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IBM Maximo vs ServiceNow 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

IBM Maximo
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) (1st), Billing Software (5th)
ServiceNow
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
224
Ranking in other categories
Help Desk Software (1st), IT Asset Management (1st), IT Service Management (ITSM) (1st), Rapid Application Development Software (2nd), No-Code Development Platforms (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

IBM Maximo and ServiceNow aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. IBM Maximo is designed for Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) and holds a mindshare of 15.4%, down 27.8% compared to last year.
ServiceNow, on the other hand, focuses on IT Service Management (ITSM), holds 15.9% mindshare, down 24.8% since last year.
Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM Maximo15.4%
Oracle Enterprise Asset Management8.5%
IFS Cloud Platform7.0%
Other69.1%
Enterprise Asset Management (EAM)
IT Service Management (ITSM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
ServiceNow15.9%
JIRA Service Management7.3%
BMC Helix ITSM5.7%
Other71.1%
IT Service Management (ITSM)
 

Featured Reviews

DM
Maximo Developer at Volvo Cars
Centralized asset tracking has reduced paperwork and now improves maintenance efficiency
The best features IBM Maximo offers are that it is a comprehensive tool where we can get the purchasing of assets or spare parts in the same application. The reports are also very good. Additionally, the barcodes are valuable. We can print barcodes for all things we need. The UI also has a very strong appearance. We use the reporting feature very often. We have multiple reports, not just one. For each module, there are multiple reports and we can customize the reports based on our needs. For example, for a work order, we can print a report which gives all the details so that it is easy to carry out the steps required to fix the issue. There are also barcodes for items which we can paste on a bin or the item so it can be scanned with a barcode scanner, which is very easy. IBM Maximo has positively impacted my organization because it reduced a lot of time and has saved a lot of cost. For example, prior to IBM Maximo, we were doing only paperwork. Now that we have IBM Maximo in place, it is useful for tracking all assets and everything in a single solution with no data loss. Previously, multiple people handled this work, but now very few people do. This has helped us significantly.
SP
General Manager at sPerception IT
Adopting flexible workflows with customized automation delivers measurable benefits
There are things that I would like to see improved in ServiceNow, such as the pricing, as it is a very costly solution compared to other tools. Additionally, its presence in the local market is very limited; in Pakistan, for example, I don't see any vendor or distributor of ServiceNow available. They need to increase their sales spectrum globally so people can easily access them and engage them for client meetings and more. From a functionality perspective, the features in ServiceNow are acceptable as, at the moment, the ITSM modules rank highly, being 13 plus Pink Elephant certified, which is a good aspect to have. When providing advice to users, I would suggest they consider making strategic decisions about their per user pricing since it is very high. In our region, people normally start with 5 to 10 users, but the per user price is quite steep. Moreover, ServiceNow does not charge based on data uploaded or downloaded, so they should reconsider their pricing and data policies to align better with the financial capabilities of the region.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The Preventive Maintenance feature, especially in its inspection routines and KPI abilities, is valuable."
"Its capabilities let us organize our work."
"The most valuable features are the ability to create work orders and preventative maintenance."
"I have found Work Order management the most valuable feature. Additionally, it is a very robust and powerful solution."
"The most powerful features are the database and integration with CMDB."
"They have a real strength of tracking the asset itself along with the condition of the asset, the maintenance of the asset and who has access to the asset, etc."
"We are very thankful to have IBM integrated with our own Legacy cloud-based system"
"It is configurable, where you can add extra fields to screens and to the database."
"Flexibility is the most valuable feature of ServiceNow, that is, being able to modify it to do what we need it to do."
"ServiceNow is a very powerful tool that can perform a lot of different functions."
"For change management, I find the CAB workbench very useful. I haven't seen any other solution that has a CAB workbench or advanced automated solutions for a change advisory board. ServiceNow also has the Workflow Engine which works very well and is very intuitive."
"Very easy to implement and to respond to my clients' needs."
"ServiceNow provides quite good insights about what is happening in the organization."
"If you stick to the out-of-the-box solution, it's an easy setup."
"There are many expansions available."
"I like the incident module, which is useful for tracking your incidents and other things. It is a reliable solution."
 

Cons

"You can get lost using the application"
"Could use some alignment regarding some standards and the tracking of the IT assets. Even though they have all of the information (i.e. where are the assets, who owns the asset, etc.), they were not mapping it to different cyber standards."
"The standard reports that shipped with the package need to be enriched with more advanced reports, especially for the Inventory Management sections."
"It needs full-service visibility. There are a lot of things that are hard for users to find out. For example, the Service Catalog is not too friendly. You really have to know what you're looking for."
"The interface is not very easy or user-friendly and is in need of improvement."
"Initial setup is a longer process because Maximo is bigger and has more processes."
"Revision management of file attachments."
"It's quite reliable, but new versions often are not too stable. They bring in enhancements but they break other stuff."
"Like all other IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS subscription cloud providers, ServiceNow is constantly improving by building new capabilities to expand the breadth and depth of its offerings while increasing its activities with partners to build more capabilities."
"I do not like the user interface."
"ServiceNow's customization is not too agile in those cases; it takes a little bit of time."
"The licensing needs to be divided into tiers in order to attract lower-level users."
"ServiceNow doesn't cater to the Middle Eastern market."
"The asset management application could be improved. They have a lot of the infrastructure built, but it does not come with already made compatibility with some of the most popular vendors, such as Cisco and Microsoft. You have to fix it yourself."
"The customer service of the product right now isn't very good. It's an aspect they really need to improve."
"It's missing monitoring capabilities."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Explore the possibility of using DB2. You will avoid the cost of SQL Server or Oracle licenses."
"Where available, concurrent licenses can be more cost efficient and provide more flexibility."
"I do not know about the price of the solution. However, this has been an expensive project overall."
"On a scale from one to ten, where one is low and ten is high, I rate the pricing a nine. The price is very high."
"You pay for what you get. There are lots of options depending on how you would like to implement Maximo."
"IBM Maximo offers a licensing application, and you have to comply with the license."
"IBM has changed the licensing policy. As I understand now, they are going from a complex way of licensing to a more simple way of licensing."
"​Explore internal processes in order to evaluate the correct number of users in each Maximo module, then evaluate the different offers of pricing and licensing.​"
"It is fairly expensive."
"ServiceNow's pricing is comparatively higher than Helix's."
"It's sold as a less expensive solution, but it has to be highly modified. That's where you get into the cost."
"They could be more competitive with their licensing."
"The licenses are expensive."
"Certainly, from a product-platform perspective, the price is not too bad."
"I'm not aware of any additional costs. I'm pretty sure that the current client is paying just the licensing fee per user. I do know that they've got some support agreement with ServiceNow, but I don't think that is broken out or specific to Project Management. It is just inclusive."
"The price could be a little lower for the solution. Many of my customers have issues with the licensing process, they have to make it easier and straightforward."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Government
12%
Energy/Utilities Company
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise19
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business55
Midsize Enterprise35
Large Enterprise166
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IBM Maximo?
IBM Maximo can be improved by providing developers with more documentation. I think IBM lacks a lot of documentation and hopefully the community who uses IBM Maximo can help if other developers hav...
What is your primary use case for IBM Maximo?
My main use case for IBM Maximo is as a technical consultant, so I help companies to use IBM Maximo. A quick, specific example of how I've helped a company use IBM Maximo is that it is quite generi...
What advice do you have for others considering IBM Maximo?
IBM Maximo in their last version includes mobility functionalities which can use the offline mode for technicians that do not have internet connection, and that is really helpful for them. Addition...
Which solution is better for developing non-ITSM applications: OutSystems or Service Now?
The short answer is that OutSystems is far better for 2 main reasons. Firstly, with Service Now you are locked into that platform for good. The business model is to lock in and then keep pumping th...
Would you choose ServiceNow over Microsoft PowerApps?
Hi Netanya, I will choose ServiceNow because ServiceNow is a very good tool compared to Microsoft PowerApp. Because ServiceNow has a very strong module (Performance Analysis) reporting which will ...
What do you like most about ServiceNow?
The solution has a user-friendly interface.
 

Also Known As

Maximo
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Royal Boskalis Westminster N.V., DTE Energy, Swedish Match, Projetech, Fingrid, East Coast
AAA, AstraZeneca, Becton, Dickinson and Company, Broadcom, Christus Health, Epicor, Equinix, GE Capital, Intuit, KPMG, Loyola Marymount University, OshKosh, Quantas, RedHat, Royal Bank of Scotland, Swiss Re, U.S. Department of Energy, Safeway, Yale University, and Zillow    
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM, Prometheus Group, Infor and others in Enterprise Asset Management (EAM). Updated: January 2026.
881,707 professionals have used our research since 2012.