6 best Intercom alternatives in 2024

A customer communication platform is a crucial part of any successful business. Why? Because customers are 2.4 times more likely to stick around when companies solve their problems quickly—a key benefit of leveraging customer service software.

In terms of revenue generation, they’re also 2.7x more likely to spend more money if you communicate clearly. In 2024, Intercom is one of the most popular communication tools.

The software is a chat widget businesses use to improve customer communications. But, it also comes with some other features like customer management, help desk ticketing, and chatbots.

And, while it’s a powerful communication tool, you’re probably wondering if it’s worth the price. Or… are there better Intercom alternatives out there?

Intercom is a powerful customer communication tool, but it has its downsides like:

• Expensive (starts at $39 per user, per month)
• Lack of customisation
• Limited automations

In this article, I break down the top alternatives to Intercom. You’ll learn each tool’s standout features, integrations, and price so you can choose the best software for your organisation.

Overview of Intercom alternatives

Thankfully, there are hundreds of Intercom alternatives available. I’ve narrowed down the top six alternatives to Intercom below, including:

1. Trengo – Best for a single inbox communication solution

2. Help Scout – Best for no-code automations

3. HelpCrunch – Best for unlimited contacts

4. Zendesk – Best for large organisations

5. Freshdesk – Best for small business and integrations

6. LiveChat – Best live chat tool for targeted communication

Some key characteristics of effective customer communication tools include:

• Integration capabilities
• Affordability
• Comprehensive support features

One of the fastest-growing alternatives to Intercom is Trengo. Here’s a Google Trends snapshot from the past 7 years (Trengo was founded in 2017), highlighting the rapid growth of the platform:

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With Trengo, you can easily combine all your favourite communication channels in a single solution. Plus, with automation and simple performance reporting, you can double down on what’s working and save time in the process.

Detailed analysis of top Intercom alternatives

Now let’s dive into a detailed breakdown of each platform. I’ll cover the tool's features, pricing, user ratings, and its suitability for different businesses. 

1. Trengo – Best for a single inbox communication solution

Trengo gives you a single inbox for a simple approach to multichannel customer support. Founded in 2017, the 20,000-user platform allows you to centralise your entire business communications into a user-friendly dashboard.

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Why choose Trengo?

It’s the easiest platform to use for multichannel communications. The software funnels every single communication channel into one stream. Rather than wasting time looking through dozens of email threads, you get to see all customer information at a glance, enabling you to respond in seconds — helping you exceed customer expectations.

Standout features include collaboration tools (for example: team tagging, internal team chants, and message assignments), Flowbot Quick Reply automatically answers customers’ most repeated questions, WhatsApp templates that speed up replies, and Rules for automatic assignment of conversations to the right team members.

Integrations include Asana, Bol.com, Facebook Messenger, Gmail, Google Sheets, HubSpot, Instagram, Klaviyo, Lightspeed, Magento, Mailchimp, Microsoft Dynamics, Outlook, Salesforce, Shopify, Slack, Pipedrive, Trello, WeChat, Webhooks, Zapier, and WhatsApp Business.

Pricing starts at $19 per user, per month with a personalised free demo.

Pros

• Simplifies multichannel communication
• Improve lead generation with automations and templates
• Extensive integrations
• Easy configuration
• Straightforward, scalable pricing structure

Cons

• Built for consumer service SMBs and enterprises. Smaller businesses with little engagement won’t experience the value of Trengo as much.

2. Help Scout – Best for no-code automations

Help Scout is a customer experience management (CXM) tool that helps organisations manage their customer relationships. Founded in 2011, the platform serves over 12,000 users as a shared inbox solution to resolve customer issues efficiently.

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Why choose Help Scout: Help Scout is a great fit for companies that are hyper-focused on improving customer support. It has a robust feature set that’s focused on improving customer relationships. Teams can leverage Help Scout’s shared inbox tool to work together and tackle customer inquiries.

Standout features include automated workflows, a collaborative inbox, reporting, and a website chat widget. The tool also has a knowledge base allowing organisations to create a library of information that customers can easily access.

Integrations include Slack, Freshbooks, Mailchimp, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, Google Apps, Shopify, Cordless, CircleLoop, Pipedrive, Webhooks, Infusionsoft by Keap, and WooCommerce.

Pricing starts at $20 per user, per month (billed annually) with a 15-day free trial.

Pros

• Shared inbox simplifies team collaboration
• Wide range of integrations
• Easily pull customer data from various sources
• User-friendly

Cons

• Limited analytics
• Basic plan has limited features
• Challenging to customise knowledge base

3. HelpCrunch – Best for unlimited contacts

HelpCrunch is an intuitive customer support tool that’s equipped with live chat, chatbots, a shared inbox, and more. With 10,000+ users worldwide, it’s one of the top communication platforms for scaling.

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Why choose HelpCrunch: It has a clean interface, and is focused on multi-channel messaging with a variety of tools for help desk ticketing, social media integrations, and even email marketing​​.

Standout features include a centralised inbox for all customer communications, a user-friendly dashboard, chatbots, a knowledge base, live chat, an email pop up feature, and email automations.

Integrations include Google Analytics, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Slack, Zapier, Pipedrive, Slack, and more.

Pricing starts at $12 per user, per month (billed annually) with a 14-day free trial.

Pros

• Budget-friendly starter pricing
• User-friendly dashboard
• Email automation tools to automate marketing
• Scalable pricing structure with unlimited contacts
• Great customer support

Cons

• Limited integrations
• Limited features on the base plan
• Desktop and mobile app don’t always communicate to one another

4. Zendesk –  Best for large enterprises

Zendesk is one of the oldest platforms in the game. Founded in 2007, the company has created multiple products over the years including Zendesk Support Suite. With over 185,000 users worldwide, the software company offers a robust customer support tool for enterprise organisations.

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Why choose Zendesk: Support Suite is an all-in-one customer support solution that’s great for large organisations. For enterprise businesses looking to ramp up their customer service at scale, it has a wide variety of features and customisation options. You can interact with chat, email, phone, social media, and self-service support via a single channel.

Standout features include interaction history tracking, live chat, unified customer profiles, and a ticketing system. Suite also includes automatic AI responses and even multilingual capabilities for international teams to optimise the customer experience.

Integrations include Slack, JIRA, Shopify, Zoom Phone, Trello, Salesforce, Mailchimp, Geckoboard, Clickup, and PandaDoc.

Pricing starts at $55 per user, per month (billed annually) with a 14-day free trial.

Pros

• A wide range of integrations
• Centralised interface that simplifies multiple communication channels
• Unified view of customer profiles
• AI-powered automatic responses speed up response times
• Easily manage support metrics like response times

Cons

• Quite expensive for starter plans
• Gets even more expensive as you add on additional features
• Steep learning curve
• Limited customisation in lower-tier plans

5. Freshdesk – Best for small business and integrations

Freshdesk is one of the many tools offered by Freshworks. With over 60,000 users, Freshworks has been in the software game since 2010. The customer support platform offers a simple solution for small businesses to get their customer support under wraps.

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Why choose Freshdesk: It has a ton of native integrations with other platforms small businesses likely already use. This makes it easy to fit right into your current tool stack. Freshdesk is one of the quickest platforms to get started with, but just keep in mind that it’s mostly directed towards small businesses, meaning it’s not a great option for mid-level or large organisations.

Standout features include contact management, email integration, customer management, social media integration, dashboards, analytics, scheduling, workflow management, API access, and chat tools.

Integrations include Microsoft Dynamics 365, Close, Zendesk, Pipedrive, Insightly, Salesforce, HubSpot, Oracle Netsuite, Copper, Zoho CRM, WhatsApp, Shopify, Mailchimp, Stripe, Slack, and Klaviyo.

Pricing starts at $15 per user, per month (billed annually) with a 14-day free trial.

Pros

• Great for small business
• A ton of native integrations
• Set up time is quite quick
• API included for further integrations
  

Cons

• Isn’t the best for scaling
• Some glitches and technical errors
• Uploading contacts can be challenging
• Automations don’t have the best user interface

6. LiveChat – Best live chat tool for targeted communication

LiveChat is one of the oldest players in the game. Originally founded in 2002, the company helps over 33,000 users worldwide improve their customer service. Their software is simple: a dedicated and simplified live chat experience.

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Why choose LiveChat: It’s dedicated (primarily) to one thing: live chat. While the live chat software includes a variety of other features, they’ve put everything into mastering the live chat arena. For companies looking strictly for a live chat solution, it’s one of the best options available, since it’s their specialty.

Standout features include interactive pop-up chats that encourage users to engage and interact, advanced reporting and analytics, and simple integrations into LiveChat’s other products, HelpDesk, and ChatBot, and KnowledgeBase, which provide the exact feature they’re named after.

Integrations include KnowledgeBase, ChatBot, HelpDesk, WhatsApp Business, Agent Activity Report, Facebook Messenger, Google Analytics, HubSpot, Salesforce, Mailchimp, Zendesk,  BigCommerce, and Calendly.

Pricing starts at $20 per user, per month (billed annually) with a 14-day free trial.

Pros

• A ton of integrations
• Simplest live chat experience
• Predictable pricing
• Mobile app available on iOS and Android
• Clean user interface
• Three core native integrations

Cons

• You’ll need other tools for a holistic customer support offering
• Chat widget is hard to configure
• Relatively expensive

Features and pricing comparison

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Pros and cons analysis

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Reviews and user feedback

Trengo

Help Scout

HelpCrunch

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Zendesk

Freshdesk

LiveChat

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Intercom Alternatives: The Takeaway

When navigating the endless maze of customer service software options, finding the perfect platform can be overwhelming.

The same holds true when you’re looking for an Intercom alternative.

Customer communication trends and software tend to change at a rapid pace, so it’s important you regularly check back on your current tool (and what market) to see what’s available.

The software you leverage to keep in touch with your customers plays a major role in the overall customer experience.

By now, you should have a good idea of the top tool you’re leaning towards. 

Just remember, there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to picking the software that’s right for you. You have to analyse your needs, industry, business size, budget, and plans (i.e. if you plan on scaling).

The rundown: top three Intercom alternatives

• If you’re looking for a simple live chat option, LiveChat is the best choice. 
• If you’re an enterprise organisation that has a large budget, Zendesk is the best choice. 
• If you’re looking for the best all-in-one solution to unify communications, Trengo is the best option.

Need more help picking the right Intercom alternative? 

Check out our quick guide: Intercom vs. Trengo.