Avaya Alternatives: Top 7 Competitors in 2025

For years, Avaya has been a trusted choice for businesses needing robust business communication and contact center solutions. Yet, as companies evolve, many users may find Avaya’s offerings insufficient for their growing needs. For many, the channel configuration efforts and patchy tech integration capabilities may become roadblocks.

Avaya’s strength lies in on-prem solutions which are great for modest teams and operations but lack the agility and scalability of cloud solutions. Consequently, users often end up buying third-party tools for full functionality, which inflates the total cost of ownership, the platform often falls short of today’s agile, cloud-driven needs.

In this guide, we’ll explore the best Avaya alternatives designed to target these challenges and backend hurdles. We compare their feature sets, customer reviews and pricing information to help you narrow down your choices and make informed buying decisions.

Why consider alternatives to Avaya?

Avaya’s portfolio includes tools aimed at enhancing customer interactions, team collaboration and network connectivity. Its contact center solution Avaya Experience Platform (AXP), offers in-depth features for handling customer interactions, from call routing to analytics, though they’re largely on-premise or hybrid.

Avaya’s collaboration tools support teamwork with features like video conferencing and file sharing, while its networking solutions connect people and devices across locations. However, these solutions are often complex to manage, leading many to explore more flexible Avaya competitors. Here are the top reasons users choose an alternative to Avaya:

💸 History of financial instability

Avaya’s financial history, marked by two Chapter 11 bankruptcies — in 2017 and again in 2023 — signal challenges in sustaining growth and managing debt. And as of Nov 2024, Avaya has begun its second round of layoffs, after cutting down 140 positions back in July.

These restructurings can mean slower innovation and diverted focus as the company prioritizes financial recovery. For users, such instability may raise valid questions: Can Avaya continue to provide seamless support and future-ready updates that a growing business needs? In contrast, Avaya's competitors with stronger financial footing could enable more secure and sturdy contact center operations.

☁️ Not cloud-native

Avaya has traditionally excelled in on-premise contact center solutions built to support in-house customer service operations. But as businesses increasingly move to the cloud, Avaya has struggled to keep pace. What could have been a smooth transition to the cloud has been a patchwork of third-party integrations and gradual product changes. This approach slows down innovation, leaving users waiting for features that cloud-native platforms offer effortlessly. For companies craving flexibility and quick adaptability, exploring more modern, cloud-first Avaya alternatives may be the best way forward.

🔗 Not seamlessly holistic

Avaya doesn’t deliver a fully integrated communications experience, often requiring users to juggle between different interfaces for internal and external communication. The experience feels fragmented as Avaya uses RingCentral to power its UCaaS capability and various third-party tools for analytics and AI. This setup can result in broken customer service workflows, forcing users to switch between windows and logins. For businesses seeking seamless communication teams and customers, all-in-one alternatives are a better bet.

🔐 Vendor lock-in

Avaya’s duct-taped ecosystem can make it challenging for businesses to switch vendors or even align upgrades smoothly. With different end-of-life (EOL) dates across multiple legacy products, users often face disjointed upgrade paths, leading to compatibility issues and potential service gaps. This “vendor lock-in” limits flexibility, forcing businesses to stick with Avaya’s timeline and products, even if alternative solutions could better support their evolving communication needs.

Top 7 alternatives to Avaya

️Based on 2024 research, here’s a list of the top seven Avaya competitors any business can prefer:

Avaya Alternative #1: Sprinklr

As a cloud-native solution, Sprinklr stands out in the market as one of the top alternatives to Avaya with its Unified Customer Experience Management (Unified-CXM) platform. Unlike Avaya’s often fragmented ecosystem, Sprinklr integrates all customer experience channels in a single interface, eliminating data silos and ensuring seamless communication.

Its purpose-built AI leverages both internal and external data, offering deep insights into your customer base. Scalable and adaptable, Sprinklr grows with your business, providing reach across 35+ digital channels, all while ensuring a cohesive, uninterrupted customer experience.

🚀Top features

Omnichannel-first

With Sprinklr’s omnichannel support, businesses can seamlessly connect with customers across 35+ digital platforms — including voice, social, messaging, live chat, email and even online communities — all within a single, unified interface. Moreover, it’s easy to pull data from multiple external sources, thanks to API integrations on Sprinklr’s no-code interface. This is in stark contrast to Avaya’s limited AXP platform, which supports less than 10 channels.

With a channel-less architecture, Sprinklr enables agents to deliver a unified experience to customers and pick up conversations contextually from where they left off. The experience remains unbroken even when customers switch channels, maintaining smooth interactions and providing a complete, 360-degree view that guarantees consistency at every customer touchpoint.

Unbeatable AI infrastructure

Sprinklr’s AI infrastructure is woven deeply into its platform, driving intelligent, real-time support across every customer interaction — a clear advantage over Avaya, whose AI capabilities are still developing using various third-party alliances.

Sprinklr’s unified AI [proprietary AI + generative AI] acts as a central brain to train multiple contact center functionalities, which results in unbeatable levels of accuracy. All of this makes your contact center agents more productive with strong features such as:

• Smart pairing: Automatically routes cases to the best-suited agent by analyzing performance, customer feedback and agent proficiency on specific query types, so the quality of resolution stays top-notch.
• Agent nudges: Predict customer intent in real-time to suggest the next best actions, providing actionable guidance through button options such as workflows and knowledge articles, helping agents proactively target issues.
• Smart responses: Uses a custom LLM to suggest relevant responses to agents throughout the conversation but is especially helpful during case opening and closing stages, letting your agents select from multiple suggestions and use sharp prompt engineering for greater relevance.

Did you know? Sprinklr uses its in-house, proprietary Sprinklr AI, OpenAI’s GPT models and Google Cloud’s Vertex AI to bring generative AI extensive flourishing capabilities all infused under Sprinklr AI+.   

Boost your team’s productivity, augment the quality of conversations, deliver sharper insights and drive smart automation across your front-office and contact center tasks — all with our GenAI technology.

Want to give it a whirl? Talk to a Sprinklr expert today. 

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Unified, everything

Avaya’s speech analytics, text analytics, manual and automated quality management are all individual, separate offerings. However, Sprinklr’s rich AI infrastructure brings customer interaction analytics and quality management bundled up under its strong CCaaS solution Sprinklr Service.

Avaya also heavily relies on its alliance partners like Verint and Calabrio for various capabilities like workforce engagement management, Google and Cognigy for virtual assistants, Afiniti for intelligent routing and Journey.ID for journey orchestration — all of these functionalities are unified and offered by Sprinklr natively on its platform.

Customer testimonials

💪 What works best

“Everything is together, I don't have to manage several tabs at once. I'm mostly in customer service and my case flow on Sprinklr is much smoother than when I'm on platforms natively. We really only go to the native site when we have to because Sprinklr is so convenient.” Source

💡What could be better

“Being a long-time agent console user, I found sometimes getting logged out automatically while I was idle or busy with another task which I wish you can improve!” Source

Verdict: Sprinklr stands out for users who value a smooth setup and flexible integrations without the hassle of vendor lock-in. Unlike Avaya, which can feel limiting, Sprinklr’s roadmap and feature updates consistently meet changing business needs, making it easier to scale as you grow. Plus, customers rave about Sprinklr’s support quality, especially with dedicated success managers available for enterprise clients — a level of personalized assistance that’s hard to overlook when considering companies like Avaya.

Did you know? IDC even lists Sprinklr as a Major Player in its Worldwide Contact Center-as-a-Service Applications Software 2024 Vendor Assessment.

Avaya Alternative #2: Genesys

Genesys makes a great alternative, especially for contact centers wanting to level up customer satisfaction as it offers a complete, cloud-based CCaaS platform Genesys Cloud CX that handles both inbound and outbound interactions effortlessly.

For businesses moving from Avaya, Genesys brings valuable migration expertise and even offers free training credits to make the switch as easy as possible.

🚀Top features

• Uses AI to assist agents, bring performance insights and ensure omnichannel routing to match customers with the best-fit agents based on past interactions.
• Helps engage and manage the workforce with gamified scorecards, personalized development hubs and accurate AI-driven forecasting models.
• Provides robust global support and availability through an extensive operational presence across regions.

Customer testimonials

💪 What works best

“Genesys brings to their CCaaS solution AI powered solutions like Predictive Engagement, Predictive Routing and Sentiment Analysis that is a step beyond compared to other solutions on the market. Another aspect that I can mention is the ease of integration since Genesys has a large amount of out-of-the-box "add-ons" that can be found in the Genesys AppFoundry website.” Source

💡What could be better

“Support provided by a 3rd party vendor is often lacking and requires multiple requests for follow up information.” Source

Verdict: Genesys offers an end-to-end contact center solution that supports cloud and hybrid setups, making it a versatile choice for businesses with varied infrastructure needs. Known for its smooth transitions, with 350+ built-in integrations, it enables brands to customize their systems extensively, fitting perfectly into unique workflows. Unlike Avaya’s, another noteworthy thing about Genesys is its stable financial footing which makes it a reliable, future-proof option for contact centers.

Price: $75 for voice and $115 for voice and other digital channels

Avaya Alternative #3: NICE CXone

NICE CXone is a powerful cloud contact center solution with a digital-first approach, offering seamless support across over 30 digital channels where Avaya often requires additional configurations for similar reach.

While Avaya has particularly strong outbound IVR for campaigns, NICE CXone uses advanced conversational AI to be just as adept at handling inbound communication as outbound relaying.

🚀Top features

• Stronghold as a workforce management tool to help users optimize and manage their agents effectively.
• Offers access to a robust ecosystem with over 100 development partners and 400+ open APIs, enabling extensive customization.
• Provides a complete suite of integrated solutions — including workforce management, quality management, analytics and IVR.

Customer testimonials

💪 What works best

“What I liked most is that it offers a wide range of functionalities to cover various needs, such as omnichannel communication or analytics. I love the chat and emails, as well as the excellent use of analytics and the provision of good services.” Source

💡What could be better

“Some of the backend programing is a bit harder to understand for most folks so you have to spend a lot of time learning it. The tech support is very good but sometimes hard to understand so things can be lost in translation.” Source

Verdict: For businesses seeking a flexible, cloud-based contact center, NICE CXone offers a streamlined, self-administered solution that avoids many of Avaya’s complexities and costs. With Avaya, you may face ongoing professional service fees, costly upgrades and limited options for SMBs, especially if not on the latest version. NICE CXone, on the other hand, provides the resilience, security and control that cloud-based solutions excel in, without reliance on third parties for adjustments.

Price: Digital agent pack starts at $71/agent/month. Offers more plans.

Avaya Alternative #4: Talkdesk

Talkdesk stands out as an innovator in contact center solutions, offering CX Cloud, a cloud-native platform built to elevate customer experience. Its intuitive interface and scalable architecture make it a versatile choice for businesses aiming to modernize their contact centers with low-code custom integrations.

Moreover, by providing an end-to-end platform, Talkdesk enables companies to preserve existing infrastructure investments while deploying tools that align with their specific needs.

🚀Top features

• Equipped with Talkdesk Ascend AI™ to boost automation through human-in-the-loop technology and protect against threats with AI-driven authentication.
• Offers a no-code builder that allows users to curate and implement customer journeys without needing extensive technical knowledge.
• Comes with AI assistant Talkdesk Copilot™ to guide and support agents during customer interactions.

Customer testimonials

💪What works best

“The (technical) customer service is amazing and actually unlike many other CS providers, directly reachable via phone. That's a huge plus point in my perspective when you quickly want to double check, confirm or simply fix things which potentially have a considerable impact on business. My CSM is superb and very flexible which isn't something one should take for granted. The ease of use and implementation of the software/service is also rather on the easy side.” Source

💡What could be better

“One thing we find challenging about Talkdesk is that some advanced reporting features can be a bit complex to navigate, and there are occasional delays in updates or new feature rollouts. However, their customer support is always helpful in resolving any issues.” Source

Verdict: Talkdesk is a top choice for businesses seeking a flexible, cloud-native contact center with robust security and ease of use. It offers AI-powered authentication through its in-house Talkdesk Identity™ biometrics solution, while Avaya relies on third-party ValidSoft. Talkdesk Guardian™ keeps remote teams secure by rerouting calls to agents with the best connectivity and alerting them to non-compliant behavior.

With direct phone support and a simple setup that doesn’t require technical expertise, Talkdesk ensures users get fast assistance and an accessible, performance-driven platform free from on-premise limitations.

Price: Starts at $85 with CX Cloud Digital Essentials

Avaya Alternative #5: Five9

Five9 is a powerful contact center solution trusted by over 2,500 organizations worldwide. It’s a cloud-native solution that brings together tools like omnichannel engagement powered by practical AI to simplify complex contact center tasks.

With built-in journey analytics, Five9 gives managers real insights to improve their team performance and customer experience — all without the high costs and upkeep of on-premise systems.

🚀Top features

• Agent Desktop Plus provides a single, intuitive workspace for sales reps, with customizable tools and REST APIs to support authentic interactions across any environment.
• Supervisor Desktop Plus enables supervisors to monitor calls, manage queues and coach agents in real-time, offering silent coaching and live call intervention options.
• APIs and SDKs enable seamless integration with proprietary applications, using Cloud APIs for minimal coding, easy configuration and instant data access with enterprise software.

Customer testimonials

💪What works best

“Calling is made much easier with Five9 Dialer, a robust cloud-based contact center solution. By only connecting agents to calls that have been answered, the predictive dialer technology helps minimize downtime and maximizes agent efficiency. I thought the user interface was simple to use, making campaign setup and navigation a breeze. Overall, Five9 Dialer is a solid choice for businesses looking to enhance their outbound calling efficiency and improve customer engagement.” Source

💡What can be better

“If there was something that I do not like is that the features available with the WFA [workflow automation] are not built into the standard functionality.” Source

Verdict: Five9 is a provider that understands the ebb and flow of today’s contact center needs, aligning its product roadmap to stay ahead of industry trends. In fact, as of Nov 2024, Five9 announced its upcoming “Five9 AI Agents,” designed to bring advanced, autonomous interactions to life.

For businesses considering a shift from Avaya, Five9 offers a seamless migration process, complete with thorough documentation to support new users through each step. Combined with excellent customer support and non-disruptive upgrades, Five9 can be worth considering for brands that value innovation.

Price: Quote available on request. Contact sales.

Avaya Alternative #6: 8x8

8x8 Contact Center is built to keep teams connected with customers anytime, anywhere. It’s designed for flexibility, making adjustments simple and straightforward and backed by a 99.999% uptime SLA — ensuring smooth, uninterrupted service.

With integrations for tools like Salesforce and Microsoft Teams, 8x8 fits easily into existing workflows, offering businesses a reliable, adaptable platform that supports seamless customer engagement and collaboration without the hassle.

🚀Top features

• Robust global infrastructure with data centers around the world, ensuring high reliability and low latency for international operations.
• 8x8 Engage™ delivers specialized customer engagement tools, traditionally reserved for the contact center, to teams across your organization.
• CX analytics for advanced search and intuitive navigation to help you with broad overviews to in-depth insights.

Customer testimonials

💪 What works best

“The tools provided within the 8x8 Contact Center are exactly what our organization needs. They provide multiple options to accomplish what we need and they have experts available to help us troubleshoot or improve on the tools we use. Our partners at 8x8 are extremely engaged in meeting our needs and help identify the right subject matter experts each and every time a need arises.” Source

💡What could be better

“There is a bit of a learning curve when it comes to learning how to build call flows/scripts with 8x8 Virtual Contact Center, but it is something they are working to improve upon and make simpler and easier to automate very soon.” Source

Verdict: 8x8 stands out as a dependable contact center solution for businesses prioritizing global connectivity and compliance. With direct connections to over 160 mobile network operators in 190+ countries, it ensures reliable messaging and communication worldwide. 8x8 meets stringent security and privacy standards — HIPAA, GDPR, ISO 27001 and NIST/FIPS encryption — providing peace of mind for data-sensitive industries.

Round-the-clock support via web, live chat and phone reinforces 8x8’s commitment to keeping businesses connected and secure anytime, anywhere making it a good alternative for brands to look into.

Price: On a need-to-know basis, contact sales to learn more.

Avaya Alternative #7: Amazon Connect

Launched in 2017, Amazon Connect is one of the newest cloud-based omnichannel contact center solutions designed to help businesses deliver high-quality customer service at a reduced cost. Originally developed to meet Amazon’s own customer service needs, it’s now available to businesses of all sizes.

Today, thousands of companies — from startups to enterprises with thousands of agents — rely on Amazon Connect to create personalized, seamless experiences for millions of customers every day.

🚀Top features

• Amazon Q to detect customer issues and provide agents with contextual information and response suggestions, improving AHT within a single workspace.
• Amazon Contact Lens to distill sharp insights and make amendments using real-time contact center analytics and quality management.
• Customer profiling for agents with real-time up-to-date customer information that syncs data from multiple disparate sources.

Customer testimonials

💪What works best

“Ability to integrate with different systems, easiness of such implementations and everyday use.” Source

💡What could be better

“There are times when the sign in would require you to repeated do the process. This added step can take precious time when logins should be straightforward.” Source

Verdict: Amazon Connect, recognized as a Leader in the 2024 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Contact Center as a Service, offers businesses a reliable and scalable contact center solution built on the trusted AWS infrastructure. Its pay-as-you-go model provides flexibility and cost savings, while tools like migration readiness assessments and cost evaluations make planning simple.

Amazon Connect also supports new users with a rich resource library, ensuring no hiccups during the onboarding experience. For companies prioritizing stability, flexibility and guidance, Amazon Connect is a solid choice.

Price: Contact sales

How to evaluate platforms like Avaya

While Avaya surely has its perks, it also has certain specific shortcomings that may need attention. And if you’re evaluating Avaya competitors, you must choose an alternative that precisely addresses your pain points as an Avaya user. Here are some questions that might resonate with you.

1. Does this solution offer a fully integrated experience?

With Avaya, you may end up stitching together third-party tools, which can feel clunky. Look for a vendor that brings everything together seamlessly on one platform. It’s simpler, smoother and keeps both agents and customers happy with a more cohesive experience from start to finish.

2. Will this solution grow with your business?

Avaya’s on-prem model can make scaling feel rigid. Choose a cloud-based platform that grows with you, adding features as you need them. This flexibility means your contact center is always ready for what’s next, without the need for complex upgrades or added infrastructure.

3. Is the vendor ahead with AI and automation?

Avaya relies heavily on external partnerships to boost its AI capabilities, which can limit flexibility and depth. When evaluating options, look for a platform with in-house, mature AI features like predictive routing and real-time agent assistance — features that elevate customer experience without extra layers. Make sure the Avaya alternative you choose doesn’t just use AI as an afterthought but carefully meshes it into its framework.

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4. Does this vendor support a smooth migration?

Switching from Avaya can be tricky, so a vendor that provides strong migration support is key. Look for one with clear documentation, guided onboarding and dedicated help. A smooth transition minimizes disruption and lets your team hit the ground running on a new platform.

5. Is omnichannel engagement supported across all channels?

Avaya’s strength lies in its traditional, on-prem contact center solutions, but it’s only recently started to explore the cloud. When considering a switch, look for a vendor that not only understands the on-prem to cloud journey but also offers comprehensive support to make migration easy. The right vendor will guide you with clear documentation, hands-on onboarding and dedicated assistance, so that you don’t miss a beat during the transition and can fully embrace the cloud-based approach.

Could Sprinklr be your Avaya alternative of choice?

Selecting the right Avaya alternative means choosing a platform that meets today’s business needs and adapts to tomorrow’s growth. For instance, NICE CXone is a solid option with its flexible AI and comprehensive omnichannel support. On the other hand, Talkdesk provides a cloud-native design with strong security and user-friendly features that ease the transition for growing teams.

But if you’re looking for a truly unified experience, Sprinklr Service offers something unique. Operating on Unified-CXM, Sprinklr Service brings all customer interactions, data and insights into one seamless system, eliminating the disjointed experience that can come with multiple tools.

Have one of our top experts help you lead the way today.