuable tools, enhancing efficiency and streamlining customer support processes effectively.
Resolution time has decreased significantly since implementing the self-service portal.
These features are crucial as we complete the implementation and maintain data accuracy in the CMDB.
It allows us to handle more support cases with fewer people due to its advanced artificial intelligence capabilities.
The benefits I have seen from using Zendesk include faster response times.
 

Categories and Ranking

BMC Helix ITSM
Ranking in Help Desk Software
5th
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
79
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Zendesk
Ranking in Help Desk Software
11th
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
11th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
61
Ranking in other categories
CRM Customer Engagement Centers (7th), CRM (24th), Sales Force Automation (11th), Reporting (19th), Knowledge Management Software (4th), Community Platforms (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of BMC Helix ITSM is 8.6%, down from 12.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zendesk is 4.9%, up from 4.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Help Desk Software
 

Featured Reviews

Ameet Darole - PeerSpot reviewer
Used for user ticket management, incident management, and event management
We had a manual event management process and a separate monitoring tool called Dynatrace. The alerts generated did not flow to the ITSM tool. With BMC Helix ITSM, the alerts flow and auto-route to respective technical support. If the alerts are resolved, the ticket will be automatically closed. So, the workload and automation are much better now. BMC Helix ITSM is a fast platform, so it is quite manageable. I would recommend BMC Helix ITSM to other users because it is a good solution. Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.
JohanSkibdahl - PeerSpot reviewer
Automating customer support with advanced AI capabilities and seamless communication
Zendesk has been invaluable in automating communications such as email and phone calls. It allows us to handle more support cases with fewer people due to its advanced artificial intelligence capabilities. This intelligent tool can manage complex queries before users even realize they are interacting with a non-human. Additionally, we have integrated Zendesk with Datto and Klaviyo, enhancing our workflows.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
22%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Educational Organization
6%
Performing Arts
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about BMC Helix ITSM?
If we consider major players like Ford or BMW, their core focus is manufacturing products like cars. To ensure smooth operations, any arising issues, be it security concerns or issues within depart...
What needs improvement with BMC Helix ITSM?
Currently, we are not utilizing the AI functionality in BMC Helix ITSM as we are still in the roadmap and development phase at this point in time. There isn't anything that I would suggest for impr...
What is your primary use case for BMC Helix ITSM?
We use BMC Helix ITSM for the complete end-to-end ITSM suite, mainly for ticketing and service management. BMC Helix ITSM supports our IT service management processes primarily for all incident, pr...
What do you like most about Zendesk Support?
I found the user experience with vendors on Zendesk to be straightforward, especially when it comes to understanding and searching for specific tickets. The search and navigation tools are easy to ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zendesk Support?
Zendesk's pricing is reasonable. It is not the cheapest solution nor the most expensive, but it provides value for money.
What needs improvement with Zendesk Support?
There could be improvements in integration, which can be achieved with APIs or tools like Zapier ( /products/zapier-reviews ). However, easier integration could enhance the usability. Multilingual ...
 

Also Known As

Remedy ITSM, Remedy, Helix Remedy
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Brookfield, HealthSouth Corporation, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, Mercator, SAP, Stanford University
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about BMC Helix ITSM vs. Zendesk and other solutions. Updated: August 2025.
865,295 professionals have used our research since 2012.