Verified AI summary ◀▼
Learn about team member roles and access in the Admin Center, where you can set roles for agents, admins, and contributors across support, knowledge, analytics, voice, chat, and QA. Understand the differences between roles like light agents and contributors, and explore custom roles for tailored permissions. This centralized approach helps you manage permissions and access efficiently across various channels and products.
The Zendesk Admin Center provides a central location for setting a team member’s roles and product access across multiple Zendesk products. A team member is anyone you add to a Zendesk account who is not an end user. Team members are also called staff, admins, and agents.
This article includes an overview of the team roles you can set in Admin Center and compares them with the legacy roles that were previously available within each product.
Support roles
| Role | Description |
|---|---|
| Admin | Can manage all Support settings except billing and can also manage Talk settings, regardless of their Talk role. |
| Agent (Team, Growth, Professional) | Can view and update tickets. Admins can control which tickets each agent can view and update. |
| Contributor (Sell and Chat Phase 4 only) | Can provide limited support by viewing and adding private comments to tickets in their groups. |
| Legacy agent | Any agent on an Enterprise plan without a custom role assigned. |
| Light agent (Collaboration feature) | Can view and add private comments to tickets. Admins can control which tickets each light agent can view and update. |
| Custom roles (Enterprise and Enterprise Plus) | Admins can define their own agent roles. Role settings control which tickets an agent can view and update. |
About light agents and contributors
Light agents and contributors are similar roles, but with a few important differences:
- You must have a Suite Growth plan or above to have light agents.
- Contributors cannot access tickets outside their groups (Assigned tickets only or Tickets in agent's group). Light agents can access tickets outside their groups depending on what their admin has set for them (Assigned tickets only, Tickets in agent's group, Tickets in agent's org, All tickets).
- Contributors do not require a paid seat and you can add as many as you want. Light agents are purchased and have limits, depending on your plan type.
Knowledge roles
| Role | Description |
|---|---|
| Admin | Can manage all settings and permissions in Knowledge admin. |
| Agent | Can create, edit, and publish articles (if enabled by an admin). This role does not consume a seat when used in conjunction with the Light agent seat. However, it does consume an extra seat when used in conjunction with the Contributor seat. |
| Viewer | Can view and comment on published articles. (The team member will have the
same permissions and access as an end user.) This role does not consume a seat when used in conjunction with a free Support seat such as Contributor or Light agent. |
Analytics roles
| Role | Description |
|---|---|
| Admin | Can manage all settings and permissions in Explore. |
| Editor | Can create and manage dashboards, queries, and datasets. |
| Viewer | Can access shared dashboards. |
| The Explore Viewer role does not consume a seat when used in conjunction with a free Support seat such as Contributor or Light agent. If an agent has a custom role and the role has the Manage channels and extensions permission enabled, Support and Talk agents can make changes to Talk settings. | |
Voice roles
| Role | Description |
|---|---|
| Admin | Can manage all Talk settings but cannot make or receive calls. Does not require a Talk seat. |
| Team lead | A Talk admin who can also make or receive calls. |
| Agent | Can make or receive calls. |
| The Talk Admin role does not consume a seat when used in conjunction with a free Support seat such as Contributor or Light agent. | |
Chat roles
The following table shows the Chat roles available in Admin Center. Chat Phase 4 roles are managed in Admin Center. As described in Giving agents access to messaging channels, an agent must be assigned a Chat Agent role to participate in messaging conversations.
| Role | Description |
|---|---|
| Admin | Can manage all Chat settings and provide chat support. |
| Agent | Can serve chats and provide chat support. |
| Agent (limited) | Can serve social messaging conversations and chats only. |
| Custom roles (Enterprise) | Admins can define their own Chat roles. |
Zendesk QA roles
The following table shows the Zendesk QA roles available in Admin Center. For more information, see Understanding roles and permissions in Zendesk QA.
When first added, Zendesk QA permissions apply to the default workspace only. Additional workspace permissions can then be added on the Zendesk QA side.
| Role | Description |
|---|---|
| Admin | Can see everything and manage all settings. |
| Agent | Can view their own conversations, reply to feedback, and view their customer reviews. They have workspace-specific permissions and can view and edit data within their assigned workspaces only. They also have access to their own dashboard and can perform self-reviews, if enabled. |
| Reviewer | Can view all reviews but cannot edit workspace settings. Can perform peer reviews. |
| Workspace lead | Can view everything in the workspace and manage quizzes, assignments, groups, disputes, and calibration sessions. Cannot edit other workspace settings or scorecards. |
| Workspace manager | Can view all reviews and manage all workspace settings. |
| Connected user | Connected users don't have access to Zendesk QA. Their conversations are available for review, but these agents are unaware that they're being reviewed. |