Market Perspectives

ISG Research is happy to share insights gleaned from our latest Buyers Guide, an assessment of how well software providers’ offerings meet buyers’ requirements. The AIOps: ISG Research Buyers Guide is the distillation of a year of market and product research by ISG Research.

Chief Information Officers (CIOs) and IT leaders face the dual challenge of optimizing IT operations while simultaneously driving innovation in an increasingly complex marketplace. The intricacies involved in managing a diverse array of technology environments require enterprises to harness a multitude of tools and platforms to address unique operational demands spanning various departments and functionalities. Technological advancements often outpace traditional strategies, so it is essential for IT leaders to have a comprehensive understanding of the software solutions at their disposal.

IT Management software plays a pivotal role in aligning technology initiatives with business objectives. As enterprises strive to enhance efficiency, reduce costs and maintain a competitive edge, these approaches become critical enablers of streamlined operations and effective resource allocation. Furthermore, as enterprises transition to more agile and cloud-centric architectures, the integration of comprehensive IT Management software platforms facilitates enhanced visibility, control and adaptability across the entire IT stack. This is particularly important as CIOs look to future-proof enterprise architecture and ensure that technology strategies are not only reactive but also proactive in addressing emerging challenges and opportunities.

ISG defines AIOps, or Artificial Intelligence for IT Operations, as the incorporation of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) technologies into IT processes. It represents a significant shift from traditional operational management methods towards a strategy for optimizing and managing IT operations. AIOps not only streamlines complex workflows but also enhances overall operational efficiency, addressing the intricate challenges faced by modern IT environments.

At its core, AIOps encompasses a suite of tools and applications designed to automate critical IT processes, thereby improving incident response times and minimizing downtime. By leveraging advanced algorithms and analytics, AIOps approaches can gather and analyze vast amounts of data sourced from various operational domains, including application performance monitoring, infrastructure metrics, event logs and user experiences. This breadth of data allows organizations to detect anomalies, correlate events and identify root causes in real time, vastly reducing the manual effort typically associated with problem-solving.

One of the most impressive capabilities of AIOps is its proactive nature. Rather than merely responding to incidents after they occur, AIOps empowers IT teams to predict potential issues before they escalate. This foresight is made possible through the continuous analysis of data patterns and trends, allowing enterprises to adopt a more anticipatory approach to IT Management. By identifying irregularities early, IT operations can avert crises, ensuring a smoother user experience and more reliable service delivery.

Another critical advantage of AIOps is its facilitation of intelligent automation. Routine tasks that traditionally consumed valuable IT resources can now be automated, enabling teams to focus on higher-value strategic initiatives. Tasks such as software updates, system monitoring and even some incident resolutions can be accomplished through automated processes, significantly enhancing operational efficiency. Additionally, AIOps can implement self-healing mechanisms, allowing systems to automatically correct minor issues without human intervention. This not only minimizes downtime but also reduces the strain on IT personnel who often find themselves inundated with routine tasks.

The transformation brought about by AIOps extends beyond automation: it also paves the way for intelligent decision-making. Through 2026, demand for real-time insights into the health and performance of IT systems will result in 40% of enterprises funding AIOps strategies to streamline operations and optimize resources. With real-time insights and data aggregation across all IT functions, enterprises can make informed decisions that impact overall business operations. AIOps helps bridge the gap between IT and business objectives by ensuring that IT services align with the strategic aims of the enterprise.

Enterprise AIOps software represents a revolutionary approach to optimizing IT operations. By embracing AI and ML technologies, organizations can enhance operational efficiency, reduce manual intervention and deliver consistent, high-quality services. For CIOs and IT leaders, the strategic adoption of AIOps is crucial for fostering innovation and agility, ultimately driving sustainable growth.

Enterprises depend on data-driven insights to enhance operational efficiency and require an effective AIOps strategy. Enterprises should take this opportunity to reassess their AIOps software approach and partners to better address business needs. Here are four IT requirements to consider while building the business case for AIOps software:

Increasing complexity of IT environments: Modern IT environments are becoming increasingly complex, encompassing cloud services, on-premises infrastructure and hybrid systems. AIOps software approaches must provide comprehensive visibility and correlation across these environments. By evaluating current AIOps capabilities, enterprises can identify gaps that may be hindering their ability to monitor and optimize performance effectively.

Proactive incident management: Amid a growing reliance on technology is the need for proactive incident management. AIOps software can automate incident detection and response, reducing downtime and improving service reliability. When enterprises evaluate their AIOps partners, it is important to verify they offer advanced features such as predictive analytics and intelligent automation that facilitate swift remediation of potential issues.

Resource optimization and cost efficiency: As economic pressures mount, enterprises are compelled to optimize resource utilization across IT operations. A review of AIOps strategies reveals opportunities for consolidating data sources, reducing duplication of effort and enhancing overall efficiency. Enterprises should seek AIOps software approaches that not only streamline operations but also provide insights into cost-saving measures and resource allocation.

Enhance business agility: Enterprises need to adapt quickly to market changes and customer demands. AIOps software that enables rapid insight generation and facilitates automation can enhance business agility. By re-evaluating AIOps partnerships, enterprises can uncover tools that empower teams to respond rapidly to evolving situations, driving innovation and competitive advantage.

By focusing on key strategic elements such as complexity management, proactive incident resolution, resource optimization and business agility, IT leaders can make a strong case for the necessary investments and changes. A refined AIOps strategy will position enterprises to achieve higher operational efficiency and respond effectively to digital business challenges.

Generative AI (GenAI) plays a pivotal role in enhancing IT Management software by automating complex processes, improving decision-making and driving efficiencies across various IT functions. By leveraging GenAI, enterprises can streamline service delivery, optimize resource allocation and proactively identify and resolve issues, ultimately leading to improved operational performance. Additionally, GenAI enables IT teams to generate insights from vast amounts of data, facilitating more informed strategic planning and enhancing collaboration among teams. As enterprises embrace digital transformation, IT Management software integrated with GenAI capabilities becomes essential for staying competitive.

In the field of AIOps, GenAI offers enterprise IT teams innovative capabilities to enhance operational efficiency and improve decision-making. One primary application of GenAI within AIOps is its ability to analyze significant amounts of operational data and generate insights in real time. This functionality enables teams to quickly identify patterns, anomalies and weaknesses in system performance, which can significantly reduce the time spent on monitoring and diagnostics.

GenAI can also streamline incident response workflows by automating the creation of alerts and notifications based on learned behavior from historical incidents. By understanding the contexts in which issues arise, GenAI can prioritize alerts and differentiate between critical incidents and minor alerts, allowing technicians to focus on high-impact issues first.

Furthermore, GenAI facilitates intelligent automation within AIOps by generating scripts that automate routine operational tasks, such as resource scaling and routine system checks. By implementing automated approaches, IT teams can achieve greater consistency and accuracy and free up valuable time to focus on strategic initiatives.

Additionally, predictive analytics supported by GenAI allows enterprises to anticipate potential issues before they become critical. By leveraging historical data and identifying trends, enterprises can take proactive measures, minimizing disruptions and maintaining optimal system performance.

Agentic AI, though not yet available, could play a crucial role in future AIOps by automating and enhancing IT operations. One potential application is to manage and resolve incidents autonomously by analyzing historical data to initiate corrective actions like scaling resources, enabling quicker incident responses. Additionally, it could facilitate intelligent anomaly detection by continuously analyzing data to identify irregularities, automatically escalating issues to relevant teams. Furthermore, agentic AI could recommend performance optimizations based on resource utilization patterns. Ultimately, its integration within AIOps could empower enterprises to manage incidents and maintain performance more efficiently and proactively.

CIOs and IT leaders should approach IT Management software incorporating GenAI, large language models (LLMs) and future agentic AI capabilities with enthusiasm and caution. While these technologies offer significant benefits, they also come with unique challenges and prerequisites. A holistic evaluation must include technical aspects as well as business, ethical and strategic considerations. Other areas of focus include risk awareness, critical infrastructure, organizational readiness, governance and compliance, and a long-term perspective on sustainability and scalability of AI approaches.

ISG believes a methodical approach is essential to maximize competitiveness. It is critical to select the right software provider and product to improve the performance of your enterprise’s people, process, information and technology components.

The ISG Buyers Guide for AIOps software is designed to provide a 360-degree view of a software provider’s ability to optimize the delivery, performance and governance of IT services within an enterprise. Separate Buyers Guide research reports are available for ITSM, IT Operations Management, FinOps and Observability software.

The ISG Buyers Guide for AIOps evaluates products based on capabilities including collaboration and communications, data visualization, event correlation, GenAI and ML, integration with other systems and tools, intelligent automation, performance monitoring, predictive analytics, root cause analysis, security and compliance, and self-healing features. To be included in this Buyers Guide, software providers must meet or exceed the inclusion criteria and have commercially available AIOps software products.

The insights gained from understanding current IT Management software are invaluable for IT leaders who aim to align their technology investments with organizational goals, optimize workflows and foster a culture of innovation. By investing in the right tools, CIOs can unlock new avenues for growth and transformation, paving the way for enterprises to thrive.

This Buyers Guide report evaluates the following software providers that offer products addressing key elements for AIOps: Aisera, BMC Software, Datadog, Dell Technologies, Digitate, Dynatrace, Elastic, IBM, LogicMonitor, New Relic, OpenText, OpsRamp, PagerDuty, ScienceLogic, SolarWinds, SoundHound AI, Splunk, Vitria and Zenoss.This research-based index evaluates the full business and information technology value of AIOps software offerings. We encourage you to learn more about our Buyers Guide and its effectiveness as a provider selection and RFI/RFP tool.

We urge organizations to do a thorough job of evaluating AIOps offerings in this Buyers Guide as both the results of our in-depth analysis of these software providers and as an evaluation methodology. The Buyers Guide can be used to evaluate existing suppliers, plus provides evaluation criteria for new projects. Using it can shorten the cycle time for an RFP and the definition of an RFI.

The Buyers Guide for AIOps in 2025 finds Dynatrace first on the list, followed by SoundHound AI and Splunk.

Software providers that rated in the top three of any category ﹘ including the product and customer experience dimensions ﹘ earn the designation of Leader.

The Leaders in Product Experience are:

• Dynatrace.
• Datadog.
• Splunk.

The Leaders in Customer Experience are:

• BMC.
• Splunk.
• PagerDuty.

The Leaders across any of the seven categories are:

• Splunk, which has achieved this rating in five of the seven categories.
• BMC and Datadog in four categories.
• Dynatrace in three categories.
• New Relic and PagerDuty in two categories.
• SoundHound AI and IBM in one category.

The overall performance chart provides a visual representation of how providers rate across product and customer experience. Software providers with products scoring higher in a weighted rating of the five product experience categories place farther to the right. The combination of ratings for the two customer experience categories determines their placement on the vertical axis. As a result, providers that place closer to the upper-right are “exemplary” and rated higher than those closer to the lower-left and identified as providers of “merit.” Software providers that excelled at customer experience over product experience have an “assurance” rating, and those excelling instead in product experience have an “innovative” rating.

Note that close provider scores should not be taken to imply that the packages evaluated are functionally identical or equally well-suited for use by every enterprise or process. Although there is a high degree of commonality in how organizations handle AIOps, there are many idiosyncrasies and differences that can make one provider’s offering a better fit than another.

ISG Research has made every effort to encompass in this Buyers Guide the overall product and customer experience from our AIOps blueprint, which we believe reflects what a well-crafted RFP should contain. Even so, there may be additional areas that affect which software provider and products best fit an enterprise’s particular requirements. Therefore, while this research is complete as it stands, utilizing it in your own organizational context is critical to ensure that products deliver the highest level of support for your projects.

You can find more details on our community as well as on our expertise in the research for this Buyers Guide.