Are you evaluating customer data platforms (CDPs) for your organization? The Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Customer Data Platforms delivers expert, unbiased analysis of the top vendors—equipping business and IT leaders to navigate an increasingly complex and fast-evolving market.
This year’s report arrives at a pivotal moment for the category. As brands scale AI-powered personalization, real-time journey orchestration, and enterprise-wide data strategies, CDPs are stepping into a new role—not just as marketing tools, but as the core infrastructure that connects data, AI, and CX across the enterprise.
The right CDP doesn’t simply unify customer data—it activates it. It powers AI models with clean, contextual insights, enables privacy-first personalization at scale, and fuels orchestration across every digital and offline touchpoint. Selecting a platform that supports composable architecture, AI readiness, and secure, real-time data access is key to building a scalable, future-proof customer experience strategy.
In this post, we’ll break down key takeaways from the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for CDPs, explore the industry trends behind the evaluation, highlight ActionIQ by Uniphore’s recognition, and share a practical framework for selecting the right CDP for your business.
Key Takeaways from the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for CDPs
The Gartner Magic Quadrant segments vendors into four categories—Leaders, Challengers, Visionaries, and Niche Players—based on completeness of vision and ability to execute. This year’s research reflects a market rapidly shifting toward composability, AI integration, and real-time performance.
Key insights:
- The CDP market continues to expand, with both legacy enterprise platforms and modern composable-first vendors adapting to meet demand and take on larger roles in the organization..
- Buyers should prioritize AI enablement, data warehouse integration and composable CDPs, and privacy-centric design as must-have capabilities.
- ActionIQ by Uniphore was recognized for its strengths in composable architecture, proof-of-concept methodology, and flexible data collaboration—demonstrating alignment with the most important enterprise requirements.
What Gartner Says About CDPs
Gartner defines CDPs as:
“Software applications that support marketing and customer experience use cases by unifying a company’s customer data from marketing and other channels. CDPs optimize the timing and targeting of messages, offers and customer engagement activities, and enable the analysis of individual-level customer behavior over time.”
This framing underscores how CDPs are evolving beyond traditional marketing use cases—supporting real-time insights, orchestration, and analytics across all customer-facing functions.
As AI becomes more embedded in business workflows, CDPs are increasingly tasked with serving as the data center that powers personalization, prediction, and performance across channels.
How Gartner Evaluates CDP Vendors
Gartner applies 15 weighted criteria in its evaluation—drawing from quantitative data, customer feedback, and deep vendor research. These criteria include:
- Product features and roadmap
- Operations and sales execution
- Innovation and go-to-market strategy
- Customer satisfaction and support experience
The result is a visual framework for evaluating vendor fit—not just based on where they are today, but how well-positioned they are to lead tomorrow.
Pro Tip
Gartner recommends pairing the Magic Quadrant with peer insights and complementary analyst research to build a more balanced, well-rounded vendor comparison.
Trends Shaping the CDP Market in 2025
The 2025 Magic Quadrant reflects the key shifts shaping the future of the CDP market. Buyers are demanding more from their platforms—and the most successful vendors are those that can meet evolving enterprise expectations.
AI-Powered Personalization
CDPs must feed AI and ML models with high-quality, unified data to drive predictive targeting, generative experiences, and intelligent decisioning at scale.
Real-Time Activation
Real-time audience building, segmentation, and cross-channel triggers are now table stakes. Enterprise brands want CDPs that can meet modern performance expectations.
Composable Architecture
The trend toward warehouse-native, composable CDPs continues to gain traction—allowing enterprises to activate data where it lives and reduce redundancy.
Privacy & Data Collaboration
Modern CDPs must offer robust privacy controls, governance frameworks, and clean room integrations to support secure, compliant collaboration across business units and external partners.
CDPs + AI: Why It Matters Now
As organizations double down on AI investments, the CDP is becoming the engine that powers those capabilities. CDPs feed the AI models with rich, unified customer data—and when done right, they also enable real-time orchestration of those AI-driven insights across channels.
With generative AI, predictive modeling, and autonomous journey orchestration becoming core requirements, your CDP must be capable of:
- Activating AI models with fresh, contextual data
- Triggering experiences in real time based on AI-powered predictions
- Enabling low-latency activation across marketing, service, and commerce
This is why ActionIQ’s alignment with Uniphore, a leader in enterprise AI and CX automation, is so significant. Together, they are building a unified platform that merges data infrastructure, intelligence, and execution—delivering on the full promise of AI-powered customer experience.
ActionIQ by Uniphore: Recognized for Composability, Collaboration & Confidence
This year, ActionIQ by Uniphore was recognized in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for its differentiated approach to enterprise-scale customer data activation.
What Gartner noted:
Deep Data Warehouse Integration
ActionIQ by Uniphore integrates directly with platforms like Snowflake and Databricks, allowing brands to activate data without copying or duplicating—essential for composability and governance.
Structured Proof-of-Concept Program
Its robust POC process gives enterprises the ability to validate performance and fit before full deployment—reducing risk and increasing adoption success.
Flexible Identity & Clean Room Capabilities
With modular identity resolution and native clean room integrations, the platform supports secure, compliant collaboration across internal teams and external partners.
These features reflect how ActionIQ by Uniphore is helping enterprises meet the growing demands of AI-powered CX, composable infrastructure, and regulatory compliance—at scale.
Gartner Voice of the Customer: ActionIQ by Uniphore Tops Peer Ratings
Beyond analyst evaluation, Gartner’s Voice of the Customer report provides insights directly from users via its Peer Insights platform.
In the most recent Voice of the Customer for CDPs report, ActionIQ by Uniphore earned top scores in both overall experience and willingness to recommend.
Peer feedback highlights:
- Ease of integration and deployment
- Powerful orchestration across channels
- Reliable performance at enterprise scale
- Exceptional support and service
“ActionIQ by Uniphore has been the most effective vendor I’ve worked with in my 30-year career… This product has exceeded all expectations.”
— IT Marketing Manager, Telecommunications (Gartner Peer Insights)
These peer-driven insights reinforce the platform’s reputation for performance, usability, and support—especially in high-scale enterprise environments.
Selecting the Right CDP for Your Business
Choosing a CDP is a strategic decision with implications across your entire customer experience stack. To make the right choice, take a layered approach:
Start with Use Cases
Define the business goals driving your CDP search: real-time personalization? Anonymous-to-known conversion? Multi-touch orchestration? These priorities will shape your use case shortlist.
Understand Integration Approaches
Explore the architecture behind each CDP—whether it’s warehouse-native, bundled, or hybrid. The right model depends on your data infrastructure, privacy needs, and team structure.
Use Multiple Analyst Resources
Balance your perspective with insights from several respected sources:
- Gartner Magic Quadrant – Strategic vision + execution
- Gartner Voice of the Customer – Real-world customer feedback
- Forrester Wave™ for B2C CDPs – Product-level capabilities and roadmap analysis
- IDC MarketScape – Quantitative and qualitative vendor comparisons
Using a mix of resources creates a comprehensive view—ensuring you choose a vendor that meets your requirements both today and tomorrow.
Real-World Success: Atlassian and ActionIQ by Uniphore
Atlassian, with 288 million customers and 10+ terabytes of data, needed a CDP that could scale with their ambitions—without compromising performance or governance.
By implementing ActionIQ by Uniphore’s Composable CDP, they unlocked:
- 71% increase in conversions
- 5X increase in audience reach
- 6.7% savings in paid media costs
- 50% reduction in RoAS
“With HybridCompute, no longer having to duplicate databases is huge for us. Our previous solution couldn’t keep up with our scale.”
— Glen Shillinglaw, Head of Global Marketing Operations, Atlassian
A Future-Ready CDP is the Foundation of AI-Powered CX
The 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for CDPs reinforces a critical reality: Customer data platforms are no longer optional. They’re the connective tissue between data infrastructure, AI strategy, and customer experience.
ActionIQ by Uniphore was recognized for its strengths in composable architecture, warehouse-native integration, and flexible data collaboration—making it a powerful choice for enterprise organizations investing in AI, privacy, and CX transformation.
By selecting a CDP built for composability, intelligence, and scale, brands can confidently drive the next generation of customer experiences.
Download the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for CDPs here.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a CDP according to Gartner?
A customer data platform unifies customer data from various sources to optimize engagement, timing, and personalization across channels.
What is Gartner’s Voice of the Customer for CDPs?
A peer-driven report that reflects customer feedback on CDP vendors based on real-world experience. ActionIQ by Uniphore was a top-rated vendor in the most recent report.
How should I evaluate CDP vendors?
Use a mix of analyst tools—Gartner MQ, IDC MarketScape, and Gartner Peer Insights—to get a well-rounded picture of vendor capabilities, fit, and future readiness.
Where can I access the full Gartner Magic Quadrant report?
Click over to download the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Customer Data Platforms.