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Qualys VMDR vs ServiceNow CMDB comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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

Qualys VMDR
Ranking in Configuration Management Databases
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
96
Ranking in other categories
IT Asset Management (3rd), Vulnerability Management (3rd), Container Security (9th), Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (1st)
ServiceNow CMDB
Ranking in Configuration Management Databases
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
34
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Configuration Management Databases category, the mindshare of Qualys VMDR is 7.7%, up from 4.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ServiceNow CMDB is 21.6%, down from 35.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Configuration Management Databases Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
ServiceNow CMDB21.6%
Qualys VMDR7.7%
Other70.7%
Configuration Management Databases
 

Featured Reviews

Vaibhav Ghule - PeerSpot reviewer
Soc Lead & Edr Administration at Persistent Systems
Continuous risk-based monitoring has strengthened incident response and vulnerability prioritization
I haven't explored Qualys VMDR's vulnerability lifecycle automation yet. One of my analysts mentioned that queries lack grouping operators in Qualys VMDR. From my experience, I would appreciate improvements in the query options in Qualys VMDR, specifically in the query-building process where I would need more features and operators. Additionally, we have been facing issues with Qualys on the cloud level. We cannot download the configuration profile from the cloud agent, and it is showing a pending action for download. During 2025, we noticed outages of Qualys a couple of times. I want to mention that there is an issue with receiving timely RCA deliveries. While this is not necessarily about the tool, it relates to support. The support has not been very responsive, and we are receiving RCAs a little delayed whenever we raise support cases or communicate with the TAMs. Additionally, the UI has a slight latency, which I and my team have experienced. They have also reported this latency issue when navigating through different pages.
reviewer2782440 - PeerSpot reviewer
ServiceNow Consultant at a consultancy with 11-50 employees
Automation features and integrated service mapping have streamlined incident and change management processes
There is probably room for improvement in ServiceNow CMDB. I'm so immersed in projects and solving direct customer issues that I don't think too much about potential improvements. Maintaining an accurate and up-to-date ServiceNow CMDB can be challenging due to incoming data from various sources, but ServiceNow has been developing small AI components to help with data discrepancies and deduplication recently. They have also improved integrations with other tools, providing many out-of-the-box integrations to different monitoring tools and CMDBs, which previously required coding experience for custom integrations. They are moving towards a more low-code or no-code approach, which is part of their goal as a company.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product's patch management is excellent for keeping our critical servers and third-party applications updated efficiently."
"I would recommend Qualys because it is a reliable, affordable, and very safe product."
"We use QualysGuard to identify all network and compliance-related violations of the assets, and the detailed reports have helped us to provide a certificate of compliance or a clean sheet for our vendors."
"I find the most valuable features are the continuous monitoring. Even on premises, there is constant monitoring."
"Before we were taking eight hours, now we're taking around 30 minutes to respond to any incident, security and such."
"It's been the chosen solution year after year for vulnerability management and our vulnerability management program is centered around this tool."
"The best features of Qualys VMDR are its patch management capabilities and the ability to mitigate vulnerabilities automatically."
"The most valuable feature is the vulnerability assessment."
"The stability is about the same as other platforms; it's not perfect, but it's pretty good, and the scalability of the solution is good."
"The most valuable feature of ServiceNow is the user interface because you can customize or configure it directly from the user interface by using the mouse. It is easy to use even for non-IT people. You can also directly plug your ServiceNow instance within your Microsoft Active Directory and then retrieve all your users and groups. So, you can use the users and groups to put automation inside the application. When you have new hires, you can automate the group security and group attribution. It is very good in terms of performance. Its performance is almost 100%. Once, it took less than two minutes to back up and run an instance. It has very good reliability."
"It has helped in tracking hardware and software and reducing overall costs."
"We were previously using spreadsheets to keep track of everything. ServiceNow CMDB has enabled us to consolidate all this information into one place, which helps with audits and reporting. It also improves visibility."
"We like that this solution allows us to easily track the relationship between our CI and the IT asset module, for troubleshooting purposes, or to check the impact of an incident site."
"The most valuable feature of ServiceNow CMDB is that it provides transparency and tracking of CI usage across multiple process owners or service owners."
"The CMDB for us is fed by our discovery tools, and it lets us be able to track the changes that we make to any incidents or escalation points that we have associated with a CI."
"It integrates with so many different things. ServiceNow CMDB assisted us in streamlining multiple processes."
 

Cons

"Every time they make a change, it's not always super smooth, and it's a little quirky with bugs sometimes."
"What we have found is that the solution is not closely tied with the patch management. It is okay with newer ones, like Windows 10 machines; it gives the correct patch. But for Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008, it does not give us the correct patch so we have to manually identify the patches. This is a major problem."
"From the application security perspective, Qualys has a way to go."
"Sometimes we face a problem with accessing the tool and not getting an expected result. From a technology point of view, they need to look into this."
"One of the biggest issues from the clients' perspective is that all Qualys computing is on the cloud."
"I am not happy with the technical support because I had a very bad experience with them."
"It would be nice to have an all-in-one solution that was automated and could handle the scanning and reports as well as the patching and updating."
"I do not like that all of the data is stored on the cloud."
"The initial setup can be very bad if the roadmap is not set up properly. You need a specialist to help you set up the roadmap."
"Integration is complicated and requires advance scripting and customization to complete it. It would be good to have the ability to customize the UI."
"There are areas that could be improved, but that's a longer discussion. It all depends on what you are looking to do with it and then it becomes an issue of how do you configure the CMDB accordingly."
"There are some gaps in the technologies that can be solved. Operational technology isn't quite 100% there yet, but I hear it is on the roadmap. I would also like it to be cheaper."
"If you have multiple tools that are going to ingest data into the CMDB, you need to be careful of what rules we write to ensure that they fall in place."
"In general, the pain points are related to ServiceNow. There is a lack of development. ServiceNow is not a true configuration management tool."
"Definitely, the price needs to be lower because there are clients that I work with who cannot afford ServiceNow. I have to end up proposing alternate solutions to fit their budget."
"The solution is scalable, however, there is some room for improvement regarding the vCenter and the Virtual Machine Center, for which we are actually struggling right now."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing and licensing for Qualys could be improved."
"The pricing is very competitive."
"There is a license for the use of this solution. We pay annually instead of monthly to receive a better discount on the price."
"Qualys is a pay-as-you-go model, so there's flexibility to the pricing."
"Qualys Virtual Scanner Appliance isn't expensive right now. But the price for their product bundles could be better."
"The tool's pricing is expensive and I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten."
"The solution is costly."
"We do see over $100,000 in terms of price, for mid-size programs. You likely will pay more than $100,000 without any discount. It is a bit pricey."
"The product is pricey."
"It is really expensive. I don't know actually how much it costs, but in 2016, when a client decided to move from an old solution to ServiceNow and had to choose a supplier for ServiceNow, I had heard that it could cost $10 per hour, which is really expensive. I am not aware of any additional fees to the standard licensing fees. There is no standard ServiceNow solution. When a company wants to acquire ServiceNow, they already know which module they will choose. In a basic package, you would have Service Catalog, Incident Management, and Change Management. These modules are usually required in an IT company."
"In comparison to the cost of other solutions, you get value for your money with ServiceNow CMDB. It could definitely be cheaper though."
"It is always fluctuating. It seems to change every six months. Every time they come out with a new iteration, it changes. It is pretty complicated, and they should improve it."
"The market sees ServiceNow as the Ferrari in terms of pricing. It's at the very top, and its cost is very, very high."
"The product price falls on the higher side of the spectrum."
"I would like it to be cheaper. If you've got a large environment, it can get quite expensive quite quickly. You still get a return on investment, but everybody has a tight budget. In terms of licensing, everything is pretty much known upfront. Being SaaS-based, there are no real additional gotchas that we came across."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
Government
6%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
8%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise12
Large Enterprise70
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise23
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Qualys VMDR?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing shows that we can consider both time and money saved.
What needs improvement with Qualys VMDR?
I haven't explored Qualys VMDR's vulnerability lifecycle automation yet. One of my analysts mentioned that queries lack grouping operators in Qualys VMDR. From my experience, I would appreciate imp...
What advice do you have for others considering Qualys VMDR?
I have some understanding about PeerSpot, and I have visited the website. PeerSpot is similar to TrustRadius. It takes reviews from customers or end users who are using the tools and technologies i...
What needs improvement with ServiceNow CMDB?
I believe that related to the solutions in the Now Assist platform, we can put more autonomy on that. Some reconciliation can be automated. AI Assist is the current improvement now. I don't have an...
What is your primary use case for ServiceNow CMDB?
I primarily work with ITSM, HR, SPM, AI, Now Assist, CMDB, and CSDM modules, covering almost all of these areas. I use the integration with ServiceNow CMDB with all the processes that we have imple...
What advice do you have for others considering ServiceNow CMDB?
I help customers evaluate their CMDB health. We use the CMDB health to make that analysis, to see the relationships, what is missing with the processes they have, and any mis-ownership issues. So, ...
 

Also Known As

Qualys VM, QualysGuard VM, Qualys Asset Inventory, Qualys Container Security
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Agrokor Group, American Specialty Health, American State Bank, Arval, Life:), Axway, Bank of the West, Blueport Commerce, BSkyB, Brinks, CaixaBank, Cartagena, Catholic Health System, CEC Bank, Cegedim, CIGNA, Clickability, Colby-Sawyer College, Commercial Bank of Dubai, University of Utah, eBay Inc., ING Singapore, National Theatre, OTP Bank, Sodexo, WebEx
Wayfair, Siemens, Allianz, Experian, Vitas Healthcare
Find out what your peers are saying about Qualys VMDR vs. ServiceNow CMDB and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
900,747 professionals have used our research since 2012.