What are Tessitura users saying about the software?
Read what people like you have said about using Tessitura software through verified user reviews
User Review Highlights
4.21
28 Reviews
Ease-of-use
out of 5Customer Support
out of 5Value for money
out of 5Functionality
out of 5"Newly implemented dashboard are extremely versatile and powerful, but sometimes a touch cumbersome if you need a look at data. Great tool to develop and maintain KPIs."
"I have been pleased with the content of reports in particular."
"Tessitura also offer a Tessitura Network Express Web (TNEW) website solution for online bookings which integrates well with the Tessitura software."
"The near-infinite report customization can be a double edged sword because any tick-box accidentally checked (or unchecked) may dramatically change the content of a report."
"It is very archaic-looking, confusing, and hard to find things."
"The worst part of this software is how easy it is to give an order to a different patron. There are no warning signs and this has been a common problem around the office."
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Showing 1 - 25 of 28 reviews
Shelley
Verified reviewer
Company size: 201-500 employees
Industry: Museums and Institutions
Time used: More than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered
February 2022
The Cadillac of CRM sytems
I've used Tessitura for 20 years, in multiple organizations and found it to be user friendly. Reporting and analytics options have improved greatly over the last 5 years. Without knowing SQL I'm able to create custom visualizations for end users.
Pros
I like that Tessitura is a non-profit helping other non-profit organizations. They truly take feedback from end users and improve the software every year. The technical support and world-wide community support is amazing. Everyone is willing to share and help find best solution. Every department is able to work in the same system and get the full picture of each patron. It forces collaboration where silos existed in the past. Ticketing and Develoment folks will use it the most, Marketing some, Finance the least. Security features are robust and easy to manage as an administrator.
Cons
My current organization is in the middle of implementation. Because the system is so flexible there are times when there are no hard and fast rules of how to set up a process. Everyone uses it differently so that's good and bad. I wish it had facility management capabilities since so many non-profits rely on that for operations.
Reasons for choosing Tessitura
Salesforce doesn't include all facets of our business, such as event registration and management.
Reasons for switching to Tessitura
We wanted a unified CRM with all departments working in same software. This helps us to see the big picture of patron engagement and improve customer service.
Anonymous
Company size: 501-1,000 employees
Time used: More than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
June 2019
A beast of a product
Tessitura is at the heart of everything we do as an organisation. It holds our customer data, we use it to manage our ticketing and website offerings, to manage Direct Debits and donations, marketing, and much more. We could not function without it.
Pros
It is so customisable, and does so much. There are facets for all areas of our organisation.
Cons
It is so customisable. This is an amazing feature, but comes with a lot of pitfalls and makes life challenging at upgrade time.
Reasons for choosing Tessitura
Tessitura offers a lot more flexibility and is more powerful for users.
Jon
Company size: 1 employee
Industry: Philanthropy
Time used: Less than 12 months
Review Source
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
April 2018
Tessitura and Fund Raising
Shop around. There has to be a more efficient and effective product.
Pros
The integration of ticketing with prospects/donors is alluring, esp. for performance art organizations.
Cons
This is a ticketing software with a CRM work-around built in. It's confusing, user abusive and extraordinarily expensive. In our town, NPO's had to group together, in one building, where they created a new company that specializes in Tessitura software management. It's a clever use of the software and a business structure. This company then went out and sold it's software services to other performance art organizations as far away as Los Angeles. However, all organizations can see who has who in their database. You can't go into the account, but it becomes readily apparent our prospects and donors are being hit on all the time by all the same organizations. It's tricky. But the fact remains. Tessitura is enormously complex, just to get acknowledgements out is a lot of busy work. When I came on board, the previous development person really used Tessitura as a storage unit and did all the fund raising in Excel and Word. And from a NPO business perspective, once you commit to this software, extraction is basically a blackmail. It costs a fortune to leave it and organizations still have this challenge of ticketing tied to fund raising.
Jared
Verified reviewer
Company size: 11-50 employees
Industry: Performing Arts
Time used: More than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered
October 2020
Tessitura - the Rolls-Royce of ticketing software
Aside from an antiquated"look and feel" (of reports, UI, etc.) functionality is KEY. Tess seems to be as functional as necessary for my organization.
Pros
As an integral part of the team working to settle financials for events I can get almost any data collected through Tessitura sliced and diced in a report with tremendous customization. I have been pleased with the content of reports in particular. Without this tool, it would be impossible to provide the backup documentation necessary for settlement and reporting throughout the sales cycle. I also love the scheduled reports feature. I can develop custom reporting and set it once to send to multiple parties throughout the sales cycle and never worry about it again. Newly implemented dashboard are extremely versatile and powerful, but sometimes a touch cumbersome if you need a look at data. Great tool to develop and maintain KPIs. Though the learning curve, assuming ticketing software is in your background the learning curve is not terribly steep and I know I have just scratched the surface.
Cons
The near-infinite report customization can be a double edged sword because any tick-box accidentally checked (or unchecked) may dramatically change the content of a report. Special care must be taken and there are many ways to produce reports with inaccurate or undesired content.
Reasons for switching to Tessitura
I wasn't working with the org at that time.
Anonymous
Company size: 501-1,000 employees
Time used: More than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
July 2019
A top-tier ticketing and CRM solution for arts, cultural, and musical venues
Tessitura is the lifeblood of our organisation used by our box office, marketing, and fundraising departments to store all manner of customer information. It is a powerful piece of software with many customisation options that, when configured and utilised correctly, proves a useful tool.
Pros
Tessitura is a mammoth piece of software that has lots of features available for ticketing, fundraising, and marketing. It holds a wealth of constituent data and we can write our own SSRS reports in-house to query this data. Support is amazing, very quick to answer any queries, and very knowledgeable about all aspects of the software. It has been relatively easy to upgrade our software/database version following the very useful documentation found on the Tessitura Network website. The TN website also features webinars, a community forum, and is packed full of information on upcoming networking events. Tessitura also offer a Tessitura Network Express Web (TNEW) website solution for online bookings which integrates well with the Tessitura software.
Cons
Although the software itself is very customisable with custom plugins and such, it can cause headaches when upgrading to newer versions and has the potential to cause issues – these customisations must be backed up, checked for compatibility, etc. Technical support has originally been handled by agents in the US which had the potential to cause issues with time zones with our organisation being based in the UK, however they have recently restructured their support for Europe and have implemented a new helpdesk system which have helped improve this situation greatly. There are a lot of functions and features that I still feel I’ve barely touched on as an administrator, as well as there being a steep learning curve for end-users due to the sheer number of features available. UI elements do look a bit dated compared to other solutions on the market.
Corinne
Company size: 11-50 employees
Industry: Museums and Institutions
Time used: More than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered
May 2019
Designed for larger orgs with data management support
It has been hard to learn, and I frankly still don't feel confident pulling lists that my data is correct. I appreciate it's enormous capacity on the back end, but there's not a lot of front-end user options.
Pros
The record integration is absolutely seamless. I can look up a constituent and see exactly when they came, what donations or purchases they have made, etc. The tech support is robust.
Cons
I have taken a training class in this product, have some experience in coding, and still feel like I only barely understand the basics. It is hard to learn, not intuitive at all, and has more functions than we can currently use at our size (small-mid-size museum) Plus: Expensive!
Anonymous
Company size: 51-200 employees
Time used: More than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
April 2020
A CRM that fits our needs
It's been positive for managing relationships and for data mining.
Pros
It was created with music institutions and not-for-profits in mind and has all the ability to hand every need our unique business type(s) have.
Cons
It's a pretty advanced program and there is a massive learning curve. Getting staff on board to learn it can be a challenge. In addition, it's one of those softwares that is "only as good as the data you put into it."
Anonymous
Company size: 201-500 employees
Time used: More than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
April 2018
Essential ticketing software for Arts venues
Runs the entire CRM and ticketing solution for the organisation.
Pros
Company fully understands the requirements of the industry that it is targeting. There is an excellent community with end users willing to engage and help each other.
Cons
Requires quite a lot of resource to manage and maintain in terms of staff and hardware. Would hope to see this improve in coming releases and perhaps a shift to a cloud implementation.
Siobhan
Company size: 201-500 employees
Industry: Fine Art
Time used: More than 2 years
July 2017
Great Arts CRM
Pros
Windows based Easy to use Great support All in one package Customisable Based on SQL Server Reports can be designed in house
Cons
Old reports are based on Sybase's Infomaker which is a hard product to purchase. Newer reports are based on SSRS so you will need training for this.
Anonymous
Company size: 51-200 employees
Time used: Less than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
August 2018
Great
Pros
Tessitura is definitely the most popular in the nonprofit arts industry. It's ticketing and fundraising features are integrated and allows for a full constituent report.
Cons
Lately, the software seems outdated. Unlike Raiser's Edge, Tessitura demands a full training to know the ins and outs of the software. It's not the most user-friendly software out there.
Katie
Company size: 201-500 employees
Industry: Performing Arts
Time used: More than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
October 2017
Industry-standard database for arts & culture
Detailed data for informing managerial decisions, increased interdepartmental communication, many facets of constituent knowledge and ways to slice and dice our donorbase
Pros
Integrates all departments on the same database. Highly customizable. Integrates with many other common industry systems (mail2, Boca, etc.). Great reporting capabilities. Fantastic support documentation and staff. The user community is unparalleled in skill level, camaraderie, and enthusiasm. Ability to share an instance in a consortium environment, with advanced settings to control who can see what information.
Cons
Steep learning curve - it can be difficult to get beginner users to do much more than search for and look at records. Not the most user-friendly interface. Customizability also means the out of box product can be pretty bare bones compared to everything the software is capable of.
Brian
Company size: 201-500 employees
Industry: Non-Profit Organization Management
Time used: Less than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
May 2018
I used Tessi in my time at a nationally-renowned Symphony orchestra.
Ease of ticketing, seating, and viewing the house. I enjoyed the option to charge directly each purchase, as opposed to batching gifts individually like I did in RE.
Pros
I find that Tessi is very intuitive and use-oriented. When I started with it, I was obviously overwhelmed, but that was tempered by it's relative ease of use, and the vast online resources available for questions that did arise.
Cons
Having used both Tessi and RE, I will say that one is much better for Box Office organizations (Tessi) than it is at housing constituent info, giving history, and basic fundraising needs. RE has robust capability for storing/targeting/querying on/exporting etc. much more so than RE.
Grace
Company size: 2-10 employees
Industry: Music
Time used: Less than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
October 2018
Could be better
Pros
This software has a lot of muscle power, no doubt about it. There is a lot of functionality, and every problem you come across when it comes to how to send tickets out, sending receipts to patrons, etc has a solution
Cons
1) This software is WAY too complicated for the average theater. The learning curve is very steep, which complicates the hiring process for temporary employees (cause they never get to the point of mastery and efficiency with the software), and there is no way to edit out which functions to "see" on your screen. For example, if xyz theater never uses a third of the functions of the software, there should be a way to visually hide them so that employees dont get confused about what they are seeing on the screen. 2) When it comes to entering information for credit card payments, the software designers never apparently thought about how the average patron reads out their information over the phone. You have to select the type of card used before entering the card number, meanwhile the patron is halfway through spewing out their number over the phone while the ticketing office employee is scrambling to write it down on a pad of paper cause Tessie wont let them enter the number yet. If there was more flexibility in the order that information could be entered (card type then number vs number then card type), the daily functionality of the software would be much improved.
Andrea
Company size: 1 employee
Industry: Arts and Crafts
Time used: Less than 12 months
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
November 2018
Tessitura review
Overall I like the program. It has everything I need to get my work done and easily see what we need to sell the following day.
Pros
I recently started using tessitura and I like the simplicity of it. I am able to easily view the events and see how many seats are available for what date.
Cons
Only con I have is for the saving button, it says "done" instead of "save". It sometimes confuses me when I'm closing an order.
Anonymous
Time used: Less than 12 months
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
January 2018
I've been using Tessitura for a few months and I enjoy the ability to learn new functions every day.
Pros
There are so many functions to learn about this software that I always am excited to learn. Tessitura gives you so much information so many forms that it's insane on what this software can hold.
Cons
It is a bit complicated and you do need a specialist if you want to really learn how to fully utilize the software.
Cameron
Company size: 51-200 employees
Industry: Events Services
Time used: Less than 12 months
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
April 2019
Great intent difficult to learn
Overall I have not been happy with Tessitura. I feel it is far harder to use than helpful. The features it offers are great but it does not make it worth the investment.
Pros
Tessitura has a lot of good ticketing features. It has a great ability to customize and tracks data way better than SABO. The best part of this software is when it comes to selling subscriptions. It is really easy and user intuitive when it comes to this feature.
Cons
This software is really difficult to learn and train others on. The UI is confusing and it is difficult to find what you are looking for. The worst part of this software is how easy it is to give an order to a different patron. there are no warning signs and this has been a common problem around the office.
Anonymous
Company size: 1 employee
Time used: Less than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
May 2019
Art Organization Zeus
Every arts organization uses Tessitura for a reason. All encompassing, it's reach is impressive, limited only by its users organization.
Pros
For donor organization, easy and effective with a wide range of tracking.
Cons
Ugh, ok, repeat entries were the scourge of my job. So its effectiveness definitely depends on the team who uses it. I wish there were an option for Tessitura to regularly compare possible multiple entries to combine.
Jill
Company size: 51-200 employees
Industry: Non-Profit Organization Management
Time used: Less than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered
February 2022
Good Across Departments - Lacking for Development
The Tessitura folks are great; however, the system is just not built for non-tech users.
Pros
A lot neat details and the analytics are beautiful.
Cons
If you don't have a someone on staff to customize on a regular basis, you will have a very nice system that probably won't meet your basic fundraising needs in timely, generally fuss-free fashion.
Reasons for choosing Tessitura
Ticketing and finance integration. Only ticketing ended up working.
Reasons for switching to Tessitura
Ticket integration
Anonymous
Company size: 51-200 employees
Time used: Less than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
October 2017
An incredibly robust ticketing and seating software
Pros
Tessitura allows you to input and seat based on your own theater's house model. I like that there's a visual layout you can view to see which seats are taken and what kind of ticket they're purchased under.
Cons
Tessitura is a large and complicated software. I'm not even aware of all of the things it can do. It's a true learning process and companies may choose how deep down the rabbit hole they'd like to go: using it lightly or going so far as to send members of their theater to the huge Tessitura conference once a year.
Anonymous
Company size: 51-200 employees
Time used: Less than 2 years
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
February 2018
Tessitura is an easy to use fundraising and ticketing software system that I would reccomend
Pros
Ease of use in the ticketing function. One is able to see and use a seat map in real time to place and track orders. These orders are then linked to the constituents account where you can track the moves management of a particular donor and see their giving history.
Cons
Does not have the full capacity of moves management as seen in Raiser's Edge NXT but has a better ticketing and box office functionality. A better database for those who own their own performance venue and have a larger marketing than development team. Not ideal for someone who is focused on development first.
Roy
Company size: 11-50 employees
Industry: Events Services
Time used: Less than 6 months
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
April 2019
Hard to Learn, Lots of Features
I had trouble learning how to use and be effective and efficient using this software, however once I learned how it works, the experience gets a lot better. The customer support is available to answer questions and solve issues.
Pros
It is an effective organizational and ticketing program which allows for many customization options to adjust the system as needed. Additionally, the customer support has been able to get most of our issues solved.
Cons
Many of its options are counter-intuitive, and the user interface is unattractive and hard to use. Additionally, it is relatively easy to make a mistake and accidentally give a ticket to a different person than intended.
Grace
Company size: 51-200 employees
Industry: Events Services
Time used: Less than 12 months
Review Source: Capterra
This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you.
May 2019
Tessitura
Pros
Tessitura is organized and can handle the complicated functions of our daily ticketing set up.
Cons
It is very archaic-looking, confusing, and hard to find things.
Tiiu
Time used: Free Trial
Review Source: Capterra
April 2017
Great but clunky and expensive
I didn't work with this software for that long, and never used it as a manager, but from what I gleaned it's pretty powerful. It has a steep learning curve and is quite expensive, so most mid-sized arts organizations I've worked for have used other platforms. But Tessitura is the dream, if you can afford it.
Luisa
Industry: Fine Art
Time used: Free Trial
March 2015
Nonprofit Arts Endorsement
Pros
Ability to incorporate both development and box office capabilities.
Cons
Difficult to access 24/7; limited abilities; not enough training for entire staff; few personnel actually use it.
Cody
Time used: Free Trial
Review Source: Capterra
February 2017
A Beast that can work for you
Tessitura is the biggest and worst CRM you can use. It has a giant network of constantly evolving apps, fixes and test cases. The annual conference is huge and a boon for those in the Arts. You will definitely need a dedicated IT person for Tessitura though, as it is complex and robust.
