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Connecting Zendesk takes your Zendesk URL and an OAuth sign-in. One connection gives you agent functions: your agents identify callers, work their tickets, and record call outcomes as comments or notes. This page covers connecting and what the signed-in account needs.

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When to use it

Connect Zendesk when your support runs on it and you want an agent handling the front of the queue. It’s the right choice when you want to:
  • Identify callers without asking for a ticket number. The agent searches Zendesk for the caller’s number, finds their profile, and pulls up their active tickets before the caller finishes explaining.
  • File tickets from calls automatically. When a caller reports a new issue, the agent creates the ticket with a subject and description summarized from the conversation.
  • Keep the ticket as the source of truth. The agent adds the call’s outcome to the ticket as a public comment the requester sees, or a private internal note for your team.
For example, a software company’s support line answers with a Retell agent that searches the caller’s number, reads back the status of their most recent ticket, and adds a private note summarizing the call — a human only picks up when the issue is new or escalated.

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Prerequisites

  • A Zendesk account with an agent or admin role. Retell acts as whoever signs in, and end-user accounts can’t read other people’s tickets or work the queue.
  • Your Zendesk URL, https://your-subdomain.zendesk.com.
  • Use a dedicated integration account rather than a person’s account, so tickets and comments are attributed to the integration and the connection doesn’t break when someone leaves.

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Connect Zendesk in Retell

1

Add the connection

In the Retell Dashboard, open Integrations, select the Available tab, find Zendesk, and click Connect (Add Account if a connection already exists).
2

Enter your Zendesk URL and sign in

Fill in the fields:
Retell's Zendesk connection dialog on its Connect tab, with a Functions tab beside it. It has a Connection name field prefilled with Zendesk - OAuth and a Zendesk tenant URL field with the placeholder https://your-subdomain.zendesk.com, above a Need help finding your credentials link and Cancel and Add Account buttons.

The Zendesk connection dialog: your Zendesk URL, then an OAuth sign-in.

Click Connect (Add Account if a connection already exists). A Zendesk window opens; sign in with the integration account and approve the request. Retell asks for Zendesk’s read and write scopes, and the token can do only what those scopes and the account’s role allow. Retell stores the resulting token, so nobody has to sign in again.
Zendesk's OAuth consent screen asking Allow Retell AI to access your Zendesk account. It lists what the application would be able to do: read all data and write all data. The Allow button is highlighted with a blue ring next to Deny, and the signed-in username below is redacted.

Zendesk's consent screen for the Retell AI app — click Allow to finish connecting.

Admins can review or revoke this authorization anytime in Zendesk under Admin Center > Apps and integrations > APIs > External OAuth clients.
3

Confirm the connection

Retell tests the connection by fetching the signed-in user’s own profile. On success the connection appears on the Connected tab, and Zendesk tools appear in your agents’ function menus — see Zendesk agent functions for what they can do.

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Troubleshooting

Check the tenant URL: it must be your own Zendesk origin, https://your-subdomain.zendesk.com, with nothing after the domain. A host-mapped vanity domain or a URL with a path won’t work.
Retell flags a connection as errored when Zendesk rejects the stored token, usually because the account was suspended or the authorization was revoked under Admin Center > Apps and integrations > APIs > External OAuth clients. A role downgrade doesn’t error the connection; it shrinks what the tools can do (see required role). Open the connection’s settings and click Reconnect to sign in again.

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Next steps

Zendesk agent functions

Identify callers by phone, read and update their tickets, and record the call as a comment or note.

Integrations overview

See every provider Retell connects to and how integration tools work.

Knowledge base

Let the same support agent answer FAQs from your help center content.

Call transfer

Hand off to a human when the issue needs one.