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NICE CXone vs Zendesk comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 30, 2025

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
4.9
Small teams saved over $200,000 in the first year with NICE CXone, benefiting from its cloud-based AWS infrastructure.
Sentiment score
6.2
Zendesk delivers cost savings and efficiency with flexible pricing and integration, addressing operational needs despite ROI measurement challenges.
NICE CXone saves time and resources due to its cloud-based nature, where infrastructure management is handled by AWS, reducing the need for me to manage it.
Technology Specialist at Cognizant
I can tell you that we probably saved at least three employees full-time with the ticket management and the automation and the macros and the user follow-up being built in.
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
I feel that Zendesk helped us set up our platform for providing support way faster than other platforms due to its easy configuration.
Junior system analyst at Wevt clous
We were able to offer a seamless 24/7 support experience and meet all our SLAs due to the robust nature of the platform.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.4
NICE CXone customer service is polite and effective, though complex issues may have delayed resolutions due to request nature.
Sentiment score
6.4
Zendesk support is generally responsive and professional, with some users experiencing delays and a lack of 24/7 chat support.
When I faced an issue with reaching a Poland DID that was ported to NICE CXone, their support team resolved the problem immediately.
Technology Specialist at Cognizant
We have our own technical account manager which provides us with substantial visibility.
Senior Manager, Contact Center Technology at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
If the issue is network-related or involves configuration, or maybe implementing a new tool, it might take north of 24 hours to identify the right resource to assist you.
Operations Manager at a financial services firm with 11-50 employees
There appears to be a lack of connection between the bot and the agents, making it feel scripted rather than helpful.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
The technical support provided by Zendesk has been very satisfactory.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
Their support team from Zendesk is excellent, similar to what you have in Freshdesk.
Customer Success Manager at Mimshackworks Endeavors
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.2
NICE CXone is highly scalable and adaptable, efficiently managing extensive loads and supporting broad use cases without difficulty.
Sentiment score
7.4
Zendesk scales well across team sizes, despite challenges in backups, updates, customization, and larger organization's specific scalability needs.
I have migrated approximately 500 people to the system, and it can certainly support more users beyond this number.
Technology Specialist at Cognizant
We have not hit a peak or a turn yet that Zendesk has not been able to go with us or been able to grow with us in the process, change or pivot that the company is making.
Project Manager III at City of Union City Government
Zendesk can scale from very small companies to very large ones.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
Zendesk's scalability is excellent.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
6.1
NICE CXone is generally stable, with brief outages well-managed, earning high praise for technical support and communication.
Sentiment score
7.8
Zendesk is stable and reliable, with occasional outages swiftly resolved, making it ideal for small businesses and startups.
In general, the stability is good.
Senior Manager, Contact Center Technology at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
While the system often operates without issues, there have been instances of reports involving VM resource congestion, WFM issues, and RT problems.
Technology Specialist at Cognizant
They are always informing us with a status update and an ETA, and the turnaround time is usually within the same day with no extended downtime that would cause a detriment to our company.
Project Manager III at City of Union City Government
Zendesk is quite stable; we experience major outages only once or twice a year, making it very reliable.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
The stability has been quite reliable.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
 

Room For Improvement

NICE CXone needs an improved user interface, better audio, streamlined reporting, enhanced AWS control, and competitive pricing.
Zendesk users seek improved usability, better integration, enhanced reporting, customization, mobile support, streamlined management, and communication tools.
Compared to challengers such as Zoom, which seem more cost-effective, NICE CXone's suite of products is very modular, so as they provide new services, you have to add to your existing package and this balloons your costs since there's an additional license needed to use the new tools, leading to potentially higher out-of-pocket expenses.
Operations Manager at a financial services firm with 11-50 employees
The audio quality in NICE CXone has room for improvement, as I experience issues like diffused calls and crackling audio.
Technology Specialist at Cognizant
Zendesk could actually support HTML on the tickets so we could format our text better than the current options such as size, bold, italic, or underscored, because the text processing is too simple.
Junior system analyst at Wevt clous
Zendesk is missing an AI aspect that could help provide quick answers based on the knowledge housed within the platform.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
Zendesk is amazing, and because they are always working on a new upgrade or a new integration, they are very forward-thinking from an engineering perspective.
Project Manager III at City of Union City Government
 

Setup Cost

NICE CXone requires careful evaluation of tiered licensing costs and features, especially considering data transition challenges.
Zendesk's pricing can be high, impacting decisions, but offers flexibility and valuable CX features if negotiated effectively.
It is not the cheapest solution nor the most expensive, but it provides value for money.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
The experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Zendesk was quite expensive.
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
 

Valuable Features

NICE CXone enhances business efficiency with customizable features, seamless integration, and real-time management tools, offering flexibility and control.
Zendesk excels in integration, user-friendly ticket management, automation, customization, and robust analytics to enhance productivity and user experience.
The switch from using Avaya, which required connecting to a hard or soft phone, to using WebRTC via a web browser has significantly improved customer service efficiency.
Technology Specialist at Cognizant
Some of the best features with NICE CXone are the real-time visibility that you have, which empowers you to make adjustments on the fly, such as turning on and off your queues and adjusting how we route calls to our agents.
Operations Manager at a financial services firm with 11-50 employees
It allows us to handle more support cases with fewer people due to its advanced artificial intelligence capabilities.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
Zendesk is way cheaper than other ITSM platforms such as ServiceNow, providing a good platform at a lower price so we could offer good support with a low budget for the license.
Junior system analyst at Wevt clous
Being able to put response counters on certain tickets and have certain ones that are high priority and have a tighter SLA than lower priority items, being able to categorize them as a question versus an urgent request, and being able to bucket them as feature requests or product enhancements.
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
 

Categories and Ranking

NICE CXone
Ranking in Knowledge Management Software
6th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
Workforce Engagement Management (3rd), IVR Systems (1st), Live Chat (1st), Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) (4th), AI Customer Experience Personalization (8th)
Zendesk
Ranking in Knowledge Management Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
66
Ranking in other categories
CRM Customer Engagement Centers (4th), CRM (8th), Help Desk Software (4th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (6th), Sales Force Automation (4th), Reporting (10th), Community Platforms (1st), AI Customer Support (7th), AI IT Support (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Knowledge Management Software category, the mindshare of NICE CXone is 6.2%, up from 4.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zendesk is 10.3%, down from 16.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Knowledge Management Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Zendesk10.3%
NICE CXone6.2%
Other83.5%
Knowledge Management Software
 

Featured Reviews

AG
Technology Specialist at Cognizant
Improved efficiency with browser-based call handling and efficient scripting tools
The audio quality in NICE CXone has room for improvement, as I experience issues like diffused calls and crackling audio. Clearing cache and cookies from browsers often resolves these problems, but it's something that occurs frequently. Simplifying the studio tool could also be an improvement, along with organizing external training and better communication about new features, like agent assist or agent co-pilot.
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.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
13%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Insurance Company
6%
Computer Software Company
8%
Performing Arts
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business35
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise11
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with NICE CXone?
The reporting isn't bad, but there are opportunities for improvement; we get real-time dashboards for monitoring, though for performance management, we have to procure certain reports manually by p...
What is your primary use case for NICE CXone?
We're working in the finance space, banking, and our customers that we support are primarily banks and remittance services. We are a contact center providing services to other businesses, primarily...
What advice do you have for others considering NICE CXone?
I really can't add any value about how it's influenced our customer journey just yet because we're just in the process of implementing that and have no data at this stage. Overall, NICE CXone is no...
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?
As of right now, I have nothing that comes to mind as an improvement needed or a feature that could work differently or be enhanced. I think across the board, Zendesk is amazing, and because they a...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

NICE inContact, NICE CXone Workforce Optimization Pro, NICE CXOne WFO Pro, CXone Workforce Optimization, inContact Workforce Optimization, CallCopy, Discover, VPI Empower, Brand Embassy, goMoxie
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

MoneyGram, Honeywell, Radisson Hotel Group, AAA, New Balance, MattressFIRM, Teleflora, Best Buy
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about NICE CXone vs. Zendesk and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
879,711 professionals have used our research since 2012.