Best Helpdesk Knowledge Base Shortlist
Here are the top 10 helpdesk knowledge bases I’d like to highlight out of the 20 I cover in this article:
A helpdesk knowledge base is an invaluable resource for any customer service team. It provides your support agents with all the information they need to answer customer questions quickly and effectively. I’ve spent some time investigating the market and researching the best helpdesk knowledge base tools available. In this article, I’ve compiled my findings to help you find the best solution for your business needs.
What Is Helpdesk Knowledge Base Software?
A helpdesk knowledge base is a type of customer service software that assists businesses in responding to customer questions and resolving customer issues. Customer support teams use it to manage their incoming support requests and provide more consistent service to their customers. The software can also be used by internal teams providing a company knowledge database or cross-team support to other business departments.
These platforms typically have content management capabilities and offer a searchable knowledge base to help team members answer common questions and help with troubleshooting common issues. They may also have support ticket management tools to help your team resolve incoming issues more efficiently.
Overviews Of The 10 Best Helpdesk Knowledge Bases
Here’s a brief description of each helpdesk knowledge base solution to showcase each tool’s best use case, some noteworthy features, and screenshots to give a snapshot of the user interface.
Document360
Best for enterprise
Document360 is a cloud-based knowledge base solution that helps businesses create, collaborate, and publish self-service knowledge bases.
Why I Picked Document360: Thanks to the Document360 category manager, users can easily maintain product documentation in a hierarchy-based structure. They can also create sub-categories, edit existing ones, and archive articles within categories.
The software features a built-in editor with markdown keyboard shortcuts. This allows you to create internal links to articles, add tables to documents, and get real-time, inline previews of content.
In addition, the security module enables users to assign role-based access permissions to different readers, redirect articles, map domains, and schedule automatic backups.
Document360 Standout Features and Integrations
Features include content management, guided problem solving, discussion boards, code snippet sharing, screenshot uploading, a self-service portal, text-to-speech functionality,
and product cataloging.
Integrations include Intercom, Segment, Google Analytics, Disqus, HTML 5, Olark, Zendesk, Freshdesk, Hotjar, Freshmarketer, and Drift.
Pros
- Customizable home-page builder
- Short learning curve
- Easy to edit and publish article
Cons
- No native mobile app
- Old-school interface
LiveAgent
Best WYSIWYG content editor
LiveAgent is a help desk and knowledge base management software that customer support teams can use to streamline their operations.
Why I picked LiveAgent: Customer support teams can build their knowledge base in addition to managing incoming chat, email, and phone tickets with the software. Crafting support content is simplified with the WYSIWYG editor that's accessible to users with varying technical skills. Beyond developing a self-serve customer support hub, the software can also be used to build forums where existing customers can exchange among themselves on common issues. Teams can collect feedback from customers as well, helping improve their strategies.
LiveAgent Standout Features & Integrations
Features include multilingual live chat, customer forums, customer feedback, website tracking, content management, customizable themes, in-app notifications, call routing, call recording, and a reporting dashboard.
Integrations include ActiveCampaign, BigCommerce, Clockify, Cloudtalk, Gmail, Jira, Magento, Pipedrive, Shopify, Slack, Trello, Twilio, and Webflow.
Pros
- Manage help desk and knowledge base in one place
- 24/7 customer support
- Quick setup and onboarding
Cons
- Reporting not included in starter plan
- Additional cost for social media tools
Jira Service Management
Best for connecting a Confluence knowledge base
Jira Service Management is an ITSM platform that can be used as both an internal and customer-facing help desk solution.
Why I picked Jira Service Management: This software can be used to manage internal company services, such as for IT, HR, or legal departments. However, users can also manage their outward customer services in the platform and benefit from many of its core features. A branded customer portal can be developed where clients can access resources, share feedback, and more. Customers can also request support from within your product or from your website.
Users can create their customer knowledge base using Confluence, a fellow Atlassian tool. For businesses already working in the Atlassian and Jira ecosystem, this can be a good option to keep their customer services in the same environment. Reporting tools help users track their customer service metrics and understand where they can improve their services.
Jira Service Management Standout Features & Integrations
Features include localization with 8 supported languages, self-service customer portal, custom branding, contextual support requests, and CSAT reporting.
Integrations include Azure, Github, Google Workspace, Intercom, Microsoft 365, PowerBI, Salesforce, Slack, Toggl, Trello, and Zoom.
Pros
- Connects with the broader Jira ecosystem
- Creates alignment between CX, product, and IT teams
- Over 1000 integrations available through the Jira marketplace
Cons
- More suitable to enterprise than SMBs
- Steep learning curve
Groove
Best for simple but effective knowledge bases
Groove is committed to providing organizations with a fresh alternative to popular customer service and knowledge management solutions.
Why I Picked Groove: The software gives agents a shared inbox that helps them organize, prioritize, and solve customer requests. Conversation assignments make it clear who is responsible for each inquiry, while collision detection prevents double replies.
Groove aims to instill customer confidence by offering instant help on any website or app page. Round-robin assignment spreads the workload, and unattended message logic ensures customers get a fast response. When customers drop offline, conversations can continue by email.
Groove Standout Features and Integrations
Features include private knowledge bases, @mentions and notifications, mobile optimization, and embeddable widgets.
Integrations include Slack, Stripe, Shopify, Recharge, HubSpot, Trello, ConstantContact, Github, Instagram, and Salesforce.
Pros
- Excellent canned replies system
- Support for multiple inboxes
- Comprehensive ticket tracking
Cons
- No bulk import
- Searching for closed requests is difficult
Slite
Best for a knowledge base with structure documents
Slite is an advanced knowledge base solution that drives action through the effective use of structured documents, meaningful collaboration, and informed decision-making.
Why I Picked Slite: This tool helps people brainstorm ideas, create notes, and share files. Team members can track document versions, maintain activity logs, comment on files, and generate recurring documents. They can also organize ideas, create project handbooks, store private notes and manage image galleries.
In Slite, decision-making and async discussion are built into documents. The software replaces scattered conversations and long email or Slack threads.
Slite's composer tool enables team members to organize ideas, create project handbooks, store private notes, and manage image galleries. The built-in sketch tool allows employees to create workflows and visualize ideas, whilst maintaining compliance with SOC2 guidelines. Additionally, administrators can schedule data backups, create user groups, set up single sign-on protocols, and configure permission rights to ensure user and data security.
Slite Standout Features and Integrations
Features include a sketch tool, workflow visualization SOC2 compliance, data backups, user groups, single sign-on protocols, document authoring, and permission management.
Integrations include Airtable, Google Workspace, Slack, Figma, Loom, Trello, Asana, Github, Google Docs, and Okta.
Pros
- Super-intuitive
- Appealing free plan
- Helpful notification features
Cons
- Can be slow
- Confusing navigation
Help Scout
Best for quickly creating knowledge base articles
Help Scout sets out to offer you a better way to talk to customers, managing all conversations in one platform that feels like your inbox.
Why I Picked Help Scout: The knowledge base software is built for discovery, encouraging customers to find their own answers through a self-service portal. It’s easy to create articles quickly, with the option to include text, images, hyperlinks, tables, and videos.
You can surface help articles across your site or app, address commonly asked questions, and reduce incoming email requests. If customers can’t find the answer they need in your knowledge base, they get clear contact options for reaching out to agents directly.
Customers can also reach out via email or chat. The Beacon widget tracks which web pages and articles customers are reading, helping you to understand trends and problem areas.
Help Scout Standout Features and Integrations
Features include real-time reporting, email integration, document knowledge base, conversation metrics, productivity data, and happiness metrics.
Integrations include Pipedrive, Jira, ChannelReply, Salesforce, HubSpot, Mailchimp, Magento, Infusionsoft, Google Workspace, and Slack.
Pros
- Easy and natural to use
- Great for email interactions
- Simple to assign conversations
Cons
- Limited customization options
- No mobile app
Zendesk
Best for a knowledge base that boosts agent efficiency
Zendesk is a help desk software solution designed to help businesses meet customer needs and enhance success.
Why I Picked Zendesk: The Zendesk knowledge base allows you to offer a self-service option to customers. The software organizes knowledge and empowers both customers and agents with this valuable information.
Customers can solve their own problems, without sending emails or making phone calls. You can also add contextual self-service within your product or on your website, using the web widget and mobile SDK.
You can leverage the knowledge gathered by the support team and make it widely accessible. The software makes it easy to publish FAQs, product details policy, and other key information.
Zendesk Standout Features and Integrations
Features include real-time chat, AI-powered analysis, feedback collection, and omnichannel presence.
Integrations include Microsoft Teams, Magento, Trello, HubSpot, Outlook, WordPress, Hootsuite, Survey Money, Pivotal Tracker, and Discord.
Pros
- Easy to use
- Configuration is simple
- Excellent analytics
Cons
- Complicated agent licensing
- The mobile interface is limited
Sprinklr
Best for an AI-driven knowledge base solution
Sprinklr is an enterprise-level customer experience management solution that handles customer service, content marketing, social media management, and social listening.
Why I Picked Sprinklr: The software turns AI-powered listening into competitive advantage, offering a better understanding of feedback on your products and services. It transforms customer opinions into actionable insights, then shares this across your entire organization to drive innovation.
Sprinklr helps protect your brand by empowering your customer support team with critical knowledge before problems become critical. This allows managers to make proactive, informed decisions about owned media strategies and tactics.
Sprinklr Standout Features and Integrations
Features include keyword tracking, scheduling, marketing automation, and social media integration.
Integrations include AppsFlyer, BazaarVoice, Corezoid, Discourse, Esko, Form Assembly, Freshdesk KB, Okta, Google Analytics, and Mailchimp.
Pros
- Combines all social media feedback
- Fast, accurate, and efficient
- Extensive reporting options
Cons
- Disorganized user interface
- Significant investment required
Stonly
Best for guiding people to success at scale
Using Stonly, you can create self-serve guides that adapt to each individual and help them along the optimal path toward effective onboarding, issue resolution, or adoption.
Why I Picked Stonly: The interactive guides created on this platform adapt automatically to every situation, offering a more satisfying and meaningful user experience. In-app guides reduce tickets, while website guidance helps people find the content or features they are seeking.
Stonly guides and forms employer customer support agents by providing them with rich ticket data, so they can get to the point and resolve issues quickly. A fully interactive customer help center can be created in minutes.
Stonly Standout Features and Integrations
Features include personal attention at scale, proactive support in every channel, customer insights, multiple language support, and no-code integration.
Integrations include Zendesk, Front, Freshdesk, Intercom, Segment, HubSpot, Helpshift, Salesforce, Gorgias, and Help Scout.
Pros
- Multiple ways to trigger help
- Simple setup
- Intuitive and easy to use
Cons
- Limited attachment options
- Expensive compared to other options
Helpjuice
Best for advanced team collaboration
Helpjuice is a cloud-based knowledge base solution that includes applications for creating and managing both internal and external knowledge bases. The software can be hosted on-premises or accessed online.
Why I Picked Helpjuice: Designed with flexibility in mind, the software includes customized design and styling tools for building out knowledge bases. The overall look and feel can be modified to match the organization’s branding.
To provide additional insights, Helpjuice tracks all searches. The data can then be analyzed to show which topics are most frequently searched and referenced.
Helpjuice Standout Features and Integrations
Features include dragging and dropping files to Helpjuice articles, troubleshooting multiple answers based on interaction, and copy/pasting from document editors.
Integrations include Salesforce, Slack, Olark, Freshdesk, Microsoft Teams, Google Drive, WordPress, Shopify, Squarespace, and Sharepoint.
Pros
- Many theme options
- Easy to customize
- Simple to use
Cons
- Limited image storage capabilities
- Formatting can be challenging
The Best Helpdesk Knowledge Bases Summary
| Tool | Free Option | Price | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Document360 Best for enterprise | 14-day free trial | From $119/user/month | Visit Website |
| 2 | LiveAgent Best WYSIWYG content editor | 30-day free trial | From $9/user/month (billed annually) | Visit Website |
| 3 | Jira Service Management Best for connecting a Confluence knowledge base | 7-day free trial | From $21/agent/month | Visit Website |
| 4 | Groove Best for simple but effective knowledge bases | 15 Days Free Trial | From $15/user/month | Visit Website |
| 5 | Slite Best for a knowledge base with structure documents | Freemium plan available (limited features) | From $8/user/month | Visit Website |
| 6 | Help Scout Best for quickly creating knowledge base articles | 15-day free trial | From $20/user/month | Visit Website |
| 7 | Zendesk Best for a knowledge base that boosts agent efficiency | 14-day free trial | From $19/user/month (billed annually) | Visit Website |
| 8 | Sprinklr Best for an AI-driven knowledge base solution | Not available | Pricing upon request | Visit Website |
| 9 | Stonly Best for guiding people to success at scale | 14 days free trial. | From $99/month (billed annually) | Visit Website |
| 10 | Helpjuice Best for advanced team collaboration | 14-day free trial | From $120/user/month | Visit Website |
Other Options
Here are a few more options that didn’t make the best helpdesk knowledge base list:
- Notion
Best for a user-friendly knowledge base
- Shelf.io
Best for complete lifecycle management of knowledge
- Zoho Desk
Best for auto-suggest features
- Freshdesk
Best for an intuitive, feature-rich knowledge base solution
- monday.com
A comprehensive project management tool that includes features for building a solid knowledge base.
- Shelf
A knowledge management software platform that uses AI to provide on-demand answers to customer and employee questions on-demand.
- Confluence
A web-based corporate wiki and help desk solution with knowledge-base features.
- TeamSupport
Includes an area to store documents for your employees or customers to access anytime.
- HubSpot
A popular CRM that also allows you to create a knowledge base to assist customers and prospects.
- Connecteam
Offers the ability to create a knowledge base for employees.
Selection Criteria for the Best Helpdesk Knowledge Base
Want to know how I selected the best helpdesk knowledge base tools for this list? Here’s a bit about my methodology:
I started with a long list of helpdesk knowledge bases with positive user ratings. From there, I compared each one against the rest based on its overall functionality and feature set. I used the evaluation criteria outlined below to be sure I was fair in my comparisons. I also leaned on my experience in customer service to keep an eye out for any features that were true value-adds.
Here are the selection criteria I used in my research:
Core Functionality
This is a somewhat niche product category, so not every knowledge base platform will have the exact same functionality. At its core, I expected each tool to have an internal knowledge management system for it to make it onto my list. In other words, it had to have the ability to centralize, store, sort, search through, and access knowledge base content.
Key Features
Beyond the basic functionality outlined above, here are some key features I kept an eye out for while I was researching the best knowledge base software:
- Self-service knowledge base: a public-facing, external knowledge base where customers can find answers to their own questions.
- WYSIWYG editor: A user-friendly editor to produce and publish knowledge base articles and adjust formatting without the need for CSS or HTML coding.
- Content management: Categorization, tagging, search functionality, and Wiki-style organization.
- Helpdesk functionality: A ticketing system to help you sort through and assign support tickets.
- Workflow automation: The ability to setup triggers and automate support workflows to alleviate your team’s manual workload.
- Widgets: The ability to embed a chatbot on your site or track how customers navigate your self-service portal.
- Templates: Ready-made templates to draft docs more quickly, or the ability to build and save customizable templates to create a consistent user experience.
- Access permissions: Some company knowledge needs to be kept secure, so knowledge sharing parameters can be set to ensure only the right people have access.
- Collaboration tools: Shared workspaces in cloud-based platforms allow for real-time team collaboration, even from different locations.
- Search engine optimization: Some software helps with SEO to ensure customers find your knowledge base when they search for answers on Google.
Usability
It’s very important that a helpdesk knowledge base is user-friendly and intuitive for both customers and your team. You want your private knowledge base to be easy for support reps to navigate so they can provide answers and solutions to customers quickly. Meanwhile, you want a public knowledge base to provide a consistent, positive customer experience so customers stay true to your products and services.
Integrations
However you plan to use your helpdesk knowledge base software, you’ll likely want to connect it to some of your other SaaS tools. Many of the platforms on this list integrate with common workplace communication tools like Slack and Microsoft Teams, and project management software like Jira and Asana. Some also connect to CRM systems like HubSpot and Zoho, and storage solutions like Google Docs. The software may integrate directly with Wordpress or have an API or widgets to connect to your website. I’ve noted the integrations included with each provider in my overviews.
Pricing
Of course, cost is always a factor when you’re looking to add a new software to your toolbox. The helpdesk and knowledge management software on this list range from about $8 per user per month to upwards of $100 per user per month. There are a few free knowledge base solutions with feature limitations, which might be suitable for startups or small businesses. I’ve noted the starting price of each software on my list as well as any free plan or trial that’s available in my overviews and the comparison chart.
Helpdesk & Knowledge Base FAQs
In this section, I’ll answer a few frequently asked questions about helpdesks, knowledge bases, and providing exceptional customer service and support.
What are the types of knowledge bases?
How can a helpdesk knowledge base help me?
Providing Exceptional Service With Helpdesk Knowledge Base Software
Whether you’re providing support or services to external customers, internal team members, or some other group, a helpdesk knowledge base can be a big help. Internal knowledge base software helps keep the people at your organization informed and aligned. Meanwhile, finding the right knowledge base software for your customer service team speeds up resolution times for customer requests and helps improve the overall customer experience.
Whether you found the perfect software solution for your needs in this list, or you’re still on the hunt, hopefully you have the information you need to make a confident choice.
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