No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

SugarCRM Platform vs Zendesk comparison

Why PeerSpot?
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 29, 2025

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

SugarCRM Platform
Ranking in CRM Customer Engagement Centers
11th
Ranking in CRM
27th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.4
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Marketing Automation (16th), Sales Force Automation (7th)
Zendesk
Ranking in CRM Customer Engagement Centers
3rd
Ranking in CRM
7th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.5
Number of Reviews
70
Ranking in other categories
Help Desk Software (3rd), IT Service Management (ITSM) (5th), Reporting (8th), Knowledge Management Software (3rd), AI Customer Support (10th), AI IT Support (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the CRM Customer Engagement Centers category, the mindshare of SugarCRM Platform is 4.6%, up from 2.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zendesk is 8.9%, up from 6.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
CRM Customer Engagement Centers Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Zendesk8.9%
SugarCRM Platform4.6%
Other86.5%
CRM Customer Engagement Centers
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer1345677 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Manager / IT Planning & Architecture Services at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees
Easily customizable, automation enhances the marketing campaigns but support is the main hiccup for us
It has been effective in managing customer relationships. It has sales email campaigns, plus integration with Active Directory. And there are centralized reports for the CEO and the general managers. We work with automation for these marketing and email campaigns. It sends out emails to prospective customers related to sales offers automatically. And it copies the sales team so that they can follow up. They are tracking the sales leads. So, the automation within SugarCRM enhances the marketing campaigns. For now, my work is done because I am the IT strategy and planning manager. I just try to deliver the solution according to the requirements of the business. From my side, it's implemented already, the requirement related to the sales funnel. But if they have any other requirement from the business side, they will submit it to me, and then I will look for a suitable solution.
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

"The most valuable feature is relation capability, which allows us to relay customers with invoice orders."
"The most valuable aspect of this solution is its low cost, and it works well."
"The most valuable features of the SugarCRM platform include its flexibility in customizing fields, layouts, and dashboards."
"Good, basic out-of-the-box solution, however, in my estimation not a long term play as the design flow and user interface make it a true chore to enter data."
"This solution's stability is very good, it runs almost without effort, and we don't have any support issues with it."
"The performance and stability are fine."
"It has sales email campaigns, plus integration with Active Directory."
"It works well with Jira. You can customize it to fit your needs."
"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 use, and I haven't encountered any issues with delays or communication gaps in ticket resolutions."
"Zendesk is a great product for managing and maintaining requests from users."
"Zendesk has had a positive impact on my company by increasing efficiency and also increasing customer satisfaction."
"The ROI is amazing."
"We tried to find a solution better and cheaper than Zendesk locally and we have not found any solution so complete and flexible as Zendesk."
"Zendesk has been invaluable in automating communications such as email and phone calls."
"It's a very stable tool, very powerful."
"Largely, we have been happy with its capabilities."
 

Cons

"I would like to see more integration on a mobile platform in the next release."
"Functionality and features are well suited for small business companies only."
"It lacks customization, and this is the main reason that we are switching to a different solution."
"While it is already user-friendly, a slight enhancement in UI design, especially in terms of color combinations, could make the platform more visually appealing and comfortable to use."
"Sugar Enterprise could improve by removing bugs and glitches. For example, a comment was made but in the comment section, it was never displayed. However, the problems we faced might not be the fault of the solution."
"The UX was such that it limited the use of it."
"Pipelines, forecasts, and reporting in general, are not that good in the free version."
"Putting so many things into SugarCRM became a much-hated task, mainly because of the horrible UI."
"It needs to have a more intuitive application of macro’s in changing ticket statuses."
"Report generation is still slightly tricky and not very customizable as per my inquiries."
"Ticket forwarding and the ability to add subscribers to tickets as some back and forth correspondence needs to be brought to attention of several team members, sometimes across different departments."
"They have something called Zendesk Explore, which isn't as good as what they had in place previously."
"Additionally, "Internal note" is never just an internal note, it is sent to all recipients on the ticket, which has led to quite a lot of miscommunication and frustration."
"Zendesk's stability on inbound calls could be improved as compared to Talkdesk."
"Support is not great. Their support is that specific support you get from a big American tech company."
"Most of the time, if a particular candidate has too many documents, it really takes some time to load."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Licensing fees are paid on a yearly basis."
"From what I hear, Zendesk's pricing is a little expensive."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"The price is very competitive."
"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."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which CRM Customer Engagement Centers solutions are best for your needs.
921,028 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Construction Company
14%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Outsourcing Company
10%
Construction Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business37
Midsize Enterprise22
Large Enterprise12
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
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 other customer management software. The setup is pretty simple as well, but if ...
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 some time to load information. Most of the time, if a particular candidate has ...
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 securely, and this is not only limited to documents but also to images and reports. ...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Redglaze Group, TengoInternet, Hilco, Bancvue, Vet Adivsor
Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber
Find out what your peers are saying about SugarCRM Platform vs. Zendesk and other solutions. Updated: November 2026.
921,028 professionals have used our research since 2012.