What is Zendesk?

Zendesk is a cloud-based customer service platform that aims to streamline customer interactions across multiple channels, including email, phone, chat, social media, and self-service portals. 

While they promise to offer a range of tools to help businesses manage their customer support operations, Zendesk comes with pricing that is confusing, costly, and may not be worth your investment.

Businesses using Zendesk will find themselves spending a significant amount of money on the platform's pricing plans, which require paid add-ons for essential features in an already expensive base plan. Additionally, while Zendesk provides businesses with tools to create a knowledge base and improve customer engagement, businesses have found that these features do not fully meet their needs.

In 2023, Zendesk's UI is still clunky and outdated and heavily relies on marketplace and custom apps that will incur additional costs and deliver a poor experience overall. While Zendesk promises to provide customer support operations effectively and offers a Plan for Everyone, they charge up to $34/agent for a basic feature like a knowledge base. So it is essential for businesses to carefully evaluate the costs and features of Zendesk to determine if it is the right choice for your business.

Let’s first have an overview of Zendesk pricing and then we’ll explain why Freshdesk is a superior option that’s worth every penny you pay for it.

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How much does Zendesk cost in 2023? 

Zendesk has different offerings in the form of Zendesk Suite, Sales and Support, with each category having 3 pricing plans named - Team, Growth and Professional. With so many plans and different offerings, it’s very difficult to navigate according to your unique business requirements. 

 

If you are looking for customer support software, here’s what Zendesk offers:

  • Zendesk Suite for everyone - It has three plans

    • Suite Team - US$ 49 per agent/month billed annually

    • Suite Growth - US$ 79 per agent/month billed annually

    • Suite Professional - US$ 99 per agent/month billed annually

  • Zendesk Suite for enterprises - It has two plans

    • Suite Enterprise - US$ 150 per agent/month billed annually

    • Elite Enterprise plan - Additional enterprise-ready plans from US$ 215 per agent/month billed annually

  • Zendesk for Sales - It has three plans

    • Zendesk Sell Team - US$ 19 per user/month billed annually

    • Zendesk Sell Growth - US$ 49 per user/month billed annually

    • Zendesk Sell Professional - US$ 99 per user/month billed annually

  • Zendesk for Support - It has three plans

    • Support Team - US$ 19 per agent/month billed annually

    • Support Professional - US$ 49 per agent/month billed annually

    • Support Enterprise - US$ 99 per agent/month billed annually

Many of these offerings come with different add-ons. However, since Zendesk Suite is their comprehensive support solution that offers all their capabilities, we’re going to focus on unpacking whether the included features and capabilities are worth the amount you’ll have to spend on it.

Zendesk Suite has five plans: Team, Growth, Professional, Enterprise, and Elite. All these plans come with a free trial and paid add-ons such as real-time chat and social messaging.

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Why Freshdesk is more cost-effective than Zendesk

Freshdesk offers transparent pricing, and all the features are natively built into the product, unlike Zendesk, where a lot of features are available via add-ons that add up to the cost to your already expensive paid plans. Here are some of the highlights that make Freshdesk a more cost-effective option.

Criteria
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Lowest plan

$15/agent/month

$49/agent/month
Highest plan

$79/agent/month

$215/agent/month
Customer support

24/7 mail support available for all plans. Phone and chat support are available for all the paid plans.

24/7 support via phone and chat is reserved only for higher-tier, expensive plans.
Bots and AI

Native bots builder and free bot sessions are available in all paid plans.

Bot flows need to be built via pricey third-party vendors. Entire bot ecosystem is more complex and expensive.
Social channels

Natively available on all paid plans

Social channels and text messages are available at additional fees
Agent load balancing

Natively available

Third-party app needed for round-robin assignment.That adds extra cost to your existing plan


See Freshdesk Pricing

Should you pay for Zendesk or Freshdesk?

While Zendesk ticks multiple boxes when you’re comparing help desk software, it doesn’t do a great job of providing an intuitive and easy-to-use platform. On the other hand, Freshdesk is a purpose-built solution that works right out of the box, lets you get up and running in weeks, and gets you a mature, scalable product that will fit in your current needs. It also allows you to grow and scale, without requiring you to switch platforms. Here’s why you should choose Freshdesk over Zendesk.

Transparent pricing

Our feature-rich customer service software is available at affordable rates and transparent pricing plans. We won't bog you down with pricey add-ons and enhancements for basic support functionalities. Absolutely no hidden costs.

Faster time-to-value

Being extremely intuitive and easy to configure, Freshdesk has a shorter implementation cycle, and you can start realizing value in weeks. Configuration and onboarding support is offered from the start to set you up for success with Freshdesk.

Scalable automation

Simple Freshdesk automation features like Thank You detector and quick actions on support tickets help agents complete tasks 3X faster than on Zendesk. Freshdesk's AI-powered automations can be set up without depending on consultants and enables agents to reduce repetitive work and focus on critical customer issues.

Native AI capabilities

Freshdesk’s built-in AI is easy to deploy and train, improving ticketing and agent productivity. AI-powered chatbots and bot workflows can be built easily on Freshdesk, without any expensive third-party integrations or dependence on developers.

Easy-to-use interface

Unlike Zendesk, Freshdesk has a more intuitive UI that both support agents and admins find easier to navigate and use. Onboard agents faster and set up the Freshdesk ticketing system effortlessly with 35% fewer rules than Zendesk. 

See Full Comparison Here

Frequently Asked Questions