Zendesk CX Trends 2026
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Zendesk has published its CX Trends 2026 report. We picked out five things CX teams should pay attention to: memory as the new gold, accelerating self- service, multimodality replacing omnichannel, the democratisation of analytics, and transparency becoming a must-have rather than a nice-to-have.
Zendesk has published its CX Trends 2026 report. Here are 5 things CX teams should take note of.
1. Memory is the new gold
AI that remembers past conversations and context makes genuinely personalised service possible on every channel.
2. Self-service is accelerating
74% of consumers now expect 24/7 availability, because AI makes it possible (and they know it).
3. Multimodality replaces omnichannel
Customers want to switch from text to image, voice or video mid-conversation without starting over.
4. Analytics is being democratised
The AI era calls for new metrics. Measuring customer satisfaction alone isn't enough. On top of that, analytics should be available to every employee simply by prompting.
5. Transparency is no longer a nice-to-have
95% of consumers want to know why an AI made a given decision, but only 37% of companies currently tell them.
In short, it's no longer enough just to adopt AI — you have to do the right things with it. The good news: 97% of Zendesk's customers reported a positive return on their AI investments last year.
