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

Freshdesk vs NICE CXone vs Salesforce Service Cloud comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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
6.1
Freshdesk boosts efficiency and customer service with Salesforce integration, cost-effectiveness, and detailed insights for improved operations.
Sentiment score
4.9
Small teams saved over $200,000 in the first year with NICE CXone, benefiting from its cloud-based AWS infrastructure.
Sentiment score
6.5
Salesforce Service Cloud achieves 135% ROI by enhancing efficiency, productivity, and service business, despite implementation costs.
NICE CXone saves time and resources due to its cloud-based nature, where infrastructure management is handled by AWS, reducing the need for me to manage it.
Salesforce Service Cloud requires significant maintenance effort to see ROI.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.3
Freshdesk's support is praised for responsiveness and efficiency, but some users report email integration challenges and response delays.
Sentiment score
6.4
NICE CXone customer service is polite and effective, though complex issues may have delayed resolutions due to request nature.
Sentiment score
5.6
Salesforce Service Cloud is praised for helpful support and community, despite some critiques on initial response and proactiveness.
We have not needed to contact technical support, as Freshdesk has met our needs efficiently.
From my experience, once it is set up, we have never had problems.
The first-time response should be within 30 seconds.
When I faced an issue with reaching a Poland DID that was ported to NICE CXone, their support team resolved the problem immediately.
We have our own technical account manager which provides us with substantial visibility.
If the issue is network-related or involves configuration, or maybe implementing a new tool, it might take north of 24 hours to identify the right resource to assist you.
Unless you have premium support, assistance is restricted.
Salesforce directly does not give you the support, and it is through the partner that you have to go, leading to some time delays.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.8
Freshdesk offers scalable, cost-effective SaaS for growing companies with versatile features, though some note integration limitations.
Sentiment score
6.2
NICE CXone is highly scalable and adaptable, efficiently managing extensive loads and supporting broad use cases without difficulty.
Sentiment score
8.1
Salesforce Service Cloud offers exceptional scalability for enterprise growth, handling increased users and transactions seamlessly across industries.
Additional features like email, WhatsApp, and SMS ticketing, along with Slack integration, can be enabled as required.
In our environment, which is a fairly small company in one country, Freshdesk is easy to scale.
I have migrated approximately 500 people to the system, and it can certainly support more users beyond this number.
Salesforce Service Cloud is the most advanced in scalability, rating around nine to ten.
Nobody can compete with Salesforce Service Cloud's scalability.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.4
Freshdesk is stable and reliable with minor issues, praised for quick support, though connectivity and integration occasionally affect performance.
Sentiment score
6.1
NICE CXone is generally stable, with brief outages well-managed, earning high praise for technical support and communication.
Sentiment score
7.9
Salesforce Service Cloud is highly stable, reliable, quickly resolves issues, and is positively rated across industries for dependability.
The goal is always to respond to customer tickets in a timely fashion, ensuring that customers feel seen and heard while also providing solutions.
After installation and continuous operation, I have encountered no problems.
In general, the stability is good.
While the system often operates without issues, there have been instances of reports involving VM resource congestion, WFM issues, and RT problems.
We rarely encounter stability issues with Salesforce Service Cloud, although when they occur, they cause significant disruption.
 

Room For Improvement

Freshdesk users seek improvements in automation, integrations, support, language options, workflows, and reporting to boost efficiency.
NICE CXone needs an improved user interface, better audio, streamlined reporting, enhanced AWS control, and competitive pricing.
Salesforce Service Cloud requires improvements in email integration, UI/UX, reporting, analytics, and cost efficiency for better user experience.
Currently, some features like SMS or WhatsApp integration are only available to larger user groups, but even smaller teams should have access based on their specific needs.
The current integration is more complicated and doesn’t work as well.
More automation would be beneficial, as it could greatly improve our efficiency and reduce manual tasks.
Compared to challengers such as Zoom, which seem more cost-effective, NICE CXone's suite of products is very modular, so as they provide new services, you have to add to your existing package and this balloons your costs since there's an additional license needed to use the new tools, leading to potentially higher out-of-pocket expenses.
The audio quality in NICE CXone has room for improvement, as I experience issues like diffused calls and crackling audio.
Salesforce Service Cloud should focus on simplification.
Configuring Flows in Salesforce Service Cloud is very difficult.
The pricing of Salesforce Service Cloud is expensive compared to other solutions like our current SAP CRM, which is much cheaper.
 

Setup Cost

Freshdesk pricing is competitive at 79 Euros annually per agent, but additional features and costs may arise.
NICE CXone requires careful evaluation of tiered licensing costs and features, especially considering data transition challenges.
Salesforce Service Cloud is seen as costly but negotiable, with user-based pricing offering potential ROI through strategic use.
Our organization pays about 200,000 Indian rupees per year for the license.
Pricing has always been handled by the company I work with, and even when I get in-house feedback, I have never had issues with pricing or complaints when compared to what others have outside.
The approximate licensing costs for Salesforce Service Cloud are around three hundred dollars a year per user.
Salesforce Service Cloud is expensive.
 

Valuable Features

Freshdesk provides a user-friendly, scalable support platform with automation, integrations, and omnichannel capabilities to enhance customer service.
NICE CXone enhances business efficiency with customizable features, seamless integration, and real-time management tools, offering flexibility and control.
Salesforce Service Cloud is praised for customization, integration, automation, user-friendliness, scalability, and features enhancing productivity and visibility.
The auto-assignment feature is particularly valuable as it alleviates the administrative task of manually checking for available engineers to assign tickets.
These features are easy to use, and the filtering is really good, providing a good overview of active tickets and who's working on them.
Some of the best features of Freshdesk include automation, user-friendly interface, and comprehensive support options that enhance our workflow.
The switch from using Avaya, which required connecting to a hard or soft phone, to using WebRTC via a web browser has significantly improved customer service efficiency.
Some of the best features with NICE CXone are the real-time visibility that you have, which empowers you to make adjustments on the fly, such as turning on and off your queues and adjusting how we route calls to our agents.
Salesforce Service Cloud improved our organization with its mobile capabilities.
Salesforce Service Cloud offers pre-built packages that are best in class.
Usability is one of the strongest characteristics of Salesforce Service Cloud.
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Knowledge Management Software category, the mindshare of Freshdesk is 4.3%, down from 6.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of NICE CXone is 5.7%, up from 4.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Salesforce Service Cloud is 4.8%, up from 4.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Knowledge Management Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Salesforce Service Cloud4.8%
Freshdesk4.3%
NICE CXone5.7%
Other85.2%
Knowledge Management Software
 

Featured Reviews

Bharanidharan K - PeerSpot reviewer
User-friendly interface but needs enhancement in ticket tracking and response times
There is no room for improvement in Freshdesk. We can set a time period for particular employees as something that could be better. For example, if some new employees are unfamiliar with Freshdesk, it should be more user-friendly. They need to give shortcut keys to use the ticketing portal. If some users don't know how to generate a ticket, providing them with a help desk or tutorial portal would be useful for the end-user.
Antoneil Phillips - PeerSpot reviewer
Real-time adjustments enhance call management, though pricing needs improvement
The reporting isn't bad, but there are opportunities for improvement; we get real-time dashboards for monitoring, though for performance management, we have to procure certain reports manually by pulling down raw data from the system, which could be better. Regarding the pricing, this would be an area of opportunity as well; this feedback is based on where we're positioned in the Caribbean. Compared to challengers such as Zoom, which seem more cost-effective, NICE CXone's suite of products is very modular, so as they provide new services, you have to add to your existing package and this balloons your costs since there's an additional license needed to use the new tools, leading to potentially higher out-of-pocket expenses.
MARIA PILAR CANDA - PeerSpot reviewer
Improved customer service and post-sales support saves time
The solution could be more affordable as it's quite expensive for some organizations, particularly middle-sized companies. Additionally, finding technical talent for improving the solution is challenging. Configuring Flows in Salesforce Service Cloud is very difficult. There are very few technical people in the market capable of implementing all the flows that clients need at this moment. It's primarily a matter of talent limitation, and flow is the technical mechanism of Salesforce Service Cloud for process automation. In general, while they have the knowledge and help solve problems, finding the right person to address specific issues is very challenging.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Knowledge Management Software solutions are best for your needs.
867,826 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
23%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
6%
Financial Services Firm
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Performing Arts
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business21
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business10
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise13
Large Enterprise24
 

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 custom...
What needs improvement with Freshdesk?
With the advancements in AI now, I will say Freshdesk should consider integrating more AI, but so far, I am satisfied...
What is your primary use case for Freshdesk?
As a customer success manager for over six years, I can sum up the benefits I've seen from using Freshdesk: it has pl...
What needs improvement with NICE CXone?
The reporting isn't bad, but there are opportunities for improvement; we get real-time dashboards for monitoring, tho...
What is your primary use case for NICE CXone?
We're working in the finance space, banking, and our customers that we support are primarily banks and remittance ser...
What advice do you have for others considering NICE CXone?
I really can't add any value about how it's influenced our customer journey just yet because we're just in the proces...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Salesforce Service Cloud?
The approximate licensing costs for Salesforce Service Cloud are around three hundred dollars a year per user.
What needs improvement with Salesforce Service Cloud?
The solution could be more affordable as it's quite expensive for some organizations, particularly middle-sized compa...
What is your primary use case for Salesforce Service Cloud?
We have many clients with Salesforce Service Cloud and numerous use cases. The main use is in the sales area rather t...
 

Also Known As

No data available
NICE inContact, NICE CXone Workforce Optimization Pro, NICE CXOne WFO Pro, CXone Workforce Optimization, inContact Workforce Optimization, CallCopy, Discover, VPI Empower, Brand Embassy, goMoxie
Service Cloud
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Honda, 3M, Hugo Boss, Petronas, Sony Pictures, The Atlantic, goodreads, Clear Channel Radio, Penn University of Pennsylvania, unicef, Kuoni, Movember
MoneyGram, Honeywell, Radisson Hotel Group, AAA, New Balance, MattressFIRM, Teleflora, Best Buy
Stanley Black & Decker, Coca-Cola, Activision, Wells Fargo, Spotify, Aldo, Philips, The Red Cross, Blue Shield of California, Sprouts Farmers Market, Direct Energy Solar, Inspirato, Kiva
Find out what your peers are saying about Atlassian, Notion, Salesforce and others in Knowledge Management Software. Updated: September 2025.
867,826 professionals have used our research since 2012.