Kayako vs. SysAid

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Kayako
Score 6.6 out of 10
N/A
Kayako is a help desk and customer support platform that helps businesses automate workflows, improve agent productivity, and deliver personalized customer experiences across email, chat, and social media.
$79
per month
SysAid
Score 9.1 out of 10
Mid-Size Companies (51-1,000 employees)
SysAid is an ITSM platform that enhances service delivery with AI Agents, chatbots, workflow automation, and asset management. AI Copilot categorizes tickets, provides case summaries, and offers sentiment analysis. The AI chatbot, available via chat, email, and Teams, speeds support.N/A
Pricing
KayakoSysAid
Editions & Modules
Kayako One
$79
per month
Enterprise
Contact Sales
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
KayakoSysAid
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeRequired
Additional DetailsSysAid Copilot is available as an add-on for any plan. It bakes generative AI into every aspect of service management.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
KayakoSysAid
Features
KayakoSysAid
Incident and problem management
Comparison of Incident and problem management features of Product A and Product B
Kayako
2.0
Ratings
120% below category average
SysAid
9.1
Ratings
11% above category average
Organize and prioritize service tickets1.00 Ratings9.90 Ratings
Expert directory1.00 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Subscription-based notifications1.00 Ratings9.90 Ratings
ITSM collaboration and documentation1.00 Ratings9.40 Ratings
Ticket creation and submission7.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Ticket response1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Service restoration00 Ratings8.90 Ratings
Self-service tools00 Ratings8.40 Ratings
ITSM reports and dashboards00 Ratings9.40 Ratings
Self Help Community
Comparison of Self Help Community features of Product A and Product B
Kayako
1.0
Ratings
155% below category average
SysAid
-
Ratings
External knowledge base1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Internal knowledge base1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Multi-Channel Help
Comparison of Multi-Channel Help features of Product A and Product B
Kayako
1.0
Ratings
154% below category average
SysAid
-
Ratings
Customer portal1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
IVR1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Social integration1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Email support1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
Help Desk CRM integration1.00 Ratings00 Ratings
ITSM asset management
Comparison of ITSM asset management features of Product A and Product B
Kayako
-
Ratings
SysAid
8.6
Ratings
5% above category average
Configuration mangement00 Ratings9.80 Ratings
Asset management dashboard00 Ratings8.80 Ratings
Policy and contract enforcement00 Ratings7.10 Ratings
Change management
Comparison of Change management features of Product A and Product B
Kayako
-
Ratings
SysAid
9.8
Ratings
16% above category average
Change requests repository00 Ratings9.80 Ratings
Change calendar00 Ratings9.80 Ratings
Service-level management00 Ratings9.80 Ratings
Best Alternatives
KayakoSysAid
Small Businesses
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
SysAid
SysAid
Score 9.1 out of 10
ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus
ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus
Score 9.2 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
KayakoSysAid
Likelihood to Recommend
1.0
(0 ratings)
9.3
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
7.8
(0 ratings)
8.9
(0 ratings)
Usability
10.0
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Availability
7.5
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
2.1
(0 ratings)
7.5
(0 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.0
(0 ratings)
8.6
(0 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
KayakoSysAid
Likelihood to Recommend
Kayako is suited for a small company that is just getting started. We are in the web-hosting industry and it was very hard to fully adapt the system the way we would have liked to. Kayako would be very good if you were hosting an ecommerce shop or customer service business where you can look at each customer interaction as separate and not over a long-term period.
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SysAid is Great for IT Support. Tickets can be easily entered using the portal that has a more modern look and feel. We have also used SysAid for our Customer Service Team. Tickets can come in through email or direct access through the cloud. They no longer get lost in the shuffle. Reports can be produced for the managers to better undersand where issues are.
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Pros
  • Gives a very good report on an individual level of what is being done for a customer or corporate issue.
  • Easy to understand who has what, what the tickets are about, how long they have been opened and how many times the customer/employee have gone back and forth with each other.
  • Nice dashboard view.
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  • Ease of use for end users creating tickets from their own Self-Service Portal (which is tied into Windows Active Directory so no login is needed).
  • Ease of use and management of tickets by the IT staff.
  • Flexibility. We currently have IT teams associated with a single program, a single department, and all other IT items. SysAid allows us to easily manage this, add to it, change it, etc.
  • Support - SysAid support has remained consistently great throughout the years that we have had the product. That is a fairly rare thing for hosted solutions these days.
  • Expandability. We have a lot more that we can still do with the product and are working on expanding what it can do as we move forward in time. There is a lot to this product overall.
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Cons
  • I have not tried to use the actual Workflow function for awhile so this issue may have been resolved. When we tried to use it, it was cumbersome and did not offer much flexibility as to meeting the needs of different departments.
  • This may no longer be an issue but if someone was knowledgeable about KQL and knew how another department was set up, they could write a report accessing their data even though they do not have permission to view/edit that departments data.
  • Perhaps adding the function of "Read Receipts" to end-users when opening a ticket.
  • When a ticket is closed, automatically include information from the initial creation of the ticket so the end user knows at a glance what issue has been resolved without looking up the Ticket ID.
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  • [I would like it if the] Due Date [could] recalculate if a ticket has been stopped (awaiting user).
  • [The] dashboard could have more options when creating a new graphic.
  • [The] end user portal [could offer] the ability to customize more info, like font and adding more images.
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Likelihood to Renew
I am no longer with the company that was using this, and they were recently bought out by a larger organization that uses an internally developed software suite. It is unlikely for that reason that they will renew or keep any service with Kayako.
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Because through SYSAID is how the operation of all IT is carried out and in this way the performance indicators of the services, systems, operation, trends, workloads, project control and their deviations are known; as well as the requests for changes and requirements that are requested by both users and that is where the system improvement projects are triggered, such as change controls, which by the way are audit topics.
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Usability
I did not come from an IT background and I picked this program up quickly
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It is a very simple tool to use, the training required to implement it is minimal and it is also very simple for end users. There is a quick guide to configure and it was the only thing we used to configure the tool. The response of the users was good to the implementation because they did not feel that it was a big change that complicated the request of tasks by the IT department.
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Reliability and Availability
They are really good, but it takes a while to get back, because of the large time difference to the Eastern US. However, they are very helpful.
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Another of the benefits of sysaid is that it is highly available when working in on-premise environments.The only times the system is down is when a restart of the services is required to add a new feature. Apart from that, we have not had any problems.In the case of the cloud, the only condition I have seen where sysaid is not available is because the internet link is down or damaged.
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Performance
No answers on this topic
In the case of system performance, I have seen that no matter the number of assets and users, Sysaid responds in the same way and at the same speed. The reports that are scheduled do not have any details because they arrive directly to your email. In the same way, when it is integrated with other systems, for example through the API or by email, we have not seen any failure due to the integration. It works very well with or without integrations.
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Support Rating
  • We didn't have to use support too much, but when we did, they were able to assist us and help us make everything work.
  • Mostly we used their Online KB and step by step instructions to get all of our issues resolved.
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I have had nothing but positive experiences working with the SysAid support team. There are multiple pathways to request and receive support, which are all connected with each other. I get an efficient and effective response most of the time and when there is not immediately a good answer, they create a support request to follow up for resolution.
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In-Person Training
No answers on this topic
My team was greatly assisted and trained well. Despite the time zone difference the trainer made every effort to be available during times that were suitable for us and the assistance and help offered was extremely appreciated by my team. A wonderful experience by the team.
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Online Training
No answers on this topic
The training I received was very good, they gave me tasks to carry out and then they checked what I had done.It was gratifying that the instructor noticed that I had made very fast progress because I had done the implementation myself and it was very fast. At least I remember that after 5 days I had already finished almost 90% of all the implementation tasks.
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Implementation Rating
Three years in we are about as happy with Kayako as we could be. We've had several employee's leave and on-boarding new hires was easier than it has ever been as things are uniform and consistent across the entire application.
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In the initial stage we implement separate SysAid servers for head and branch offices. When we managed to link up our offices via point to point VPN, we manage to console them into one server. All the assets and devices on branch office were divert back to the server in head office
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Alternatives Considered
Kayako is way more scalable than Spiceworks' helpdesk offering. We had trouble visualizing our current layout within their environment. Zendesk was priced quite a bit higher than Kayako while offering similar functionality. It didn't make sense to want to migrate to a new platform. We have also evaluated various Sharepoint-based help desks, but their speed and reliability did not match our standards for what a help desk should be.
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The value of SysAid just seemed to be much better than Kaseya. The review was relatively short with Kaseya, but I immediately liked what SysAid offered. The overall capability compared to the costs associated with SysAid made it a great choice.
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Scalability
No answers on this topic
Le doy esta calificación porque los módulos que contiene se pueden usar para casi cualquier departamento, tanto gestión de tickets como inventarios de equipos, hemos utilizado una versión gratuita en Ingeniería para gestionar sus tiempos en las tareas asignadas, es lo único que utilizan pero podrían usar fácilmente el módulo de inventario para su herramienta y el módulo de proyectos también
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Return on Investment
  • Kayako has helped our business to grow by allowing us to scale our help desk to accommodate more client companies in an efficient manner.
  • Kayako has allowed our customers to have more direct control over their help desk tickets and has made it easier for them to interface directly with our help desk staff.
  • The built-in chat features in Kayako that tie to our main website has allowed prospective customers to chat with our sales teams right away, resulting in more business.
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  • Our resolution time has increased a lot compared to not using a ticketing system.
  • We have reduced communication load significantly for our helpdesk admins.
  • The knowledgebase is rough, but still allows us to preserve and share our collective experience and expertise.
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ScreenShots

SysAid Screenshots

Screenshot of Monitoring & Fine Tuning - Gives the admin control over the quality of answers that the AI Chatbot provides, through the ability to edit and fine-tune the answers.Screenshot of Ticket Journey - Admins can deep dive into the history and context of a ticket, quickly, with ticket journey filters, while reviewing a chronological, consolidated view of everything to help reach a resolution, faster – including all actions takenScreenshot of a Ticket Queue, which offers a consolidated, easy-to-navigate view of the ticket queue to help admins resolve issues more more efficiently.Screenshot of AI Chatbot, a conversational self-service experience that uses Generative AI to help employees work through issues by delivering answers based on what it has learned by absorbing knowledge base articles, internal data, and ticket resolution historyScreenshot of the workflow automation that digitizes processes without coding or scripting. Users can automate complex processes with simple design and editing capabilities, and real-time visibility of the end-to-end process.Screenshot of the SysAid AI Agents that empower IT teams with intelligence that thinks, learns, and acts securely. Designed to enhance—not override—IT operations, they anticipate needs, make informed decisions, and adapt responsibly