Looker Studio vs Zendesk comparison

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Looker Studio

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 2025

Looker Studio and Zendesk compete in the fields of data visualization and customer service management, respectively. Looker Studio is strong in data analytics while Zendesk stands out in customer service features, leaning towards Zendesk for customer-focused operations.

Features: Looker Studio offers excellent data visualization with features like seamless integration with Excel and Google Sheets, data aggregation before visualization, and custom filter creation. Zendesk provides robust customer service management with features like comprehensive ticketing, integration with multiple business applications, and customizable workflows.

Room for Improvement: Looker Studio could enhance its real-time collaboration capabilities, expand its integration options beyond Google products, and improve data model customization. Zendesk may benefit from streamlining its interface for easier navigation, improving integration with non-CRM tools, and offering more affordable pricing for smaller teams.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Looker Studio integrates well with existing data ecosystems, providing instant insights, although it may need enhanced guidance for users. Zendesk requires alignment with CRM systems but compensates with excellent implementation support and comprehensive user training that supports its complex deployment.

Pricing and ROI: Looker Studio's competitive pricing offers good ROI due to its data utilization capabilities without significant initial costs. Zendesk demands a higher upfront investment because of its extensive features; however, it promises high ROI through improved customer satisfaction and retention.

To learn more, read our detailed Looker Studio vs. Zendesk Report (Updated: February 2026).

Looker Studio vs. Zendesk

February 2026

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Helped 881,733 peers since 2012

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

Looker Studio

Ranking in Reporting

12th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

5.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Zendesk

Ranking in Reporting

10th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.6

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

CRM Customer Engagement Centers (4th), CRM (8th), Help Desk Software (5th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (6th), Sales Force Automation (4th), Knowledge Management Software (3rd), Community Platforms (1st), AI Customer Support (21st), AI IT Support (7th)

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Reporting category, the mindshare of Looker Studio is 2.7%, up from 2.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Zendesk is 1.2%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Reporting Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Zendesk	1.2%
Looker Studio	2.7%
Other	96.1%

Reporting

Featured Reviews

Heron Ziegel

Project Engineer at Quartz Consulting Group

Has supported quick dashboard creation and data sharing but lacks tools for managing multiple reports efficiently

We integrated Looker Studio with other platforms in our data ecosystem; we tried integrating with Sheets, and that went okay, but it could have been better. It could have been better because it needed a very specific format to read the data, so we had to reformat the sheet file. Looker Studio was mostly just helpful in that it provided live updating charts for tracking performance indicators in the organization. Integrating with a database was very difficult because there wasn't a lot of feedback for what was going wrong with the connection. I don't remember if we reached out to support. I didn't personally reach out, but my boss may have. I didn't reach out to support, so I do not have experience with it to rate it. We worked with the free version of Looker Studio initially, and we upgraded at some point to the pro version; I don't remember if we actually paid for it or if it was just a free trial. The pricing was reasonable. I remember doing a price comparison, and it was pretty reasonable, but it did have fewer features than a lot of other software, which was okay for a comparable price but a little cheaper.

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AmandaSanchez

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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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The solution is free so that is a good feature."

"The ability to integrate with a great variety of data sources."

"Data Studio integrates seamlessly with other Google products, and we can use it with other APIs if we like."

"The ability to design complex data models and equations."

"What I appreciate about Looker Studio is mostly the clean visuals, which is good, as I prefer a dashboard with a clean aesthetic rather than feeling sort of an old Windows type of dashboard."

"Valuable features include advanced integrated analysis and easy implementation."

"I am impressed with the tool's scheduling mechanism, refresh mechanism, and different types of charts."

"I would rate this solution eight or nine out of ten."

More Looker Studio pros

"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."

"The most valuable feature is the trackability of incoming requests. The system keeps a comprehensive history of work requests, making it a useful tool for our internal processes."

"We loved the notifications and the way to build custom views for a specific user's open tickets and to see how long they have been open, how long it was since the last request."

"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."

"It's very convenient to use."

"The benefits I have seen from using Zendesk include faster response times; as a CSM, faster response is the goal, which solves the customer's challenge in a timely manner, and Zendesk offers that capability, which is beneficial."

"It's a very stable tool, very powerful."

"We rarely had issues with Zendesk."

More Zendesk pros

Cons

"There are issues with integration and I encountered limits and warnings, especially with my pivot table size."

"From the perspective of infrastructure, I cannot provide a valuable opinion on the ease of use and customization options of Looker Studio."

"The tool has a lot of room for improvement. It's not very professional and allows for only simple tasks like indicating KPIs or quick calculations. It lacks a good calculation-based language like Power BI's DAX, making it less suitable for professional use. Additionally, the variety of visualization tools is limited, and customization options are restricted."

"I would appreciate improvements in the data modeling features, as it's not straightforward, and it's not what people in analytics are used to."

"Stability and scalability an be improved for a full ten."

"It's not yet a replacement for a complete BI tool."

"Looker Studio did not fit our needs for scalability."

"Other tools might be worth considering if you need more advanced features or support for a larger user base."

More Looker Studio cons

"It needs to improve in terms of its flexibility, price, and installation."

"The support team is time-consuming, and they don't find the answer to our problem."

"If I write an article, and I have a team of 30 people, and they all have a Zendesk account, when I write an article, I send them an email. "Hey guys, I just wrote this article. It's one of the most popular topics this month on which we are not covered. Please check it and make sure that you include it in your resolutions". The issue is, once I send it to those 30 people, and they open it, the next morning, that article is the most popular article."

"The dashboard could be better."

"There could be improvements in integration, which can be achieved with APIs or tools like Zapier."

"The solution could integrate better with QR codes from some websites such as Facebook."

"The data you get when logged in to Zendesk Support differs from the data you get when you programmatically query Zendesk Support through its API because of a sync time delay."

"As per me, there arent much significant issues or areas for improvement with Zendesk, as my usage of it is limited. I appreciate its ability to organize tickets effectively based on tags, allowing me to easily gather and analyze customer feedback and requests."

More Zendesk cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool is free."

"The product is available for free."

"The cost is quite affordable based on feature analysis."

"I think the tool is cheap because you don't need to pay anything for using the tool. However, when connecting and analyzing other data sources, you should consider where to analyze this information because Google Data Studio doesn't handle much data well. You must also consider how you will connect this data to it. In this case, you might need to hire DevOps or a data team to help with these issues."

"The solution is free but the Google Looker is expensive."

"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."

"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."

"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."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

11%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Performing Arts

Computer Software Company

Outsourcing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	7
Midsize Enterprise	3
Large Enterprise	6

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	36
Midsize Enterprise	21
Large Enterprise	11

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Google Data Studio?

The company dashboard is useful because we could share it via a link as a reminder for everyone to check it weekly. We observed the progress of our portfolio from last week to the current week, all...

What needs improvement with Google Data Studio?

I would appreciate improvements in the data modeling features, as it's not straightforward, and it's not what people in analytics are used to. Specifically, most people using this visualization too...

What is your primary use case for Google Data Studio?

I used Looker Studio mainly for reporting, where I created multiple dashboards on it. I wouldn't say I made the most of the usage of the connections because all the connections were based on flat f...

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...

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Product Reports

Download Looker Studio product report

Looker Studio

January 2026

Download Zendesk product report

January 2026

Also Known As

Data Studio

Zendesk Support, Zendesk Guide, Zendesk Sell

Overview

Google Looker Studio is a free tool designed to help users create visually appealing reports and dashboards, making data easier to understand. It allows you to connect to various data sources such as Google Analytics, Facebook Ads, and spreadsheets. With Looker Studio, you can create charts and graphs to showcase trends and comparisons, build comprehensive dashboards that provide an overview of your data, and customize reports to match your brand or preferences. Additionally, you can share your reports online or export them as PDFs for wider distribution.

Google

Zendesk Support is intuitive, and it's built with support agents in mind. Everything they need lives in a single, dynamic help desk interface so it's easy to be productive and manage customer interactions.

Sample Customers

Genesys, Shueisha

Mailchimp, Tesco, Vimeo, Instacart, Mediaocean, Slack, Uber