We review products independently, but we may earn affiliate commissions from buying links on this page. Terms of use. ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 from ManageEngine is a strong entry among the helpdesk software solutions we've looked at, especially for advanced features such as change management. It is available in a free version, but get in touch with ManageEngine for a price estimate of the cloud version that will suit your needs. ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 offers strong functionality, especially with a focus on internal Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) tasks, but it's geared more toward enterprises rather than small to midsize businesses (SMBs). It does offer a version of ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 specifically for managed service providers (MSPs) though. ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 was too complex to use compared with our Editors' Choice winners Freshdesk, HappyFox, and the feature-comparable Vivantio Pro. That said, ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 still earns a 4.0 Editors' Rating for its plethora of features and simple-to-access menu bar. Helpdesk Features For testing purposes, we stuck with ServiceDesk Plus 9.3's free Standard version, which encapsulates its core helpdesk functionality. One thing that's apparent is, while ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 has a clean and modern UI design, the back end of our tested installation was all about client-server. You can enable a web-based, self-service portal of sorts by combining ServiceDesk Plus 9.3's application programming interface (API) with a web form, but that results only in a URL to a data-entry form. Users who go this route won't see the ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 knowledge base (if you've opted to set that up) or other self-service tools, unless they choose to further flesh out the web form. (Again, ManageEngine has another product called "SupportCenter Plus" that does provide customer support features, including billing via the web but that's not part of the package we tested.) ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 touts multisite configuration as a feature for its helpdesk module, too. This feature results in multiple views of trouble by location, with automatic accounting for time zones, personnel, language, and similar considerations. The feature becomes more valuable as you progress up ServiceDesk Plus 9.3's versions, adding location capabilities around asset, identity, and contract management but, at the helpdesk level, it's fairly basic. Reporting is another ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 strength. The product comes with 150 canned reports that will cover most businesses' needs. ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 does provide the ability to build custom reports for any module, but you'll be editing down to the table and column level and using specific tools such as Query Editor to do so. That's more complex than the checkbox customization we saw in some of the lighter-weight products in this roundup, such as HappyFox, but then again, it gives you complete customization flexibility, which will be important to some. For those looking for easy custom report creation, however, ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 is not for you. One thing we would have liked to have seen in the Standard helpdesk module we reviewed was support for remote desktop sharing. Remote control is available as an out-of-the-box feature in both the Professional and Enterprise editions. ManageEngine added limited forms of that for its iOS app in 2016, but it's still not part of the Standard ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 package. The ability to take over a user's PC to make fixes should be ubiquitous for helpdesk staffers and, while there are other third-party ways to enable this capability, ManageEngine does not provide it in the Standard version (however, they do provide it in the higher-priced ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 versions). If you're using the Standard version, change management, asset management, and project management are all add-ons requiring additional cost or a version upgrade, too, but those are feature categories that make sense to push up the cost ladder. By contrast, remote desktop seems like a noticeable gap. Still, even without remote desktop, ServiceDesk Plus 9.3's Standard edition can be considered a full-featured helpdesk platform and the fact that it's free makes it very attractive indeed. What you'll need to watch out for are its back-end requirements. Client-server means you'll need to manage a server installation and configuration process as well as client installation for all users. ManageEngine is a very Microsoft-centric company so a network based on Windows Server and Active Directory (AD) is the primary target, but the company also supports Linux. ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 has added boosted its security features compared with previous versions. It lets users configure an account lockout and choose between HTTP and HTTPS mode. You can also select various Transport Layer Security (TLS) settings. Pricing and Plans As stated earlier, the version we reviewed was ServiceDesk Plus 9.3's Standard edition, which is the free edition. It includes a free trial (as do the Professional and Enterprise editions), but there is also a free tier that gives a business access to basic helpdesk functionality such as incident management, a knowledge base that can be populated by your team, and both canned and custom reports. You'll need to do different math to decide whether or not it's a good fit for your budget. Once you go beyond the free product, ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 will bill on a base price adjusted by the number of IT technicians and agents accessing the app and the number of IT assets managed using the app. For 100-percent ITIL shops, the Enterprise tier is probably the best fit, even with its $58-per-month starting price and $995 price point for 1,000 nodes. Interface and Workflow Unfortunately, ServiceDesk Plus 9.3's UI is less than inspiring but it is easy to use. All of the software's various modes are listed across the top of the screen, which makes for easy navigation. Because of this, users are unlikely to get lost while doing their work. All of the suite's major points of interest are easily found thanks to their big and clearly labeled buttons at the top of the screen. Important for busy helpdesks is a one-button solution for creating new tickets that persists as users move around the app. This, along with the ability to choose templates right from that same button, means that creating new incidents doesn't involve digging through menus. Instead, agents can click one button and start typing. There is also a Search box right on the menu bar at the top of the screen, which lets you search for anything from problems to purchase orders. This button also makes raising new tickets a breeze, and a keyboard shortcut is also available for those who like to avoid using their mouse. Once inside a newly created ticket, just select the relevant drop-down options and complete the freeform Description box with information about the issue at hand. Those drop-down boxes are plentiful and they let you add assets and the department that is requesting the new ticket. Not all of this is required data, however, so those who need to quickly get a barebones ticket raised can quickly do so without filling in all of this information. But keep in mind that the more data that's added, the better. Choosing a template at this point will reconfigure just about everything, automatically populating fields and even adding canned text to that freeform field we mentioned earlier. If there's a ticket type your business will be regularly using, then it would be undoubtedly wise to set up a template. Once inside an existing ticket, agents can add notes, view the ticket's status, and of course resolve the ticket once ready. ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 features a handy Task tab that lets agents essentially add to-dos to a ticket, which can be handy in circumstances that warrant multistep fixes. When resolving a ticket, agents can search for existing resolution details, which could cut down on typing and is a feature we like but haven't seen until now. Again, this would be of real benefit if your helpdesk finds itself repeatedly dealing with similar requests. Raising problems and changes is a very similar affair to raising a ticket, and can be done either via the Quick Actions button on the menu bar or by drilling down into each view and then clicking New Problem or New Change. We found ourselves gravitating toward the Quick Actions button. ITIL and Integrations On a day-to-day basis, we liked the functionality of ServiceDesk Plus 9.3's UI, but its overall design felt clunky and cluttered compared with some of the clean, web-based designs we saw in products such as Freshdesk. The fact that adding optional modules with new functionality will probably clutter that design even more is also problematic. Another area of weakness that surprised us was in integrations with third-party apps. While ManageEngine does provide some ready-to-download extensibility modules to popular products, including Salesforce, Zoho CRM, and Jira Service Desk, it was surprising that the list was so short (eight other apps in total). Considering that Zoho, ManageEngine's parent company, has more than 35 different business apps all by itself, we expected a much longer list of available integrations. We eventually found mention of an open API (so your code-capable IT staffers can build their own custom integrations) in the company's support documentation. Overall, the key differentiators for ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 are easy. It's far more mature than most of the other helpdesk offerings we reviewed, and it's focused on internal, ITIL-centric IT operations rather than as a tool to support customers outside the organization. That means for organizations with large user pools and significant IT budgets, ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 is definitely worth a look. But for SMBs that focus on supporting purchased products, you'll need to keep shopping or opt for one of the other tools in ManageEngine's portfolio. ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 Bottom Line: ServiceDesk Plus 9.3 is an enterprise-oriented helpdesk application that's complicated and comes with a steep price, but its strong set of features make it worth consideration.

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