SCSM vs Zendesk comparison

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SCSM

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

SCSM and Zendesk compete in the IT service management category. Zendesk often has the upper hand due to its focus on user-friendliness and multi-channel customer engagement capabilities.

Features: SCSM stands out with its integration with Microsoft products, advanced configuration management, and robust support for ITIL processes like incident and change management. Zendesk excels in ticket management, provides a highly customizable agent workflow, and offers extensive integration with SaaS applications and tools.

Room for Improvement: SCSM needs improvements in user-friendliness, reporting customization, and non-Microsoft product integration. Zendesk can improve its email handling, customization for reports, and make multi-brand management more intuitive.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: SCSM requires intensive on-premises deployment but has good cloud integration options with Microsoft. Zendesk, with its cloud deployment, offers quick setup and scalability, with generally responsive support that may need enhancement in complex technical issues.

Pricing and ROI: SCSM offers competitive pricing within Microsoft's licensing agreements; however, ROI is best for those heavily invested in Microsoft's ecosystem. Zendesk's pricing involves per-agent fees, which can be costly, but delivers a strong ROI by enhancing customer satisfaction and efficiency.

To learn more, read our detailed SCSM vs. Zendesk Report (Updated: January 2026).

SCSM vs. Zendesk

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Helped 881,082 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:

ROI

Sentiment score

6.0

SCSM offers high ROI by saving time via remote operations, despite reporting issues and limited feature enhancements.

Sentiment score

6.0

Zendesk provides significant ROI with cost savings, productivity boosts, and improved efficiency through better ticket management and supportive sales team.

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the SCSM report

I can tell you that we probably saved at least three employees full-time with the ticket management and the automation and the macros and the user follow-up being built in.

For more quotes and insights, download the Zendesk report

Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises

Time saved is definitely a benefit because it puts all of our tickets in one spot.

reviewer2795478

Technical Solutions Lead at a computer software company with 51-200 employees

I feel that Zendesk helped us set up our platform for providing support way faster than other platforms due to its easy configuration.

Filipe Abreu

Junior system analyst at Wevt clous

Customer Service

Sentiment score

6.3

Microsoft's SCSM support is responsive and professional, but users cite inconsistent resolution times and reliance on partners.

Sentiment score

6.2

Zendesk support is praised for responsiveness and availability but criticized for slow responses and lack of personal interaction.

Response times are slow, and engineers often lack the necessary product knowledge.

UX Manager at a computer software company with 5,001-10,000 employees

When we get up to Microsoft, I would rate it an eight or nine.

For more quotes and insights, download the SCSM report

Director Metropolitano de Gobierno Digital at a government with 10,001+ employees

There appears to be a lack of connection between the bot and the agents, making it feel scripted rather than helpful.

Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees

The technical support provided by Zendesk has been very satisfactory.

For more quotes and insights, download the Zendesk report

CEO at Etcetera Networks

Their support team from Zendesk is excellent, similar to what you have in Freshdesk.

Anita Orioma

Customer Success Manager at Mimshackworks Endeavors

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score

7.2

SCSM is scalable, adaptable, integrates well, but may have issues with slowness and complexity in larger implementations.

Sentiment score

7.2

Zendesk is adaptable and scalable for diverse organizations, handling growth well but posing challenges in cost and customization.

From an admin point of view, Intune has more features and is easier to manage.

For more quotes and insights, download the SCSM report

UX Manager at a computer software company with 5,001-10,000 employees

We have not hit a peak or a turn yet that Zendesk has not been able to go with us or been able to grow with us in the process, change or pivot that the company is making.

Dimitri Cooper

Project Manager III at City of Union City Government

Zendesk can scale from very small companies to very large ones.

CEO at Etcetera Networks

Zendesk's scalability is excellent.

For more quotes and insights, download the Zendesk report

Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees

Stability Issues

Sentiment score

7.3

SCSM is highly reliable, with improved stability in recent versions and performance rated between eight and ten.

Sentiment score

7.8

Zendesk is reliable and stable, with minor issues and rare outages, communicated promptly via Twitter, ideal for small businesses.

The SCSM is stable.

For more quotes and insights, download the SCSM report

Director Metropolitano de Gobierno Digital at a government with 10,001+ employees

They are always informing us with a status update and an ETA, and the turnaround time is usually within the same day with no extended downtime that would cause a detriment to our company.

Dimitri Cooper

Project Manager III at City of Union City Government

Zendesk is quite stable; we experience major outages only once or twice a year, making it very reliable.

Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees

The stability has been quite reliable.

For more quotes and insights, download the Zendesk report

CEO at Etcetera Networks

Room For Improvement

SCSM's Self-Service portal is criticized for lack of usability, integration, mobile support, and user-friendly features.

Zendesk users seek enhancements like efficient ticket merging, advanced reporting, better integrations, improved usability, and AI features.

From an admin point of view, Intune has more features and is easier to manage compared to SCCM.

UX Manager at a computer software company with 5,001-10,000 employees

We have to always try to hire some maintenance hours from external companies to fix small things that maybe would be faster if we could get it in-house, but because of the lack of information, we lose a lot of time solving some small problems.

For more quotes and insights, download the SCSM report

Director Metropolitano de Gobierno Digital at a government with 10,001+ employees

Zendesk could actually support HTML on the tickets so we could format our text better than the current options such as size, bold, italic, or underscored, because the text processing is too simple.

Filipe Abreu

Junior system analyst at Wevt clous

Zendesk is missing an AI aspect that could help provide quick answers based on the knowledge housed within the platform.

For more quotes and insights, download the Zendesk report

Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees

Zendesk is amazing, and because they are always working on a new upgrade or a new integration, they are very forward-thinking from an engineering perspective.

Dimitri Cooper

Project Manager III at City of Union City Government

Setup Cost

Enterprise buyers find SCSM pricing competitive but complex, influenced by licensing models, integration requirements, and additional support costs.

Zendesk's pricing is high but flexible, justified by its value in saving time and enhancing customer experience.

No quotes available

For more quotes and insights, download the SCSM report

It is not the cheapest solution nor the most expensive, but it provides value for money.

CEO at Etcetera Networks

The experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Zendesk was quite expensive.

For more quotes and insights, download the Zendesk report

Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises

Valuable Features

SCSM is a scalable, user-friendly IT service management platform with integration, reporting, and security features ideal for ITIL processes.

Zendesk enhances productivity with customizable ticket management, CRM integrations, automation, and multi-channel support for improved customer satisfaction.

SCCM provides remote tool functionality, which is not in Intune.

UX Manager at a computer software company with 5,001-10,000 employees

If it is correctly configured, you can access and give service quickly to all the end users.

For more quotes and insights, download the SCSM report

Director Metropolitano de Gobierno Digital at a government with 10,001+ employees

It allows us to handle more support cases with fewer people due to its advanced artificial intelligence capabilities.

CEO at Etcetera Networks

Zendesk is way cheaper than other ITSM platforms such as ServiceNow, providing a good platform at a lower price so we could offer good support with a low budget for the license.

Filipe Abreu

Junior system analyst at Wevt clous

Being able to put response counters on certain tickets and have certain ones that are high priority and have a tighter SLA than lower priority items, being able to categorize them as a question versus an urgent request, and being able to bucket them as feature requests or product enhancements.

For more quotes and insights, download the Zendesk report

Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises

Categories and Ranking

SCSM

Ranking in Help Desk Software

10th

Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)

10th

Average Rating

7.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Zendesk

Ranking in Help Desk Software

4th

Ranking in IT Service Management (ITSM)

6th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

CRM Customer Engagement Centers (4th), CRM (8th), Sales Force Automation (4th), Reporting (10th), Knowledge Management Software (3rd), Community Platforms (1st), AI Customer Support (7th), AI IT Support (7th)

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of SCSM is 1.9%, up from 1.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zendesk is 5.1%, up from 4.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Help Desk Software Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Zendesk	5.1%
SCSM	1.9%
Other	93.0%

Help Desk Software

Featured Reviews

Current setup enables smooth problem-solving but lacks comprehensive guidance and local support

Director Metropolitano de Gobierno Digital at a government with 10,001+ employees

More information about setup procedures and a more user-friendly front end would be beneficial. We need more information for setup processes. It is difficult to do the work independently, requiring us to hire external companies for maintenance hours to fix small issues that could be resolved faster in-house if we had better information. We have been looking for an upgrade version, but finding local service has been difficult. It has been challenging trying to get things done. Speaking with the Microsoft office, we found there are no local companies with substantial experience with SCSM. What we have now was installed five or six years ago. It has been difficult to change configurations and look for upgrades, even with all the manuals. Our office is considering moving away from SCSM and getting a service desk solution outside of Microsoft. For me, it has been a good tool to get help and solve internal problems in the office. It is a very good tool, but the difficulty in getting local service or more information is pushing us to look for another tool.

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Macros and automation have streamlined workflows and reduced manual effort across support teams

Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises

The ability to communicate on the Zendesk ticket through the actual user software, so TOPs, would have been helpful. Somehow seeing a user's ticket history within our app would have been beneficial. That is the only thing that I do not think existed at the time that might have been helpful. Some people struggled with Zendesk, but it was always easy enough to show them how to use it and what they were missing. The only times we really had people report concerns about it was when they did not understand that it could do that or how to use it in that way.

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Government

19%

Manufacturing Company

University

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

Performing Arts

Computer Software Company

Outsourcing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	8
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	14

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	36
Midsize Enterprise	21
Large Enterprise	11

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about SCSM?

The solution offers good productivity at a low price point.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SCSM?

I am not sure about the pricing as I do not have experience with it.

What needs improvement with SCSM?

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?

From what I recall, the experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Zendesk was quite expensive and that is what prohibited us from expanding usage of it into more users and using more o...

What needs improvement with Zendesk Support?

I wish there was a more easily dynamic tool. Currently, it is quite difficult because not all the tools are labeled. A feature that would be beneficial is if hovering over an icon would tell you wh...

ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus vs SCSM

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Spiceworks vs SCSM

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JIRA Service Management vs Zendesk

Compared 6% of the time

Freshservice vs Zendesk

Compared 6% of the time

NICE CXone vs Zendesk

Compared 3% of the time

BMC Helix ITSM vs Zendesk

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

SCSM

Download SCSM product report

Download Zendesk product report

Also Known As

System Center Service Manager

Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell

Overview

System Center Service Manager is a software product by Microsoft to allow organizations to manage incidents and problems. Microsoft states that the product is compliant with industry best practices such as the Microsoft Operations Framework (MOF) and in the Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL). SCSM has integrated ITIL compliant fulfillment of service requests. Service requests are submitted by the end user in order to obtain information, access to a new application or the most common of all, password reset.

Microsoft

Zendesk Support is intuitive, and it's built with support agents in mind. Everything they need lives in a single, dynamic help desk interface so it's easy to be productive and manage customer interactions.

Sample Customers

Fibabanka, UMC Health System

Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber

SCSM vs. Zendesk