Aspreviously announced, Zendesk is simplifying the packaging of our AI agent functionality and expanding access to our most advanced, agentic capabilities across all Zendesk Suite and Support plans.

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As previously announced, Zendesk is simplifying the packaging of our AI agent functionality and expanding access to our most advanced, agentic capabilities across all Zendesk Suite and Support plans.

This article provides migration guidance for customers who are currently using the following AI agent functionality and need to transition to the new AI agents experience:

  • AI agents - Essential
  • Legacy AI agent functionality (Bot builder, answers, and intents in AI agents)
  • Default messaging responses

This article contains the following topics:

  • Overview of the change and migration
  • Migrating an essential AI agent
  • Migrating legacy AI agent functionality
  • Migrating a default messaging response

Overview of the change and migration

Between May 11, and June 12, 2026, Zendesk is rolling out our new AI agent packaging model. As part of this change, the distinction between the Essential and Advanced levels of our AI agent functionality is being removed. Going forward, all customers have access to the agentic AI–powered functionality that was previously offered only on AI agents - Advanced.

On August 31, 2026, Zendesk will stop technical development, except for critical bug fixes and supporting breaking changes, for the following features. These features will then be removed from the product in December 2026.

  • AI agents - Essential
  • Legacy AI agent functionality (Bot builder, answers, and intents in AI agents)
  • Default messaging responses

This article includes guidance to help you transition to the upgraded AI agent experience before August 31, so you can avoid any potential disruptions to your customer support.

Note: AI Expert is available for customers who would like additional assistance in migrating and optimizing their AI agent setup. This offering is an AI recurring service subscription which includes ongoing access to expertise designed to scale automation, drive continuous improvement throughout your AI journey, and provide ongoing expert support for operational excellence. For more information, see the Zendesk AI Expert Packages and contact Zendesk Sales.

Migrating an essential AI agent

AI agents - Essential was a previous level of AI agent functionality designed for quick, self-service adoption, allowing you to create generative AI agents that answered customer questions based on content from your knowledge sources.

If you previously created an essential AI agent, you can replicate the same functionality by creating a new AI agent in the new AI agents experience. To get started, see Creating an AI agent to automatically resolve customer issues.

Tip: In the future, an automated, in-product migration tool will be offered that will help you recreate an essential AI agent without manual rebuild. You can either follow the steps in this guide to unlock the potential of the new platform earlier, or wait for the tool to be available. More details on this process will become available later in 2026.

Performing the creation flow described in the linked article results in an AI agent that’s capable of responding to your customers with AI-generated responses based on the knowledge sources you connect to it. This mimics the functionality of AI agents - Essential without requiring you to perform any of the additional configuration required to power more complex workflows.

Note: In the new AI agents experience, each AI agent can interact on only one type of channel. For example, a single AI agent can’t interact with customers on messaging and email channels. If you had created an essential AI agent and deployed it on messaging and email channels, note that you’ll have to create two AI agents to cover the same functionality, one for messaging and one for email.

Migrating legacy AI agent functionality

Bot builder, answers, and intents in AI agents were pieces of legacy AI agent functionality that allowed you to create custom answer flows to address customer questions.

If you previously created an AI agent that made use of any of these pieces of functionality, you can replicate the same functionality in the new AI agents experience.

Tip: While you can replicate your previous functionality, this migration is also a good opportunity to take advantage of the more advanced functionality offered as part of the new AI agents experience, such as generative procedures. For more information, see Getting started with AI agents.
Note: If your legacy AI agent includes many answer flows, or answer flows with a high degree of complexity (such as many branching steps or integrations), Zendesk strongly recommends engaging with our AI Expert offering for hands-on assistance.

The table below describes how the legacy functionality maps to the new AI agents experience.

Concept Legacy AI agent functionality Equivalent functionality in the new AI agents experience
The interface where you create scripted conversation flows that determine how your AI agent responds to customers Bot builder Dialogue builder
What the scripted conversation flows are called Answers Dialogues
The mechanism by which an AI agent understands what a customer is asking about and connects them with the right conversation flow Intents Use cases

To recreate a legacy AI agent in the new AI agents experience, follow the instructions in Getting started with AI agents. As you do, pay particular attention to the following steps:

  • Step 4.1: Create use cases to identify customer requests
  • Step 4.2: Create generative procedures or dialogues to control responses

As you work through these steps, it may be helpful to first generate a list of your current answers and intents. That way, you can create corresponding dialogues and use cases that cover the same information.

Additionally, to help you as you create your dialogues, the following table shows you which step types in the bot builder map to which block types in the dialogue builder.

Step type in bot builder Corresponding block type in dialogue builder
Send message AI agent message
Present options Customer message
Show help center articles Generative replies
Add carousel Carousel
Ask for details AI agent message that presents a form template
Ask if question resolved Customer message that asks if the question was resolved
Make API call API integration
Transfer to agent Escalation
Branch by condition Conditional
Add business hours condition Availability
Link to another answer Link to
Set variable Any block type with an added action that sets a conversation parameter

Migrating a default messaging response

The default messaging response was the previous way to configure the first message sent to a customer when they launch the Web Widget. This response:

  • Includes a basic greeting, a request for more information, and a message letting the customer know they’re being connected to a human agent.
  • Can also be customized based on your business hours and the customer’s authentication status.

If you previously configured a default messaging response on any messaging channel, you can replicate the same functionality using an AI agent instead. See Workflow recipe: Using an AI agent to collect customer info and immediately escalate to a human agent.

Tip: In the future, an automated migration path will be offered that will help you recreate your default messaging response as an AI agent without manual rebuild. More details on this process will become available later in 2026.
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