Report:
Magic Quadrant for the CRM Customer Engagement Center
How does Gartner define the CRM Customer Engagement Center market in 2025?
Gartner defines the CRM customer engagement center (CEC) as a cohesive set of software built around core case management tools, dedicated to providing customer service and support by engaging with customers, and intelligently orchestrating the processes, data, systems, and resources of an organization. CRM CEC is a key software platform used in delivering end-to-end customer service and support experiences. It enables customers to engage and interact with an organization as well as for the organization to orchestrate its internal and external processes and resources to fulfill the customer's expected outcome. CRM CEC solutions provide two types of tools that work together seamlessly: external facing tools that enable customer interaction, and internal tools that enable the orchestration of various service processes, customer records, systems, data, and other organizational resources.
Key Facts for Magic Quadrant for the CRM Customer Engagement Center in 2025
- Publication Date: 27 October 2025
- Document ID: G00826574
- Coverage: Global
- Authors: Pri Rathnayake, Drew Kraus, Francesco Vicchi, Jim Robinson
- Core Purpose: CRM customer engagement centers are unified AI-augmented customer service technology suites offering customer interaction orchestration and service process orchestration. Customer service and support technology leaders can use this Magic Quadrant to find the solution that best fits their needs.
Strategic Planning Assumptions
No strategic planning assumptions provided.
How was the CRM Customer Engagement Center market evolved in 2025?
- The $43.4 billion customer service and support software market grew at 13.5% year-over-year
- CEC represents approximately 44.3% of the customer service and support market in 2024
- Top 10 vendors command 61.6% of market share
- Leading CEC vendors by revenue: Salesforce, Oracle, Zendesk, ServiceNow, Microsoft, and SAP
- Market is fragmented but highly competitive
- Strong demand for AI, GenAI, and agentic AI capabilities
- Increasing convergence between CRM CEC and CCaaS markets
- Growing focus on autonomous AI agents for customer service automation
- Market evolving at accelerating pace driven by rapid technology innovations
What product features are required to be included in this year's evaluation?
- Case Management — enables case creation, assignment, routing, escalation, case conversations, and other necessary processing of a case record
- Digital Engagement — enables customers and employees to seamlessly connect, reconnect and interact over a variety of digital channels
- Knowledge Management — enables the discovery, capture, creation, curation and maintenance of contextual knowledge to be consumed by customers, employees and automations during various moments in a customer's service journey
- Workflow and Business Process Management — enables the design, orchestration, monitoring and potential automation of process steps involved in delivering customers' service and support outcomes
- Automation of Engagements — uses AI techniques to enable automated customer engagements and workflow automations
- Real-Time Continuous Intelligence — uses of AI techniques and analytics derived from both historical and real-time data to power smarter interactions and customer service journeys in real-time
- Intelligent Voice Support — enables customers to seamlessly move between voice and digital interaction modes while preserving the interaction context, through the use of a range of techniques and data
- Platform Ecosystem and Integration — provides a range of techniques to incorporate third-party function development and integration of systems and data, including through applications developed by independent software vendors participating in a marketplace
What are the common features of top products in the CRM Customer Engagement Center space?
- Composability
- Low-Code Development
- Workforce Engagement Management
- Usability
- Collaboration
- Globalization
Scope Exclusions
- Software applications developed, marketed and implemented primarily for IT service management use cases
- Software applications developed, marketed and implemented primarily for field service management (FSM) use cases
Inclusion Criteria
Vendors must, among other requirements:
- Minimum of $51 million in total CRM CEC software license revenue
- At least $14 million in CRM CEC software license revenue from net new clients
- Minimum of 10% year-over-year growth in total CRM CEC software license revenue
- Presence in at least three out of five major geographical markets (North America, Europe, Asia/Pacific, Middle East/Africa, Latin America), with each contributing minimum 10% of total revenue
- Support for at least three industries
- Average deal size above 100 customer service representatives
- Must provide all mandatory features defined in the Market Definition
- Demonstrated market awareness through regular appearances on client shortlists and tradeshow presence
- Sufficient funded operations, professional services capacity, and partner ecosystem
Ability to Execute — Relative Weighting
- Product or Service - High
- Overall Viability - Medium
- Sales Execution/Pricing - High
- Market Responsiveness/Record - High
- Marketing Execution - Medium
- Customer Experience - High
- Operations - Medium
Completeness of Vision — Relative Weighting
- Market Understanding - High
- Marketing Strategy - Medium
- Sales Strategy - High
- Offering (Product) Strategy - High
- Business Model - High
- Vertical/Industry Strategy - High
- Innovation - High
- Geographic Strategy - Medium
FAQs
Q: What does this research cover?
A: This research evaluates 13 CRM Customer Engagement Center vendors across their ability to execute and completeness of vision. It covers unified AI-augmented customer service technology suites that provide customer interaction orchestration and service process orchestration, including mandatory features such as case management, digital engagement, knowledge management, workflow/business process management, automation of engagements, and real-time continuous intelligence. The report includes detailed vendor assessments with strengths and cautions for each provider.
Q: Who should use this research?
A: Customer service and support technology leaders should use this research to identify and evaluate CRM CEC solutions that best fit their organizational needs. It is particularly valuable for organizations seeking to modernize their customer service technology with AI-augmented platforms, comparing vendor capabilities across execution and vision dimensions, understanding market trends and vendor positioning, and making informed procurement decisions for customer engagement center implementations across various organization sizes, industries, and geographic regions.
Q: What are the mandatory features of vendors included in this market?
A: To be included in this Magic Quadrant, CRM CEC solutions must offer the following mandatory features: Case Management for case creation, assignment, routing, and escalation; Digital Engagement for seamless customer and employee interaction across digital channels; Knowledge Management for contextual knowledge discovery and maintenance; Workflow and Business Process Management for designing and orchestrating service processes; Automation of Engagements using AI techniques; Real-Time Continuous Intelligence using AI and analytics; Intelligent Voice Support for seamless voice-to-digital transitions; and Platform Ecosystem and Integration capabilities for third-party development and system integration. Additionally, solutions must be anchored in a customer system of record enabling control of customer master data during interactions.
Q: What are some reasons for not being included in this report?
A:
- Software applications developed primarily for IT service management use cases are excluded
- Software applications developed primarily for field service management (FSM) use cases are excluded
- Vendors that do not meet the minimum revenue threshold of $51 million in total CRM CEC software license revenue
- Vendors that do not achieve at least $14 million in revenue from net new clients
- Vendors with less than 10% year-over-year growth in total CRM CEC software license revenue
- Vendors without presence in at least three major geographical markets
- Vendors without coverage of at least three industries
- Vendors whose average deal size is below 100 customer service representatives
- Vendors that do not provide all mandatory features outlined in the Market Definition
- Vendors lacking sufficient market awareness, funded operations, or partner ecosystem
Q: What differentiates Ability to Execute vs. Completeness of Vision?
A: Ability to Execute focuses on a vendor's current market performance, operational capabilities, and delivery effectiveness. It evaluates tangible factors like product quality, sales results, customer satisfaction, pricing strategies, and the vendor's financial viability. Completeness of Vision assesses a vendor's strategic direction and future planning. It examines how well vendors understand market trends, their innovation roadmap, business model soundness, vertical market strategies, and their approach to geographic expansion. Essentially, Ability to Execute measures 'what they do now' while Completeness of Vision evaluates 'where they are going and how they plan to get there.'
Reference
- Gartner, Magic Quadrant for the CRM Customer Engagement Center, 27 October 2025, ID G00826574
View Leaders
View Vendor Movements
