Geckoboard is a fine cloud dashboard. But if your desk runs on Zendesk, Freshdesk, Jira SM or HaloPSA and you'd rather keep your customer data on your own server — and pay a flat price instead of $149+/month — Nexus was built for you.
Nexus runs on your server and reads your helpdesk directly. Nothing proxies through our cloud — there isn't one. Geckoboard ingests your ticket data into theirs.
£29–£119/month flat, every screen included. Geckoboard's published plans start around $149/month and climb with dashboards and seats.
Built Zendesk-deep first (Support + Talk: 20-second call refresh, SLA countdowns, CSAT, leaderboards) — with the same board now reading Freshdesk, Freshservice, Jira Service Management and HaloPSA in beta. Depth first, not 90 shallow connectors.
| Nexus | Geckoboard | |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting | Self-hosted — your server, your LAN | Their cloud only |
| Where your ticket data lives | On your infrastructure, full stop | Processed & stored in their cloud |
| Pricing model | Flat £29 / £59 / £119 per month — unlimited screens | From ~$149/mo, tiered by dashboards & users |
| Free to try | Demo mode in ~30s — full board, sample data, no account | Free trial |
| Zendesk Support depth | Native — 33 panels, SLA breach countdowns, CSAT, backlog burn-down, FCR & reopen, heatmaps | Good core Zendesk widgets |
| Zendesk Talk (calls) | Live — 20-second refresh, queue, leaderboard | Available, less call-floor focused |
| Refresh cadence | 20s calls · 60s tickets · 5-min aggregates | Varies by source/plan |
| TV / wallboard mode | Built-in TV rotation, scheduling, war-room takeover | Send-to-TV supported |
| Screen Sync — control every screen (Pro+) | Live screen registry, identify, push-board, groups, central rotation playlists & reload-all from one admin | — |
| Leaderboards, goals & gamification | Leaderboards, team goal thermometer, streaks, agent of the week — confetti included | Goals on numbers; lighter on gamification |
| SLA war-room | Full-screen takeover when things catch fire | — |
| Client-scoped boards (MSP) | Read-only links showing one client's org, enforced server-side | Sharing links; not org-scoped to your PSA |
| Alerts & digests | Threshold webhooks (Slack/Teams/Discord) + scheduled end-of-day digest | Plan-dependent |
| Native apps | Web, desktop (Win/macOS/Linux), iOS, Android + a Zendesk in-app view | Web + TV; mobile via browser |
| Data sources beyond Zendesk | Freshdesk, Freshservice, Jira Service Management & HaloPSA (beta), multi-vendor network health (UniFi · Meraki · Aruba · Omada), on-call (.ics), AI daily summary | 90+ integrations & spreadsheets |
| Works offline / licence model | Licence keys verified offline — a billing-service blip never bricks your board | Cloud session required |
| Setup | One Docker command + a 2-minute wizard | Sign up, connect, build widgets |
Comparison reflects Geckoboard's published product and pricing to the best of our knowledge as at June 2026 — their plans change; check geckoboard.com for current details. Geckoboard, Plecto and Zendesk are trademarks of their respective owners; Nexus is not affiliated with or endorsed by any of them. Spot something out of date? Tell us and we'll fix it.
| Nexus | Plecto | |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting | Self-hosted — your data never leaves | Their cloud only |
| Pricing model | Flat £29–£119/mo, unlimited screens & agents | Per-seat with minimums — typically ~$200+/mo for a small team |
| Gamification | Leaderboards, goals, streaks, Agent of the Week, confetti | Excellent — contests, achievements, deep customisation |
| Zendesk depth | Purpose-built: Support + Talk live, SLA countdowns, per-agent CSAT drill-downs | Solid connector among ~100 integrations |
| Call-floor view | 20-second Talk refresh, queue + leaderboard | Possible via integrations |
| Client-scoped boards (MSP) | Org-scoped read-only links, enforced server-side | Dashboard sharing, not PSA-org scoped |
| TV mode | Rotation, scheduling, war-room takeover | TV display supported |
| Setup | One Docker command + 2-minute wizard | Cloud signup; real building to get value |
Pick Plecto if you want contest-style gamification across many data sources and per-seat SaaS pricing works for you. Pick Nexus if your floor runs on Zendesk and you want the motivation layer flat-priced on your own tin.
| Nexus | Zendesk Explore | |
|---|---|---|
| What it's for | A live wall your whole team watches all day | Deep historical reporting & BI inside Zendesk |
| Cost | From £29/mo flat | Included with Zendesk Suite plans |
| Liveness on a TV | 20s calls · 60s tickets, built to run forever on a wall | Dashboards refresh periodically; live widgets are limited & plan-gated |
| Wall ergonomics | 4K-scaling layout, TV rotation, themes, ticker, lock mode | Built for analysts at desks, not screens across a room |
| Motivation layer | Leaderboards, goals, streaks, Agent of the Week, confetti | — |
| SLA war-room & alerts | Full-screen takeover + Slack/Teams webhooks with recoveries | Alerting limited; no takeover mode |
| Share outside Zendesk seats | Client-scoped read-only links — no Zendesk login needed | Sharing is largely seat/plan-bound |
| Historical BI depth | Trends, burn-down, heatmaps — operational, not BI | Excellent — custom queries, datasets, joins |
Honestly: they're complements. Keep Explore for month-end analysis — it's good at it and you already pay for it. Nexus is the layer Explore doesn't do: the always-on, motivating, live wall. Most Nexus customers run both.
Breadth: if you need Salesforce + HubSpot + Sheets + 90 other sources on one screen, Geckoboard's connector library is excellent and Nexus doesn't try to compete with it.
Fully managed: nothing to host. If running a Docker container (or a desktop app) isn't your team's thing, a cloud product is the right call.
Track record: they've been at this for over a decade. Nexus is new — that's also why it's a fraction of the price.
Illustrative, using published entry pricing as at June 2026. Currency conversion not applied — the gap speaks for itself.
Demo mode fills the board with realistic sample data in about 30 seconds — no account, no card. If you like what you see, plans start at £29/month flat.
Nexus