FreeITSM vs SysAid
FreeITSM
freeitsm.co.uk
SysAid
sysaid.comSide by side
| Figure | FreeITSM | SysAid |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $89/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | Yes | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| iOS | — | Yes |
| Android | — | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 2 | 2 |
| Spec score · IT Change Management Software | 9.0 (#6) | 8.6 (#12) |
| Spec score · IT Knowledge Base Software | 8.9 (#9) | 8.6 (#19) |
| Spec score · AI IT Service Desk Software | 8.9 (#4) | 8.6 (#7) |
| Spec score · IT Problem Management Software | 9.0 (#7) | 8.7 (#10) |
| Spec score · IT SLA Management Software | 8.9 (#11) | 8.6 (#16) |
| Asset management | Assets tracks custody, locations, warranties and QR labels and can synchronize VMware vCenter, Proxmox, VMware Cloud Director and Intune data. | SysAid includes asset management and describes discovery, inventory, and asset monitoring capabilities. |
| Change management | Change Management includes CAB voting, risk assessment, calendars, activity timelines and post-implementation review. | Change management supports templates, approvals, risk logging, CAB notifications and audit trails. |
| Integrations | Official pages document Microsoft 365, Google Workspace/Gmail, VMware vCenter, Microsoft Intune, WhatsApp through Twilio or Meta, and optional chat channels. | SysAid Connect combines native integrations, Workato recipes and a Microsoft Teams application; the marketplace lists integrations such as Jira, Confluence, PagerDuty and Pax8. |
| Licence | The project is released under the MIT License. | The cloud terms prohibit reverse engineering, copying, sublicensing, redistribution and creation of derivative works, indicating proprietary commercial software rather than open source. |
| Problem management | Problem Management records root causes and known errors and can use AI to draft root-cause analyses and detect recurring incident patterns. | Problem management links incidents, records root causes and documents known errors and workarounds. |
| Public API | The product exposes a versioned REST API at /api/v1/, with an OpenAPI 3.0 document, granular permissions, rate limiting, structured JSON errors and audit parity with the UI. | SysAid exposes a REST API using JSON for users, groups, service records, assets and other entities. |
| Security | The System module lists OpenID Connect SSO, AES-256-GCM encryption key management, TOTP multi-factor authentication, account lockout, IP-based brute-force protection, and trusted device management. | The pricing page lists GDPR, CCPA, SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001/27017/27018, MFA, SSO, SSL, DPA, and multi-region data residency. |
| Self-hosting | Supported deployment methods are Docker or manual installation on WAMP, XAMPP, LAMP, IIS or another PHP-capable server. | SysAid is available as both cloud software and an on-premises edition; cloud has features that are not currently present on-premises, including AI Service Desk. |
| Support | The maker describes FreeITSM as a solo passion project with no formal support and directs users to GitHub to report bugs or ideas. | Both plans list 24/6 support; the page gives Professional and Enterprise P1 response times of 3 hours and 1 hour, respectively. |
| System requirements | Manual installation requires PHP 7.4–8.4, MySQL 8.0 or newer, PDO MySQL, cURL, OpenSSL and mbstring; MariaDB 10.5+ is also listed on the getting-started page. | Cloud access supports the latest two versions of Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Edge; mobile support is iOS 15.1+ and Android 7.0+. |
| What it does | FreeITSM is a self-hosted web IT service-management platform for running a service desk and related IT operations. | SysAid is an AI-powered IT service-management platform for service requests, incidents, workflows, assets and organizational service processes. |
| Workflow automation | Workflows use a visual canvas with more than 138 triggers, outbound webhooks and an AI co-author. | A no-code Workflow Designer builds multistep ticket workflows with approvals, notifications and escalations. |
Plans
In their own words
FreeITSM
FreeITSM is an open-source IT service management platform with 23 integrated modules for running a service desk. Its Tickets module connects Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace mailboxes for email ticketing, assignment, prioritisation, replies, attachments and audit trails. Assets tracks physical and virtual equipment and can discover VMware virtual machines through vCenter. Listed service-management tools include risk assessment, approval workflows, change calendars and change audit trails. Optional AI features provide knowledge answers, ticket-reply cleanup, form assistance, workflow authoring and problem detection. They use a customer-provided Anthropic, OpenAI or OpenRouter key, and provider usage may cost extra. FreeITSM runs with Docker on Linux or Windows, or through IIS with PHP or WAMP and MySQL 8.0+ or MariaDB 10.5+. Security options include OpenID Connect SSO, AES-256-GCM key management, TOTP multi-factor authentication, account lockout, brute-force protection and trusted devices. The project has no formal support.
SysAid
SysAid is an IT service management platform for handling incidents, requests, changes, and problems. It also covers IT asset management, including discovery, inventory, and monitoring, alongside a knowledge base, approval workflows, SLA management, and an employee portal. Plans include Copilot chatbots for end users and agents, AI automations, and prebuilt AI agents. SysAid Connect provides Workato integrations with more than 1,000 business applications, plug-in add-ons, and API access. Named AI connections include Azure AD, Intune, SharePoint, O365, Slack, and Salesforce. The platform lists GDPR, CCPA, SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001/27017/27018, MFA, SSO, SSL, DPA, and multi-region data residency. Cloud and On-Premises delivery are available, although some features are Cloud-only. Mobile apps for iOS and Android support incident and request work. Professional costs $89 a month, billed at $89 agent/month, with 100K Workato credits and 250 managed assets. Enterprise pricing is custom and starts at 20 agents.