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A PDQ alternative — if what you want is for the routine to run itself.
PDQ and GuardifAI solve adjacent problems and it is worth being blunt about which is which. PDQ is a deployment tool: you decide what gets pushed, and it pushes it, exactly. GuardifAI is maintenance that runs unattended: updates get applied, Defender is kept on, and you are interrupted only when a machine needs a decision. If you enjoy the control PDQ gives you, this page will probably talk you out of switching — which is the point of writing it honestly.
Why people look
Two things on PDQ’s pricing page, read on 21 September 2026, send people looking. The on-premises pair, Deploy & Inventory, is priced per administrator — $1,950 per admin per year, with no licence sharing — which scales with how many people touch the console rather than with the size of the fleet. And the cloud product, PDQ Connect, is priced per device per year across three tiers ($12, $18 and $28) with a 100-device minimum.
A two-person shop with 60 machines runs into both edges at once: the per-admin licence doubles with the second admin, and the cloud alternative has a floor below which it does not go.
Source: pdq.com/pricing, read 21 September 2026. Trials only — “14-day free trial” on Connect, a 14-day trial on Deploy & Inventory; neither is a free forever tier.
What GuardifAI covers of the use case
Keeping software current, without building the packages
Windows updates through the Windows Update Agent and applications through winget. Nothing to package, no repository to curate — and, correspondingly, no control over exactly which build lands.
Inventory with a verdict
Hardware, disk, battery and performance on every enrolled machine, with the evidence behind each verdict, not just a table of what is installed. On the paid plans — the free plan is the health of each machine, read-only.
Priced per device, from one machine
Free to start, then per device. No per-admin licence and no device floor to clear before you can start.
Restarts that ask
A reboot is never automatic. The machine shows a notification and the person picks now, with a 60-second countdown, or in three hours.
Where GuardifAI does not replace PDQ
Written as what we lack. If any of these is the reason PDQ is in your toolkit, GuardifAI is not a substitute for it.
Deploying arbitrary software and scripts
There is no package builder, no custom deployment step and no “run this on these machines”. GuardifAI applies updates through winget and Windows Update; it does not deploy what you author.
Control over exactly what gets installed
Third-party coverage is whatever the winget catalogue carries. You cannot pin a version, stage your own installer or curate a private library. That is precisely the control PDQ exists to give you.
Imaging and provisioning
No imaging, no bare-metal deployment, no machine provisioning of any kind.
macOS
Windows only. Anything Mac in your fleet is outside GuardifAI entirely.
If you build packages, you should keep building them. The overlap is narrower than the search term suggests: GuardifAI fits where nobody has time to build anything and the machines still need to stay current.
Side by side, verifiable items only
| Dimension | GuardifAI | PDQ |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier | GuardifAIEvery device — monitoring and alerts, no card, no expiry. | PDQTrials only: 14 days on Connect (up to 250 devices, no card), 14 days on Deploy & Inventory. |
| How it is priced | GuardifAIPer device. | PDQConnect: per device/year — $12 Basic, $18 Plus, $28 Premium. Deploy & Inventory: $1,950 per admin/year, on-premises. |
| Minimum to start | GuardifAIOne device. | PDQConnect states a 100-device minimum; Deploy & Inventory has no licence sharing. |
| Coverage | GuardifAIWindows PCs, laptops and servers only. | PDQConnect is described on the pricing page as Windows and macOS device management. |
| Custom package deployment | GuardifAINone. Updates through winget and Windows Update only. | PDQNot verified here — only the pricing page was read. |
PDQ figures: pdq.com/pricing, read 21 September 2026. Rows marked “not verified here” are dimensions we did not read on the vendor’s own page.
Common questions
Can I deploy my own installers with GuardifAI?
No. There is no package builder and no arbitrary deployment. Updates come through winget and the Windows Update Agent. If authoring packages is the job, keep PDQ.
Is there a device minimum?
No. It starts at one machine, and monitoring is free for every machine you have.
Does it work on macOS?
No. Windows PCs, laptops and servers only.
Does it replace the console my team logs into?
It replaces the routine, not the tooling. Everything is in one cloud dashboard, and pricing does not change with how many people open it.
Try it on your own machines.
Free, no card, and enough to see whether it covers your case before anything changes.