Zendesk

Connect & Ingest data from Zendesk

Zendesk is a customer service platform that provides support ticketing, knowledge management, and customer communication tools. The Sling Zendesk connector extracts data from the Zendesk REST API, supporting tickets, users, organizations, satisfaction ratings, and configuration data.

CLI Pro Required: APIs require a CLI Pro token or Platform Plan.

Setup

The following credentials and inputs are accepted:

Secrets:

• subdomain (required) -> Your Zendesk subdomain (the first part of your Zendesk URL, e.g., mycompany from mycompany.zendesk.com)

• oauth_token (optional) -> OAuth Bearer token for authentication (starts with Bearer )

• email (optional) -> Email address for Basic Auth (required if using API token instead of OAuth)

• api_token (optional) -> API token for Basic Auth (required if using email instead of OAuth)

Inputs:

• anchor_date (optional) -> The starting date for historical data extraction on first sync (default: 1 year ago). Format: YYYY-MM-DD

Authentication Methods: You can authenticate using either OAuth Bearer token OR Basic Auth (email + api_token). At least one method must be configured.

Getting Your Credentials

OAuth Bearer Token (Recommended)

OAuth is the recommended authentication method for Zendesk:

1. Log in to your Zendesk Admin Center

2. Go to Apps and integrations > OAuth clients

3. Click Create OAuth client (or use an existing one)

4. Under Authorized redirect URIs, add your application's redirect URI

5. Copy your OAuth token from the client details

6. Format it as: Bearer <your_token>

Basic Auth with API Token

For Basic Auth using an API token:

1. Log in to your Zendesk Admin Center

2. Go to Settings > API and webhooks > API tokens

3. Click + Add API token to create a new token

4. Copy the API token (you'll only see it once)

5. Use your account email address and the API token for authentication

Important: Store your API token securely. It provides full access to your Zendesk account data. Never commit tokens to version control.

Using sling conns

Here are examples of setting a connection named ZENDESK. We must provide the type=api property:

With OAuth Bearer token:

sling conns set ZENDESK type=api spec=zendesk secrets='{ subdomain: mycompany, oauth_token: "Bearer xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" }'

With Basic Auth (email + API token):

sling conns set ZENDESK type=api spec=zendesk secrets='{ subdomain: mycompany, email: [email protected], api_token: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx }'

Environment Variable

With OAuth:

export ZENDESK='{ type: api, spec: zendesk, secrets: { subdomain: "mycompany", oauth_token: "Bearer xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" } }'

With Basic Auth:

export ZENDESK='{ type: api, spec: zendesk, secrets: { subdomain: "mycompany", email: "[email protected]", api_token: "xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" } }'

Sling Env File YAML

See here to learn more about the sling env.yaml file.

With OAuth Bearer token:

connections:
  ZENDESK:
    type: api
    spec: zendesk
    secrets:
      subdomain: "mycompany"
      oauth_token: "Bearer xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

With Basic Auth (email + API token):

connections:
  ZENDESK:
    type: api
    spec: zendesk
    secrets:
      subdomain: "mycompany"
      email: "[email protected]"
      api_token: "xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

With anchor date for historical data:

connections:
  ZENDESK:
    type: api
    spec: zendesk
    secrets:
      subdomain: "mycompany"
      oauth_token: "Bearer xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"
    inputs:
      anchor_date: "2020-01-01"

Replication

Here's an example replication configuration to sync Zendesk data to a PostgreSQL database:

source: ZENDESK
target: MY_POSTGRES

defaults:
  mode: incremental
  object: zendesk.{stream_name}

streams:
  # Core support data
  tickets:
  ticket_comments:
  users:
  organizations:

  # Reference data (full-refresh only)
  groups:
    mode: full-refresh
  ticket_fields:
    mode: full-refresh
  ticket_forms:
    mode: full-refresh
  brands:
    mode: full-refresh
  tags:
    mode: full-refresh

Sync all endpoints:

source: ZENDESK
target: MY_POSTGRES

defaults:
  mode: incremental
  object: zendesk.{stream_name}

streams:
  # Sync all available endpoints
  '*':

Full refresh example for configuration data:

source: ZENDESK
target: MY_POSTGRES

defaults:
  mode: full-refresh
  object: zendesk_config.{stream_name}

streams:
  groups:
  ticket_fields:
  ticket_forms:
  brands:
  custom_roles:
  tags:
  views:
  sla_policies:
  schedules:

Endpoints

Core Support Data

Endpoint	Description	Incremental
tickets	Support tickets	Yes (cursor-based)
ticket_comments	Comments on tickets (child endpoint)	No
satisfaction_ratings	Customer satisfaction ratings	Yes (time-based)

Users & Organizations

Endpoint	Description	Incremental
users	Support agents and end-users	Yes (cursor-based)
organizations	Customer organizations	Yes (time-based)
group_memberships	Membership of users in groups	No
organization_memberships	Membership of users in organizations	No

Ticket Configuration

Endpoint	Description	Incremental
ticket_fields	Custom ticket field definitions	No
ticket_forms	Ticket form configurations	No
ticket_metrics	Ticket statistics and metrics	No

Groups & Routing

Endpoint	Description	Incremental
groups	Support agent groups	No
views	Saved ticket views/filters	No

Organization Configuration

Endpoint	Description	Incremental
brands	Account brands	No
custom_roles	Custom role definitions	No

SLAs & Schedules

Endpoint	Description	Incremental
sla_policies	Service level agreements	No
schedules	Business hour schedules	No

Automation

Endpoint	Description	Incremental
triggers	Automation triggers	No
automations	Automation workflows	No
macros	Quick action macros	No

Tags & Metadata

Endpoint	Description	Incremental
tags	Available tags	No

To discover available endpoints:

sling conns discover ZENDESK

Incremental Sync

The Zendesk connector supports incremental sync for the following endpoints:

Cursor-based Incremental Sync

• tickets - Uses cursor pagination for large result sets

• users - Uses cursor pagination for large result sets

First run fetches all records, subsequent runs only fetch records created or modified after the last sync.

Time-based Incremental Sync

• organizations - Filters by updated_at timestamp

• satisfaction_ratings - Filters by created_at timestamp

Anchor Date

On the first sync, incremental endpoints use the anchor_date input (default: 1 year ago) as the starting point. Subsequent syncs only fetch records modified after the last sync timestamp.

Child Endpoints

The ticket_comments endpoint uses a queue-based pattern:

1. First, the tickets endpoint runs and collects ticket IDs

2. Then, the ticket_comments endpoint iterates through the queue to fetch comments for each ticket

This means you should run the tickets endpoint before ticket_comments in your replication.

Rate Limiting

The Zendesk API has rate limits:

• Standard accounts: 10 requests per second

• Enterprise accounts: May have higher limits

The connector automatically:

• Uses conservative rate limiting (5 requests/second)

• Retries with exponential backoff on rate limit responses

To check your rate limits, refer to the Zendesk Rate Limiting documentation.

Common Use Cases

Sync Core Support Tickets

source: ZENDESK
target: MY_POSTGRES

defaults:
  mode: incremental
  object: support.{stream_name}

streams:
  tickets:
  ticket_comments:
  users:
  satisfaction_ratings:

Sync Users and Organizations

source: ZENDESK
target: MY_POSTGRES

defaults:
  mode: incremental
  object: zendesk.{stream_name}

streams:
  users:
  organizations:
  group_memberships:
  organization_memberships:

Configuration and Reference Data

source: ZENDESK
target: MY_POSTGRES

defaults:
  mode: full-refresh
  object: zendesk_config.{stream_name}

streams:
  groups:
  ticket_fields:
  ticket_forms:
  brands:
  custom_roles:
  views:
  sla_policies:
  schedules:
  triggers:
  automations:
  macros:

Support Analytics with SLA Tracking

source: ZENDESK
target: MY_POSTGRES

defaults:
  mode: incremental
  object: analytics.{stream_name}

streams:
  tickets:
  ticket_comments:
  ticket_metrics:
  satisfaction_ratings:
  sla_policies:
    mode: full-refresh

If you are facing issues connecting, please reach out to us at [email protected], on discord or open a Github Issue here.