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ServiceNow Security Operations vs Splunk Security Essentials comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 2, 2025

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

ServiceNow Security Operations
Ranking in Security Incident Response
1st
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
Security Orchestration Automation and Response (SOAR) (9th), Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (12th)
Splunk Security Essentials
Ranking in Security Incident Response
10th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
4.8
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (14th), IT Alerting and Incident Management (14th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Security Incident Response category, the mindshare of ServiceNow Security Operations is 8.8%, down from 14.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Splunk Security Essentials is 2.7%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Security Incident Response Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
ServiceNow Security Operations8.8%
Splunk Security Essentials2.7%
Other88.5%
Security Incident Response
 

Featured Reviews

Suhel Khan - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Consultant (Siem Admin) at IBM
Precise incident handling has improved reporting and searching across complex security cases
I would like to see new features added, particularly regarding the incident upgrading part. For instance, if you have an instance and need to transfer it to a particular team, being able to show that the status is still in progress, which is currently in a beta version, would definitely help people to understand that the status has changed for the incident.
reviewer2836941 - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant Manager at a tech services company with 1-10 employees
Centralized monitoring has given our SOC real-time visibility into security and application activity
When I first implemented Splunk Security Essentials in this environment, it took a week for each log source to onboard and to create use cases and implement the data model, CIM, etc., for production readiness. Training is mandatory, and we need at least the Splunk Security Essentials User certification because it is a very critical resource in the organization, as we are handling security logs. In my organization, Splunk Security Essentials is used not only by the SOC but also for monitoring logs across different teams, as it is important for handling both security and application logs, given its capability to manage unstructured logs. Splunk Security Essentials has dramatically impacted my organization, as without it, we were blind to what is happening from both a security and application perspective, and it provides vital visibility into the organization's operations.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable aspect of working with ServiceNow is its meaningful and feature-rich product."
"Multiple projects use the ServiceNow tool because it is a low-cost and open-source tool."
"The ease of use is great."
"The most valuable features are service management and case management, and ServiceNow Security Operations also takes care of problem management as well as GRC, governance, risk, and compliance, enabling it to provide risk assessment."
"It's stable."
"ServiceNow Security Operations provides significant control over vulnerabilities, allowing users to mark false alarms as false positives and ignore them, which is important because many vulnerabilities are not real but appear as such."
"The product has a very simple UI, I like the look and feel, and I find it very easy to navigate."
"The product has a very simple UI."
"Splunk Security Essentials has impacted my organization in that we have been getting the results that we wanted."
"The network monitoring feature is particularly valuable for gathering information about users, login times, and other statistics."
"I would have to rate Splunk Security Essentials a 10 out of 10 because it's free and there's tons of usable content."
"They have a good catalog of plans to use to resist the attacks."
"We are focusing on security to ensure incidents are reported efficiently. In addition to that, for reporting purposes, we are utilizing our dashboards or creating new ones. We will be using free visualization tools for this purpose."
"Splunk Security Essentials has dramatically impacted my organization, as without it, we were blind to what is happening from both a security and application perspective, and it provides vital visibility into the organization's operations."
 

Cons

"There is room for improvement in terms of developer support and documentation."
"A one-year delay from their go-live date is a bit too long."
"They should stick to the roadmap and continue to build plugins and integrations with other third parties, enhance the UI, and enhance the reporting. It's all good. They should just continue enhancing the releases."
"Report generation within ServiceNow can take some time. Additionally, there are occasional issues when raising a ticket, which can also consume time."
"ServiceNow Security Operations is not specifically a vulnerability management or incident tool, but rather a data aggregator."
"The product of ServiceNow Security Operations needs more features. The product is called SecOps, but it is not security operations in terms of SIEM solutions."
"One area for improvement for the product is the need to tailor and alter some codes for customization, which can cause issues during upgrades. It does not support customized operations."
"The solution needs to make customization easier. You cannot do much customization immediately. It requires an extensive workload. If the customization process was user-friendly, it would be much better."
"The biggest friction points I have with Splunk Security Essentials are the high license costs and user behavior that causes performance issues due to inappropriate wildcard searches."
"If I could change one thing about Splunk Security Essentials, it would be pricing. I believe they are still very costly as compared to the competition."
"The reporting feature needs to be more user-friendly."
"The price could be improved."
"It takes a lot of time to install Splunk Security Essentials. It's not very difficult, but it requires time."
"They could add more AI content or AI and machine learning."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product is more expensive than other solutions."
"The solution is more expensive than BMC Remedy, the other ITSM tool available in the market."
"If you're going to implement it on your own, there would be internal costs. If you're going to implement it through a contractor or consultant, you have to pay for that."
"This product is a good value for the money."
"It is an expensive product."
"Compared to competitor tools, ServiceNow Security Operations is more affordable"
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Comms Service Provider
6%
Government
6%
Construction Company
19%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Healthcare Company
8%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise17
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ServiceNow Security Operations?
In my opinion, the pricing is quite affordable considering the features, and I do not find it expensive. I would not call it cheap; rather, I am looking at it as a product owner.
What needs improvement with ServiceNow Security Operations?
I would like to see new features added, particularly regarding the incident upgrading part. For instance, if you have an instance and need to transfer it to a particular team, being able to show th...
What advice do you have for others considering ServiceNow Security Operations?
For someone looking to use ServiceNow Security Operations, I recommend that they read about the documentation and spend one or two hours familiarizing themselves with FortiGating, and that will be ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Splunk Security Essentials?
Our SecOps manager and CISO were more familiar with Splunk, and the price was right. That was probably the primary driver, and we did evaluation as well with strict criteria and Gartner ratings.
What needs improvement with Splunk Security Essentials?
The biggest friction points I have with Splunk Security Essentials are the high license costs and user behavior that causes performance issues due to inappropriate wildcard searches. Additionally, ...
What is your primary use case for Splunk Security Essentials?
My main use case for Splunk Security Essentials is for Enterprise Security, specifically the ES app. Splunk Security Essentials is my primary tool for threat detection and monitoring because as a S...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

DXC Technology, Freedom Security Alliance, Prime Therapeutics, Seton Hall University, York Risk Services
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about ServiceNow Security Operations vs. Splunk Security Essentials and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
908,800 professionals have used our research since 2012.