What is SOAR?

Article updated on 25/09/26

Unlike SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) systems, which detect and log threats, SOAR acts on them — automatically isolating devices, revoking credentials, and opening IT tickets. It is used primarily by Security Operations Center (SOC) teams managing high volumes of daily alerts who need consistent, documented, and fast incident response at scale.

This is where SOAR (Security Orchestration, Automation and Response) comes into play. A system that doesn’t just detect threats, but manages them in an automated, structured, intelligent way. And that can integrate synergistically with ITSM to ensure a superior level of resilience.

In this article, we’ll see in detail what SOAR is and how it works; what the concrete benefits are for companies; how it integrates with ITSM processes for a truly solid defense suitable for every type of company.

SOAR Definition: What It Is and How It Works

We talk about SOAR to identify a platform designed to help security teams detect, analyze and respond to incidents in a structured, automated and documented way. In other words, it’s a tool that doesn’t just observe what happens (like classic SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) systems do), but acts, coordinating responses between people, processes and technologies.

SOAR ingests data from dozens of sources, including firewalls, antivirus tools, authentication systems, and endpoints. It analyzes and correlates these inputs against predefined playbooks. When a threat is confirmed, the SOAR platform automatically triggers response actions — such as isolating a device, revoking credentials, or opening an IT ticket — and sends notifications to the Security Operations Center (SOC) team.

But that’s not all. The value and function of SOAR go beyond simple automation. What the SOAR platform enables, in fact, is:

• standardizing response procedures, reducing errors and ensuring consistency in actions;

• documenting every step, useful both for security teams and for audit and compliance needs;

• creating fluid collaboration between IT and cybersecurity teams, facilitating shared incident management.

Below, we proceed by going even deeper, analyzing the three core components of SOAR inherent in the acronym itself.

The Three Components of SOAR: Orchestration, Automation, and Response

1. Orchestration

Orchestration is the strategic heart of SOAR. It connects all security tools, devices and processes in a single integrated framework, creating a command center from which to monitor and manage every phase of incident response. Without orchestration, security tools operate in isolation — generating data that no single system is responsible for acting on.

2. Automation

Thanks to predefined scripts and playbooks, the SOAR platform can automatically execute a series of actions when it detects a threat. Examples include endpoint isolation, credential revocation, opening an IT ticket, and notifications to the SOC team. Everything depends on your needs and how the SOAR platform is configured.

What Is a SOAR Playbook? A playbook is a predefined, automated workflow that maps a specific threat type to a specific sequence of response actions. For example, a phishing playbook might automatically quarantine the suspicious email, check the sender against threat intelligence feeds, reset the affected user’s credentials, and open an ITSM ticket — all without human intervention for each step. Playbooks can be fully automated or semi-automated, requiring analyst approval at key decision points. They are the operational core of SOAR: they eliminate variability, enforce consistency, and create a documented audit trail for every incident type.

3. Response

An effective SOAR platform guides the entire incident response process: from initial assessment to resolution and final reporting. Every step is documented, traceable and optimizable. The point of arrival is also the starting point of a continuous improvement process.

SOAR vs. SIEM: What’s the Difference and Why You Need Both

SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) collects, aggregates, and correlates log data from across the IT environment to detect potential threats and generate alerts. SOAR picks up where SIEM leaves off: it takes those alerts and orchestrates an automated response. Think of SIEM as the detection layer and SOAR as the response layer.

Most mature security operations centers use both — SIEM surfaces the threat, SOAR acts on it. Many SOAR platforms are designed to integrate directly with leading SIEM solutions to create a seamless detection-to-response pipeline. The two technologies are complementary, not competitive: organizations that deploy SOAR without a reliable detection source will find their playbooks underutilized, while those running SIEM without SOAR often find their analysts overwhelmed by alerts they cannot act on fast enough.

How AI and Machine Learning Are Transforming SOAR

Modern SOAR platforms increasingly incorporate artificial intelligence and machine learning to move beyond rule-based playbooks toward adaptive, intelligence-driven response. ML models improve alert triage by learning which alerts represent genuine threats versus false positives over time — reducing analyst fatigue and improving the signal-to-noise ratio without requiring manual tuning of every threshold. AI-assisted playbook recommendations reduce the burden on analysts to manually configure every response scenario, surfacing suggested workflows based on threat patterns and historical incident data.

The emerging concept of agentic security operations takes this further: AI agents can autonomously investigate and contain threats within defined parameters, escalating only when human judgment is genuinely required. For organizations already investing in ITSM automation and IT orchestration, this trajectory is familiar — the same principles that drive IT process automation are now reshaping how security operations centers operate at scale.

SOAR and ITSM: Two Sides That Strengthen Each Other

ITSM is the acronym for IT Service Management: it’s the set of processes, tools and best practices that allow managing IT services in a structured, efficient way oriented towards continuous improvement. In practice, it’s the foundation on which all the IT operations of an organization rest.

SOAR, at its core, can be seen as a natural extension of ITSM logic in the cybersecurity field. The two approaches share a procedural and systemic vision, and precisely for this reason the integration between SOAR and ITSM represents a highly effective strategy for facing modern security challenges.

Why integrate them?

The case for integrating SOAR with ITSM is operational, not theoretical. Security incidents do not stay within the security team’s domain — a compromised server becomes a service outage; a credential breach triggers a password reset workflow; a ransomware attack demands emergency change management. When SOAR and ITSM operate in silos, the handoff between security response and IT operations introduces delay, duplication, and documentation gaps. Integration eliminates that handoff. Security actions trigger ITSM workflows automatically; every response step is recorded in the system of record; and both teams work from a shared, real-time view of the incident.

According to IBM’s 2023 Cost of a Data Breach Report, organizations using AI and automation in security operations identified and contained breaches an average of 108 days faster than those that did not — a finding that underscores why automated, integrated response is no longer a nice-to-have but an operational necessity. When a security incident automatically generates an IT ticket, activates response playbooks across both security and IT systems — password reset, patch application, network isolation — and documents every action in the ITSM system of record, the result is faster resolution, cleaner audit trails, and continuous improvement built into the process itself.

How to integrate them?

The answer to this question is not, and cannot be, uniform. A great deal depends on the specific environment of the individual organization, the systems already in use, the needs and objectives.

The depth of SOAR-ITSM integration depends heavily on the architectural flexibility of the ITSM platform in use. Organizations evaluating integration options should look for platforms that expose open APIs for bidirectional data exchange, support automated workflow triggers from external systems, and maintain full ITIL process alignment so that security-generated tickets are handled with the same rigor as any other IT service event. EV Service Manager is built with this integration architecture in mind, offering open APIs, automated workflows, and full ITIL process support — but any ITSM platform under consideration should be evaluated against these criteria based on your organization’s specific requirements.

The Main Advantages of a SOAR System

The operational case for SOAR is grounded in measurable outcomes. IBM’s 2023 Cost of a Data Breach Report found that organizations using security AI and automation contained breaches significantly faster and at lower cost than those relying on manual processes — with a 108-day advantage in mean time to contain. Industry benchmarks consistently show SOC teams receiving alert volumes that far exceed what analysts can manually investigate, making automated triage not just efficient but necessary. With that context established, the core advantages of SOAR are:

1. Faster incident response

By reducing manual workload, security analysts can focus on the most complex cases. Routine, high-volume tasks are handled automatically at machine speed — IBM’s 2023 Cost of a Data Breach Report found that organizations using AI and automation in security operations identified and contained breaches an average of 108 days faster than those that did not.

2. Reduction of errors and repetitive activities

Thanks to automation, the most repetitive and foundational tasks — IP verification, machine isolation, ticket updates — are executed in a standardized way and without margins of error.

3. Greater visibility and control

The SOAR platform records every action and makes every event traceable. This enables precise reporting useful for IT managers and control authorities, and provides the data foundation for continuous improvement.

4. Collaboration between IT and security teams

SOAR becomes a bridge between Security Operations Center (SOC) teams and IT Operations teams, enabling a structured exchange of information that leads to shared and more efficient problem resolution.

Signs Your Organization Is Ready for SOAR, and When to Act

A company should consider adopting SOAR when alert volumes exceed manual management capacity, response times are too slow, or compliance documentation is inconsistent. More specifically, the five key indicators are:

1. The volume of alerts is unmanageable

If security operations centers receive hundreds or thousands of notifications per day, the risk is that real threats get lost among false positives. The SOAR platform helps filter, classify and automatically manage alerts, reducing the burden on human analysts.

2. Response times are too long

Every minute counts during a cyber attack. When the response process still depends on manual steps, email approvals or tickets managed verbally, fatal delays are risked. SOAR drastically accelerates intervention by automating workflows.

3. Processes are not documented or standardized

In many organizations, incident management happens in a fragmented way. Each analyst follows their own method. The result is discontinuity, inefficiencies and auditing difficulties. With SOAR, every action is guided by predefined playbooks, tracked and easily verifiable.

4. There‘s a need for continuous compliance

In sectors governed by frameworks such as NIS2 (EU), HIPAA (US healthcare), or PCI DSS (payment processing), documenting and demonstrating every action is fundamental. The SOAR platform makes everything verifiable: every log, every decision, every automation is recorded with full traceability, directly supporting compliance reporting requirements.

5. You want to move from reactive to proactive management

The most significant value of SOAR lies in its ability to transform the approach to security: not just reacting to attacks, but preventing them through pattern recognition, consistent documentation, and continuous playbook refinement. A genuine operational paradigm shift.

SOAR Limitations and Implementation Considerations

SOAR delivers measurable value — but only when the conditions for success are in place. Organizations that treat SOAR as a plug-and-play solution consistently underperform relative to those that approach it as a process transformation initiative supported by technology.

The most important prerequisite is process maturity. SOAR automates processes; if your incident response process is undocumented or inconsistently followed, automation will scale the chaos, not eliminate it. Before deploying SOAR, ensure that your core response workflows are defined, agreed upon, and actually practiced by your team.

Data quality and integration readiness are equally critical. The SOAR platform is only as good as the data it receives. Fragmented tools with poor API coverage, inconsistent log formats, or unreliable alert data will limit orchestration effectiveness and produce playbook misfires that erode analyst trust in the system.

Playbook governance is an ongoing commitment, not a one-time configuration task. As the threat landscape evolves, playbooks must be reviewed, updated, and retired. Organizations that treat SOAR as a set-and-forget tool find their automated responses drifting out of alignment with current threats and organizational changes.

Finally, smaller organizations with genuinely low alert volumes and simple IT environments may not need a full SOAR platform. The value of SOAR scales with complexity — the right threshold is not organizational size, but whether your security team is spending more time on repetitive, manual tasks than on strategic threat analysis.

Conclusions

In a context where cyber threats multiply and become increasingly sophisticated, SOAR represents an important technological and strategic response — one that delivers the most value when integrated with mature ITSM processes, clean data inputs, and a commitment to ongoing playbook governance.

When integrated with advanced ITSM platforms, the SOAR platform reduces manual workload for security teams, accelerates incident resolution, and creates the audit trails and compliance documentation that regulated industries require. According to Gartner’s research on SOAR adoption, the primary drivers remain alert fatigue and the need for consistent incident documentation — both of which intensify as organizations scale. The question for most IT leaders is not whether SOAR is relevant, but whether their current process maturity and integration architecture are ready to make it effective.

FAQ

What is SOAR and what problems does it solve?

SOAR stands for Security Orchestration, Automation and Response. It helps organizations respond more quickly to security incidents by automating repetitive response actions, orchestrating workflows across multiple security and IT tools, and improving collaboration between SOC and IT operations teams. It addresses the core operational problem of alert volume exceeding what security analysts can manually investigate and act on.

What are the advantages of integration with ITSM? 

Integrating SOAR with ITSM eliminates the organizational handoff between security response and IT operations. Security incidents automatically generate ITSM tickets, trigger change management workflows, and are documented in the system of record — reducing delay, duplication, and documentation gaps while ensuring every action is traceable for audit and compliance purposes.

What is the difference between SOAR and SIEM?

SIEM (Security Information and Event Management) collects and correlates log data to detect threats and generate alerts. SOAR acts on those alerts by orchestrating automated response workflows. The two are complementary: SIEM is the detection layer, SOAR is the response layer. Most mature security operations centers deploy both, with SOAR consuming SIEM alerts as inputs to its playbooks.

Do you need a large company to implement SOAR?

No. Mid-sized organizations managing sensitive data or operating in regulated industries have equally compelling reasons to implement SOAR. The key threshold is not organizational size — it is whether your security team is spending more time on repetitive, manual tasks than on strategic threat analysis. If the answer is yes, SOAR delivers measurable value regardless of scale.

What are SOAR playbooks and why do they matter?

A SOAR playbook is a predefined, automated workflow that maps a specific threat scenario to a specific sequence of response actions. For example, a phishing playbook might automatically quarantine the suspicious email, check the sender against threat intelligence databases, reset the affected user’s password, and log the incident in the ITSM system — all without a human initiating each step. Playbooks matter because they eliminate variability in incident response, ensure consistency, and create a documented audit trail that satisfies compliance requirements.

What should organizations do before implementing SOAR?

Before deploying SOAR, organizations should ensure that their foundational incident response processes are documented and consistently followed. They should also audit the integration readiness of existing security tools — SOAR’s orchestration value depends on its ability to communicate with the tools already in your environment. Finally, establishing clear metrics for success — mean time to detect (MTTD), mean time to respond (MTTR), alert-to-investigation ratio — before go-live ensures you can measure ROI and continuously improve playbook performance.