InvGate Asset Management and Freshservice are two standalone IT Asset Management (ITAM) products. Freshworks sells Freshservice ITAM on its own, with its own plans and free trial, so IT teams that run a different service desk can evaluate it head to head with InvGate Asset Management. Both cover discovery, a Configuration Management Database (CMDB) and software license tracking, and each one gets there in its own way.
This article compares them on discovery, CMDB and dependency mapping, software licenses, deployment, integrations and pricing model, using each vendor's official pages. Service desk features stay out of scope, since InvGate Service Management vs Freshservice already compares tickets, workflows and AI.
InvGate Asset Management vs Freshservice ITAM at a glance
The table below sums up how InvGate Asset Management and Freshservice ITAM handle the areas IT teams check first. Each row is developed in its own section further down.
We checked every Freshservice row against Freshworks' official product, pricing and support pages, and every InvGate row against our own page, in November 2026. InvGate develops and sells InvGate Asset Management and competes with Freshservice in this category, so each claim about both products links to the page where it can be verified.
What changed: Freshservice ITAM as a standalone product
Until 2026, Freshservice Asset Management lived inside the Freshservice service desk. Freshworks now describes Freshservice ITAM as available both as an integrated solution for Freshservice ITSM customers and as a standalone offering. Its October 2026 innovation update presents the standalone version as a way to manage assets and the CMDB alongside a team's current service desk, billed by Asset Units.
The product itself also changed. Since March 31, 2026, new customers get a rebuilt Freshservice ITAM that brings the discovery and dependency mapping of Device42, a company Freshworks acquired, into the platform (getting started guide). Existing customers move to it in phases through 2026 and early 2027, and ITAM Classic retires in December 2028, according to the upgrade FAQ, so anyone who inherits a Freshservice instance should check which version it runs before comparing features.
Discovery and inventory
Discovery decides how complete the inventory is on day one and how current it stays afterwards. Both tools combine an agent with agentless scans, and they differ in what runs on your network and which sources feed the inventory.
Freshservice ITAM
Freshservice ITAM runs agent scans on Windows, macOS, Linux and other Unix-based systems, recommended for laptops that are not always on the corporate network or for segments where agentless discovery is not possible. For agentless discovery, teams install a Remote Collector, a virtual appliance placed in each network segment, and a Windows Discovery Service for Windows machines, as its deployment guide explains.
For public cloud, the Cloud Collector announced in the same October 2026 update discovers supported Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud and Intune resources without customer-hosted collection software. Physical assets without an IP address can also be tracked, and each one consumes a fraction of an Asset Unit.
InvGate Asset Management
Unify Your IT Asset Inventory in 24 hours! Leverage Automated Discovery
InvGate Asset Management populates the inventory through four methods: the Agent, InvGate Discovery for agentless network scans, integrations, and manual entry or CSV import. Integrations bring in devices and resources from Microsoft Intune, Jamf, SOTI MobiControl, Google Workspace, AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, VMware and Kubernetes, so mobile, cloud and virtual assets sit in the same inventory as computers.
Devices found by network discovery can be converted into assets in bulk, which shortens onboarding after a first scan. Assets without an IP address, such as monitors and other peripherals, are tracked as non-IP devices in the same inventory.
CMDB and dependency mapping
A CMDB is only as useful as the relationships it holds: which server an application runs on, which database it depends on, who owns each piece. This is where the two products differ most, because Freshservice inherited Device42's automated mapping.
Freshservice ITAM
Every Freshservice ITAM plan includes a CMDB fed by discovery, and its top tier adds service discovery, application dependency mapping and business service mapping. Application dependency mapping builds on autodiscovery jobs, where rule sets define the starting point of each application and logic templates control how discovery traverses the network, according to Freshworks' ITAM upgrade guide.
Freshworks positions this mapping for impact analysis on incidents and changes, with relationships mapped continuously as the environment changes. It suits teams with large, changing infrastructure, such as data centers with many interconnected servers, that want discovery to build most of the map.
InvGate Asset Management
In InvGate Asset Management, each CI has a Related CIs tab where teams create typed connections to other assets, people, cloud assets, databases or Business Applications, using native connection types or their own. Every connection shows on both CIs, works as a filter in the explorers and can trigger automations, for example to notify a new technical owner, and connections are also visible from InvGate Service Management.
For application maps, Business Application diagrams suggest relationships the product already detected: application services the Agent finds running or consumed on a computer, connections between computers, network neighbors, and the layers of VMware, Kubernetes, databases, AWS and Azure. Teams review each suggestion and accept or discard it, so the dependency map grows from discovered data while the team validates what goes in.
Software and License Management
Both products cover SAM, the part of ITAM that tracks what is installed, what is licensed and what is used. The difference is in how each one approaches compliance and usage.
Freshservice ITAM
Freshservice adds Software Asset Management, SaaS discovery and software normalization from its middle tier upward. Its Software Asset Management page describes discovery of on-premises and SaaS software, license inventories by core, CPU and client access license (CAL), and alerts for expired, unlicensed and over-licensed software.
On the usage side, the same page promises the identification of unused or underutilized licenses so teams can reclaim them, plus SaaS management to uncover shadow IT and stay ahead of renewals. Contract management adds centralized license tracking and renewal monitoring.
InvGate Asset Management
InvGate Asset Management detects installed software through the Agent, normalizes names and versions into software groups and measures how often each title is used with software metering. Software compliance capabilities compare the licenses acquired with the installations detected in use, and authorization policies classify titles as allowed, under review or prohibited to flag unauthorized installs.
Together, these show where licenses sit unused and where installations exceed what was bought, the two numbers a renewal or a vendor audit depends on. The license optimization capabilities turn that data into decisions about what to renew, reassign or cut.
Deployment and integrations
Where the tool runs and what it connects to often decide the shortlist before features do. Regulated teams need to know whether on-premises is an option, and teams that already run a service desk need to know whether the ITAM tool works with it.
Freshservice ITAM
Freshservice runs in the cloud, on servers Freshworks hosts in its data centers, as its pricing FAQ states, and its official documentation does not describe an on-premises edition. The discovery components, the Remote Collector and the Windows Discovery Service, are the parts that run inside the customer's network.
For integrations, Freshworks positions the standalone ITAM next to a team's current service desk, and its public pages do not name connectors for third-party service desks as of November 2026. The path it describes is to unify service and asset management on Freshservice later, since both versions use the same ITAM foundation.
InvGate Asset Management
InvGate Asset Management is available in the cloud, managed by InvGate, or on-premises on the customer's own infrastructure, including air-gapped environments, with feature parity between both models according to its deployment FAQ. On-premises releases can arrive in a later version than cloud, and AI features need internet access in either model.
It works as a standalone ITAM tool and integrates natively with InvGate Service Management, as well as with ServiceNow and Zendesk. It can connect to more than one service desk at the same time, showing each system's tickets in a separate tab on the asset profile, and it adds integrations for Device Management, identity and cloud plus an API for custom connections, as its integrations FAQ details.
Pricing model
Both vendors price ITAM by the assets under management, and they count those assets differently. Prices change often, so this section covers only the model, and current figures are on each vendor's pricing page.
Freshservice ITAM: Asset Units
Freshservice licenses ITAM in Asset Units, sold in packs of 500, and each asset consumes units according to its type, as listed on the Freshservice ITAM pricing page. The weighting is what makes an estimate differ from a simple device count:
- Server, virtual machine or network device: 4 Asset Units.
- Desktop, mobile or end-user computing device: 1 Asset Unit.
- SaaS user: 1 Asset Unit.
- Container or function: 1/2 Asset Unit.
- Storage: 1/5 Asset Unit per 5 terabytes of storage discovered.
- Physical asset without an IP address, or archived device: 1/25 Asset Unit.
- Mainframe or mid-range system: 400 Asset Units.
Its three plans add capabilities on top of each other, so dependency mapping and Software Asset Management depend on the tier. The 14-day free trial gives unrestricted access to the top tier.
InvGate Asset Management: IP devices
InvGate Asset Management is priced per IP device per year, and each IP device includes two non-IP devices, such as monitors or keyboards, at no extra cost, according to its licensing FAQ. Devices reported by the Agent, integrations and cloud sources count as IP devices, and the pricing page lists three tiers by number of IP devices.
The free trial runs for 30 days without a credit card. For a deeper evaluation, Sales can extend it or set up a proof of concept.
Which one fits your IT team?
Neither tool wins every scenario, and the right choice depends on what the team already runs and where its infrastructure lives. These four situations cover most evaluations.
You already run Freshservice for tickets
If the service desk is already Freshservice, its ITAM is the shortest path: assets, the CMDB and tickets share one platform, and Freshworks built the standalone and unified versions on the same foundation. The main decision is which tier covers the discovery and software features the team needs.
Check first whether the instance runs ITAM Classic or the rebuilt ITAM, since features and billing change with the upgrade. Existing customers move to Asset Units at their first renewal after the upgrade.
You run data center infrastructure and need automated dependency maps
For teams with large data centers, many interdependent servers and frequent changes, the top tier of Freshservice brings service discovery, application dependency mapping and business service mapping from Device42. It also includes data center infrastructure management (DCIM) and power and environmental monitoring, which go beyond what most IT asset tools cover.
That depth comes with Asset Units weighted toward infrastructure. Servers and network devices count four units each and mainframes 400, so the estimate should start from the real server count.
You need on-premises or an air-gapped deployment
When data residency rules, a regulator or a security policy require the tool to run on internal infrastructure, InvGate Asset Management can be installed on-premises, including air-gapped networks where the Agent reports to the internal server. Freshservice runs in the Freshworks cloud.
On-premises customers keep control over where their data lives and when updates are applied. InvGate ships Long-Term Support releases for on-premises installations, and each team deploys them in its own maintenance windows.
You want ITAM next to your current service desk, up and running fast
Teams that run ServiceNow, Zendesk or InvGate Service Management can connect InvGate Asset Management to it and see each asset's tickets from its profile, without changing the service desk. InvGate Asset Management offers an enterprise experience without the complexity or the price of one, with an intuitive interface, a no-code approach and fast deployment.
The Judicial Branch of Arizona in Maricopa County is an example. After leaving a ServiceNow contract, its team had the Agent reporting from every endpoint 18 hours after deployment began and a complete inventory five days later, covering about 4,000 machines across five judicial divisions.
Conclusion
InvGate Asset Management vs Freshservice comes down to fit. Freshservice ITAM is the natural extension for teams already on Freshservice and the deeper option for automated data center mapping, while InvGate Asset Management offers cloud or on-premises deployment, connects to the service desk the team already runs and gets a complete inventory in place fast.
The best way to compare is with your own assets. Start a free trial of InvGate Asset Management or talk to Sales about your environment and deployment needs.
Frequently Asked Questions
These are the questions IT teams ask most often when they compare Freshservice asset management with InvGate Asset Management. Each answer sums up a point developed above.
Is Freshservice ITAM available without Freshservice ITSM?
Yes. Freshworks sells Freshservice ITAM as a standalone offering for teams that keep their current service desk, and it can be unified with Freshservice ITSM later on the same ITAM foundation.
Does Freshservice offer an on-premises version?
Freshworks hosts Freshservice in its own data centers, and its official documentation does not describe an on-premises edition. Only discovery components, such as the Remote Collector, run inside the customer's network.
How does Freshservice count assets without an IP address?
Physical assets without an IP address consume 1/25 of an Asset Unit each, according to the Freshservice ITAM pricing page. In InvGate Asset Management, each IP device includes two non-IP devices at no extra cost.
Can InvGate Asset Management map dependencies automatically?
It maps some relationships automatically, such as the software installed on each computer, and suggests others in Business Application diagrams from data the Agent, network discovery and integrations already collected. The team accepts or discards each suggestion before it becomes part of the map.
What happens to Freshservice ITAM Classic customers?
Freshworks is upgrading existing customers to the rebuilt Freshservice ITAM in phases through 2026 and early 2027, and ITAM Classic retires in December 2028. Billing moves to Asset Units at the first renewal after the upgrade.
Disclaimer: All product names, logos, and brands are property of their respective owners. All company, product, and service names used on this site are for identification purposes only. Use of these names, trademarks, and brands does not imply endorsement. Comparisons are based on publicly available information as of November 2026 and are provided for informational purposes only.
