As your business and customer base expand, having a help desk ticketing system becomes increasingly necessary for your customer support operation to run successfully. Without one, your team simply cannot swiftly and efficiently handle customer queries, requests, and incident reports that continue to pile up on different channels.
While help desk software is not in the HR space, we find that many of our readers are asking us about these solutions and so wanted to provide some research so they can find and buy the right ticketing system :)
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There are several IT help desk solutions on the market today, each with different selling features and price points. In this article, we’ve listed the best help desk software solutions available for businesses of all sizes to help you make an informed decision:
Why we love it
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Not only does Spiceworks have all the important features you need, but it's also completely free.
Spiceworks is a free of charge ticketing system with cloud-based and on-premise deployment options and mobile apps for Android and iOS devices. Spiceworks packs all the features you’d expect from a help desk ticketing system, like omnichannel support, automatic ticket assignment and management, a self-service portal, and more - all without any limitations on the number of agent accounts, customers tickets, data storage, etc.
Spiceworks
Customers
Spiceworks
Stats
Spiceworks
Pricing
As far as pricing goes, Spiceworks stands out from competitors by offering all of its products for free. The company makes its profit from ads that appear in the backend and are sponsored by numerous IT vendors.
Best For
Small and medium sized companies looking for a FREE customer support solution with cloud-based and on-premise versions.
Worth Checking Out:
Why we love it
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With standout features such as customer journeys and collaboration, Kayako is a great choice for companies of all sizes to gain better context about customers.
Kayako is a user-friendly customer support solution with cloud-based and on-premise deployment options. It packs many of the common features of ticketing systems such as omnichannel support for incident logging, live chat, a help center for self-service, an analytics dashboard, integrations with social media channels, and popular third-party tools, customizable business logic rules for workflow creation, process automations and more.
Kayako also offers some standout features such as customer journeys, a detailed record of everything the customer has been up to before logging a support ticket, which allows you to provide context-driven customer service. Another notable feature is the ability to add collaborators, i.e. other employees besides your customer support agents and managers that can access customer data.
Kayako
Customers
GeneralElectric, Warner Bros, Toshiba, FedEx, Sega, Peugeut, MTV.
Kayako
Stats
Over 131,000 agents provide support using Kayako.
Kayako
Pricing
Kayako offers three plans: Inbox, Growth, and Scale. The Inbox plan starts at $15 per agent per month, while the Growth and Scale plans cost $30 and $60 respectively per agent per month.
Kayako also offers free 14-day trials for all of its plans as well as demos upon request. Check out Kayako’s pricing page for more information on their available plans and features.
Best For
Companies of all sizes looking for an easy to use customer support solution.
Worth Checking Out:
Why we love it
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JitBit is a 100% remote company, meaning they've built a tool they believe is valuable for teams anywhere across the globe.
JitBit is a customer service software with a clean user-interface that’s very easy to navigate; it has an inbox for all incoming tickets, a knowledge base for customers and agents to self-serve, and a reporting section with detailed dashboards, providing insights into all of your activities. Amongst JitBit’s features are automation rules and categories that allow you to stay organized and optimize a good number of tedious processes.
JitBit
Customers
Microsoft, VMware, Adobe, Xerox, General Electric, HP, ESPN, Dell, Vodafone.
JitBit
Stats
JitBit
Pricing
When billed annually, JitBit’s cloud-based software plans cost as follows:
JitBit’s self-hosted version is a single-time purchase starting at $1699 for small companies, $3499 for medium-sized businesses (up to 20 agents), and $4999 for enterprises with an unlimited number of agent accounts. This on-premise solution can be trialed with a 30-day moneyback guarantee.
Best For
Medium to large sized companies looking for a self-hosted customer service solution.
Worth Checking Out:
Why we love it
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Freshdesk is a scalable solution for companies of any size, with strong features and a gamification feature to urge agents to improve their output.
Freshdesk is a highly scalable, cloud-based help desk system for businesses of all sizes. It features a shared inbox where all customer support tickets from several channels are collated, customizable workflows, automated pop-ups that help deflect common customer queries, and comprehensive dashboards to monitor quality metrics. Freshdesk also offers a team huddle feature that allows you to bring in experts to resolve complex tickets, as well as a gamification feature to motivate agents and improve their performance.
Freshdesk
Customers
Fiverr, HP, Decathlon, Panasonic, NYU, Henkel, Pearson, Thai Union, American Express.
Freshdesk
Stats
Freshdesk
Pricing
Freshdesk offers five plans: Sprout, Blossom, Garden, Estate, and Forrest. Sprout is a free plan for small businesses to get started with a help desk software. Blossom, Garden, Estate, and Forrest are paid plans that range from $15 to $99 per agent per month, billed annually. All Freshdesk plans can be trialed for free for a 14-day period.
Best For
Companies of all sizes looking for a comprehensive customer support solution.
Worth Checking Out:
Freshdesk isn’t classified as an IT service management (ITSM) solution. The company, Freshworks, offers another tool for that called Freshservice, which is more suitable for enterprise-level businesses. Visit Freshwork’s website for more information about their offerings.
Why we love it
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Zendesk is the best-known customer support software today.
Zendesk is arguably the most well-known customer support software available today. With its intuitive cloud-based interface, it allows you to receive, prioritize, and handle customer issues and queries from different channels including email, chat, and social media, all in one centralized and shared location.
With the help of triggers, you’re able to automatically assign and escalate tickets to specific groups, send automated responses and follow-ups, notify customers and agents of certain updates and tag certain tickets for easy reporting and information retrieval. Among Zendesk’s features are also integrated surveys to measure customer satisfaction and analytics dashboards to monitor your team’s performance.
Zendesk
Customers
Mailchimp, Uber, Khan Academy
Zendesk
Stats
Zendesk
Pricing
Zendesk offers five paid plans: Essential, Team, Professional, Enterprise, and Elite. These plans cater to different business sizes and range from $5 to $199 per agent per month, billed annually.
To find out which plan suits your business, visit Zendesk’s pricing page. You can sign up for a free 14-day trial or contact Zendesk’s team for a demo.
Best For
Worth Checking Out:
Why we love it
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Jira Service Management was created by Atlassian, meaning you'll have access to thousands of its integrations. Therefore, Jira can fit snugly in any tech stack.
Created by Atlassian, Jira Service Management is a collaborative IT service management (ITSM) solution that enables your support team to create multiple projects to track and handle customer support requests and incidents.
Jira Service Desk
Customers
Dominos, Square, Puppet, Twitter, Airbnb, Square, Sotheby’s, The Telegraph.
Jira Service Desk
Stats
Jira Service Desk
Pricing
Jira Service Management offers a three-tiered pricing structure with its Free, Standard, and Premium plans. The Free plan offers access to a good number of the platform’s features and is capped at three agent accounts. The Standard and Premium plans start at $10 and $40 per agent per month and can be trialed for up to 7 days for free. Visiting Jira Service Management’s pricing page for more information.
Best For
Companies of all sizes looking for a robust customer service and project management system.
Worth Checking Out:
Why we love it
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Zoho Desk is a highly affordable option for any startup or new team.
Zoho Desk is a cloud-based help desk software that allows you to provide context-driven support. It provides comprehensive features and workflows for ticket management, assignment, categorization, prioritization, escalation, and more. It also features a knowledge base for ticket deflection through self-service, as well as easy-to-use dashboards to track quality metrics such as customer satisfaction and overall team performance.
Zoho Desk
Customers
McAfee, Daimler, Lycamobile, Godrej, Essilor.
Zoho Desk
Stats
Zoho Desk
Pricing
Zoho Desk stands out from competitors by offering affordable plans, ranging from free (with a reasonable limit of three users) to $35 per agent per month billed annually.
Best For
Companies of all sizes looking for a comprehensive yet affordable customer support solution.
Worth Checking Out:
Why we love it
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LiveAgent is incredibly easy to use and empowers customers to self-serve.
LiveAgent is a customer service solution with a clean and user-friendly interface. It features a unified inbox where all customer support tickets are collected from different channels then assigned and prioritized according to your predefined workflows. Its native live chat is easily accessible via a widget that integrates smoothly with your websites and apps, allowing you to connect with customers instantaneously. LiveAgent also offers a knowledge base that empowers customers to self-serve, a built-in call center with IVR and unlimited call recording storage, and over 40 third-party integrations with popular solutions.
LiveAgent
Customers
Huawei, BMW, Yamaha, O2, Slido, Forbes, AirBus.
LiveAgent
Stats
LiveAgent
Pricing
LiveAgent offers a free plan with some limitations on the features that can be accessed and three paid plans with feature increases, competitively priced as follows:
Best For
Companies of all sizes looking for an affordable and easy to use customer support solution.
Worth Checking Out:
Why we love it
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SolarWinds Service Desk has one of the widest feature sets in IT service management, complete with a 30 day free trial to ensure you like it before you buy.
SolarWinds Service Desk is an IT service management (ITSM) solution that goes beyond just ticketing and incident management. Besides allowing you to assign, prioritize and escalate tickets collected from different sources, it offers features for self-service, live chat, scheduled reporting, asset management, change management, network discovery, API access, and more.
SolarWinds
Customers
Adler Planetarium, The Bloc, DPR Construction, Betfred.
SolarWinds
Stats
SolarWinds
Pricing
SolarWinds Service Desk offers a tiered pricing model of four plans that can be tested for free for up to 30 days. When billed annually, SolarWinds Service Desk’s plans cost as follows:
Best For
Medium to large companies looking for an ITSM solution with asset management capabilities.
Worth Checking Out:
Besides Service Desk, SolarWinds also offers Web Help Desk, a robust on-premise help desk solution that you can purchase a perpetual license of, once only. Visit SolarWinds’ website for more information on their ITSM and help desk solutions.
Why we love it
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HappyFox's biggest benefit is its customizability, allowing customers to fit the system into their stack without much friction.
HappyFox is a web-based help desk that’s most notable for its easy and quick set-up. It integrates with several points of contact to collect tickets and organize them neatly on its Ticket List page. Tickets can be automatically assigned to available agents or specific groups and escalated to experts as needed.
HappyFox offers users customizability options to create workflows, views, canned actions, tasks, reports, and more. It also offers a self-service portal that’s connected to your knowledge base and an AI-powered Chatbot that helps customers with common questions, taking a considerable weight off your support agents’ workload.
HappyFox
Customers
Lowe’s, Whirlpool, LeapFrog, Harbour Air Seaplanes, Planned Parenthood.
HappyFox
Stats
HappyFox
Pricing
HappyFox offers four pricing plans, Mighty, Fantastic, Enterprise, and Enterprise Plus. Mighty and Fantastic target small and medium-sized businesses and start at $29 and $49 per agent per month, while Enterprise and Enterprise plus are more geared toward larger operations.
Best For
Medium to large sized companies looking for an easy to use customer service solution.
Worth Checking Out:
Choosing a help desk ticketing system can be a long process, but we’re confident you’ll make a good selection if you:
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