Spiceworks Help Desk vs. Zendesk Suite

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Spiceworks Help Desk
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
Spiceworks offers a set of free tools for IT network management and help desk support ticketing. The inventory management system essentially provides comprehensive device information for asset management. The Spiceworks Network Monitor provides information on observed IT for problem tracking and server performance monitoring. And finally, the Spiceworks Help Desk Software lets IT personnel stay on top of issues across the network with a ticketing system. Help desk roles with role-based…N/A
Zendesk Suite
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
The Zendesk Support suite is a cloud-based customer support software built for better customer relationships. Designed to improve customer satisfaction and to support customers on any channel: text SMS, web, mobile app, phone, email, social media. The vendor states more than 200,000 companies such as Uber, Groupon, Box, Airbnb, and Slack are using Zendesk to lower their support costs, raise productivity, and increase customer satisfaction. Zendesk offers a full suite of products to meet customer…
$55
per month agent
Pricing
Spiceworks Help DeskZendesk Suite
Editions & Modules
All Tiers
Free
Support Team (Foundational Support Only)
$19
per month agent
Suite Team
$55
per month agent
Support Professional
$55
per month agent
Suite Growth
$89
per month agent
Suite Professional
$115
per month agent
Support Enterprise
$115
per month agent
Suite Enterprise
$169
per month agent
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Spiceworks Help DeskZendesk Suite
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoYes
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Spiceworks Help DeskZendesk Suite
Considered Both Products
Spiceworks Help Desk
Chose Spiceworks Help Desk
A lot of the competition starts with some free options, but bare minimum or "paid only modules" etc. And their support is often either non existent or convoluted while Spiceworks Help Desk is both great and responsive as well as having an open community and forums. You can …
Chose Spiceworks Help Desk
We are in the process of looking at Remote Monitoring & Management tools as we are growing so rapidly. We have been checking out demos & reading reviews of these other applications and they are way more feature-rich than Spiceworks - however, they come at a cost and will …
Chose Spiceworks Help Desk
Spiceworks was free and already in place at the organization. Users are comfortable with the process and transparency offered.
Chose Spiceworks Help Desk
The main commercial alternative product evaluated was Zendesk, which was not selected because of the price. The second alternative researched was the osTicket, which was not selected as it was complicated to configure. With hindsight, I would suggest using osTicket instead of …
Chose Spiceworks Help Desk
Spiceworks was the best solution by far, and it was also free, so it was impossible to beat. Also the community of IT pros using Spiceworks is huge and makes it even more of a clear winner. When it comes to help desk and inventory software, there was not really any …
Chose Spiceworks Help Desk
Footprints, Zendesk, and TrackIt.
Zendesk Suite
Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk is used in conjunction with ConnectWise Manage to communicate to us in our ticketing system. Zendesk has more features than Spiceworks, and I believe the increased cost justifies itself. The ability for our users to text in to the ticketing system makes it easy to …
Chose Zendesk Suite
No comparison to TSC2. We used it years ago and it was very limited (no automation, customizations, etc). We used Kace for 3 years and hated it as a support desk solution. It was great for asset inventory, but that was all. Spiceworks was just too busy to look at. JitBit was a …
Chose Zendesk Suite
In my searches I have come across a lot of alternatives and I try to keep and open mind on each of them, here are a few of the tools I heard and saw a lot of chatter about while reviewing a looking for Helpdesk tools.

SpiceWorks -
This was a freeware program that i had used in …
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Spiceworks Help DeskZendesk Suite
Incident and problem management
Comparison of Incident and problem management features of Product A and Product B
Spiceworks Help Desk
7.4
54 Ratings
6% below category average
Zendesk Suite
8.1
109 Ratings
3% above category average
Organize and prioritize service tickets7.453 Ratings8.4108 Ratings
Expert directory5.646 Ratings7.268 Ratings
Subscription-based notifications7.241 Ratings7.374 Ratings
ITSM collaboration and documentation6.444 Ratings7.970 Ratings
Ticket creation and submission9.153 Ratings9.1109 Ratings
Ticket response8.752 Ratings8.8108 Ratings
Self Help Community
Comparison of Self Help Community features of Product A and Product B
Spiceworks Help Desk
7.3
51 Ratings
6% below category average
Zendesk Suite
7.9
97 Ratings
2% above category average
External knowledge base8.847 Ratings7.893 Ratings
Internal knowledge base5.947 Ratings8.088 Ratings
Multi-Channel Help
Comparison of Multi-Channel Help features of Product A and Product B
Spiceworks Help Desk
5.3
51 Ratings
37% below category average
Zendesk Suite
7.9
107 Ratings
3% above category average
Customer portal6.145 Ratings7.484 Ratings
IVR4.010 Ratings7.835 Ratings
Social integration3.126 Ratings7.366 Ratings
Email support8.045 Ratings8.5105 Ratings
Help Desk CRM integration5.027 Ratings8.579 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Spiceworks Help DeskZendesk Suite
Small Businesses
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Score 9.0 out of 10
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Score 9.0 out of 10
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Agiloft Flexible Service Desk Suite
Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Salesforce Service Cloud
Salesforce Service Cloud
Score 8.7 out of 10
SAP Service Cloud
SAP Service Cloud
Score 8.7 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Spiceworks Help DeskZendesk Suite
Likelihood to Recommend
8.8
(82 ratings)
8.3
(147 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(29 ratings)
10.0
(40 ratings)
Usability
8.6
(8 ratings)
6.9
(20 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(3 ratings)
8.6
(13 ratings)
Performance
8.0
(1 ratings)
8.0
(10 ratings)
Support Rating
8.7
(26 ratings)
9.0
(29 ratings)
In-Person Training
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
7.9
(9 ratings)
Implementation Rating
10.0
(7 ratings)
9.0
(18 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
9.3
(3 ratings)
Product Scalability
10.0
(1 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Spiceworks Help DeskZendesk Suite
Likelihood to Recommend
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
It's a great helpdesk solution - we currently have five years of data within it, roughly 25,000 tickets. The older edition is a great inventory and software license tracking tool. It is easy for users to use the interface and submit tickets and requests on the web, and its email integration is solid. The new version is a below-average system monitoring tool, only giving up/down status and a few other metrics.
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Zendesk
The ability to Merge tickets is a good to have feature. Navigation is easy from one ticket to another ticket without having to go back to the list. Admin options should be more clear, internal menu navigation is complex and creates more confusion while arranging the sections and articles. Channel Management is good but Forum management can be brought in with more flexibility. More Apps integration or flexibility in APIs so that a newbie can also integrate the application into the software. A redundant software that brings in 360-degree communication of support/service concepts into practicality however if the option to compile texting with platforms like ringcentral, Twilio or Dialpad will be an awesome thing to share ticket updates with custom templates.
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Pros
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
  • It helps to multitask, even on the go with the mobile App.
  • We can customize to meet your needs with automated responses, notifications, and templates.
  • Detailed reports allow managers to keep track [of] and analyze data.
  • Allows for a database to store notes helpful for future tickets.
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Zendesk
  • Reporting and Analytics
  • Ease of Agent Training and Use
  • Able to add multiple brands with related custom reports and dashboards
  • Adding a new brand and basic help center is easy to do without the need of an expert or web team
  • Ability of agents and supervisors to see customer history across multiple channels
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Cons
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
  • I have always wanted a way to redirect a support request into another IS bin, such as a development task.
  • It's possible to extract the data from the Spiceworks database, but it would be helpful if the process to do so were easier.
  • Improved ability to customize the system generated emails to improve the formatting and company branding.
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Zendesk
  • I think the Graphical User Interface could use a facelift. It not the most aesthetically pleasing platform in my experience.
  • Particular things like where the default is when you click on each and every dropdown menu.
  • The macro integration could be a little more simplified.
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Likelihood to Renew
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
Spiceworks is a free tool, so there would be no hesitation if we are required to upgrade it. We have installed Spiceworks on a dedicated server with more than enough resources to get the most from this tool, so we will have this running in our department for years to come.
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Zendesk
Zendesk is super easy to use and navigate. I really enjoy the sleek layout, the ability to tailor tickets, the macro option, and the quick key guide they have to make your use of time even more effective. My whole team loves working with Zendesk and rarely ever has problems.
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Usability
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
Spiceworks is user friendly and easy to set up. It can be customized to suit your needs. If there are any problems, you can go to the community forums for support and be in contact with many IT Pros, as well as the Spiceworks support staff and development teams who are always happy to help users out
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Zendesk
As an agent it's very simple to use. As an admin it's also easy to use, but sometimes lacks some functionality that would be nice to have such as expanded native 2 way sync functionality for many major apps that are commonly used today like HubSpot and Salesforce. The ability to add followers to tickets to they get updates and are in the know without the customer seeing this agent cc'd is a nice touch. This ensures additional visibility and easily following the communication without having to appear as a CC to the customer, who could accidentally remove that person in a response, thus breaking the visibility
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Reliability and Availability
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
We use it both locally on our own server so up time is decided by us and we also use the hosted help desk. We have never had an outage of that.
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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
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
No answers on this topic
Zendesk
There has been minor performance degradation on a very few days out of the two years I have been using the product.
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Support Rating
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
Spiceworks has been working out of the box, and some of the basic customizations have been successful with just our internal staff handling. We don't have any other issues with the tool. It provides us with the inventory information we want in a quick and concise report in a variety of formats for our team.
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Zendesk
Every time I contacted them they were not only very responsive and knowledgable, but always seemed to have a positive upbeat attitude. It probably helps that we did not have significant service outages or sev 1 level issues, but even my lower severity issues were quickly answered. And the positive and upbeat attitude really made things feel comfortable.
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Online Training
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
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
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
If you can spin up a VM to run it on, you'll thank yourself later. If you have remote sites, set up a local server (or dedicated computer) at each site and set them up as remote collectors for the main site. You'll save time and bandwidth
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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
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
EGroupware UI is clunky and hard to use, Jira is great but the pricing is expensive in comparison with spice works that has a free version and you can test it out properly before buying and make a correct decision based on your business plan and company objectives with the right software.
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Zendesk
Although a bit pricey, it does the job well. We are happy with the results it provides; our team is also quite satisfied on how easy it is to use, login and start working. Compared to the other two we have tried, Zendesk takes the cake. It makes Customer Management much easier, more efficient, and more effective.
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Return on Investment
Spiceworks Ziff Davis
  • Positive - Allow organizations to implement structured Help Desk procedures.
  • Positive - IT can begin to quantify their tickets and uncover needs within the organization.
  • Positive - IT can develop a solid roadmap with [the] management of future needs, equipment refresh schedules, etc.
  • Positive - IT can pinpoint employees who may need extra training or updated equipment based on historical ticketing data.
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Zendesk
  • The positives weigh more than the negatives here, as it gives us a one-stop portal where we can tend to customer needs using one web app
  • It has also helped us identify areas of improvement based on the reporting feature
  • The value it provides outweighs any missing or lacking features that I'm sure will be available in the future
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ScreenShots

Zendesk Suite Screenshots

Screenshot of 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