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Cherwell Service Management vs Clarity SM 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:
 

Categories and Ranking

Cherwell Service Management
Ranking in Help Desk Software
28th
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
27th
Average Rating
7.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Clarity SM
Ranking in Help Desk Software
22nd
Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)
21st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
107
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2026, in the IT Service Management (ITSM) category, the mindshare of Cherwell Service Management is 1.7%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Clarity SM is 1.7%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
IT Service Management (ITSM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Clarity SM1.7%
Cherwell Service Management1.7%
Other96.6%
IT Service Management (ITSM)
 

Featured Reviews

Thobile Moeketsi - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager at Sasria SOC Ltd.
Having everything in one location has significantly improved our efficiency and reporting
We need to be on VPN in order to set up and access the solution, and that has created some challenges. Even though it uses our Windows login, we still have to be on VPN. The product should be able to log tickets directly from system to system. We haven't got there yet and I'm not sure it's possible but it would determine the product's capability to integrate with other systems.
Sandip Kheni - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead Developer at STL - Sterlite Technologies Limited
Allows for customization of the service desk manager
They should enhance the service desk manager's service point function to be more customizable. Presently, there are so many limitations in this particular UI. Thus, similar to the existing UI, they should provide a customization source for this new UI. It could turn out to be very good for the end-user experience.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Its integration features, orchestration features, and discovery tools are the most valuable. It is also pretty stable, and it can be as scalable as you want."
"The dashboard and the reporting functionality are the solution's most valuable features."
"The dashboard is very useful to get a quick overview of current tasks."
"All our activities are carried out in the one place."
"Clear processes with transparent responsibilities led to more efficiencies within the teams."
"The most valuable features are problem management and change management."
"The integration between the ticketing and knowledge is huge, because that is a best practice. The knowledge is great. It is simple but efficient, and it works.​"
"Being able to specify event rules and SLAs that can help to automate some of the processes that people are doing manually is valuable."
"It improves our service delivery process. We're more efficient. We're leveraging the ticketing system, which is always more efficient, so we can measure and improve."
"Our users access it via the web. We have external and internal sources, and we're now introducing the mobile app portion so our computer engineers can respond to tickets remotely."
"The in-service catalog is quite useful."
"All the interactions and orchestrations of every problem, we can analyze what happens in the organization and which kind of incident we have."
"The initial setup is pretty straightforward."
"When users have a problem, they report using Service Desk and it is very useful for this."
 

Cons

"Access is only available if we're on VPN."
"Application service mapping, GRC, SecOps, and things like that need improvement."
"The stability, specifically in the on-premises deployment model, could be improved."
"Areas for improvement would be the service catalog and customer catalog, which is not very user-friendly. The shopping cart experience is also terrible - you submit and go straight to the cart, you can't continue shopping or see your overall cost."
"Although I wasn't involved in the initial setup I have been involved with upgrades. They have been fairly complex. We've had some issues with upgrades where we had to roll back and get some things fixed. Some things that we ended up tracking back to not following directions right, but then other things we've run into issues."
"Needs custom dashboards, without them it takes too long to view some information (though xFlow is an improvement)."
"More user experience in the look and feel of the application. ​"
"​Compared to some of the other products, I think we are bit behind​.​"
"The API is very, very bad so we developed our own."
"I am not able to see tickets on a bigger scale. I can't see the overall bigger picture."
"The cost of this solution is too high, which is why we're leaving."
"The upgrade was pretty complex."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"For an ITIL user, the cost is probably about 50 bucks a month."
"There is a subscripted needed to use Clarity SM. The price of the solution could be less expensive. ServiceNow is less expensive and BMC Helix is priced similar to Clarity SM."
"It is a bit expensive, but you definitely get what you pay for. It is worth it!"
"I don't see anyone other than large companies being able to afford this system."
"Clarity offers a perpetual license. Customers purchase the license once and then pay for maintenance. CA provides a subscription model as well. Both models are available for our customers."
"I think pricing of this model is suitable for growing corporations."
"The solution is quite reasonable compared to other solutions in the market."
"The pricing is based on a subscription model."
"Pricing is simple, as it’s per concurrent analysts."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Energy/Utilities Company
11%
Healthcare Company
10%
Marketing Services Firm
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Media Company
8%
Performing Arts
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise66
 

Also Known As

No data available
CA Service Desk Manager, Clarity Service Management, CA Service Management, Unicenter Service Desk, CA SDM, CA Service Catalog, CA Business Service Insight
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Ausenco, Highlights for Children, B/E Aerospace
Banco G&T Continental City of Perth, FEMSA, Fujitsu, Manpower, Muslim Commercial Bank - MCB, Punjab National Bank, Santa Clara County Social Services, Stefanini
Find out what your peers are saying about Cherwell Service Management vs. Clarity SM and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
884,797 professionals have used our research since 2012.