What the interviews show. These interviews do not establish an overall winner, and several buyers who use both rate them about the same. Medallia buyers praise how it captures feedback across transactions, digital channels and the contact center, and complain about cost, an interface some find hard to use, and AI they describe as behind. Qualtrics buyers praise survey building their own teams can run and its breadth across customer, market and employee research, and complain about cost above all, then reporting and AI. Buyers of both describe the same gap: the platforms collect feedback well, and turning it into action is harder. In the direct comparisons described here, Qualtrics wins more selections, including two completed migrations from Medallia. The picture is not one-way: other companies retain or evaluate Medallia, and some large companies run both. The split is where your feedback comes from and who will run the program.
| Strongest contrast in these interviews | Commentary centres on capturing feedback across channels, and on cost and AI | Commentary centres on building surveys in-house, and on cost and reporting |
|---|---|---|
| Buyer pattern in these interviews | Includes hospitality, retail and service companies running transactional feedback programs | Includes companies running customer, market and employee research on one platform |
| Most-discussed job | Post-transaction and relationship surveys | Customer feedback surveys |
| Also does | Web and app intercepts, contact-center feedback and review management | Market and brand research, employee surveys and contact-center analytics |
| Praised most | Capturing feedback across the customer journey, without a complaint against it | Survey building and flexibility a team can run itself |
| Top complaint | Cost, then an interface and AI some buyers find behind | Cost, then reporting and AI that buyers say fall short of the pitch |
| Relative cost | Premium; no buyer here praises its price | Premium; cost is its most common complaint |
| Where buyers say it fits | A program collecting feedback at many customer touchpoints | A team that wants to build and run its own surveys across uses |
What buyers say about each platform
Every buyer interview spends its minutes somewhere — praising the thing that won the deal, or flagging the thing that still stings. Map where those minutes go for Medallia and Qualtrics, and the chart below shows where each platform's praise and complaints concentrate in these interviews — not a ranking of what either can do:
Relative share of buyer commentary by theme in Alium's verified interviews, praise vs. complaint, through October 2026. Widths compare themes within this pair — they are relative, not counts. Each vendor's widths are normalized to its own commentary, because Qualtrics appears in roughly twice as many interviews; an empty side means too few accounts raise the theme to chart.
In their own words
The phrases buyers reach for, verbatim, when they describe each platform:
Medallia
“gives you the entire customer journey” capture
“easily integrates with our digital channels” digital
“very simple, it's trustworthy” data
“great tool, just expensive” cost
“digest it by yourself” insight
“not very intuitive to use” ease
Qualtrics
“Qualtrics can make it happen” surveys
“they make it very flexible” flexibility
“very good self-service capabilities” self-serve
“absurdly expensive” cost
“AI is not up to speed” AI
“It's over engineered” complexity
Where Medallia buyers concentrate their praise
Medallia buyers concentrate their praise on capturing feedback across the customer journey — post-stay and post-purchase surveys, web and app intercepts, the contact center — and no buyer here complains about that part. “The value of Medallia gives you the entire customer journey,” says a contact-center leader, and a user of more than six years says “Medallia easily integrates with our digital channels to prompt users to provide feedback.” Its complaints concentrate on cost — “It's a great tool, just expensive,” says one buyer re-implementing it — and on turning feedback into insight: one buyer says “you have to digest it by yourself,” and in 2026 several describe its AI as behind, though two still praise its analytics. Its interface draws praise and complaint in roughly equal measure.
Where Qualtrics buyers concentrate their praise
Qualtrics buyers concentrate their praise on survey building their own teams can run and on breadth: one buyer says “if you want to do something with a survey, Qualtrics can make it happen,” and many use it for market and employee research as well as customer feedback. Its complaints concentrate on cost, raised more often than anything else — one buyer calls it “absurdly expensive for a platform that emails out surveys and puts them into a dashboard” — and on reporting and AI that buyers say fall short of what was sold. Smaller teams also describe it as more platform than they needed: one left for SurveyMonkey because “Qualtrics was just way too much.”
Buyers who know both describe the same shape. “The only competitor that's equivalent to Qualtrics in the industry is Medallia, and they have the same exact situation as Qualtrics,” says one Qualtrics buyer: good at generating and distributing surveys, weaker at the analysis and AI around them. A company that runs both kept Medallia rather than consolidate because “the tech stack is too similar, cost is not advantageous at this point.”
Among the direct platform selections described in these interviews, more favored Qualtrics. Two companies completed migrations from Medallia to Qualtrics — at one, new research leaders arrived with Qualtrics experience and “pushed Medallia out” — while several others selected Qualtrics during evaluations. One company has offboarded Medallia and is talking to Qualtrics. The moves also run the other way: one company kept Medallia after an evaluation in which Qualtrics's pricing did not come together, and a long-time Qualtrics user is looking at Medallia over cost and complexity. Companies leaving either also go to smaller tools — an AI-native quality-assurance platform from Medallia, SurveyMonkey from Qualtrics.
On cost, buyers do not place either clearly below the other. Both are described as premium: cost is the complaint Qualtrics buyers raise most, and no Medallia buyer here praises its price. Where buyers compare the two directly, the evidence points both ways — one company found no saving in switching from Medallia to Qualtrics, another kept Medallia when Qualtrics's pricing did not come together, and a Qualtrics user names cost as a reason to look at Medallia. Buyers of both also describe paying around the platform: outside consultancies or agencies to run or analyze the program, and support that costs extra.
What buyers wish they'd known
Before picking Medallia
Buyers describe a platform that collects feedback well but leaves them to make sense of it, and in 2026 several describe its AI and pace of innovation as behind. Buyers split on how much help comes with it: one company saw a model that relies on Medallia's professional services, another found it too self-serve, and one pays an outside consultancy to run it. Our recommendation, not a practice buyers describe: settle who will turn the feedback into action, and what help is included, before you sign.
Before picking Qualtrics
Buyers describe a broad platform whose price is its most common complaint, a long first implementation, and reporting and AI that some say fall short of what was sold. Smaller teams describe it as more than they needed, and one large buyer says it is stuck because moving the data integrations would be too hard. Our recommendation, not a practice buyers describe: price the modules you will actually use, and test the reporting you need, before you sign.
Four questions the interviews raise
Buyers praise capture across stays, purchases, digital channels and the contact center.
Buyers use it for customer feedback, and more often also for market and employee research.
Buyers split: one saw reliance on its services, another found it too self-serve.
Self-serve survey building is its most-praised theme, though some rely on agencies.
In 2026, several buyers describe its AI as behind; two still praise its analytics.
Buyers split on its AI and text analytics, with more complaint than praise.
Incumbents describe staying because switching would not save money or time.
One incumbent describes itself as stuck because the data integrations are too hard to redo.
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Book mine →How the operating conditions differ
Recurring situations in the corpus, and where the evidence concentrates in each:
Pressures visible in these interviews
The complaints these interviews carry sit on both sides: Medallia's are cost, turning feedback into insight, AI and an interface some find hard to use; Qualtrics's are cost, reporting and AI that fall short of the pitch, and complexity for smaller teams.
The sharpest pressure is shared. Buyers of both platforms want to ask open questions of their feedback and get answers, rather than read dashboards, and several are adding smaller AI-native tools beside or instead of them. Neither platform is described as declining: both keep long-tenured users, and the moves between them run both ways.
The purchasing question, as we read it rather than as buyers state it, is where your feedback comes from, who will turn it into action, and whether an enterprise platform is worth its price for that program. Qualtrics is discussed in roughly twice as many interviews as Medallia, so Medallia's side of this page rests on fewer accounts.
For the customer-service tools these programs often sit beside, see Salesforce Service Cloud vs. Zendesk; for the digital-experience analytics buyers pair with feedback, Contentsquare vs. Quantum Metric.
Common questions
Medallia vs. Qualtrics: which is better?
Neither is better for every company, and several buyers who use both rate them about the same. Medallia buyers praise how it captures feedback across transactions, digital channels and the contact center, and complain about cost, an interface some find hard to use and AI they find behind. Qualtrics buyers praise survey building their own teams can run and its breadth across customer, market and employee research, and complain about cost above all, then reporting and AI. Buyers of both describe the same gap: collecting feedback works, turning it into action is harder. The fit depends on where your feedback comes from and who will run the program.
What's the difference between Medallia and Qualtrics?
Both are enterprise voice-of-customer platforms, and buyers in these interviews treat them as the two main options. Medallia is used mostly for transactional feedback tied to stays, purchases, digital channels and the contact center. Qualtrics is used mostly for customer feedback surveys too, and more often than Medallia also for market research and employee surveys. Buyers differ on how hands-on each is: one chose Qualtrics because its own team could run surveys without Medallia's professional services, while another found Medallia too self-serve and wanted more help.
Why do companies switch from Medallia to Qualtrics?
The companies that moved from Medallia to Qualtrics in these interviews describe dissatisfaction with Medallia, new research leaders who brought Qualtrics experience with them, and a preference for running surveys in-house. Moves also run the other way: one company kept Medallia because switching would not save money, another kept it when Qualtrics pricing did not come together, and a long-time Qualtrics user is looking at Medallia over cost and complexity.
Is Qualtrics more expensive than Medallia?
Buyers do not place either one clearly below the other. Both are described as premium platforms: cost is the most common complaint about Qualtrics, and no Medallia buyer here praises its price. Buyers who compare them directly point both ways, with one finding no saving in switching from Medallia to Qualtrics and a Qualtrics user looking at Medallia partly over cost.
Can you use Medallia and Qualtrics together?
Yes. Several large companies in these interviews run both, typically split by division, region or program. One buyer in that position rates the two the same and expects the business eventually to consolidate on one, without knowing which.
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