Crisp

Crisp suits teams that want customer conversations, self-service content and automation in one workspace. Its free plan makes a low-cost start possible, but the two-seat cap and lack of AI credits mean growing or AI-dependent teams will need a paid tier.

Overview

Crisp is a customer-support platform for support, inbound sales and marketing teams. It brings conversations from multiple channels into a shared inbox and pairs that workspace with a help center, AI agents and workflow tools. Founded in 2015, the company is headquartered in Nantes, France.

Key features

Shared inbox and chat

The collaborative inbox gathers inbound conversations across channels, which gives teams one place to coordinate replies. Crisp also offers website chat, a website chatbot, live-agent chat and visitor tracking. Its widget works on websites and web apps as well as native iOS, Android and React apps, making it relevant to teams supporting customers across those touchpoints.

Help content, AI and workflows

Teams can create and manage help articles in a customer-facing help center, adding a self-service route alongside live support. Crisp can train AI from website content, PDFs, help articles, conversations and private snippets. No-code workflows cover internal automation and customer-facing AI agents. These tools offer a broad support toolkit, but AI capacity is tied to plan credits and automated-conversation allowances rather than being unlimited.

Integrations, API and security

The directory includes 2,000 integrations across CRM, CMS, marketing, messaging and teamwork, including Salesforce, HubSpot, Shopify, Slack, WhatsApp and Jira. A REST API lets teams access and control data such as conversations and contacts, which is useful for custom connections. Crisp says it applies GDPR protections, uses encrypted backups and limits access to customer data by need to know. Public network channels use TLS with forward secrecy and HTTP Strict Transport Security; messaging servers are hosted in the Netherlands and plugin servers in Germany.

Pricing

The free plan costs nothing, billed Forever. It includes two seats, unlimited conversations and 100 customer profiles, but no AI credits. That is a practical starting point for a small team handling conversations without AI; the seat and profile caps limit its use as the team or customer base grows.

Mini costs $45 a month, billed per month, per workspace. It raises capacity to four seats and 5,000 profiles, with around 90 automated conversations and $ 5 in included AI credits. It suits a small team that needs some automation, though the conversation allowance is modest.

Essentials costs $95 a month, billed per month, per workspace, and provides 10 seats, 50,000 profiles, around 450 automated conversations and $ 25 in AI credits. It is the more credible fit for a growing support team, with a substantial increase in team and customer capacity over Mini.

Plus costs $295 a month, billed per month, per workspace. It includes 20+ seats, 200,000 profiles, around 1,350 automated conversations and $ 75 in AI credits, targeting larger teams with heavier automation needs. Enterprise has custom pricing and adds dedicated onboarding, a personalized SLA, enhanced rate limits, custom features and team training.

Every new account gets a 14-day trial of all Crisp features without a card. The trial gives teams a way to assess the broader toolset before choosing a plan.

Platforms

Crisp supports Android, iOS, macOS, Windows and web, alongside an API. Its desktop app is available for macOS and Windows.

Who it's for

Crisp is best suited to teams that want a shared, multi-channel support workspace with help content and automation, and can match their needs to its per-workspace seat, profile and AI allowances. The free tier fits a two-person operation with limited profile needs; teams needing more seats, customer capacity or AI should compare the paid tiers. It is less compelling for anyone who needs AI without plan-based quotas.

Pros and cons

• Pros: One inbox spans inbound channels, while the widget reaches websites, web apps and supported mobile and React apps.
• Pros: Help articles, AI training sources and no-code workflows bring self-service and automation into the same support workspace.
• Pros: The free plan allows unlimited conversations, and the 14-day full-feature trial requires no card.
• Cons: Free is limited to two seats and 100 customer profiles, with no AI credits.
• Cons: Paid plans set finite automated-conversation allowances and AI credits, so teams with heavier use must account for those caps.
• Cons: The monthly per-workspace price rises from 45.00 USD on Mini to 295.00 USD on Plus as seat and usage capacity grows.

Alternatives

For a self-hosted, open-source option with no per-message or per-room fees, consider Jack The Butler; hosting and AI API usage may still cost extra. For usage-based SMS, Smstools charges from €0.025 per message with no subscription and volume discounts. If the need is specifically SMS messaging through an API, compare Clickatell SMS API, whose prepaid outgoing-message prices vary by destination and message type. For other options, see Live chat software, SMS Chatbot Software and Social Media Customer Service Software.

Verdict

Choose Crisp if your team wants shared customer conversations, help content and automation together, and its seat and AI allowances fit your workload. Its strongest case is the combination of channels and support tools with a genuinely usable free entry point; look elsewhere if you need more than two free seats or AI without plan-bound credits and conversation limits.