Summary: Talkdesk and Five9 are two popular contact center solutions with scalable workforce management, AI-powered conversational analytics, and proactive outbound engagement.
Both providers have voice-only, digital-only, and true omnichannel plans that include 24/7 customer support and 99.999% uptime. Talkdesk is more affordable than Five9, has more transparent pricing, and offers 8 industry-specific packages for the government, retail, financial, healthcare, travel and hospitality, utilities, and commercial and residential services sectors.
While it’s more expensive than Talkdesk, Five9 is the more feature-rich option, giving users better overall value for money. Compared to Five9, Talkdesk has stronger security features, more third-party integrations, and better WFM and agent coaching tools. Five9, on the other hand, provides deeper analytics than Talkdesk thanks to its unique AI Insights feature.
Five9 also has more digital channels than Talkdesk–including customer-facing video calling–and more advanced outbound auto dialers. That said, both providers lack native unified communications and collaboration tools.
Choose Talkdesk If You Need:
- Industry-specific contact center solutions that fulfill your unique third-party integration and compliance requirements
- An affordable omnichannel contact center that lets you scale to add more advanced WFM features a la carte for greater cost savings
- Automated real-time and post-interaction agent coaching tools with sentiment monitoring, synchronized agent screen and voice recordings, and customizable evaluation forms
Choose Five9 If You Need:
- Advanced scheduling and forecasting tools that optimize available agents during peak times, alongside multilingual AI insights that identify additional opportunities for automation
- Best-in-class outbound auto dialers and proactive engagement tools to increase conversions, optimize the lead management process, and reduce sales agent burnout
- Highly customizable voice and digital AI Agents for fully automated self-service and omnichannel proactive outbound notifications/reminders
Five9 vs Talkdesk: At A Glance
The table below provides a quick comparison of Five9 vs Talkdesk.
| Five9 | Talkdesk | |
| Pricing+Plans |
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| Voice Calling+SMS |
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| Digital Communication |
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| Omnichannel Workflow Automation |
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| Workforce Management |
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| Analytics+Reporting |
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| Integrations+APIs |
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| Security+Network Reliability |
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| Customer Support | 24/7 omnichannel support | 24/7 omnichannel support |
How We Compared Talkdesk vs Five9
We used the below criteria to compare Five9 vs Talkdesk:
- Pricing and Scalability: We reviewed the cost of bundled month-to-month plans, overall plan value, flexible pricing options like pay-as-you-go or concurrent user billing, platform scalability, and available individual add-ons
- Communication Channels: We looked at included voice and digital communication channels like VoIP voice calling, SMS/MMS texting, website chat, social media messaging, video calling, email, online fax, etc.
- AI Workflow Optimization: We evaluated how each provider leverages AI to optimize workflows and automate routine business processes. We looked for features like live agent assist, automated agent coaching/scoring, IVR and IVAs, knowledge base management, interaction summaries, etc.
- Workforce Management: We compared workforce and performance management tools like automated and supervisor-led agent coaching, agent evaluations and scoresheets, performance gamification, scheduling/forecasting, etc.
- Analytics and Reporting: We reviewed available live and historical KPI monitoring reports, report types, conversational AI-powered insights, customer survey tools, and custom analytics
- Third-Party Integrations and APIs: We looked at available APIs, pre-built third-party integrations with popular business communications software, and app marketplaces
- Security and Customer Support: We reviewed the quality and availability of support channels, looked for paid support upgrades and self-help tools, and reviewed security certifications
Five9 vs Talkdesk: Pricing and Plans
Summary: With 3 CX Cloud plans starting from $85/user/month and 8 industry-specific Experience Clouds, Talkdesk provides more value and scalability than Five9. Talkdesk also offers 8 industry-specific Experience Clouds for businesses in the healthcare, banking, insurance, retail, travel and hospitality, utilities, commercial and residential services, and government sectors. Five9 has 5 plans from $119/user/month, but three of the plans are entirely quote-based–making it tough to estimate value. Both Five9 and Talkdesk have voice-only, digital-only, and omnichannel plans alongside plans with scalable WFM and analytics tools. Only Five9 includes WFM, CX analytics, and proactive outreach on top-tier plans, meaning it offers more value than Talkdesk.
Five9 has 5 total plans from $119/user/month with a 36-month contract. Usage-based pricing and concurrent pricing options are available, but require a 50-seat minimum. The digital-only and omnichannel Core plans are $119/user/month and $159/user/month, respectively and include blended calling or messaging, interaction recording, and complete workflow automation. The voice-only plan includes the Five9 Dialer.
The quote-based Five9 Premium plan provides omnichannel communication and adds essential quality management tools. The Optimum plan adds enterprise WFM and quality management, while the top-tier Ultimate plan adds interaction analytics.
For more details, see our Five9 pricing guide.
Talkdesk has 3 CX Cloud plans from $85-$165/user/month. Per-hour and concurrent user pricing are also available. The Digital Essentials Plan ($85/user/month) includes quality management, interaction routing, APIs, Talkdesk Connections, basic reporting, and mobile app access.
The Voice Essentials Plan ($105/user/month) is the voice-only solution, adding automation and workspace design tools. Essentials users can access third-party integrations via a paid add-on. The Cloud Elevate plan ($115/user/month) is an omnichannel solution that adds customer surveys and screen recording, while the Cloud Elite Plan ($165/user/month) includes performance management and advanced reporting. However, the Cloud Elite plan only let users pick one WFM, CX analytics, or proactive engagement add-on to be included in their plan. The other 2 add-ons must be purchased separately. While this flexibility may result in cost savings for businesses that don’t need all three capabilities some money, it will drive up operating costs for those that do.
Talkdesk offers 8 industry-specific Experience Clouds from $225/user/month for banking, insurance, healthcare, retail, travel and hospitality, utilities, commercial and residential services, and government users, with custom pricing for government. These plans include 2 add-ons, integrate with niche third-party tools, and meet unique compliance regulations.
For more details, see our Talkdesk pricing guide.
Communication Channels: Five9 vs Talkdesk
Summary: Five9 and Talkdesk provide comparable voice and digital communication channels, although Five9 is the only option to include customer-facing video calls. Both provide omnichannel skills-based routing and intergrate with internal knowledge base and CRM data to give agents in-conversation assistance via screen pops. Talkdesk offers stronger customer security than Five9 thanks to its built-in voice biometrics tool and Talkdesk Shield security bundle. Five9, however, easily bests Talkdesk when it comes to automated outbound voice calling.
Five9 and Talkdesk both provide agent-led and fully automated customer communication across voice, SMS, email, website chat, social media messaging, and integrated digital channels. While only Talkdesk includes online faxing, only Five9 includes customer-facing video calls. Both providers leverage omnichannel AI-powered features like live Agent Assist, automated interaction summaries, intelligent omnichannel routing, real-time transcription, and intuitive IVA and IVR design tools to improve CX.
Both also include proactive engagement across voice and digital channels, but Five9 offers a stronger outbound auto dialer than Talkdesk. Five9 is best for outbound contact centers, while Talkdesk’s automated ticketing feature makes it the better fit for inbound customer service teams.
Five9 and Talkdesk both provide preview, predictive, and power dialing–but only Five9 also includes progressive auto dialing and comes with more advanced campaign and lead management tools.
AI and Automation: Five9 vs Talkdesk
Summary: Talkdesk splits its AI into two products: Autopilot for customer self-service and Copilot for live agent assistance. Five9 bundles its Intelligent Virtual Agent, Agent Assist, and AI Insights into the Five9 Genius AI stack. Talkdesk’s no-code Automation Designer and Navigator routing make it easier for smaller teams to build bots and route interactions, while Five9’s Genius AI suits contact centers that want self-service, agent assist, and analytics running on one AI layer.
For customer self-service, Talkdesk Autopilot handles routine voice and digital requests without a live agent. Admins build these virtual agents in the no-code Automation Designer and manage IVR call flows in Talkdesk Studio. Five9’s Intelligent Virtual Agent also handles self-service across voice and digital channels. As part of Genius AI, it feeds conversations directly into Five9 AI Insights for spotting new automation opportunities.
For live interactions, Talkdesk Copilot surfaces suggested answers and knowledge base content while agents talk to customers, and Talkdesk Navigator uses GenAI to send each interaction to the right agent. Five9 Agent Assist gives agents real-time guidance during calls and chats.
Both providers generate automated interaction summaries after each conversation, which cuts after-call work and gives supervisors a consistent record to review.
Workforce Management: Five9 vs Talkdesk
Summary: Talkdesk and Five9 both provide advanced WFM suites including forecasting and scheduling apps, gamification, live agent interaction monitoring, coaching tools, and employee recognition programs. Talkdesk’s WFM solution is among the best in the CCaaS market–especially when it comes to performance evaluations and agent coaching. Five9, however, provides stronger agent scheduling and forecasting tools, making it the better fit for understaffed contact centers struggling to keep up with high contact volumes. Teams looking to increase agent retention rates alongside CSAT scores should choose Talkdesk.
Both Five9 and Talkdesk include multiple forecasting methods, shift templates, automated scheduling with live intraday management, and adherence monitoring in their workforce management tools. While both offer omnichannel forecasting, only Five9 has native multi-skill forecasting and more algorithms than Talkdesk. That said, Talkdesk’s agent-facing schedule management app is available on desktop and mobile devices, unlike Five9’s.
Talkdesk provides far better quality and performance management tools than Five9. Talkdesk Forms lets supervisors completely customize agent evaluations and score sheets–and automatically scores agent performance in real time. Once an interaction is over, supervisors can add time-stamped notes to voice recordings/transcripts, review trends in agent performance, and assign relevant training modules for better agent coaching.
On the other hand, Five9’s performance management dashboard provides multi-role dashboards for agents, supervisors, and managers with real-time KPI and SLA alerts–a feature Talkdesk doesn’t offer.
Analytics+Reporting: Five9 vs Talkdesk
Summary: Five9 and Talkdesk both offer excellent reporting tools, including standard KPI monitoring, speech and text analytics, quality management, CSAT monitoring, and omnichannel customer surveys. Talkdesk monitors more individual KPIs than Five9, and is the only provider to analyze customer survey responses in real time. However, Five9’s AI Insights tool, powered by Five9 Genius AI, is difficult to beat.
Talkdesk and Five9 both analyze 100% of omnichannel interactions to evaluate customer sentiment and intent, the root cause of common customer service issues, trends in agent performance, and common conversation topics. Five9, however, also offers conversational AI insights in 28 languages, making it the better choice for global contact centers.
Five9 AI Insights identifies opportunities for automation, automatically categorizes calls by topic, tracks CSAT trends and marketing campaigns, and lets supervisors drill data down to view team-based, agent-based, and KPI-based reports.
Talkdesk’s AI-powered Customer Experience Analytics tool identifies common keywords and topics in customer conversations, and tracks customer mood insights that identify the root causes of changes in CSAT levels. While it’s a strong tool, it can’t compete with Five9 AI Insights.
Integrations+APIs: Five Vs Talkdesk
Summary: Five9 and Talkdesk both include API access on all plans, but only Five9 includes third-party integrations with all plans. Still, Talkdesk provides 70+ pre-built integrations, while Five9 only integrates with a few CRM and helpdesk tools (despite claiming to have more.) Talkdesk and Five9 both have an app marketplace that lets users purchase and integrate third-party tools into the platform with one click–but only Talkdesk offers free 30-day trials with AppConnect tools.
Both Talkdesk and Five9 include APIs and integrate with essential CRM systems and helpdesk solutions like Salesforce, Zendesk, ServiceNow, and Oracle. Both also integrate with popular unified communications tools like Zoom and Microsoft Teams. Talkdesk has 70+ pre-built integrations, but limits access to them to upper-tier plans. Five9 doesn’t appear to offer nearly as many integrations as Talkdesk, and doesn’t include much information about compatible platforms on its website.
While both Talkdesk and Five9 have an app marketplace, Talkdesk’s is more extensive and offers free 30-day trials of popular software. That said, while all Five9 plans include integrations and API access, only Talkdesk Cloud Elevate users and above have access to pre-built third-party integrations and the AppConnect Marketplace.
Security, Uptime, and Customer Support
Summary: Talkdesk has the edge on security and reliability thanks to Talkdesk Shield, PCI-compliant Secure Payments, FedRAMP compliance, and a 99% uptime SLA on its Experience Clouds. Five9 covers the core compliance standards most contact centers need. Both offer 24/7 omnichannel support.
Five9 complies with HIPAA, PCI, SOC 2 Type 2, and GDPR, signs BAAs for healthcare customers, and encrypts data both in transit and at rest. That covers the requirements of most healthcare, financial, and international contact centers.
Talkdesk holds 30+ third-party security certifications, including HIPAA and FedRAMP, so it is the stronger option for government agencies and public sector contractors. Talkdesk Shield adds user authentication controls, and Talkdesk Secure Payments lets agents take card payments over the phone in a PCI-compliant way without hearing or storing card details.
Both providers guarantee 99.999% uptime, and Five9 backs its network with 24/7 monitoring. Talkdesk also provides a 99.999% uptime SLA on its industry-specific Experience Clouds.
Both vendors provide 24/7 omnichannel support. Five9 customers frequently praise its support team for resolving issues quickly and keeping them updated, even at smaller call centers.
Five9 Pros+Cons
The pros to choosing Five9 over Talkdesk include:
- Five9 offers 4 types of auto dialers which are included with voice-enabled seats (Premium Talkdesk plans offer power and preview auto dialers, while Talkdesk Advanced Dialer also offers predictive and unattended dialing)
- Five9 offers real-time call center video chat as an add-on (Talkdesk offers face-to-face video calls in Financial Services Experience Cloud for Banking)
That having been said, here is where Five9 falls short:
- Five9 is more expensive than Talkdesk
- SMS/MMS is only included in the digital plan or as an add-on
- Five9 has fewer pre-built integrations than Talkdesk (though APIs are available)
Talkdesk Pros+Cons
The pros to choosing Talkdesk over Five9 include:
- Talkdesk offers industry-specific packages with prebuilt workflows (Five9 does not offer this)
- Talkdesk offers a 99.999% uptime SLA with experience cloud packages
That having been said, here is where Talkdesk falls short:
- Marketing, outreach, and WFM/WEM features like bulk SMS, preview dialing and automated scheduling are only available in the most expensive plan–and customers may only choose one of these features to be included in their package (Five9 includes WFM/WEM tools in Premium plan and up)
User Experience: What are Customers Saying?
We’ve taken a look at what some of GetVoIP’s users have been saying about both providers, and here are a few that stand out.
Here's what Five9 users are saying:
“The service is very reliable and dependable. They have great customer support. Issues are always resolved in a timely manner and they stay in constant communication with you with updates so you always now the status of your issue being resolved. You can customize your features to meet all of your business needs.” – Tina A.
“Even though we’re a small call center, Five9 provides the support and attention we need. The Five9 platform meets all of our needs and makes our call center run more effectively.” – Jake N.
Here's what Talkdesk users are saying:
“Talkdesk is an excellent platform on which to connect with customers across a variety of communication methods such as phone, chat and email. It provides well developed tools to monitor performance and deep integration across the various apps. The cloud based approach allows colleagues to work remotely and connect across all of our sites easily and has helped during the current COVID-19 pandemic.” – Paul James R.
“This is easy to use. Everyone will be able to learn to use it and be able to use it with ease. Makes monitoring the agents and statuses easy. All of the monitoring is on one screen so it is easy to find statuses of a specific agent. Finding the calls stats for the day is conveniently in one location and you are able to change the dates and times to monitor a certain time frame easily.” - E'Llysa A.
Ease of Use and Implementation: Five9 vs Talkdesk
Summary: Talkdesk is easier for agents and admins to learn and typically goes live faster. Five9 offers deeper configuration but takes longer to set up.
Talkdesk’s interface is the more intuitive of the two. Agents can start handling interactions with little training, and supervisors see agent statuses and daily call stats on a single screen, a point Talkdesk users raise often. Five9 gives admins more control over dialer campaigns, routing, and workflow design, but that depth brings a steeper learning curve for the people configuring the platform.
Talkdesk deployments are commonly described as taking days, while Five9 implementations tend to run for weeks, especially for outbound campaigns and enterprise WFM. Talkdesk’s 70+ pre-built integrations and AppConnect marketplace also cut setup time for teams already using popular CRM and helpdesk tools, whereas Five9 users often rely on APIs or partner tools to connect their stack.
Company size shapes the choice:
- Five9: Fits high-volume enterprise contact centers that can absorb a longer setup, a 36-month contract, and the 50-seat minimum for usage-based or concurrent pricing.
- Talkdesk: Fits mid-market teams that want a quick rollout and plan to add WFM or analytics features later.
Pick Talkdesk for a fast, low-friction launch, and Five9 if you have the IT resources to configure a more powerful platform.
Alternatives to Five9 and Talkdesk
Our final take on Five9 vs Talkdesk?
Outbound call centers and enterprises needing extensive AI analytics to improve the customer experience should choose Five9. Five9 is also a good fit for digital-first omnichannel contact centers heavily reliant on proactive messaging for upselling and retaining customers.
Enterprises that need extensive workforce management tools to optimize agent scheduling, decrease agent turnover, and improve agent performance should choose Talkdesk. Talkdesk is also right for growing omnichannel contact centers that prioritize scalable pricing and the flexibility of individual add-ons.
If neither option sounds right for your business, check out our guides to the best Talkdesk alternatives and the top Five9 alternatives. Providers like RingCentral, NICE CXone, or Genesys may be a better fit for your team.
