Freshdesk vs. Zendesk Suite

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Freshdesk
Score 8.6 out of 10
N/A
Freshdesk is a cloud-based customer service software that helps businesses of all sizes to deliver customer support. Freshdesk converts requests coming in via email, web, phone, chat, and social into tickets, and unifies ticket resolution across channels. Additionally, Freshdesk lets the user automate workflows, provide self-service, manage SLAs, and measure metrics, to stay on top of customer support. Freshdesk also offers out-of-the-box features like an AI-powered support chatbot,…
$0
Up to 10 agents per user
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
FreshdeskZendesk Suite
Editions & Modules
Free
$0
Up to 10 agents
Growth
$15
per month per agent
Pro
$49
per month per agent
Enterprise
$69
per month per agent
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
FreshdeskZendesk Suite
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
YesNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesYes
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeOptional
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
FreshdeskZendesk Suite
Considered Both Products
Freshdesk
Chose Freshdesk
We chose Freshdesk for the variety of capabilities and easy-to-use features. Jobber lacked the analytics, history, sales features, and easy-to-use options needed to grow our business. Zendesk was not user-friendly and many of the "integrations" could only be connected by people …
Chose Freshdesk
Value for Money and Ease of Use put it ahead of the competing products when making our decision.

Whilst they all offer similar services, our time to implement, set-up and get the platform running the way we needed was shortest. It was also an easy to use tool for agents - …
Chose Freshdesk
Freshdesk is cheaper.
Zendesk would also allow customers to close tickets on their own and it also has functionality where a few solution articles are automatically recommended to the customer based on what they wrote and that might already solve the customers' request.
Chose Freshdesk
we decided to use Freshdesk based on the fact that a sister company was also using it and recommended we use it as well
Chose Freshdesk
It is easier to start with, but less robust overall. Freshdesk has a better free tier, and had some advanced customization capabilities. Zendesk is easier to get to an advanced level with, has more and better integrations, and has a better data tool. HubSpot is comparable to …
Chose Freshdesk
Freshdesk is much more cost effective than competitors.
Chose Freshdesk
Freshdesk offers so much more support, integration and a great mobile app compared to ZenDesk.
Chose Freshdesk
We used to use Spiceworks but it was extremely clunky and not very customisable at the time. When we started looking at other options we ended up focusing on Freshdesk, Zendesk and Zoho as they seemed like the best out of all the ones we found. We eventually went with Freshdesk …
Chose Freshdesk
For the price point, FreshDesk is a great starter solution for service desk management.

If you need further integration with other systems, you may quickly find yourself looking at other options, or using native tools - because FreshDesk simply doesn't have the integration …
Chose Freshdesk
Compared to the above alternatives, Freshdesk has proven to be easier for our organisation to use for both our colleagues and external parties. The fast and personalised support also rose above the other alternatives.
Chose Freshdesk
I did not make the decision originally on implementation however having inherited it I would choose it again, it's feature rich and cost effective with great support.
Chose Freshdesk
- Zendesk vs Freshdesk is similar but FD is better than zendesk. - SF vs Freshdesk cost is almost ok but got better contacts in FD to begin with. - Siebel vs Freshdesk UI challenge are easier than Siebel. - Jira vs Freshdesk Cost effective than Jira.
Chose Freshdesk
We set up test instances of Zendesk, Zoho Desk, UVdesk, Freshdesk and trakdesk and asked our agents to evaluate the products themselves. It was very clear to all that Freshdesk was the more user-friendly, easy-to-set-up and more innovative solution. In the meantime we are very …
Chose Freshdesk
It's a matter of which one is more straightforward and beneficial for the agents. There was much more features offered with Freshdesk that could help our business flow and workflow which is why we've opted to use it for a client. There was also less cost to using it compared to …
Chose Freshdesk
We purchased both Freshsales and Fresh desk at the same time. The Freshworks products gave the best solution at the time because I believed I'd receive one-on-one support and guidance as well as get all of the features we required between the two products as well as full …
Chose Freshdesk
The decision was made before my time. I want to move to another platform ASAP.
Chose Freshdesk
Similar, but we found Freskdesk easier to use. Maybe Zendesk has improved since we last used it.
Chose Freshdesk
Freshdesk is the middle of Zendesk and Zoho Desk when it comes to pricing. For us the biggest reason to switch from Zoho Desk to Freshdesk is because we wanted to consolidate our sales and support team into just one helpdesk software and we really liked the help center and …
Chose Freshdesk
Freshdesk does everything that Zendesk did for less cost.
Chose Freshdesk
Freshdesk is cheaper in cost versus Zendesk. Also, it has many features which are more advanced then Zendesk. Zendesk has many limitations, which Freshdesk overcomes and provides a better user-friendly experience. Automations are also easy and better in Freshdesk.
Chose Freshdesk
Freshdesk offers a free trial of 21 days and the onboarding is a very smooth process. It is comparatively cheaper than its competitors and the UX is far more simple than the other products in the market. Also, the customer support that we get post the purchase is brilliant and …
Chose Freshdesk
Jira Service Management Configuration was incredibly complicated and would have required significant time and effort to set up properly. Customer Portal customization is very limited compared to other solutions. No integrated voice solution is available, which was something …
Zendesk Suite
Chose Zendesk Suite
We used Freshdesk when it was a relatively new product. We switched to Zendesk later to take advantage of better user management, easier interface and user experience, better reporting tools and to align ourselves with a recognised brand.

We use Intercom to engage with …
Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk is more established than these two companies and provides a more robust solution for multi-channel support. Intercom is better suited for chat support and Freshdesk doesn't offer as many features and Zendesk does.
Chose Zendesk Suite
Mainly falls on familiarity as I have been using Zendesk for more than 10 years now. The timeline was a bit strict during deployment quarters hence we have decided to go with the less friction software to be deployed. Additionally, Zendesk on agent's view is user-friendly which …
Chose Zendesk Suite
If spoken honestly Intercom is a level-par with any nearest competitor, Tools like Zendesk has to catchup with them in speed. However, there is an advantage to Zendesk with its simple and easy-to-get software which falls in every mid and small-size business pocket wherein …
Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk is the industry leader in terms of the number of other platforms you can connect it with (CRM's, Customer Success Tools, Billing Tools, etc)—this makes it extremely sticky and a core part of your workflow. Zendesk also offers a variety of channels all in the one …
Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk has been easy to implement and evolve over time. They have launched more online Client learning sessions and occasionally offer in-person local client group sessions to aid in our learning. They offer their training modules for free. The key is we can create the needed …
Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk Support Suite might be pricey but the cost definitely outweighs numerous benefits. Other platforms focus solely on the customer but what our organization likes about Zendesk is that it not only aims to provide a great experience for the customer, it also keeps in view …
Chose Zendesk Suite

Zendesk offers an all-in-one solution and great analytics to analyze the ticketing in the company.

Zendesk seems to be more customizable than others and it seemed to be the best option for the price paid. It's secure and stable which is what we needed in the company.

Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk is currently on par with both of these services in that they are great ticketing software programs but are light in Contact/Sales management. The autoresponder with Zendesk is much easier to implement and customize compared to the other options. The option of the mobile …
Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk was the best of the bunch and allowed us the best value for what we were looking for. It allowed us to import data from our other ticketing system and was very user friendly when it came to ticket and email integration. We also were able to setup on our website where …
Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk is a world recognised tool, that ITIL recommend. Easy to use format, great search tools to cross reference issues that are logged. Personalisation allows you to brand your customer facing site.
Chose Zendesk Suite
Zendesk competitors include:
  • Microsoft Parature -- this product intreface is possibly the worst I've seen for customer service. Looks like a mid-90s enterprise application and is about as intuitive to use. We have help migrate dozens of instances away from Parature into Zendesk …
Chose Zendesk Suite
Freshdesk, Sherpadesk
Chose Zendesk Suite
Other platforms I have evaluated: Kayako, Fogbugz, Bugzilla, Assembla, FreshDesk.

I ended up picking Zendesk for several reasons, but there was really 3 reasons why I ultimately picked them:
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
FreshdeskZendesk Suite
Incident and problem management
Comparison of Incident and problem management features of Product A and Product B
Freshdesk
8.4
145 Ratings
6% above category average
Zendesk Suite
8.1
109 Ratings
3% above category average
Organize and prioritize service tickets8.7141 Ratings8.4108 Ratings
Expert directory8.195 Ratings7.268 Ratings
Subscription-based notifications8.43 Ratings7.374 Ratings
ITSM collaboration and documentation7.64 Ratings7.970 Ratings
Ticket creation and submission8.8142 Ratings9.1109 Ratings
Ticket response8.7142 Ratings8.8108 Ratings
Self Help Community
Comparison of Self Help Community features of Product A and Product B
Freshdesk
8.3
130 Ratings
7% above category average
Zendesk Suite
7.9
97 Ratings
2% above category average
External knowledge base8.4116 Ratings7.893 Ratings
Internal knowledge base8.3120 Ratings8.088 Ratings
Multi-Channel Help
Comparison of Multi-Channel Help features of Product A and Product B
Freshdesk
8.3
138 Ratings
8% above category average
Zendesk Suite
7.9
107 Ratings
3% above category average
Customer portal8.2116 Ratings7.484 Ratings
IVR8.143 Ratings7.835 Ratings
Social integration8.572 Ratings7.366 Ratings
Email support8.8138 Ratings8.5105 Ratings
Help Desk CRM integration8.284 Ratings8.579 Ratings
Best Alternatives
FreshdeskZendesk 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
SAP Service Cloud
SAP Service Cloud
Score 8.7 out of 10
Salesforce Service Cloud
Salesforce Service Cloud
Score 8.7 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
FreshdeskZendesk Suite
Likelihood to Recommend
8.7
(213 ratings)
8.3
(147 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.8
(14 ratings)
10.0
(40 ratings)
Usability
8.9
(36 ratings)
6.9
(20 ratings)
Availability
9.1
(4 ratings)
8.6
(13 ratings)
Performance
8.5
(4 ratings)
8.0
(10 ratings)
Support Rating
8.7
(34 ratings)
9.0
(29 ratings)
In-Person Training
8.2
(1 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Online Training
7.9
(2 ratings)
7.9
(9 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.4
(142 ratings)
9.0
(18 ratings)
Configurability
8.5
(3 ratings)
9.3
(3 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
9.1
(3 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
8.8
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
9.1
(4 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
8.0
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
7.8
(2 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
FreshdeskZendesk Suite
Likelihood to Recommend
Freshworks Inc
Using a collection of Skill Based Ticket Assignment, Ticket Allocation, and alerts, we’ve been able to bring our average resolution time to under half our previous time. This is done by making sure the right tickets get to the right agents, and by ensuring agents are followed up on to ensure they do not forget deadlines on tickets in their queue. Furthermore, tickets which would be open for weeks due to lack of a client response are now closed automatically following a prompt email to the end-user
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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
Freshworks Inc
  • Follow up on all conversations that enter and are easy to use by the employee and save responses ready for use.
  • Find out the average rate of the number of conversations that occur in the company and conduct the analysis.
  • There is a feature it allows one to take a permit in the name of the employee who responds to the conversation and to know the problem faced by the customer and the solution.
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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
Read full review
Cons
Freshworks Inc
  • Ticket templates and canned responses should be able to be used interchangeably. We frequently have the same response in both fields.
  • The spam filter can be a little too aggressive. We have had issues with tickets being accidentally marked as spam then filtering incorrectly for weeks at a time.
  • Freshdesk doesn't quite have the right integrations with our other providers (Vonage, and Avochato, to name a few).
Read full review
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
Freshworks Inc
We are extremely happy with Freshdesk and can foresee using it for the next year. We might only consider using a different platform if our average daily ticket volume reaches four digits and its AI isn’t enough to handle our needs by then. While we haven’t tested this yet, we have read reviews that it’s AI capabilities are lacking
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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
Freshworks Inc
I gave it a rating of 9 out of 10 because they delivered on everything we asked them to do. Easy to setup, easy to deploy to end users, easy to customize, easy to enter tickets and so much more. Our experience with their support is top notch! After opening a ticket for support they call use back within 10 minutes every time!
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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
Freshworks Inc
I have encountered a lot of errors in the Freshdesk, however, they tend to resolve it on priority or at least they will share the timeline by when this can be resolved. Most of the time the issue has been from the other partner's end. They take time to resolve their vendor issues and they don't have any timelines in case of developed app errors.
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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
Freshworks Inc
The reports take a lot of time to download if the time period is large. Also, the tickets take their sweet time to open and load. It is not fast as Zendesk. Only 30 tickets are visible in a single go and there isn't any option to select all. If we need to change the pages and dashboards it takes a lot of time to open.
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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
Freshworks Inc
The main thing about Freshdesk user service is that once a request has been made for information about a feature of the platform, the support team responds to tickets quickly, within a day of writing and submitting them, with information that is concise enough so that there is no need to ask for help on the same topic again.
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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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In-Person Training
Freshworks Inc
In-person training is provided to all the agents and it is very easy to learn the basics of the Freshdesk interface. Solving tickets via dashboards, replying to the guest queries in bulk via Freshdesk. The training which is a bit hard is creating the logic according to the ticket flow and intergeration.
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Online Training
Freshworks Inc
This tool is no doubt easy to learn but in-person training is a lot better than online training. It takes time to grasp things in the online training, however, in pandemic we have done all the training online. Apart from a bit more time we haven't faced any issues with online training.
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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
Not applicable. I have never used a support desk system before and FreshDesk had already been implemented at my company before I joined. I am not involved in financial decisions and I have no opinion on buzzwords like "time to productivity" and "time to value"
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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
Freshworks Inc
FreshDesk was the best combination of ease of use and price. While inexpensive, even the lowest tier offered more functionality than the other guys, and the learning curve is almost nonexistent so it's easy to add new agents and get them up to speed quickly instead of having them spend days getting use to the UI.
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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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Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Freshworks Inc
The pricing we had taken is on yearly basis but the subscription and billing frequency that we have is on monthly basis. I would not want to make any changes to it, it is a seamless process with all the contract terms and we both agreed on it. It should be as per the customer's need.
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Scalability
Freshworks Inc
The product they have developed is amazing. They have made different products for emails, tickets, chats & calls as well. It is flexible according to multiple departments. The finance team can use it, the Customer support team is using it, we can use it in call centres, emails etc. We can use these tickets internally as well to create child tickets and assign them to different departments for query resolution.
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Zendesk
No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
Freshworks Inc
  • Freshdesk is certainly better than nothing, or a simple shared inbox
  • Freshdesk is frustrating to incorporate social media with
  • Freshdesk excels at ticket management
  • Freshdesk needs to do more to bring it into alignment with business, rather than 'just' service desk needs.
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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