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Hornbill Systems Supportworks vs Zendesk comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 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

Automation Anywhere
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
661
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (2nd), Robotic Process Automation (RPA) (2nd), Process Mining (1st), Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) (1st), Agentic Automation (1st), Business Orchestration and Automation Technologies (2nd), AI Legal & Compliance (1st), AI Finance & Accounting (2nd), AI Procurement & Supply Chain (1st)
Hornbill Systems Supportworks
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
Help Desk Software (33rd), IT Service Management (ITSM) (31st)
Zendesk
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
70
Ranking in other categories
CRM Customer Engagement Centers (2nd), CRM (5th), Help Desk Software (3rd), IT Service Management (ITSM) (5th), Reporting (7th), Knowledge Management Software (3rd), AI Customer Support (8th), AI IT Support (4th)
 

Featured Reviews

Venkat Sivaprakash - PeerSpot reviewer
Management Consultant at Accenture
Has significantly improved document-driven workflows and reduced processing time across finance and HR functions
Automation Anywhere has evolved significantly and upgraded itself to provide agentic AI and AI-based automation solutions for document automation. The product has matured considerably over time. We can create workflows that can call an API. We can include prompts in particular workflows for ChatGPT-related functions, connecting to an LLM and RAG to perform tasks. For document automation, modern features are available to train documents, ensuring high accuracy and repeatability over time. The system is very easy to use. I recently completed a course in document automation, typically designed for people involved in coding and technical aspects. Though I understand coding comprehensively, I don't do actual coding. The course was very accessible. Currently, extensive coding isn't necessary due to the hybrid model incorporating GenAI aspects, low-code, no-code capabilities, APIs, and numerous pre-built objects in Automation Anywhere. The features include GenAI-driven prompting methods and workflow creation capabilities. In these workflows, we can create decision boxes and call APIs without coding. We simply pull objects, drop them, connect them, and add minimal coding when needed. The most crucial aspect isn't coding but rather sizing the automation and fleshing out the details. Automation Co-pilot takes notes and performs automated analysis. It can extract details from videos, summarize conversations, and provide detailed information. During calls, it identifies instructions and performs tasks such as preparing reports and reconciliation. Automation Anywhere can also connect with Microsoft Co-pilot. Through Co-pilot, real-time operations can be executed, allowing direct interaction between vendors and automation through this component.
it_user1262703 - PeerSpot reviewer
Service Desk Team Leader at a healthcare company with 5,001-10,000 employees
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.
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.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Automation Anywhere helped me achieve my automation goals as it reduced turnaround time, cost, human intervention, and increased overall satisfaction levels for our customers."
"Several manual, repetitive, time-consuming processes were automated, giving back time to the process owner, and for most of them the process now follows a single standard with additional controls created."
"It's very easy to use. It helps streamline manual processes."
"My experience with Automation Anywhere over three years has shown tremendous growth in operational efficiency and business processes, as it helps to automate repetitive and rule-based tasks such as report generation and data entry quite faster and efficiently, reducing errors by about thirty to forty percent from what I observed a few years back and improving SLA-related compliance."
"The drag-and-drop feature is valuable."
"At run time, Automation Anywhere can let you know which line of code the bot is running and what it is doing. It is very clear."
"Automation Anywhere is a pioneer in RPA tools."
"It's very easy for business users to learn Automation Anywhere."
"It is quite user friendly to use and has a lot of very useful features that makes the analyst/technician's life easier."
"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."
"We've definitely seen an ROI; we've had the system in place for eight years, and it's provided a solid platform for us to deliver our services during that period."
"In a nutshell, it's a great tool that allows you to manage all your customer service issues in one location."
"Zendesk Support has a lot of good APIs."
"Zendesk saves us over $50,000 per year and can be maintained in-house by our staff."
"The way it’s set up makes it very easy for agents, end-users, and administrators to use."
"One of the most valuable features is that Zendesk gives you a lot of configurability, and a lot of leeway in terms of customizing the look and theme. Zendesk offers you the facility to design your own landing page, as well as the look and feel of the entire knowledge base. At the same time, they offer themes that you can simply purchase and implement. Either way, it can really be turned into the right look and feel of the knowledge base required by our company, which is very important—if you have a bland-looking page, most of the time, people will lose interest. Zendesk also allows you to test the customizations before you publish it. It gives you a sandbox location where you can test everything new that you're trying to create and publish, which is very interesting."
"The initial setup was incredibly simple: choose your integration method, set up your fields and workflow, and it’s running."
"Zendesk has helped us to increase productivity and has reduced the time between when a ticket is opened and when it is completed."
"It's an amazing product, it really helps out in organizing all our tasks."
 

Cons

"The optical character recognition of various documents and templates, particularly when using the Arabic language, has room for improvement."
"The price is a little high and could be reduced."
"For me at the very beginning when I started working with that, the technical setup was extremely complicated and extremely problematic, and we spent half a year to really make the software work."
"The schedule queue needs improvement. When one task fails, everything else gets stuck, requiring manual intervention to clear the problematic schedule and trigger the other tasks."
"The older versions, like version 8 and 9, were not very stable."
"The availability of material in terms of more technical documentation could be improved, particularly in-depth information about how things can be done."
"Migration is a little challenging since it requires direct integration with DB, credential vault and all that."
"We have our limitations. We can run only VBScripts and one more thing. If we want to run Python scripts or batch files, we cannot do it. So, if they would add these extra things in there then that would be beneficial."
"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."
"Customer Service: I'd rate it as a 5/10 or 6/10."
"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."
"You couldn't give administrative access to new hires."
"Support is not great. Their support is that specific support you get from a big American tech company."
"Zendesk Guide could be improved by allowing us to put our assets in one location. What happens now for each article, for example, is we have to upload the images for that article to that location, so the image reuse is still not something that they have perfected. If they could allow us to update all the images in one location, and then pull the image from there, it would be easier when working on Multibrand projects. There are no Multibrand updates available—we have to update each brand manually. For my company, I have come up with an API tool which allows me to push the content to multiple brands together, but if you don't have something like that, you have to manually do it."
"Many channel inquiries are not possible to collect into a single interface."
"Recently they have been under some stability issues, but they do have @ZendeskOps to keep us posted on Twitter when they have issues."
"Zendesk has not positively impacted my organization."
"It is easy to use, however, it is not quite as powerful as many other ticketing systems out there."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"One of the things that will be good for the community will be to get the free version to download, which came out just a month ago called Community Edition. So, you can actually download it and try it for yourself."
"I am using that Automation Anywhere Master Certification for version 11. Recently, this has been updated in Automation Anywhere University. Until this month, it's free to use. There are no charges. That's why I would like to complete it this month."
"My understanding is that the license cost of Automation Anywhere is more reasonable than UiPath and Blue Prism."
"Licensing costs range from $50,000 to $200,000."
"Our advice is that anybody interested in this product should negotiate product bundles in order to reduce the cost of installation and setup."
"Automation Anywhere offers a subscription-based licensing model for cloud, on-premises, and hybrid deployments."
"The licensing needs to be made simpler or shortened."
"Automation Anywhere is reasonably priced because it can sustain us for a long period."
"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."
"You have to pay extra for better support. So it's not only the license that you pay for, but you have to pay extra for the support as well."
"The price is very competitive."
"Zendesk's licensing is not cheap. For Enterprise, we are paying $200 per agent. It's a per-month cost, so it's pretty steep. There are some services you need to pay extra for. For example, with Zendesk Guide, we had to buy the most expensive offering in order to get Multibrand and everything. We also had to pay a lot of money for themes."
"From what I hear, Zendesk's pricing is a little expensive."
"We pay for the solution on a yearly basis and my understanding is that the cost is about $30,000. That's the cost for 24 to 25 agents."
"There are different plans that are offered. We are using the entry-level plan. The overall price of the solution should be reduced. The price is too high."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Outsourcing Company
15%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Manufacturing Company
10%
No data available
Outsourcing Company
11%
Construction Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business161
Midsize Enterprise82
Large Enterprise560
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business37
Midsize Enterprise22
Large Enterprise12
 

Questions from the Community

How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It depends on your use case. Is it simply to automate a couple of processes? Is it to augment a human team? AA is ver...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
From my experience using AA tool, it depends on the applications that you want to automate, because there some applic...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It is a highly preferred RPA tool. You can check my Automation Anywhere Review to know more.
Ask a question
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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zendesk Support?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Zendesk shows that pricing is really affordable compared to...
What needs improvement with Zendesk Support?
Regarding my main use case for Zendesk, it is really easy to use, but one of the cons I have with it is that it takes...
What is your primary use case for Zendesk Support?
On a day-to-day basis, I use Zendesk to track, manage, and work on my cases. I also use it to upload information secu...
 

Also Known As

Automation Anywhere, Testing Anywhere, Automation Anywhere Enterprise, Agentic Process Automation System (Now Certified for WorkSpaces)
Supportworks
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Interactive Demo

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Google, Linkedin, Cisco, Juniper Networks, DellEMC, Comcast, Mastercard, Quest Diagnostics
Aylesbury Vale District Council
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about Hornbill Systems Supportworks vs. Zendesk and other solutions. Updated: September 2026.
914,262 professionals have used our research since 2012.