Freshchat vs. Zendesk Suite

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Freshchat
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
A solution to engage customers with smarter conversations on any channel, designed so support, marketing, sales, and even bots to have conversations at scale with customers.
$0
per month free for up to 10 agents
Zendesk Suite
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
Zendesk is a customer support solution with built-in ticketing, conversational messaging, and live chat, designed to help businesses of all sizes and industries deliver personalized service at scale. Zendesk's AI agents are trained in CX to help Service teams resolve customer issues faster and more accurately while still providing a human-centered experience. Zendesk ultimately aims to help businesses improve time to value, reduce effort per ticket, and keep costs low.
$69
per month per agent
Pricing
FreshchatZendesk Suite
Editions & Modules
Growth
$19
per month (billed annually) per agent
Pro
$49
per month (billed annually) per agent
Enterprise
$79
per month (billed annually) per agent
Suite Team
$69
per month per agent
Suite Growth
$115
per month per agent
Suite Professional
$149
per month per agent
Suite Enterprise
Contact Sales
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
FreshchatZendesk Suite
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
YesNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesYes
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalOptional
Additional Details20% discount available with annual pricing.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
FreshchatZendesk Suite
Considered Both Products
Freshchat
Chose Freshchat
Freshchat stands out as a strong live chat and messaging solution, especially for live customer support. Compared to Zendesk Explore, which is a tool specifically designed for analytics and reporting. Freshchat is designed for instant communication with customers, making it a …
Chose Freshchat
We have used Intercom.

The terms used within Intercom were quite complex and the knowledge curve was not very smooth.
Zendesk Suite
Chose Zendesk Suite
We Initially started working the Zendesk Suite and it is more easier to understand all the functionalities and workflows. It is more secured and well managed platform
Features
FreshchatZendesk Suite
Chat Analytics and Reports
Comparison of Chat Analytics and Reports features of Product A and Product B
Freshchat
7.3
18 Ratings
17% below category average
Zendesk Suite
-
Ratings
Chat history and transcripts7.818 Ratings00 Ratings
Chat reporting7.118 Ratings00 Ratings
Chat and web analytics7.015 Ratings00 Ratings
Incident and problem management
Comparison of Incident and problem management features of Product A and Product B
Freshchat
-
Ratings
Zendesk Suite
8.9
172 Ratings
8% above category average
Organize and prioritize service tickets00 Ratings9.3171 Ratings
Expert directory00 Ratings8.2118 Ratings
Subscription-based notifications00 Ratings8.7119 Ratings
ITSM collaboration and documentation00 Ratings8.2122 Ratings
Ticket creation and submission00 Ratings9.4172 Ratings
Ticket response00 Ratings9.3171 Ratings
Self Help Community
Comparison of Self Help Community features of Product A and Product B
Freshchat
-
Ratings
Zendesk Suite
8.4
156 Ratings
4% above category average
External knowledge base00 Ratings8.3150 Ratings
Internal knowledge base00 Ratings8.5143 Ratings
Multi-Channel Help
Comparison of Multi-Channel Help features of Product A and Product B
Freshchat
-
Ratings
Zendesk Suite
8.8
168 Ratings
9% above category average
Customer portal00 Ratings9.1138 Ratings
IVR00 Ratings8.570 Ratings
Social integration00 Ratings8.4112 Ratings
Email support00 Ratings9.3165 Ratings
Help Desk CRM integration00 Ratings9.0128 Ratings
Best Alternatives
FreshchatZendesk Suite
Small Businesses
Gist
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Score 9.5 out of 10
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Genesys DX (discontinued)
Genesys DX (discontinued)
Score 10.0 out of 10
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Agiloft Service Desk (discontinued)
Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Genesys DX (discontinued)
Genesys DX (discontinued)
Score 10.0 out of 10
SysAid
SysAid
Score 8.9 out of 10
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User Ratings
FreshchatZendesk Suite
Likelihood to Recommend
8.5
(42 ratings)
9.0
(209 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.2
(4 ratings)
10.0
(43 ratings)
Usability
8.2
(18 ratings)
8.8
(82 ratings)
Availability
7.3
(1 ratings)
9.1
(14 ratings)
Performance
7.3
(1 ratings)
9.1
(11 ratings)
Support Rating
6.0
(3 ratings)
5.6
(31 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
6.4
(10 ratings)
Implementation Rating
7.3
(2 ratings)
9.1
(19 ratings)
Configurability
4.5
(1 ratings)
9.1
(4 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
4.5
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Ease of integration
7.3
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
4.5
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Professional Services
4.5
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
8.2
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
8.2
(1 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
FreshchatZendesk Suite
Likelihood to Recommend
Freshworks Inc
It is best suited for having 24-hour support, where customers can interact easily, even using their phones, to raise concerns or inquire about information. This makes it easier than going through the documents portal as a source of knowledge or sending emails for worries. However, it can be less appropriate for scenarios when you need more formal communication, like emails, and when proper documentation is necessary.
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Zendesk
Being a customer support agent, I found it very good when it comes to send an email or call or chat- with the user. I can do all that from the one single platform which is so easy and time saving for you. It does not take much time to use this, We can chat- with the user and at the same time we can send an email to them as well.
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Pros
Freshworks Inc
  • Real time customer support. During busy times all our available agents can jump on and handle large volume of customer interactions.
  • Automations and canned response features. With automation we can greet our customers the moment a chat gets assigned to an agent letting customers know they are being attended to similarly canned response helps us use templates for generic and commonly asked questions.
  • Dashboards and analytics. Freshchat's ability to build customized dashboards and analyze performance in a granular level helps us monitor workload and manage performance effectively.
Read full review
Zendesk
  • UI/UX; mature macros and automations, slick and well thought out UI.
  • Reporting, reporting, reporting. With user, org, and ticket level tags, we can track every aspect of our ticket flow.
  • Extensibility; the app marketplace is a great resource for expanding functionality from the baseline offering.
Read full review
Cons
Freshworks Inc
  • Freshchat is one of the best platforms, but still there are certain areas that require further improvement in order for the platform to become flawless.
  • I feel that the automated system in Freshchat is comparatively slow and due to this, it does not respond well according to all the requirements.
  • There are certain features in Freshchat which are not available for everyone and they can only be accessed by those who are paying the highest pricing tier.
Read full review
Zendesk
  • Is there a way for AEs and CSMs to be informed in a weekly summary of all their accounts and any tickets? Example: Disney submitted a ticket on XYZ. Google has an urgent issue on X still unresolved.
  • Is there a way for CSMs or AEs to have a Dashboard that's specific to their accounts instead of seeing all the tickets in the queue that are not relevant to them?
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Likelihood to Renew
Freshworks Inc
Freshchat has met all our expectations and more. It has allowed our team to be more efficient with their time, field questions quickly, and escalate issues up the chain. We highly recommend freshchat as the perfect addition to anyone already using freshdesk or simply looking for a good solution for in app messaging.
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Zendesk
Zendesk is an amazing tool for communicating with your customers easily. The communication tickets from sellers to us or from us to sellers are stored, and there are statuses used to make communication easy. We have internal conversations between departments, linked with useful software such as Zingtree, Talkdesk, and Webs.
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Usability
Freshworks Inc
I give it an 8 due to its usability. Yes, I had a few issues to begin with and needed some assistance from Freshchat agents, but considering this is something that is completely new to me, to set up what feels like a professional chat handling system complete with autobot within a day is really saying something I feel.
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Zendesk
Pros: The agent interface is sleek, contemporary, and relatively easy to learn compared to many other enterprise tools. For common tasks, admins are given point-and-click options- adding fields, modifying workflows, constructing macros. The knowledge base (Guide) editor is easy to use for non-developers. Drawbacks: Once you move past the initial things - complex automations, reporting/analytics in Explore, and/or customizations integrating the API, it requires much more advanced training to use successfully. Navigating between the different modules (Support, Explore, Chat, Guide) can feel very disconnected; often you are reminded that it really is a "suite" of products brought together -not really one unified platform. If you're using multiple brands managing simultaneous support tickets, or heavily customizing workflows to meet your brand, you may run into a bit of struggle with usability. So: it's a lot more user friendly than the palaces (Salesforce Service Cloud, ServiceNow), but is not used as quickly or with as much streamlined flow as a product made for a small shop. So if you are looking for a great balance, this is a good option if you are a net new organization or an organization on their way to scaling from 15 - 50 employee. Expect some elbow grease from the admin team once learning, adapting, and working efficiently once you move past the basics with your support tickets and initial customizations.
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Reliability and Availability
Freshworks Inc
Freshchat has always been available when I needed to use it.
Read full review
Zendesk
In the past year, I'd say I have only noticed maybe two hours total of downtime in my own usage. Very minimal.
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Performance
Freshworks Inc
Freshchat always loads quickly and communication is quickly sent and received.
Read full review
Zendesk
There has been minor performance degradation on a very few days out of the two years I have been using the product.
Read full review
Support Rating
Freshworks Inc
The experience we had in past for lets say 4-5 months with the support team and our TAM was really helpful. The changes in the bot flow has helped our bot to ensure we connect with customer easily.
Read full review
Zendesk
We rarely need to contact their support team, but when we do they are responsive. However there have been notable times when communication between myself and the support rep was challenging despite me providing clear explanation of the issue, screenshots, and a thorough explanation of the goal we hope to achieve. It took several back and forth attempt, on a few occasions, to get resolution on an otherwise simple request
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Online Training
Freshworks Inc
No answers on this topic
Zendesk
Zendesk has tons of available material for training - videos, webinars, articles, etc. The only reason this is not a 10 is because it can be hard to figure out how to navigate to these things and find what you are looking for.
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Implementation Rating
Freshworks Inc
I hope to show new users data because this can save a lot of time
Read full review
Zendesk
I was very satisfied. They have a free trial for 30 days and I recommend you do that and use it. It is very easy to get started with the basics and the build on over time.

The only thing technically complex was single sign-on and integration to Salesforce.com required some tweaks – otherwise setting up system was very easy
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Alternatives Considered
Freshworks Inc
Messaging across mediums - Freshchat integrates with majority of mainstream instant messaging apps. Like Facebook messenger, Telegram and WhatsApp . This makes it convenient for us to have a presence on the above-mentioned platforms and respond to messages from these platforms from a single Freshchat dashboard.its good app Freshdesk Messaging help me to contact the customer and contact the customer to inform my problem to solve it and is a good app and help full app and its easy to use uncomplicated and Freshdesk Helps me provide good quality to the customer and make customer feedback good for a company
Read full review
Zendesk
The customisable reporting every time. Our leadership reply on me to run my team and want to know what customers are telling us so they can elevate our products. We have extensive custom reports that tie up all aspects of our product and customer journeys. I've not found another product that allows me as much freedom as Zendesk Suite explore does, so far.
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Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Freshworks Inc
Did not help with the purchase
Read full review
Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Scalability
Freshworks Inc
We only implemented the product in 1 way so I cant speak to this.
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Zendesk
WHY we will use Zendesk in HR and PD internally
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Professional Services
Freshworks Inc
Did not use
Read full review
Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
Freshworks Inc
  • From the positive effect of working on it, it helps employees to speed up their thinking and writing.
  • One of the positive effects of our clients is that their problems are solved easily and quickly.
  • Each employee knows how many of his chats have been resolved.
  • There is no negative effect in general.
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Zendesk
  • Integrating other AI solutions for an organization with high volumes can cost about USD5000 monthly. With Zendesk AI and by building onto the same with AI powered apps built for Zendesk Suite we save a projected USD4000 monthly.
  • Robust Zendesk APIs have enabled us to integrate our internal system with a customized app saving us hundreds of hours every quarter spent loading customer profiles that are not loaded instantly from the app.
  • Plug and play apps like Round robin save us weeks of sprint delay timelines as they do not require additional coding or developer support to install and start using.
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ScreenShots

Freshchat Screenshots

Screenshot of Channel Freedom: The interface to engage customers on the channel of their choiceScreenshot of Unified Agent Workspace: Equips agents to deliver personalization at scaleScreenshot of Admin and Analytics: These drive informed decisions to help business scale

Zendesk Suite Screenshots

Screenshot of the Zendesk Agent WorkspaceScreenshot of Omnichannel MessagingScreenshot of Zendesk TicketingScreenshot of Bots powered by Zendesk AIScreenshot of Tone shift with Zendesk AIScreenshot of Zendesk ticketing side conversations