# KIX — IT Service Management

KIX by KIX Service Software GmbH holds a panel rating of 2.5/5 from 6 AI judges (category median 3/5), as of 2026-11-02. Provenance: EU-Made; sovereignty: not determined.

- Vendor: KIX Service Software GmbH (https://www.kixdesk.com/)
- Category: [IT Service Management](https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm.md)
- Provenance (editorial classification): EU-Made
- Canonical page: https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/kix
- Alternatives: https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/kix/alternatives ([markdown](https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/kix/alternatives.md))
- Data as of: 2026-11-06 · evaluated 2026-11-02 · oldest source captured 2026-11-01

**AI-generated.** Every score, rationale and verdict here is written by a panel of AI judges from public evidence — an analysis, not a hands-on test. Every fact quotes the vendor page it was read from. No score can be bought. How scores are made: https://whats-best.ai/methodology

## At a glance

- Vendor: KIX Service Software GmbH
- Headquarters: Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 1 Nov 2026
- Data hosting: Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 1 Nov 2026
- Free plan: Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 1 Nov 2026

## The panel's verdict

KIX is an open-source ITSM, ESM and technical customer service desk from KIX Service Software GmbH of Chemnitz, offered self-hosted or as a hosted service. The scoring is strongest on the service desk, 4 to 6, and pricing transparency, a flat 5: tickets arrive by phone, email and self-service portal with automatic assignment, and Pro Business is published at 33 € per month per agent in the cloud and from 3.690 € on premise in 10-agent packages up to 250 agents, with a free base version. Deployment and integration scores 4 to 5, helped by LDAP/AD authentication in every edition and migrations from OTRS, Topdesk, Matrix42 and Jira Service Management. The weakest clusters are change and problem and the self-service portal, both 3 to 4: KIX Pro is certified for 16 ITIL practices, but we found no public information on approvals, change calendars, problem records or a service catalog. Sovereignty spreads 4 to 6: the higher scores rest on self-hosting the open-source edition, the lower ones on the hosted edition's unconfirmed storage location and data processing agreement.

**Speaks for it:**
- Published pricing for Pro Business — 33 € per month per agent in the cloud and from 3.690 € on premise in 10-agent packages up to 250 agents — over a free base version.
- Open-source base offered self-hosted or as a hosted service, letting buyers hold records on their own servers.
- Tickets arrive by phone, email and self-service portal and are automatically assigned to a suitable service employee.
- KIX Pro is certified for 16 ITIL practices against over 700 criteria of the CERTIFIEDTOOL certification.
- LDAP/AD authentication in every edition, plus documented migration experience from OTRS, Topdesk, Matrix42 and Jira Service Management.

**Held against it:**
- We found no public information on change types, approvals, a change calendar or problem records, leaving change evidenced as a named practice.
- We found no public information on configuration-item relationships, discovery or licence compliance, so the CMDB reads as an inventory with configurable categories.
- We found no public information on SLAs with escalation and business hours, time tracking on tickets or major-incident handling.
- Enterprise tiers are on request only, and the maintenance plan, specific web services and workforce management are chargeable without published figures.
- We found no public information on where the hosted cloud edition stores ticket data or on a product-side data processing agreement.

**Best for:**
- You want an open-source ITSM you can self-host, so staff and device data stay on your own servers.
- You need a readable published price for a small to mid-sized Pro Business deployment.
- You are moving off OTRS, Topdesk, Matrix42 or Jira Service Management.
- You want solid phone, email and portal intake with automatic ticket assignment for your service desk team.

**Avoid if:**
- You must show an auditor who approved which change and which services it touched — the captured pages name incident management, service request management and change enablement, and we found no public information on approvals, change types or a change calendar.
- You run a multi-client service business needing separated client data and time-based billing — the REST API is stated as restricted to ticket and asset management, and we found no public information on multi-client operation.
- You depend on the hosted cloud edition and must confirm where ticket data is stored and under which data processing agreement — the captured pages leave this unconfirmed, with self-hosting the evidenced alternative.

## Scores by judge and criterion

Scores out of 5, each judge scoring independently against the published rubric (v1). "n/r" = not rated: the vendor publishes no price, or the judge found no public information on that criterion.

| Criterion | The Service Desk Lead | The MSP Owner | The Change & Configuration Manager | The Municipal IT Lead | The Solo IT Admin | The Skeptic |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Service desk, incidents & requests | 2.5/5 | 3/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 | 2.5/5 | 2.5/5 |
| Change, problem & release management | 2/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 | 1.5/5 | 1.5/5 | 2/5 |
| Assets, CMDB & discovery | 2/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 |
| Self-service portal & service catalog | 1.5/5 | 2/5 | 1.5/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 |
| Deployment, integrations & multi-client operation | 2/5 | 2.5/5 | 2.5/5 | 2.5/5 | 2/5 | 2.5/5 |
| European sovereignty | 3/5 | 2/5 | 3/5 | 3/5 | 2/5 | 2/5 |
| Pricing transparency | 2.5/5 | 2.5/5 | 2.5/5 | 2.5/5 | 2.5/5 | 2.5/5 |
| **Weighted verdict** | **2/5** | **2.5/5** | **2/5** | **2.5/5** | **2/5** | **2/5** |

### The judges

- **The Service Desk Lead** (v1.0): Leads a team of eight agents at a machine builder with 1,400 employees across three plants in Germany and one in Poland. Most tickets still arrive by email, and the same printer and VPN questions come in every Monday. Wants incidents and requests told apart, SLAs that escalate on their own, a portal with a catalog people actually use, answers that deflect the Monday tickets, and reports the IT director reads without a spreadsheet.
- **The MSP Owner** (v1.0): Owns a managed service provider with twenty-two technicians and sixty client companies, from dental practices to a logistics firm with nine sites. Every client has its own contract, its own SLA and its own devices, and every hour has to end up on an invoice. Wants one desk with client data kept apart, the RMM and remote support tool connected, time and contracts billed, a portal per client, and a price per technician that still works when the team doubles.
- **The Change & Configuration Manager** (v1.0): Change and configuration manager at a regional bank that answers to BaFin and, since January 2025, to DORA. Chairs the weekly change advisory board and has to show an auditor who approved which change, which services it touched and which incident it caused. Wants change types with real approvals, risk read from a CMDB that knows how systems depend on each other, problem records tied to incidents, and an audit trail that can be exported.
- **The Municipal IT Lead** (v1.0): Runs IT for a district administration with 900 staff, schools included, on servers in the municipal data centre. Follows BSI IT-Grundschutz and buys through public tenders, and the data protection officer will not sign off staff and device data on a US cloud. Wants an on-premise or open-source edition that is documented and maintained, a portal for teachers and clerks, assets linked to tickets, and a contract and price list the procurement office can put into a tender.
- **The Solo IT Admin** (v1.0): The whole IT department of a 160-person engineering firm, with a part-time trainee on Thursdays. Requests come in by email, Teams and in the corridor, and the asset list is a spreadsheet nobody trusts. Has no time for an ITIL project: wants email and Teams turned into tickets, a simple portal with answers to the common questions, laptops and licences found automatically, a setup that takes days rather than months, and a price they can read off the website.
- **The Skeptic** (v1.0): Has seen "ITIL-certified" on a tool whose change management is a status field, a "CMDB" that is a list of devices without a single relationship, and an "AI agent" that searches the knowledge base. Reads that a product runs on premise and asks whether that edition gets the same features, which of the asset packs are extra, where the tickets and attachments are stored — and how ten years of ticket history would leave.

## European sovereignty — proven facts

Built only from facts on the vendor's own pages; a dimension we could not prove is left open, never scored as zero. Headline: not determined.

| Dimension | Finding | Points | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Legal entity | Not determined | — | — |
| Hosting location | Not determined | — | — |
| Hosting options | Not determined | — | — |
| Open source | Not determined | — | — |
| Data processing agreement | Not determined | — | — |
| Transfer impact assessment | Not determined | — | — |

## Key facts

Each fact is the vendor's own statement, cited to the source page it was read from ([S*n*] → Sources).

**Compliance**
- Analytics DPA: yes [S7]
- GDPR data portability: yes [S7]
- ISO 27001 support: yes [S2]
- Ssl tls: yes [S7]

**Data**
- Cookie consent domains: www.kixdesk.com · www.jira.kixdesk.com [S7]
- Customer deletion: yes · yes [S7]
- Newsletter double opt in: yes [S7]

**Integrations**
- Migration experience: OTRS · Topdesk · Matrix42 · Jira Service Management [S2]

**Legal**
- Company name: Chemnitz · Schönherrstr. 8 · KIX Service Software GmbH [S6]
- Content responsible: § 5 TMG · Rico Barth [S6]
- Controller: Schönherrstr. 8, 09113 Chemnitz · KIX Service Software GmbH [S7]
- Register: Amtsgericht Chemnitz · HRB 23192 [S6]
- VAT id: DE251622741 [S6]

**Pricing**
- Competitive claim: besseres Preis-Leistungs-Verhältnis als ServiceNow, Jira Service Management, Topdesk; Preise auf separater Seite [S2]
- Pro business cloud: agent · monthly · 33 [S5]
- Pro business onprem: 3690 · blocks of 10 agents up to 250 agents [S5]
- Pro enterprise cloud: no · 30 · yes [S5]
- Pro enterprise onprem: 250 · yes [S5]
- Start cloud: no [S5]

**Product**
- Asset database itil: database · REST interface · yes [S4]
- Asset scope: IT-Equipment · Hardware · Software · Büromöbel · technische Großanlagen · Verträge [S2]
- Cmdb asset management: yes · yes [S2]
- Connect webservices: yes [S5]
- Customizable implementation: individuelle Anpassung der Software an Kundenprozesse [S2]
- Deployment models: Cloud and On-Premise deployment options offered [S5]
- Description: Open Source solution for ITSM, ESM and technical customer service [S6]
- Description: Open Source solution for ITSM, ESM and technical customer service [S5]
- Distributed systems: yes [S5]
- Editions: KIX Start · KIX Pro Business · KIX Pro Enterprise [S5]
- External data connects: yes [S5]
- Flexible teams: flexible Team-Aufteilung für standortübergreifende Ticketbearbeitung [S2]
- Implementation duration: 2 bis 3 Wochen · 12 · 4 [S2]
- ISO 27001 audit support: ITIL-oriented working with standardized ITSM eases ISO 27001 audits, leading to cost and time savings [S4]
- Itil addon included practices: 8 · yes [S4]
- Itil addon usability: ITIL Add-on described as very user-friendly, nearly self-explanatory; training support offered if needed [S4]
- Itil certification body: CERTIFIEDTOOL Service Management Version IV · 700 [S4]
- Itil certified practices: KIX Pro · 16 [S4]
- Itil certified practices: KIX Pro · yes · 16 [S2]
- Itil demo video practices: Demo video: 8 ITIL practices demonstrated in 8 minutes using a broken printer scenario [S4]
- Itil practices named: Incident Management · Service Request Management · Change Enablement [S2]
- Ldap ad auth: yes [S5]
- Maintenance plan: kostenpflichtig [S5]
- Modules: IT Service Management · Enterprise Service Management · IT Helpdesk & Servicedesk · Field Service Management [S6]
- Open source: ITSM · ESM · technical customer service · open source [S4]
- Open source: ITSM · ESM · technischer Kundendienst · yes [S2]
- Open source itsm: ITSM · ESM · technischer Kundendienst · yes [S7]
- Pro enterprise extras: Higher service & support class and 2 tickets for annual user conference [S5]
- Pro features: Knowledge base/FAQ, multilingual, revision security, API integration, website integration, conversation guides, templates & checklists, REST API (restricted), self service portal, service contracts, ticket anonymization, form templates, pr… [S5]
- Rest API: REST API with restrictions: ticket management & asset management [S5]
- Scalability: hoch skalierbar, vom spezialisierten IT-Team bis zum komplexen Unternehmensverbund [S2]
- Self service portal: Telefon · E-Mail · yes [S2]
- Specific webservices: kostenpflichtig [S5]
- Start free: yes · yes [S5]
- Ticket auto assignment: yes [S2]
- Workforce management: kostenpflichtig [S5]

**Subprocessors**
- Cookiebot: Cookiebot · Cookie-Einwilligungsmanagement [S7]
- Google analytics: Google Analytics · Webanalyse · yes [S7]
- Webinargeek: WebinarGeek · Durchführung von Webinaren [S7]

**Support**
- Consulting team: yes [S2]
- Pro business calls: 24 [S5]
- Pro business critical reaction: 4 [S5]
- Pro business request reaction: 24 [S5]
- Pro business service time: 12 · 5 [S5]
- Pro enterprise calls: 48 [S5]
- Pro enterprise critical reaction: 1 [S5]
- Pro enterprise request reaction: 12 [S5]
- Pro enterprise service time: 12 · 7 [S5]
- Training discount: 25 · 40 [S5]

## Questions

### Is KIX European?

Yes. whats-best.ai classifies KIX as EU-Made.

### Where does KIX store data?

Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 1 Nov 2026.

### Does KIX have a free plan?

Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 1 Nov 2026.

### What are the best alternatives to KIX?

As of 2 Nov 2026, the panel rates [ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus (3.5/5)](https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/manageengine-servicedesk-plus), [Xurrent ITSM (3/5)](https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/xurrent) and [GLPI (3/5)](https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/glpi) highest among the other 14 IT Service Management products evaluated. Ratings that look equal are rounded to half stars; the order uses the unrounded rating, then the name. The highest-rated European alternative is [GLPI](https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/glpi) (EU-Made). Ratings are the AI panel’s opinion, formed from public evidence: [how scores are made](https://whats-best.ai/methodology#ordering). The full list, with European products first: [KIX alternatives](https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/kix/alternatives).

## What this page leaves out

- 18 product facts could not be confirmed on the vendor’s page as captured and were left out of this page and of the panel’s material.
- 4 support facts could not be confirmed on the vendor’s page as captured and were left out of this page and of the panel’s material.
- 2 hosting facts could not be confirmed on the vendor’s page as captured and were left out of this page and of the panel’s material.
- 2 pricing facts could not be confirmed on the vendor’s page as captured and were left out of this page and of the panel’s material.
- 3 sovereignty dimensions could not be confirmed on the vendor’s own pages and are shown as unknown.

## Sources

- [S1] Vendor homepage: https://www.kixdesk.com/ (checked 2026-11-01)
- [S2] Features page (ITSM): https://www.kixdesk.com/it-service-management-itsm (checked 2026-11-01)
- [S3] Features page (IT help desk and service desk): https://www.kixdesk.com/it-helpdesk-und-servicedesk (checked 2026-11-01)
- [S4] Features page (ITIL-certified ITSM): https://www.kixdesk.com/software/service-management-erweiterungen/itil-zertifizierte-itsm-software (checked 2026-11-01)
- [S5] Pricing page: https://www.kixdesk.com/preise (checked 2026-11-01)
- [S6] Legal notice: https://www.kixdesk.com/impressum (checked 2026-11-01)
- [S7] Privacy policy: https://www.kixdesk.com/datenschutz (checked 2026-11-01)

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Cite as: whats-best.ai, "KIX — IT Service Management", AI panel analysis, as of 2026-11-06. https://whats-best.ai/software/itsm/kix

Corrections: https://whats-best.ai/correct/1335?target=page