Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Freshdesk vs Hornbill Systems Supportworks comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 1, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Freshdesk
Ranking in Help Desk Software
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
Customer Experience Management (4th), Field Service Management (3rd), Knowledge Management Software (5th)
Hornbill Systems Supportworks
Ranking in Help Desk Software
35th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
IT Service Management (ITSM) (34th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Help Desk Software category, the mindshare of Freshdesk is 3.4%, down from 4.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Hornbill Systems Supportworks is 0.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Help Desk Software
 

Featured Reviews

SujayRao - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers insights into team performance, with ready-made reports and GenAI features that assist in creating reports
Freshdesk's major drawback is its limitation in integrating tools for App Store and Play Store reviews, and social channels like Twitter, which come with additional costs. Despite having third-party integration options, these features should be inherently available in the tool without additional expenses. Integration with social media and review platforms should be built-in.
it_user1262703 - PeerSpot reviewer
Excels in call logging and call flows but is limited in terms of scalability
I'd advise others to map their processes out before starting with the solution. Hornbill has recently generated a new version of its product and it meets some of the requirements that we would have been looking for. It's a bit more scalable, a bit more responsive to a customer-focused model for support, and they've improved a lot of things like process flow and self-service. In terms of rating the solution, it's difficult to grade. It really depends on the size of the organization that's trying to use it as that tool. One of the reasons why we're looking to shift is because we've grown quite a bit over the years that we've had it, which makes it difficult for it to meet our demands. However, for an organization the size of what we were when we started our journey with it, I'd rate it ten out of ten. Where we are now, with our company size and needs, I'd rate it six out of ten.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"We have made use of the training academy and the technical support team from Freshdesk. Both have been very good resources."
"It is quite easy to program custom apps and integrate them."
"The user experience on the platform itself is fantastic. The UI is clean and uncluttered, so it's easy to find any information about your customer or the issue at hand. You can find out the person responsible for that particular issue, what the problem is, who the stakeholders are, and how to resolve it. There are lots of tools that will help you do that as well."
"I used Freshdesk for communication with the clients, such as real-time chats."
"It's free of charge for us. For our scale of business, it's very important. We don't have a lot of tickets."
"The UI is easy to use."
"It is very easy to make reports."
"It's easy to use and integrates with other tools. We can embed Jira into it, link Jira tickets with Freshdesk tickets, and use it for our knowledge base."
"The solution's business process flow is quite strong. Its reporting is quite good. The standard, basic ITSM functionality like call logging and call flow, for example, are areas the solution really excels in."
 

Cons

"I would like to see a little bit more color in the solution."
"Technical support is not the best. It could be much, much better and offer better support to users."
"An area for improvement in Freshdesk would be enabling all features regardless of company or user size."
"The reporting, analysis modules and insights capabilities for this solution could be improved."
"The solution's inbound calls could be improved."
"We have many cases where a ticket comes in, and it ends up having multiple team members working on it. It would be really nice to be able to assign a single ticket to multiple people, rather than having to create the parent-child hierarchy that they have set up. It generates a proliferation of tickets that I really don't want to have. Having to jump from a parent to one child and then to another child makes it harder for me to be able to see the entire case from end to end. A simple example is our new hire process or our termination process. We have people who leave. We also have people who come on board. We have got multiple people participating and doing things related to the leaving or onboarding process. Currently, I have to go to different tickets to be able to see whether all tasks are really done or not. If I could assign lots of people to one ticket, it would be really nice."
"Having so many tags makes everyday work a lot more complicated, and a lot more time-consuming."
"It would be helpful to pull reports or schedule them based on agents, users, ticket numbers, or responses."
"It's worked well for us for a significant period of time. However, we are kind-of outgrowing it at the moment. We're struggling a bit with making it meet our requirements."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The best system plan is enterprise. It costs basically 79 Euros per agent per month when it's billed annually and 95 Euros per agent per month when it's billed monthly."
"It was definitely not expensive. It was two grand or maybe three grand total for a year. It has just straight and simple standard licensing fees. There is no additional fee."
"The price could be better, but it's okay. Compared to ServiceNow and JIRA, Freshworks offers a competitive price. There are also additional licensing costs because you need Microsoft Outlook. Each new email account costs around $15 to $19."
"It is costly."
"Freshdesk was the best solution with the best price. It was cost efficient and included all the features that we needed."
"We pay approximately $70 per agent to use Freshdesk. We have 10 agents, which is approximately $700 or $800 per month. It is a fixed license, there are not any additional fees."
"The pricing is pretty manageable and acceptable."
"We use a licensing model only so we pay for the number of agents we have configured in the system only."
"Our organization pays about $40,000 annually. There are ongoing consultancy costs and if we want to change anything, we're charged a day rate. Other than that, there are no other extra costs involved in working with the solution."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Help Desk Software solutions are best for your needs.
860,632 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
24%
Real Estate/Law Firm
8%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
No data available
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Freshdesk?
Freshdesk significantly improved our customer issue resolution process. We can now easily record and track all customer requests, ensuring that no tickets are lost.
What needs improvement with Freshdesk?
More automation would be beneficial, as it could greatly improve our efficiency and reduce manual tasks.
What is your primary use case for Freshdesk?
My primary use cases with Freshdesk involve help desk software as well as additional functionalities tailored to our operations. For the industry that I'm working in, Freshdesk is used primarily fo...
Ask a question
Earn 20 points
 

Also Known As

No data available
Supportworks
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Honda, 3M, Hugo Boss, Petronas, Sony Pictures, The Atlantic, goodreads, Clear Channel Radio, Penn University of Pennsylvania, unicef, Kuoni, Movember
Aylesbury Vale District Council
Find out what your peers are saying about Freshdesk vs. Hornbill Systems Supportworks and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
860,632 professionals have used our research since 2012.