6 Best Intercom Alternatives in 2025

The generation of a connected world is what we are living in. It is time to accept the fact for all business owners that customer communication can make or break the business. 

According to a 2025 report, almost 86% of customers agreed to pay more for a better customer experience, and isn’t that crazy? Tools like Intercom in the market have long been the gold standard, but as businesses grow and diversify, one surely needs a solution that fits all. 

Whether it is rising costs or overwhelming complexity, multiple businesses are searching for alternatives that fit right, give more value without any compromise, and most importantly it is affordable! 

“Customer service shouldn’t be just a department, it should be the entire company,” said Tony Hsieh, the now-deceased Zappos CEO.”

In this blog, we will guide you through the ten most preferred Intercom alternatives in 2025 that you should know. We’ve made it easy for you to save time researching.

Let’s get in!

Key Criteria for Selecting Intercom Alternatives

Switching from a tool like Intercom is not just about saving your pocket; it is about finding the solution that accurately aligns with and meets your business needs to ensure excellent customer service. As customer expectations rise, the tools should also evolve to facilitate smooth customer communication.

Here are some key criteria to remember while looking at Intercom Alternative!

1. Evaluating Intercom Limitations

When considering Intercom alternatives, it’s essential to evaluate the limitations of the platform. This section will delve into the functionality gaps, pricing concerns, multi-channel messaging, and AI-powered tools that may be lacking in Intercom.

Functionality Gaps

Intercom is a robust customer communication platform, but it may not cater to the specific needs of every business. Some functionality gaps to consider include:

• Limited Customization Options: Intercom’s chat widget and customer portal offer limited customization, which can restrict businesses from tailoring the interface to match their brand identity. This can impact the overall customer experience and satisfaction.
• Integration Challenges: While Intercom integrates with many third-party apps, it may not support all the tools a business uses. This can create silos in customer interactions and hinder seamless communication.
• Reporting and Analytics: Intercom’s reporting capabilities may not be as comprehensive as some businesses require. Limited analytics can make it challenging to gain insights into customer interactions and measure the effectiveness of support efforts.
• Customer Feedback Tools: Intercom lacks built-in customer satisfaction surveys and feedback tools, making it harder for businesses to gather and act on customer feedback directly within the platform.

These gaps may lead businesses to seek alternative solutions that offer more flexibility and features tailored to their specific needs.

Pricing Concerns

Intercom’s pricing structure can be complex and unpredictable, leading to concerns for businesses with growing teams or increasing customer interactions. Some pricing concerns to consider include:

• Cost Per Seat: As your team grows, the cost per seat can increase rapidly, making it expensive to scale customer support operations.
• Additional Features and Add-Ons: Intercom’s additional features and add-ons can add up quickly, leading to unexpected expenses. This can strain budgets, especially for small and medium-sized businesses.
• Lack of Transparency: The pricing structure may not be transparent or predictable, making it challenging to budget for customer communication needs. Businesses need a clear understanding of costs to manage their finances effectively.

Businesses may seek alternative solutions with more transparent and predictable pricing structures to ensure they can scale their customer communication efforts without breaking the bank.

1. Scalability

Your business will grow and won’t stay in the same size forever. With your growing business, even your communication tool should grow. Founders of SMBs must strive to find highly scalable solutions. When searching for a type of solution, look for flexibility in terms of payment plans or range, meaning only pay for what you need which can grow with the business.

2. Ease of Use

Complex tools can overwhelm teams and slow productivity. Alternatives to Intercom should prioritize intuitive interfaces that make onboarding a breeze and ensure team members can focus on customers, not clunky software. The learning growth should be easier for new users so that it can be speedily adopted. 

Intercom’s extensive feature set can feel overwhelming, especially for teams with limited technical expertise. Alternatives often offer streamlined, user-friendly interfaces that prioritize simplicity and ease of use.

3. Pricing and Value for Money

Small and medium-sized business needs affordable customer support tools that will not burn the pocket of users. Multiple alternatives to Intercom help small businesses to provide solutions at affordable prices. You can find tools like Desku that do not compromise the quality while staying budget-friendly.

4. Feature Set for Customer Engagement

Each business is different and so it has unique needs catering that will help the business when it is needed. Desk software is crucial for managing user queries and communications, offering features like ticket management and cross-channel support. Intercom offers plenty of features, but small-scale business needs specific features that cater to the specific areas. Live chat software plays a vital role in facilitating real-time engagement and support, enhancing customer experience through chatbots and integration with other tools. It may be AI-powered chatbots, multichannel communication, or robust and accurate analytics.

Multi-Channel Messaging

Intercom offers robust live chat capabilities, but it may not provide the same level of support for other customer communication channels. Some multi-channel messaging limitations to consider include:

• Social Media Messaging: Intercom’s support for social media messaging and customer inquiries may be limited, making it difficult to engage with customers on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
• Email Marketing and Automation: Intercom does not offer built-in email marketing or automation tools, which are essential for nurturing customer relationships and driving engagement.
• Phone and SMS Integration: Limited integration with customer support channels like phone and SMS can hinder comprehensive customer communication strategies.

Businesses may seek alternative solutions that offer more comprehensive multi-channel messaging capabilities to ensure they can engage with customers across various platforms.

AI-Powered Tools

Intercom’s AI-powered tools, such as Fin, are impressive, but they may not be available in all pricing plans or may require additional costs. Some AI-powered tool limitations to consider include:

• Access to AI Tools: Limited access to AI-powered chatbots and automation tools can restrict businesses from leveraging advanced technologies to enhance customer support.
• Customer Segmentation and Personalization: Intercom lacks built-in AI-powered customer segmentation or personalization tools, which are crucial for delivering tailored customer experiences.
• Integration with AI Platforms: Limited integration with AI-powered customer service platforms can hinder businesses from fully utilizing AI to improve customer engagement and satisfaction.

Businesses may seek alternative solutions that offer more comprehensive AI-powered tools to enhance customer engagement, support, and satisfaction.

By evaluating these limitations, businesses can better understand their needs and seek alternative solutions that cater to their specific requirements.

5. Customizability and Personalization

Customers expect customization and personalization but at affordable pricing. With the expected personalized interactions, it must allow to tailor the messages, workflows, and interfaces to deliver robust customer experiences. While Intercom is powerful, it lacks deep customization capabilities in areas like UI adjustments or workflow personalization. 

6 Best Intercom Alternatives To Have a Look

1 Desku

Desku is one of the comprehensive customer support platforms that suit all businesses. Apart from it is affordable for each business model, may it be a small or large-scale business. The intrusive features like live chat, chatbot, multichannel support, AI-trained chatbot, and more are provided without burning your pocket.

Desku is the ultimate partner to transform customer support into an easy and productive process. All queries from different channels can be brought in on one intuitive dashboard, then support teams can prioritize and respond to problems faster than ever while increasing productivity and response times. Desku helps customer support agents manage communication through various channels.

Eva, the AI-powered chatbot that will lighten your support team’s workload, lies at the heart of Desku’s brilliance. Eva can quickly handle repetitive customer inquiries, like tracking orders or recommending products while escalating the more complex issues to human agents. It is a tireless assistant, ensuring no customer waits. Desku efficiently manages customer requests with built-in ticketing systems and AI-powered chatbots.

But Desku doesn’t stop there. Powerful integrations with Shopify and Slack make it perfect for e-commerce and SaaS businesses looking to streamline operations. Add real-time analytics and reporting tools to track metrics like resolution times and customer satisfaction, and you have a recipe for continuous improvement.

With flexible pricing plans and a free trial to get you started, Desku grows with your business and is a smart, scalable choice for companies that value exceptional customer service.

Key features

• Engage with your customers in real-time using a seamless live chat interface. Answer queries, provide support, and cultivate long-lasting relationships in one easy-to-use platform.
• Helpdesk Group your customer support in such a unified helpdesk where all tickets from different channels are gathered into one. This way, your team can prioritize, track, and efficiently resolve issues.
• Omnichannel Support Monitor and manage all your customer conversations, from email to social media chats, in one place. With Desku, omnichannel ensures consistent and unified experiences across all platforms.
• No Code Chatbot Creator Build custom chatbots without a single line of code. Guide users, automate answers, and take care of repetitive tasks easily using an intuitive drag-and-drop builder.
• Knowledge Base Build a self-service knowledge base that enables both customers and teams. Answer frequently asked questions, guides, and tutorials that can help reduce the volume of tickets raised and increase customer satisfaction.
• AI Chatbots for Customers – Give 24 – hour – seven – day support with AI chatbots that can answer customers’ frequent inquiries, perform tasks like order tracking, and recommend items according to what the customer needs great way to save time and cost.
• AI Co-Pilot for Teams – Greatly boost intake team capabilities with an AI-backed co-pilot that makes intelligent suggestions automates dull workflows, and offers insights to inject support challenges a dose of practicality.
• Automation- Automate repetitive tasks such as ticket categorization, follow-ups, and escalations. Automations take off the control of your team to focus on high-value interactions that lead to improved response times.
• Real-Time Visitors List-Monitor and interact with your website visitors in real-time. Learns the behavior of the visitors and directly engages with the odds of conversions in a way customer experience is enhanced.
• Efficient Customer Queries Handling – Desku’s AI chatbots handle customer queries efficiently, providing instant assistance and streamlining customer interactions to enhance service quality.

Pros of Desku 

• User-friendly: It provides intuitive and easy navigation for all kinds of teams.
• Full-featured: Allows live chat, helpdesk, knowledge base, and chatbot builder all in one platform. 
• AI-Driven Tools: Offers AI-powered chatbots and an AI co-pilot for smarter support and automation.
• Omnichannel Support: Centralizes interactions across multiple channels, including email, social media, and website chat.
• Customizable Solutions: No-code chatbot builder and flexible settings make it adaptable to various business needs.
• Affordable Pricing: Scalable plans with a free trial, making it budget-friendly for startups and small businesses.
• Powerful Integrations: Works seamlessly with Shopify, Slack, and other tools, ideal for e-commerce and SaaS businesses.
• Real-Time Insights: Features like real-time visitor tracking and analytics help optimize customer engagement.
• Efficient Automation: Automates repetitive tasks, improving team efficiency and response times.
• Strong Support Team: Responsive and helpful customer support, ensuring smooth onboarding and troubleshooting.

Cons of Desku

More features coming soon!

Pricing

• Startup: $19/per seat/month
• Team: $39/per seat/month
• Business: $59/per seat/month

Integration capabilities

For the Ecommerce stack, it integrates with:

• Shopify 
• Ecommerce
• Ecwid
• Shopline

Integration with other tools: 

• WhatsApp
• Facebook Messenger
• Instagram
• Slack
• Shopify
• Telegram
• WooCommerce
• Twitter
• Twilio
• Google Business Messages
• Email
• Line
• Viber

Support channels

• Live Chat 
• Support Email 
• Contact Us page from the website 

Reviews and Ratings for Customer Satisfaction

Ratings:

G2: 4.8/5

Reviews: 

Desku offers an all-in-one platform to streamline team collaboration & responses with shared inbox features, cross-channel functionality, options/rules to automate repetitive tasks along with having all the communication in one place. Our team can now assign tickets to the relevant support agents for faster & context-based resolution.

Desku is a lifesaver for our customer support team. The Eva AI bot handles most of the queries, freeing up our team for more complex issues. The No-Code Chatbot Builder is super easy to use, and we deployed it on our Shopify store in no time. Plus, it’s way cheaper than Intercom but does the job just as well.

2 Zendesk

Zendesk is a multi-channel customer service platform aimed at enhancing the customer service experience through email, live chat, phone, and social media. Its ticketing system helps make it easier to manage inquiries through AI-driven routing and workflows, making tickets get solved faster by routing them to the right agents.

Zendesk’s Help Center equips customers to find answers for themselves through a customizable knowledge base, while live chat and messaging tools allow businesses to engage with customers in real time on websites, apps, and social media. Businesses can use 24/7 AI-powered bots to respond to routine questions without hiring extra staff.

Key Features

• Messaging and Live Chat: Engage customers in real-time across websites, apps, and social media for faster resolutions.
• AI and Automation: Leverage AI-driven tools and workflows to streamline ticket routing and handle routine queries 24/7.
• Data Privacy and Protection: Ensure customer data is secure with robust privacy measures and compliance with industry standards.
• Help Center: Offer self-service options with a customizable knowledge base for customers to find answers independently.
• Agent Workspace: Provide agents with a unified, streamlined dashboard to manage customer interactions efficiently.
• Voice Support: Deliver personalized service with integrated call handling and seamless voice communication.
• Workforce Engagement: Optimize team performance with tools to monitor, manage, and engage support staff effectively.

Pros of Zendesk

• Ease of Use: Intuitive interface that makes it simple for teams to navigate and manage customer interactions.
• Intrusive Features: Offers a comprehensive suite of tools to handle customer support across multiple channels.
• Customer Support: Provides responsive and reliable support to ensure smooth operations for users.
• Efficiency: Streamlines workflows and automates processes, reducing resolution times and boosting productivity.

Cons of Zendesk

• Difficult learning curve
• No support system to help customer
• Cancelling contract 
• 60days’s notice to cancel or downgrade the  contract
• Unorganised UI 
• Complicated feature setting

Pricing

• Support Team: $19/per agent/per month
• Suite Team: $55/per agent/month
• Suite Professional: $115/per agent/month

Integration capabilities

• Salesforce Integration
• Jira Integration
• Slack Integration
• HubSpot Integration
• Shopify Integration
• Power BI Integration
• Tableau Integration
• WordPress Integration
• WhatsApp Integration
• Microsoft Teams Integration

Support Channels

• Contact sales team 
• Live Chat 
• Email

Reviews and Ratings

Ratings

G2: 4.3 /5

Reviews:

They do have not a support system to help the customer. Either we have to stick with our partners or we have to do everything on our own.

Almost everything. Primarily the lack of support. Even in canceling our contract. We informed our Account Executive in March we would not be renewing in June, and our card was still charged. No way to cancel your contract in the tool despite guides in their “help center” that indicate you can. If you are a growing tech startup, avoid Zendesk AT ALL COSTS.

3 Freshdesk

Freshdesk, part of the Freshworks suite, is a dynamic customer support platform that simplifies managing inquiries across email, chat, phone, and social media. Its AI-powered ticketing system centralizes requests into one dashboard, while automation like task routing and SLA management boost efficiency.

With a customizable self-service portal, customers can find answers independently, reducing team workload. Freshdesk integrates seamlessly with popular tools, offers advanced analytics, and provides scalable pricing plans to meet the needs of businesses of all sizes.

Key Features

• Ticketing: Centralized ticketing system for streamlined issue resolution and team collaboration.
• Freddy AI: AI-powered assistant to enhance customer support and agent productivity.
• Analytics and Insights: Real-time dashboards and customizable reports to monitor support operations.
• Self-Service: Multilingual knowledge base and customizable customer portals for empowering customers.
• Routing and SLA: Automated ticket routing and SLA policies to prioritize and assign tasks efficiently.
• Security: Advanced role-based access, single sign-on, and IP whitelisting for secure operations.

Pros of Freshdesk

• Easy to use
• Can easily detect the bottlenecks 
• Automation features are useful for users in every stage

Cons of Freshdesk

• Multiple features that are needed are missing
• Ticketing management and handling issues
• Limited features at a lower cost 
• Lack of customer support
• Most of the users are untrustworthy and cannot rely on getting instant replies

Pricing

• Free plan
• Growth: $15/agent/month (billed annually)
• Pro: $49/agent/month (billed annually)
• Enterprise: $79/agent/month (billed annually)

Integration capabilities

• Google Calendar
• Slack
• Microsoft Teams
• Google Analytics 
• Skyvia 

and more

Support Channels

• Live Chat 
• Support Email 

Reviews and Ratings

Ratings:

G2 : 4.4 /5

Reviews:

Lack of customer support, every time we need to wait.

Their business and billing practices. They promised an upgraded experience but 1 year later it never happened so we canceled fresh chat and then were promised the use of Freddy AI Insights under the Enterprise plan using Freshdeck. We renewed, and they added 2 more users to our plan we caught and inquired about. They responded with “Hi Kevin,

4 Drift Live Chat

Drift is an AI-driven, human-centric platform designed to revolutionize buyer engagement. It seamlessly listens, understands, and adapts to buyers, delivering personalized and human-like experiences at every stage of the purchasing journey.

By analyzing conversational data and buyer behavior, Drift empowers businesses to foster stronger customer relationships, drive pipeline growth, and boost revenue. It redefines the B2B website experience, modernizing how companies engage with prospects and customers.

Key Features

• Pop-up Chat: Engage visitors instantly with a chat popup.
• Notifications: Notify users in real time for seamless communication.
• Targeted Emails: Send personalized email campaigns to specific audiences.
• In-App Messaging: Communicate directly within your app interface.
• Customer-facing Chatbot: Automate customer interactions with AI chatbots.
• Lead Qualification: Identify and prioritize high-quality leads.
• Meeting Scheduling: Allow users to book meetings effortlessly.

Pros of Drift

• Faster customer support response 
• Features that are suitable for small and medium-sized business
• It helps in lead generation and better customer support engaging
• Easy and instant live chat features that help to instantly respond to customers

Cons of Drift

• Initial setup is difficult for users
• No filter for junk emails and interactions
• Difficult in password resetting 
• Always looking for tpselling to their users no matter whether they need it or not.

Pricing

Contact them to get a quote

Integration capabilities

Multiple tools can be integrated. You have to contact them for more details.

Support Channels

• Live chat 
• Self-service portal 
• Platform status 
• The contact form on the website

Reviews and Ratings

Ratings:

G2: 4.4/ 5

Reviews:

Initial setup can be burdensome. The workflows, chat mappings, and workflow can be difficult. It would be great to see more pre-made templates.

I have clients who have left an important message and I can’t get to it. The password reset emails are not coming through to my email address. So I sent Drift a support request to send me a reset email manually and they closed the ticket without even looking at it saying it was a free account and free accounts don’t get support.

5 Tidio

Tidio is a powerful customer service platform combining live chat, AI chatbots, and a helpdesk to facilitate customer communication as well as boost sales. It centralizes all channels, such as email, Messenger, or Instagram, into one dashboard; the AI chatbot, Lyro, handles up to 70% of inquiries, with human-like responses for 24/7 support and freeing agents for complex tasks.

Easy workflow automation, especially lead generation and order tracking, is offered by Tidio through its no-code chatbot builder. Of particular value to e-commerce is the ability to recover abandoned carts and guide customers through purchases. Canned responses and visitor tracking help agents connect with high-value prospects seamlessly.

Key Features

• Live Chat 
• Chatbot 
• Order Management 
• Ticketing and Helpdesk 
• Departments
• Analytics and Reports 
• Communication Channels 
• Customization 
• Support 
• Multiple integrations

Pros of Tidio

• On-point customer support who are available 24/7 
• Best for live chat and instantly connecting with customers
• Multiple device compatibility 
• Easy to implement and start work on

Cons of Tidio

• Loading problems in the website after integration of live chat 
• Confusing pricing plans 
• It does not exactly set the small business

Pricing

• Starter: $29/month
• Growth: $59/month
• Plush: $749/month
• Premium: $2999/month

Integration capabilities

• Shopify
• WordPress
• Squarespace
• WIX
• Adobe Commerce
• Shopware
• BigCommerce
• PrestaShop
• Ecwid by Lightspeed
• Weebly
• WooCommerce
• OpenCart
• Joomla
• Jimdo
• Webydo
• Drupal
• Shift4Shop

Support Channels

• Live Chat 
• Website contact form

Reviews and Ratings

Ratings: 

G2: 4.7 /5

Reviews: 

We’ve been using Tidio for over 2 years now and just now we noticed that it’s harming our site. We started to do some SEO work and noticed our loading speeds were so mad and one of the biggest problems was the Tidio. After contacting support they just suggested and kept saying, not them and to ignore the issue. I talked to

The pricing plan is extremely confusing. As I mentioned to your support team. Second, I discussed the HubSpot integration with 4 support staff, and only one mentioned that the HubSpot integration doesn’t work, except to send the email of the contact to HubSpot, and nothing is automated. This was a discussion over two months. As I kept getting different answers, the last support staff ensured that the HubSpot integration was native and I wouldn’t have any issues.

6 Crisp

Crisp Chat is a strong customer engagement platform that includes live chat, chatbots, CRM, and multi-channel messaging. Its shared inbox centralizes messages from email, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp, and SMS into one dashboard, allowing teams to respond in real time.

A no-code chatbot builder can help automate tasks such as lead qualification and 24/7 customer support. Crisp also has a feature of co-browsing where agents can assist customers in navigation through the website, enhancing user experience and solving problems efficiently.

Key Features

• Widget: Customizable chat widget to engage visitors directly on your website.
• AI Chatbot: Automates customer interactions, which includes lead qualification and FAQs 24/7.
• CRM: Built-in customer relationship management to track and nurture customer interactions.
• Shared Inbox: Combines messages from multiple channels (email, social media, SMS) into a single dashboard.
• AI and Automation: Improves productivity through automated workflows, chat routing, and personalized responses.
• Campaigns: Run email and messaging campaigns targeted at converting customers.
• Knowledge Base Portal: A self-service resource center designed to help your customers find what they need in a timely fashion.
• Ticketing System: Process and prioritize your customer inquiries.

Pros of Crisp Chat

• Easy to integrate
• Easy to use for beginners and low learning curve
• Good customer support 

Cons of Crisp Chat

• Customer email delievery issue
• Money-back and refund problems 
• Complications in integrating a few complex apps and platforms 

Pricing

• Free plan available 
• Essential: $95/month
• Plus: $285/month

Integration capabilities

• Video support
• n8n
• Briskport
• Message Scheduler
• Segment
• Zapier
• Support AI ChatBot
• Rotic Chatbot
• LunaGPT
• Quick Actions
• Auto-Responder
• Spam Detector
• Data Cleaner
• Quicklinks
• Auto-Delete

Support Channels

• Live Chat 
• Contact Forms 
• Customer Center 

Reviews and Ratings

Ratings: 

G2: 4.5 /5

Reviews:

We had several email deliverability issues with Outlook users in particular, which caused us loss of business, and we didn’t feel like the support cared much/knew what was happening. We had to unplug Crisp and respond from Gmail while transitioning to another service.

Our users often report that they haven’t heard back from us, when we looked into this it turns out Crisp hadn’t even sent our support teams responses in many cases.

How To Choose The Right Customer Support Intercom Alternative Tool For Your Business?

Understand Your Business Needs

Determine your specific needs, such as multi-channel support, chatbot automation, and team collaboration. Desku provides these features without the high costs of Intercom.

Check Pricing and Scalability

Choose tools that offer transparent, affordable pricing with scalability as your business grows. Desku offers flexible plans for businesses of all sizes, ensuring value for money.

Ease of Use

Seek a platform that is easy to set up and use. With Desku’s intuitive interface, your team gets started right away, with no extended training.

Customization Options

Choose a tool that lets you customize workflows, chat widgets, and reports so that they are aligned with your brand. Desku allows you to have numerous customization features tailored to your business.

Multi-Channel Integration

Ensure the platform integrates with several channels, including WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and email, for communication. Desku brings all the channels together in one place for better management.

Customer Support Features

Choose tools with strong ticketing systems, automation, and knowledge base management. Desku scores well in all these areas by making customer support processes easier.

Emphasize Automation and AI

Automation saves time and enhances customer experience. Desku offers advanced AI-powered chatbots that handle inquiries efficiently, unlike the costly AI add-ons of Intercom.

Transparent Customer Support

Choose a provider that ensures excellent support for its users. Desku is known for its reliable customer service, ensuring you’re never left stranded.

Budget-Friendly for SMBs

The other thing is that the Intercom tends to be too pricey for small businesses. However, Desku is designed to suit small and medium businesses in terms of cost, with its powerful features offered at a fraction of the price.

Proactive Engagement Features

Look for proactive messaging and engagement tools. Desku helps you reach your customers efficiently through proactive chats and notifications that make every single interaction valuable.

Conclusion

Accurate customer support software is one of the foremost factors affecting efficiency, customer experience, and cost-saving, while Intercom, no doubt being one compelling tool, is often not worth the cost and complexity for many companies. 

On the other hand, Desku strikes the perfect balance with its cost-effectiveness, intuitive nature, and the complete package to run your support operations.

Switching to Desku will save you more money and time. 

Grab on to Desku and watch your business stick to the new paradigm of cost-effectiveness while making customers happy.

FAQs