Net Promoter Score is beautifully simple: one question, one number, a clear signal of customer loyalty. But the software you use to collect, analyze, and act on that number? That decision is anything but simple.
The NPS software market in 2026 is crowded, fragmented, and full of platforms that look identical on a features page but perform very differently in practice. Some are built specifically around NPS methodology. Others treat NPS as one checkbox among dozens. Some automate the entire lifecycle from survey to recovery. Others give you a score and leave you to figure out the rest.
This guide compares the eight best NPS software platforms available right now. We evaluate each on the five capabilities that actually determine whether your NPS program produces results or just produces a number: automated survey distribution, AI-powered analysis, benchmarking, trend tracking, and close-the-loop workflows. If you are evaluating NPS tools for the first time or replacing a platform that is not delivering, this is where to start.
Before comparing specific tools, it helps to establish what βgreatβ looks like. The NPS methodology has not changed since Fred Reichheld introduced it in 2003, but the technology around it has evolved dramatically. Here is what separates excellent NPS platforms from adequate ones.
Manual NPS surveys die quickly. Someone forgets to send them. The timing drifts. Coverage becomes inconsistent. Great NPS software automates distribution based on triggers: post-purchase, post-support interaction, post-onboarding, or on a recurring schedule.
It should also handle smart throttling so the same customer is not surveyed after every transaction. Survey fatigue destroys response rates faster than anything else.
Collecting the 0-10 score is step one. The real value is in the open-text follow-up question: βWhat is the primary reason for your score?β That free-text response tells you why someone is a promoter or detractor. But manually reading through hundreds or thousands of verbatim responses is not scalable.
The best NPS platforms use AI-powered text analysis to automatically categorize responses by theme, detect sentiment, and surface the specific topics driving your score up or down. This is not a luxury feature anymore. It is the difference between having data and having insight. See our deep dive on how AI sentiment analysis transforms raw feedback into actionable intelligence.
Your NPS score in isolation is almost meaningless. Is +32 good? It depends on your industry, your company size, and your customer segment. Great NPS software provides benchmarking that puts your score in context: industry averages, percentile rankings, and peer comparisons.
Without benchmarks, teams celebrate mediocre scores and panic over perfectly normal ones.
A single NPS measurement is a snapshot. A series of measurements over time is a story. Trend tracking lets you see whether your score is improving, declining, or plateauing, and correlate those movements with business events: product launches, pricing changes, support restructuring.
Segmentation breaks your NPS down by customer cohort, product line, account size, geographic region, or any other dimension that matters to your business. Aggregate NPS hides more than it reveals.
This is where most NPS programs fail. You collect the score. You read the comments. You put it in a quarterly report. And then⦠nothing happens. The detractor who took time to explain their frustration never hears back. The promoter who expressed enthusiasm is never asked for a referral or review.
Close-the-loop workflows automate the response. Detractors trigger service recovery cases. Passives receive targeted follow-ups. Promoters are prompted for reviews, referrals, or case studies. This is the mechanism that transforms NPS from a measurement exercise into a growth engine. For more on building effective feedback loops, see our guide on closing the customer feedback loop.
| Platform | AI Analysis | Multi-Channel | Benchmarking | Close-the-Loop | Automation | Starting Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Customer Echo | Advanced (NLP) | QR, web, voice, email, SMS | Industry data | Full case management | Yes | $49/mo |
| AskNicely | Moderate | Email, web, SMS | Yes | Team coaching workflows | Yes | ~$199/mo |
| Delighted | Basic | Email, web, SMS, link | Limited | Basic follow-up | Yes | Shutting down June 2026 |
| SurveyMonkey | Basic | Email, web, link | Yes (with plans) | No | Limited | $25/mo |
| Qualtrics | Advanced | Email, web, SMS, in-app | Extensive | Full action planning | Yes | Custom ($$$$) |
| Medallia | Advanced | All channels + IoT | Extensive | Full orchestration | Yes | Custom ($$$$$) |
| Zonka Feedback | Moderate | Email, SMS, web, kiosk | Limited | Basic workflows | Yes | $49/mo |
| Retently | Basic | Email, web, in-app | Limited | Automated campaigns | Yes | ~$25/mo |
Now letβs dig into what makes each platform different.
Best for: Businesses that want AI-powered NPS with multi-channel collection and automated service recovery
Customer Echo approaches NPS differently than most dedicated NPS tools. Rather than treating NPS as a standalone metric, it embeds NPS within a broader feedback intelligence system that connects the score to the actions it should trigger.
The intelligence engine automatically categorizes every NPS verbatim response using natural language processing. Instead of manually tagging why detractors are unhappy, the AI surfaces themes like βbilling confusion,β βslow response time,β or βproduct quality declineβ and tracks how these themes correlate with score changes over time. This turns your NPS program from a reporting exercise into a diagnostic tool.
Multi-channel collection is where Customer Echo creates separation from traditional NPS platforms. Most NPS tools are limited to email and web surveys. Customer Echo adds QR code collection (deploy codes on receipts, packaging, signage, or printed materials), voice feedback with Whisper transcription (customers speak their response instead of typing), and SMS-based surveys. The broader your collection channels, the more representative your NPS data becomes. Learn more about the full range of feedback collection methods.
The close-the-loop system is built into the core platform, not bolted on as an afterthought. When a detractor submits feedback, the system automatically creates a case, assigns it based on your routing rules (by topic, by location, by severity), and tracks it through resolution. The assigned team member sees the NPS score, the verbatim comment, the AI-generated category, and any customer history. They can respond, escalate, or resolve directly within the platform.
For promoters, Google Business Profile integration automatically prompts satisfied customers to leave a public review, channeling positive sentiment where it drives the most business impact.
NPS and satisfaction scoring is comprehensive: real-time NPS dashboards, trend tracking, segmentation by any customer attribute, and exportable reports for stakeholder presentations.
Pricing: Starting at $49/month. Multi-location and volume-based pricing available. Free trial included.
Limitations: Customer Echo is a newer platform without the decades of NPS-specific benchmarking data that established players like AskNicely or Medallia offer. If your primary requirement is deep industry benchmarking against thousands of companies, the benchmarking dataset is still growing.
Best for: Service businesses that want NPS tied directly to frontline team performance and coaching
AskNicely was built from the ground up as an NPS platform, and it shows. The entire product is organized around the NPS methodology, with a particular focus on connecting customer scores to the frontline employees who influence them.
Key Strengths:
Key Limitations:
Best fit: Service businesses with 50+ frontline employees where individual performance coaching is a strategic priority.
Best for: Previously a top pick, but shutting down June 2026
Delighted was one of the cleanest, most developer-friendly NPS tools ever built. Its minimalist approach, fast setup, and elegant API made it a favorite for startups and mid-market SaaS companies. Unfortunately, Qualtrics is shutting Delighted down on June 30, 2026.
If you are currently a Delighted user, you need to migrate before the shutdown date. No new subscriptions or renewals are being accepted, and all data must be exported by March 31, 2026.
We wrote a comprehensive guide covering the shutdown timeline, migration checklist, and the best alternatives: Delighted Is Shutting Down: 8 Best Alternatives for 2026.
Key takeaway: Do not start a new NPS program on Delighted. If you are evaluating it for the first time, look elsewhere. If you are an existing user, start your migration planning now.
Customer Echo offers AI-powered NPS with multi-channel collection, automated service recovery, and a smooth migration path from Delighted. Start your free trial today.
Best for: Teams that want basic NPS surveys from a trusted, widely recognized brand
SurveyMonkey is the most recognized name in online surveys, and it supports NPS as one of many survey types. For teams that already use SurveyMonkey for other survey needs, adding NPS is straightforward.
Key Strengths:
Key Limitations:
Best fit: Teams already using SurveyMonkey that want to add basic NPS tracking without adopting a separate tool. For NPS as your primary CX metric, a dedicated platform will deliver significantly more value.
Best for: Enterprise organizations running NPS alongside comprehensive experience management programs
Qualtrics is the enterprise standard for experience management, and their NPS capabilities reflect that positioning. If your organization needs NPS embedded within a broader program covering employee experience, brand experience, product experience, and customer experience, Qualtrics provides the most integrated platform available.
Key Strengths:
Key Limitations:
Best fit: Enterprises with 1,000+ employees, dedicated CX teams, and budget for comprehensive experience management.
Best for: Large enterprises that need signal capture across every customer touchpoint
Medallia is the other enterprise heavyweight alongside Qualtrics. Its strength lies in capturing customer signals from every possible touchpoint: surveys, social media, contact center interactions, IoT devices, video, speech analytics, and more. NPS is one signal within a much larger intelligence operation.
Key Strengths:
Key Limitations:
Best fit: Large enterprises with complex customer journeys spanning multiple channels and touchpoints, and budget to match.
Best for: Multi-location businesses running NPS with on-premise and digital feedback collection
Zonka Feedback combines NPS survey capabilities with strong multi-channel collection including on-premise kiosks and tablets. For businesses with physical locations that want to measure NPS at the point of experience, Zonka is a solid choice.
Key Strengths:
Key Limitations:
Best fit: Retail, hospitality, and healthcare businesses with physical locations that want NPS collection both on-premise and digitally.
Best for: B2B SaaS companies that want NPS automation with strong campaign management
Retently is a focused NPS platform built specifically for B2B SaaS and subscription businesses. Its strength is in campaign automation: scheduling recurring NPS surveys, segmenting audiences, and managing the cadence of your NPS program with minimal manual intervention.
Key Strengths:
Key Limitations:
Best fit: B2B SaaS companies with 100-5,000 customers that want automated, recurring NPS measurement with clean reporting.
Use this checklist to evaluate any NPS platform against your specific requirements.
From automated survey distribution to AI-powered analysis to service recovery for every detractor. Start your free trial and see results in your first week.
Most NPS tools handle one or two stages well and leave gaps in the rest. Here is how Customer Echo addresses the complete lifecycle.
NPS surveys deploy through every channel your customers use. Email surveys trigger automatically based on customer events. QR codes on physical touchpoints capture NPS at the point of experience. Voice feedback lets customers speak their score and their reasons. SMS reaches customers on their most-checked device. Web embeds capture NPS on your site or in your product.
The result is higher response rates because you are meeting customers in their preferred channel rather than forcing them into yours. Read more about multi-channel feedback collection.
Every NPS response flows through the intelligence engine for automated processing. The 0-10 score is recorded and calculated into your running NPS. The verbatim follow-up response is processed through NLP sentiment analysis that detects:
This analysis happens automatically. No manual tagging rules. No reading through hundreds of comments. The AI does the categorization work and surfaces the themes that matter.
This is where NPS stops being a number and starts being a business process.
Detractors (0-6) automatically trigger a service recovery case. The case is assigned to the right team member based on the topic identified by the AI engine. The assignee sees the full context: NPS score, verbatim comment, sentiment category, customer history, and any previous interactions. They respond directly within the platform, and the case is tracked through resolution.
Passives (7-8) receive targeted follow-up communications designed to understand what would move them to a 9 or 10. These responses feed back into the analysis engine, building a playbook for converting passives to promoters.
Promoters (9-10) are prompted to take high-value actions: leave a Google review through the Google Business Profile integration, provide a testimonial, or participate in a referral program.
Every case has a resolution status. Every detractor interaction is tracked from initial feedback through follow-up to resolution. Reporting shows your average time to respond, time to resolve, and resolution satisfaction rate.
This closed-loop data feeds back into your NPS analysis. You can measure whether your service recovery efforts actually improve retention and whether recovered detractors return as passives or promoters in subsequent surveys.
For a deeper exploration of building effective feedback loops, see our complete guide on closing the customer feedback loop.
After working with hundreds of businesses implementing NPS programs, these are the mistakes we see most frequently.
The most common mistake and the most damaging. Organizations invest in NPS software, send surveys, track their score, report it in quarterly reviews⦠and never actually do anything with the feedback. Detractors are never contacted. Promoter enthusiasm is never leveraged. The themes driving the score are never addressed.
NPS without action is theater. If you are not prepared to close the loop with detractors and address the operational issues they surface, you are wasting your customersβ time and your own budget. Choose software that makes action automatic, not optional.
Survey fatigue is real. If the same customer receives an NPS survey after every interaction, every purchase, and every support ticket, they will stop responding. Or worse, they will respond with artificially low scores because the surveys themselves have become an annoyance.
On the flip side, surveying only once a year gives you a single snapshot with no ability to detect trends or respond to changes. The sweet spot for most businesses is transactional NPS after key interactions combined with relational NPS on a quarterly cadence, with smart frequency capping so no customer receives more than one survey per 30-90 days depending on their interaction volume.
The number is not the insight. The comment is the insight. A detractor who scores you a 3 and writes βbilling is confusingβ gives you something actionable. A detractor who scores a 3 with no comment gives you almost nothing.
Choose NPS software that makes the follow-up question mandatory (or at least strongly encouraged) and that analyzes those comments automatically. If you are only tracking the score, you are using NPS at 20% of its potential.
A customer who scores you a 0 has a very different experience from one who scores a 6. The 0 might have had a catastrophic failure. The 6 might just be mildly disappointed. Your response should reflect that difference.
Segment your detractors by score range and by theme. A customer who scored 0-3 citing a product defect needs immediate, high-priority outreach. A customer who scored 5-6 mentioning that pricing feels slightly high needs a different conversation entirely.
Launching an NPS program and getting a score of +25 on your first measurement tells you almost nothing. Is that good? Bad? Average? Without a baseline to compare against and industry benchmarks to provide context, you cannot set meaningful improvement targets.
Establish your baseline with at least 3 months of data before setting targets. Use industry benchmarks to understand where you stand relative to competitors. Our guide on NPS vs CSAT vs CES includes industry benchmark data across multiple metrics.
Transactional NPS measures satisfaction with a specific interaction (a purchase, a support call, an onboarding session). Relational NPS measures overall loyalty to your brand over time. These are different measurements that answer different questions.
Mixing them in the same dashboard, averaging them together, or comparing them directly leads to confused analysis. Track them separately, trend them separately, and act on them separately.
When NPS becomes a KPI that leadership tracks without understanding the methodology, bad behaviors follow. Teams game the score by cherry-picking who receives surveys. Customer-facing staff ask customers to βrate us a 10β before the survey arrives. Detractor responses are excluded as βoutliers.β
NPS should drive improvement, not performance bonuses. The moment your team has incentive to inflate the score rather than improve the experience, the metric becomes useless. Choose software that provides transparency and makes manipulation difficult, and create a culture where honest feedback is valued regardless of the number.
NPS correlates with revenue growth, customer lifetime value, and churn reduction. But correlation is not automatic. You need to connect your NPS data to your financial data to prove the business case for your CX investments.
Track retention rates for promoters vs. detractors. Measure the revenue difference between cohorts with different NPS scores. Calculate the ROI of your service recovery program by comparing the lifetime value of recovered detractors against those who churned without intervention.
This is the analysis that turns NPS from a customer experience metric into a business intelligence metric that justifies continued investment.
The right NPS software depends on your specific situation.
If you are a small business or startup: Customer Echo gives you the most complete NPS lifecycle (collect, analyze, act, close loop) at an accessible price point. The AI-powered analysis and multi-channel collection provide capabilities that used to require enterprise budgets. Compare pricing to see which plan fits.
If you are a service business with a large frontline team: AskNicelyβs employee coaching tools make it the best choice for organizations where individual team member performance directly impacts customer NPS.
If you are a B2B SaaS company: Retentlyβs campaign automation and SaaS-specific integrations (Stripe, Segment, Intercom) make it a natural fit for subscription businesses.
If you are an enterprise with a dedicated CX team: Qualtrics or Medallia provide the depth, benchmarking, and cross-experience integration that large organizations require, if you have the budget and resources to implement them.
If you are migrating from Delighted: Read our complete migration guide and evaluate Customer Echo as a direct replacement that adds AI analysis and multi-channel collection to the clean NPS workflow you are used to.
For a broader view of the feedback tools landscape, see our comprehensive best customer feedback tools guide. And if you are still deciding which metric to prioritize, our NPS vs CSAT vs CES comparison will help you build the right measurement framework.
Customer Echo gives you AI-powered NPS with multi-channel collection, automated service recovery, and a close-the-loop system that turns scores into action. No IT team needed. Starting at $49/month.
A good NPS score depends on your industry. As general benchmarks: above 0 means you have more promoters than detractors. Above 30 is considered good in most industries. Above 50 is excellent. Above 70 is world-class. However, context matters enormously. Telecom companies typically average 20-30, while SaaS companies average 30-40. Always benchmark against your specific industry rather than using universal targets. The most important number is your trend over time rather than any single measurement.
The standard cadence is quarterly for relational NPS and after key interactions for transactional NPS. Relational surveys measure overall loyalty and should be sent to your entire customer base on a rolling quarterly basis. Transactional surveys measure satisfaction with specific touchpoints and should trigger automatically after purchases, support interactions, onboarding completion, or other meaningful events. Use frequency capping to ensure no customer receives more than one NPS survey per 30-90 day window.
Absolutely. In fact, we recommend it. NPS measures loyalty, CSAT measures satisfaction with specific interactions, and CES measures effort. They answer different questions and work best as a complementary measurement framework rather than competing metrics. Use NPS for overall relationship health, CSAT for transactional quality, and CES for process efficiency. Customer Echo supports all three metrics with automated scoring and tracking. For a complete framework on using these metrics together, see our NPS vs CSAT vs CES guide.
Respond within 24-48 hours. The speed of your response matters more than having a perfect answer. Acknowledge the customerβs feedback, apologize for their experience, and take ownership of resolving the issue. Track the resolution through completion and follow up to confirm satisfaction. Aggregate detractor themes to identify systemic issues that need operational fixes, not just individual responses. Our guide on responding to negative feedback covers the complete playbook.
Free NPS tools like Google Forms can technically collect a 0-10 score, but they lack everything that makes NPS useful: automated distribution, AI analysis, benchmarking, close-the-loop workflows, and trend tracking. You will spend more time on manual administration than you save on software costs. For any business serious about using NPS to drive improvement, investing in dedicated NPS software pays for itself through operational efficiency and the revenue impact of closing the feedback loop. Plans starting at $25-49/month represent a trivial cost compared to the value of retaining even one customer who would have otherwise churned.
NPS is a simple question with a complex operational reality behind it. The software you choose determines whether that question leads to meaningful action or sits in a dashboard gathering dust. Choose the tool that makes action the default, not the exception.