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IBM Maximo vs Zendesk comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

IBM Maximo
Average Rating
8.2
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) (1st), Billing Software (5th)
Zendesk
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
68
Ranking in other categories
CRM Customer Engagement Centers (4th), CRM (8th), Help Desk Software (5th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (6th), Sales Force Automation (4th), Reporting (10th), Knowledge Management Software (3rd), Community Platforms (1st), AI Customer Support (21st), AI IT Support (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

IBM Maximo and Zendesk aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. IBM Maximo is designed for Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) and holds a mindshare of 15.4%, down 27.8% compared to last year.
Zendesk, on the other hand, focuses on CRM Customer Engagement Centers, holds 7.4% mindshare, up 6.1% since last year.
Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
IBM Maximo15.4%
Oracle Enterprise Asset Management8.5%
IFS Cloud Platform7.0%
Other69.1%
Enterprise Asset Management (EAM)
CRM Customer Engagement Centers Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Zendesk7.4%
Microsoft Dynamics CRM13.2%
Salesforce Service Cloud10.8%
Other68.6%
CRM Customer Engagement Centers
 

Featured Reviews

DM
Maximo Developer at Volvo Cars
Centralized asset tracking has reduced paperwork and now improves maintenance efficiency
The best features IBM Maximo offers are that it is a comprehensive tool where we can get the purchasing of assets or spare parts in the same application. The reports are also very good. Additionally, the barcodes are valuable. We can print barcodes for all things we need. The UI also has a very strong appearance. We use the reporting feature very often. We have multiple reports, not just one. For each module, there are multiple reports and we can customize the reports based on our needs. For example, for a work order, we can print a report which gives all the details so that it is easy to carry out the steps required to fix the issue. There are also barcodes for items which we can paste on a bin or the item so it can be scanned with a barcode scanner, which is very easy. IBM Maximo has positively impacted my organization because it reduced a lot of time and has saved a lot of cost. For example, prior to IBM Maximo, we were doing only paperwork. Now that we have IBM Maximo in place, it is useful for tracking all assets and everything in a single solution with no data loss. Previously, multiple people handled this work, but now very few people do. This has helped us significantly.
AmandaSanchez - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
Macros and automation have streamlined workflows and reduced manual effort across support teams
The ability to communicate on the Zendesk ticket through the actual user software, so TOPs, would have been helpful. Somehow seeing a user's ticket history within our app would have been beneficial. That is the only thing that I do not think existed at the time that might have been helpful. Some people struggled with Zendesk, but it was always easy enough to show them how to use it and what they were missing. The only times we really had people report concerns about it was when they did not understand that it could do that or how to use it in that way.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The Preventive Maintenance feature, especially in its inspection routines and KPI abilities, is valuable."
"Reliable, very configurable, and it's all integrated in the same database."
"I have found Work Order management the most valuable feature. Additionally, it is a very robust and powerful solution."
"Its capabilities let us organize our work."
"The large range of configurability of the product is great, since everyone has a different way of doing things."
"We can manage, organize, and track incidents, claims, jobs, tasks, preventive and corrective maintenance, locations, and assets."
"There are not many enterprise asset management systems on the market and not many that have the categories that IBM Maximo has."
"It is configurable, where you can add extra fields to screens and to the database."
"The benefits I have seen from using Zendesk include faster response times; as a CSM, faster response is the goal, which solves the customer's challenge in a timely manner, and Zendesk offers that capability, which is beneficial."
"One of the most valuable features is that Zendesk gives you a lot of configurability, and a lot of leeway in terms of customizing the look and theme. Zendesk offers you the facility to design your own landing page, as well as the look and feel of the entire knowledge base. At the same time, they offer themes that you can simply purchase and implement. Either way, it can really be turned into the right look and feel of the knowledge base required by our company, which is very important—if you have a bland-looking page, most of the time, people will lose interest. Zendesk also allows you to test the customizations before you publish it. It gives you a sandbox location where you can test everything new that you're trying to create and publish, which is very interesting."
"It is a scalable solution."
"The most valuable feature is the trackability of incoming requests. The system keeps a comprehensive history of work requests, making it a useful tool for our internal processes."
"It's very convenient to use."
"I love how the tickets would auto-populate very quickly in Zendesk, especially when a call comes in."
"My advice to others looking into using Zendesk is that if you need an alternative to GitHub Actions or GitHub issues, this is worth looking at."
"The collaboration between agents is impressive, and I also use Zendesk Workspace, which provides a seamless experience when communicating through chat and email."
 

Cons

"Vendor management needs enhancement."
"The latest version is slow due to the power it requires."
"The interface is not very easy or user-friendly and is in need of improvement."
"Coding can be complex when customization is required."
"It's quite reliable, but new versions often are not too stable. They bring in enhancements but they break other stuff."
"There are always ways to improve and make things better."
"The standard reports that shipped with the package need to be enriched with more advanced reports, especially for the Inventory Management sections."
"The initial setup was complex, because it is a complex product."
"My experience with Zendesk's customer support has not been positive. When I open a ticket for a bug, it often does not expedite the resolution process."
"We have been quite frustrated lately with Zendesk, to the point where we are actually considering switching to different software that is more intuitive and better organized."
"Zendesk's stability on inbound calls could be improved as compared to Talkdesk."
"The support team is time-consuming, and they don't find the answer to our problem."
"There is always a network issue with Zendesk. But we don’t know whether it is managed. The network issue is that when I call, it does not let us."
"Report generation is still slightly tricky and not very customizable as per my inquiries."
"There could be improvements in integration, which can be achieved with APIs or tools like Zapier."
"If I write an article, and I have a team of 30 people, and they all have a Zendesk account, when I write an article, I send them an email. "Hey guys, I just wrote this article. It's one of the most popular topics this month on which we are not covered. Please check it and make sure that you include it in your resolutions". The issue is, once I send it to those 30 people, and they open it, the next morning, that article is the most popular article."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"IBM Maximo offers a licensing application, and you have to comply with the license."
"IBM has changed the licensing policy. As I understand now, they are going from a complex way of licensing to a more simple way of licensing."
"Explore the possibility of using DB2. You will avoid the cost of SQL Server or Oracle licenses."
"The price of IBM Maximo could reduce, it is expensive."
"$USD700 per agent user."
"The concurrent user license is much more effective in management and cost-wise, as it is more suitable for maintenance management."
"​Explore internal processes in order to evaluate the correct number of users in each Maximo module, then evaluate the different offers of pricing and licensing.​"
"Where available, concurrent licenses can be more cost efficient and provide more flexibility."
"You have to pay extra for better support. So it's not only the license that you pay for, but you have to pay extra for the support as well."
"Zendesk's licensing is not cheap. For Enterprise, we are paying $200 per agent. It's a per-month cost, so it's pretty steep. There are some services you need to pay extra for. For example, with Zendesk Guide, we had to buy the most expensive offering in order to get Multibrand and everything. We also had to pay a lot of money for themes."
"The price is very competitive."
"We pay for the solution on a yearly basis and my understanding is that the cost is about $30,000. That's the cost for 24 to 25 agents."
"There are different plans that are offered. We are using the entry-level plan. The overall price of the solution should be reduced. The price is too high."
"From what I hear, Zendesk's pricing is a little expensive."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Government
12%
Energy/Utilities Company
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Performing Arts
8%
Computer Software Company
7%
Outsourcing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise19
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business36
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise11
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with IBM Maximo?
IBM Maximo can be improved by providing developers with more documentation. I think IBM lacks a lot of documentation and hopefully the community who uses IBM Maximo can help if other developers hav...
What is your primary use case for IBM Maximo?
My main use case for IBM Maximo is as a technical consultant, so I help companies to use IBM Maximo. A quick, specific example of how I've helped a company use IBM Maximo is that it is quite generi...
What advice do you have for others considering IBM Maximo?
IBM Maximo in their last version includes mobility functionalities which can use the offline mode for technicians that do not have internet connection, and that is really helpful for them. Addition...
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?
From what I recall, the experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Zendesk was quite expensive and that is what prohibited us from expanding usage of it into more users and using more o...
What needs improvement with Zendesk Support?
I wish there was a more easily dynamic tool. Currently, it is quite difficult because not all the tools are labeled. A feature that would be beneficial is if hovering over an icon would tell you wh...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Maximo
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Royal Boskalis Westminster N.V., DTE Energy, Swedish Match, Projetech, Fingrid, East Coast
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM, Prometheus Group, Infor and others in Enterprise Asset Management (EAM). Updated: January 2026.
881,565 professionals have used our research since 2012.