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Freshdesk vs Zendesk comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
8.2
Freshdesk offers efficient customer service and time management, providing significant financial benefits and excellent return on investment.
Sentiment score
7.3
Zendesk offers cost efficiency and improved productivity, with ROI influenced by alignment with operational needs and process integration.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.2
Freshdesk's efficient support resolves issues quickly, though setup challenges and process delays occasionally occur; technical capabilities are highly rated.
Sentiment score
7.0
Zendesk receives praise for responsiveness and ease of use, but some users desire better chat features and human interaction.
We have not needed to contact technical support, as Freshdesk has met our needs efficiently.
The technical support provided by Zendesk has been very satisfactory.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.8
Freshdesk is highly scalable, handling increased users and ticket volumes efficiently while facilitating easy growth for organizations.
Sentiment score
7.5
Zendesk is praised for scalability and customization, although some face initial setup challenges and structural integration issues.
Additional features like email, WhatsApp, and SMS ticketing, along with Slack integration, can be enabled as required.
In our environment, which is a fairly small company in one country, Freshdesk is easy to scale.
Zendesk can scale from very small companies to very large ones.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
Freshdesk is praised for its reliability with minimal downtime, efficient service recovery, despite occasional support concerns and related service issues.
Sentiment score
7.9
Zendesk is stable with minimal downtimes, reliable performance, occasional minor issues, and high reliability ratings, especially for smaller businesses.
 

Room For Improvement

Freshdesk requires enhancements in interface, customization, support, integration, and pricing, with opportunities in translation and asset management.
Zendesk faces challenges with data management, flexibility, integration, user-friendliness, and customer communication, while users are dissatisfied with support and pricing.
Currently, some features like SMS or WhatsApp integration are only available to larger user groups, but even smaller teams should have access based on their specific needs.
The current integration is more complicated and doesn’t work as well.
There could be improvements in integration, which can be achieved with APIs or tools like Zapier.
 

Setup Cost

Freshdesk's pricing is flexible and affordable compared to Zendesk, with customization options and potential additional costs.
Enterprise buyers find Zendesk's pricing high but valuable, with costs varying by agent count and business needs for tailored solutions.
Our organization pays about 200,000 Indian rupees per year for the license.
It is not the cheapest solution nor the most expensive, but it provides value for money.
 

Valuable Features

Freshdesk enhances customer service efficiency with features like automation, scalable APIs, and seamless integration, supporting team collaboration and performance tracking.
Zendesk offers user-friendly ticket management, seamless integrations, multi-channel support, and robust security for efficient and productive customer service.
These features are easy to use, and the filtering is really good, providing a good overview of active tickets and who's working on them.
The auto-assignment feature is particularly valuable as it alleviates the administrative task of manually checking for available engineers to assign tickets.
It allows us to handle more support cases with fewer people due to its advanced artificial intelligence capabilities.
 

Categories and Ranking

Freshdesk
Ranking in Help Desk Software
6th
Ranking in Knowledge Management Software
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
31
Ranking in other categories
Customer Experience Management (4th), Field Service Management (3rd)
Zendesk
Ranking in Help Desk Software
9th
Ranking in Knowledge Management Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
60
Ranking in other categories
CRM Customer Engagement Centers (7th), CRM (20th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (7th), Sales Force Automation (7th), Reporting (13th), Community Platforms (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of Freshdesk is 3.5%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zendesk is 4.1%, down from 4.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Help Desk Software
 

Featured Reviews

Alexey Timchenko - PeerSpot reviewer
Incredibly user-friendly, flexible, and affordable
Automation and ticket routing rules in Freshdesk save us daily by streamlining routine tasks. We use reports to identify issues, allocate resources, and continuously improve our processes. It is a vital part of our daily operations, helping us stay proactive and efficient in handling various types of tickets. The reporting and analytics tools in Freshdesk are effective for measuring customer service performance. While our current subscription level has some limitations in terms of reporting, the next level provides more options. Budget constraints currently prevent us from upgrading, but the available reporting features still meet our basic needs. I highly recommend Freshdesk, especially for companies in their early stages. It is user-friendly, easy to configure, and great for those with a moderate volume of customer requests. The cost is reasonable, making it a quick and efficient solution to implement. Overall, I would rate Freshdesk as an eight out of ten.
JohanSkibdahl - PeerSpot reviewer
Automating customer support with advanced AI capabilities and seamless communication
Zendesk has been invaluable in automating communications such as email and phone calls. It allows us to handle more support cases with fewer people due to its advanced artificial intelligence capabilities. This intelligent tool can manage complex queries before users even realize they are interacting with a non-human. Additionally, we have integrated Zendesk with Datto and Klaviyo ( /products/klaviyo-reviews ), enhancing our workflows.
report
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847,772 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
24%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Real Estate/Law Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
23%
Educational Organization
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Freshdesk?
Freshdesk significantly improved our customer issue resolution process. We can now easily record and track all customer requests, ensuring that no tickets are lost.
What needs improvement with Freshdesk?
An area for improvement in Freshdesk would be enabling all features regardless of company or user size. Currently, some features like SMS or WhatsApp integration are only available to larger user g...
What is your primary use case for Freshdesk?
We utilize Freshdesk ( /products/freshdesk-reviews ) primarily for handling incoming tickets. The system auto-assigns these tickets to the available engineer, who then troubleshoots the issue, upda...
What do you like most about Zendesk Support?
I found the user experience with vendors on Zendesk to be straightforward, especially when it comes to understanding and searching for specific tickets. The search and navigation tools are easy to ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zendesk Support?
I am not currently aware of the exact pricing, but since we are still using Zendesk, it appears to be at a reasonable price point.
What needs improvement with Zendesk Support?
Report generation is still slightly tricky and not very customizable as per my inquiries. It would be advantageous to have an AI layer that can analyze incoming requests and generate summaries, as ...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Honda, 3M, Hugo Boss, Petronas, Sony Pictures, The Atlantic, goodreads, Clear Channel Radio, Penn University of Pennsylvania, unicef, Kuoni, Movember
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about Freshdesk vs. Zendesk and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
847,772 professionals have used our research since 2012.