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Five9 vs Zendesk comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 27, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
7.0
Five9 enhances efficiency and revenue through features and CRM integration, boosting growth and optimizing marketing and appointments management.
Sentiment score
6.0
Zendesk provides significant ROI with cost savings, productivity boosts, and improved efficiency through better ticket management and supportive sales team.
I can tell you that we probably saved at least three employees full-time with the ticket management and the automation and the macros and the user follow-up being built in.
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
Time saved is definitely a benefit because it puts all of our tickets in one spot.
Technical Solutions Lead at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
I feel that Zendesk helped us set up our platform for providing support way faster than other platforms due to its easy configuration.
Junior system analyst at Wevt clous
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.3
Five9 support varies from satisfactory to excellent, with responsiveness and communication praised but some report delays and mixed experiences.
Sentiment score
6.2
Zendesk support is praised for responsiveness and availability but criticized for slow responses and lack of personal interaction.
The technical support for Five9 has been exemplary.
Five9 offers multiple support options.
They were good about hosting regular, recurring meetings, understanding priorities, and getting things escalated that were appropriate to escalate.
CX Intelligence Analytics at a healthcare company with 1,001-5,000 employees
There appears to be a lack of connection between the bot and the agents, making it feel scripted rather than helpful.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
The technical support provided by Zendesk has been very satisfactory.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
Their support team from Zendesk is excellent, similar to what you have in Freshdesk.
Customer Success Manager at Mimshackworks Endeavors
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
Five9 is praised for scalability and adaptability, though some users experience challenges with large-scale feature additions.
Sentiment score
7.2
Zendesk is adaptable and scalable for diverse organizations, handling growth well but posing challenges in cost and customization.
We face scaling issues, especially when trying to scale up bigger contact centers.
We have not hit a peak or a turn yet that Zendesk has not been able to go with us or been able to grow with us in the process, change or pivot that the company is making.
Project Manager III at City of Union City Government
Zendesk can scale from very small companies to very large ones.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
Zendesk's scalability is excellent.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.3
Five9 is generally stable, offering quick resolutions to issues, though updates occasionally cause challenges, with room for improvement.
Sentiment score
7.8
Zendesk is reliable and stable, with minor issues and rare outages, communicated promptly via Twitter, ideal for small businesses.
In my experience, I have not encountered major downtime.
Sr Specialist - Analytics Metrics and Reporting at Mercer
During training and demos, resiliency tests failed, which was not ideal.
They are always informing us with a status update and an ETA, and the turnaround time is usually within the same day with no extended downtime that would cause a detriment to our company.
Project Manager III at City of Union City Government
Zendesk is quite stable; we experience major outages only once or twice a year, making it very reliable.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
The stability has been quite reliable.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
 

Room For Improvement

Five9 needs enhancements in call quality, reporting, integration, UI, support, costs, international compatibility, and workflow tools.
Zendesk users seek enhancements like efficient ticket merging, advanced reporting, better integrations, improved usability, and AI features.
I would like a feature where reports such as AHT or workforce-related reports can be generated automatically without starting from scratch.
Sr Specialist - Analytics Metrics and Reporting at Mercer
Five9 should provide free training resources for end users, including agents, supervisors, and admins.
The solution lacks versioning in scripting, making it crucial to manually back up scripts to prevent rollbacks from causing issues.
Zendesk could actually support HTML on the tickets so we could format our text better than the current options such as size, bold, italic, or underscored, because the text processing is too simple.
Junior system analyst at Wevt clous
Zendesk is missing an AI aspect that could help provide quick answers based on the knowledge housed within the platform.
Technical Support Engineer/ QA at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
Zendesk is amazing, and because they are always working on a new upgrade or a new integration, they are very forward-thinking from an engineering perspective.
Project Manager III at City of Union City Government
 

Setup Cost

Five9's pricing, though initially high, is cost-effective and scalable, with cloud benefits offering value and flexibility for enterprises.
Zendesk's pricing is high but flexible, justified by its value in saving time and enhancing customer experience.
They just rent the specific resources they need, which reduces high costs from hardware, software licenses, and operating systems.
It is not the cheapest solution nor the most expensive, but it provides value for money.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
The experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Zendesk was quite expensive.
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
 

Valuable Features

Five9 offers cloud-based CRM integration with AI features, enhancing service levels, efficiency, and user satisfaction through comprehensive tools.
Zendesk enhances productivity with customizable ticket management, CRM integrations, automation, and multi-channel support for improved customer satisfaction.
The ability to automatically populate borrower details when the call comes in using the Loan Pop feature enhances call efficiency dramatically.
Five9 provides powerful CRM integration capabilities with platforms like Salesforce, Zendesk, and Oracle Service Cloud, making it highly valuable for large companies.
It pre-fills variables from a form and routes to the correct agent, reducing handling times and increasing single-call resolution.
It allows us to handle more support cases with fewer people due to its advanced artificial intelligence capabilities.
CEO at Etcetera Networks
Zendesk is way cheaper than other ITSM platforms such as ServiceNow, providing a good platform at a lower price so we could offer good support with a low budget for the license.
Junior system analyst at Wevt clous
Being able to put response counters on certain tickets and have certain ones that are high priority and have a tighter SLA than lower priority items, being able to categorize them as a question versus an urgent request, and being able to bucket them as feature requests or product enhancements.
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
 

Categories and Ranking

Five9
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
Contact Center Platforms (3rd), Workforce Engagement Management (3rd), Contact Center Infrastructure (1st), Sales Force Automation (8th), Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) (3rd)
Zendesk
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
68
Ranking in other categories
CRM Customer Engagement Centers (4th), CRM (9th), Help Desk Software (4th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (5th), Reporting (10th), Knowledge Management Software (3rd), AI Customer Support (20th), AI IT Support (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Contact Center solutions, they serve different purposes. Five9 is designed for Contact Center Platforms and holds a mindshare of 8.3%, down 15.5% compared to last year.
Zendesk, on the other hand, focuses on IT Service Management (ITSM), holds 4.8% mindshare, up 3.9% since last year.
Contact Center Platforms Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Five98.3%
Genesys Cloud CX13.8%
Amazon Connect13.0%
Other64.9%
Contact Center Platforms
IT Service Management (ITSM) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Zendesk4.8%
ServiceNow15.8%
JIRA Service Management7.3%
Other72.1%
IT Service Management (ITSM)
 

Featured Reviews

Call efficiency improves dramatically with features that ensure smooth communication
There are several audio issues that need attention. Whenever I disconnect a headset after connecting to the VDI, the station connection in Five9 disconnects automatically, requiring a VMware restart. Also, during logins, there are issues with station connections. This may lead to IP Protocol errors that require browser resets and other troubleshooting steps.
AmandaSanchez - PeerSpot reviewer
Consultant and Startup Founder at AimHi Enterprises
Macros and automation have streamlined workflows and reduced manual effort across support teams
The ability to communicate on the Zendesk ticket through the actual user software, so TOPs, would have been helpful. Somehow seeing a user's ticket history within our app would have been beneficial. That is the only thing that I do not think existed at the time that might have been helpful. Some people struggled with Zendesk, but it was always easy enough to show them how to use it and what they were missing. The only times we really had people report concerns about it was when they did not understand that it could do that or how to use it in that way.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Insurance Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Construction Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise7
Large Enterprise7
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business36
Midsize Enterprise21
Large Enterprise11
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Five9?
I like the capability of call and screen recording. It has helped us to hold our agents accountable to the expectations for the role. It creates a clearer picture than giving feedback that is just ...
What needs improvement with Five9?
The reporting suite needed improvement. I saw recently that Five9 released a new platform for reporting, as the reporting was not great previously.
What is your primary use case for Five9?
I was using Five9 in the senior living space.
What do you like most about Zendesk Support?
I found the user experience with vendors on Zendesk to be straightforward, especially when it comes to understanding and searching for specific tickets. The search and navigation tools are easy to ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zendesk Support?
From what I recall, the experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Zendesk was quite expensive and that is what prohibited us from expanding usage of it into more users and using more o...
What needs improvement with Zendesk Support?
I wish there was a more easily dynamic tool. Currently, it is quite difficult because not all the tools are labeled. A feature that would be beneficial is if hovering over an icon would tell you wh...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Agilysys, BISSELL, From You Flowers, SumUp, Kyndryl, PING, Alaska Airlines, Omaha Steaks International, NextRep, AdventHealth
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about Five9 vs. Zendesk and other solutions. Updated: March 2026.
885,789 professionals have used our research since 2012.