How to Replace Open CTI in Salesforce: A Look at Contact Center Innovation Post‑Sunset
Summary
Salesforce is retiring its legacy Open CTI telephony integration by early 2028, pushing contact centers to modernize their systems. The shift is from disconnected, external telephony setups to fully native or orchestrated AI-powered voice integrations using Salesforce Voice and Agentforce. This transformation enables real-time transcription, sentiment analysis, and proactive next-best-action recommendations, dramatically boosting agent efficiency and customer experience. Enterprises can adopt a hybrid orchestration layer to preserve existing telephony infrastructure while unlocking AI-driven productivity gains. Following a clear modernization blueprint can help Salesforce teams safely retire legacy adapters and build intelligent, automated contact centers.
Takeaways
- Evaluate current legacy CTI adapters and custom scripts before transitioning.
- Choose between full native Salesforce Voice migration or hybrid orchestration layer.
- Use enterprise voice orchestration to integrate existing telecom hardware with Salesforce.
- Activate AI features like real-time transcription and Agentforce gradually with pilot users.
- Decommission legacy custom adapters after stable parallel testing of the new solution.
About the author of this guest post. Antonina Kharchenko is a Salesforce Admin with 6 certifications and a 2-Star Ranger on Trailhead who works with Salesforce systems, automation, and process improvement. She continues to expand her skills and knowledge, and enjoys turning her day-to-day working experience into useful articles. For customer service organizations running on complex legacy architecture, maintaining the status quo is no longer an option. Salesforce has officially placed its legacy browser-based telephony integration into maintenance mode. With the Salesforce Open CTI end of life set for February 28, 2028, IT leaders are facing a hard deadline to rethink their telecommunications strategy. However, looking at this transition strictly as a mandatory software upgrade misses the larger picture.