// 19 comparisons in Support
Jira is a work and issue tracker used mostly by software and IT teams; Zendesk is a customer service suite built around tickets, omnichannel routing and AI agents. The honest comparison is Zendesk against Jira Service Management, Atlassian's separate per-agent product. Prices sit in the same direction of travel: Jira Service Management Standard renders at $21.50 per agent a month, Zendesk Suite Team at $55 per agent billed annually.
HubSpot's Service Hub is priced per seat: Starter at $7 per month per seat, Professional at $90 and Enterprise at $150, with ticketing, live chat, calling minutes (500/3,000/12,000), knowledge bases (1 with 2,000 articles at Professional, 100 with 10,000 at Enterprise) and AI agents metered through HubSpot Credits. Zendesk prices per agent on its German pricing page: Support Team at €19 per month billed annually for ticketing, Suite Team at €55 for the unified inbox with AI agents, Suite Professional at €115, plus Copilot at €50 per agent and automated resolutions billed at €1.50 each on a pay-as-you-go option. HubSpot is cheaper at entry and stronger when service must share one contact database with marketing and sales; Zendesk is the service-native choice with per-agent pricing and marketplace depth of 1,800+ apps.
Freshsales is a sales CRM: Growth is $9 per user a month billed annually, Pro is $39 and Enterprise is $59, with a Freddy AI Agent add-on at $49 per 100 sessions and 500 free sessions on paid plans. Zendesk is a support platform: Support Team is $19 per agent a month paid yearly, Suite Team is $55 and Suite Professional is $115, with Copilot AI at $50 per agent a month and Contact Center at $83. Freshsales sells pipeline; Zendesk sells ticket resolution. Buying one to do the other's job is the expensive mistake.
Zendesk sells a customer support suite by the agent: Support Team at $19 per agent a month paid yearly for email and ticketing, Suite Team at $55 to add AI Agents and an AI knowledge base, Suite Professional at $115 for admin copilot and app builder, and Enterprise through sales, with add-ons such as Copilot at $50 per agent a month and Contact Center at $83. Zoho CRM sells a sales pipeline by the user: free for up to 3 users, Standard at $14, Professional at $23, Enterprise at $40 and Ultimate at $52 per user a month billed annually, with Zoho CRM Plus from $20 per user. The honest framing: one is a help desk, the other is a sales CRM, so the right comparison is what each does with tickets, cases and contacts rather than feature-for-feature parity.
Freshdesk is a helpdesk sold in three published tiers: Growth at $19, Pro at $55 and Enterprise at $89 per agent per month billed annually, with a 14-day trial that opens the Enterprise plan and AI priced as add-ons — Copilot $29 per agent, extra agent sessions $49 per 100, day passes $2 to $12. Salesforce Service is a CRM with service on top: Starter Suite $25, Pro Suite $100, Service Core $195, Advanced $395 and Max $550 per user per month, billed annually above Starter. Buy Freshdesk when tickets, a portal and SLAs are the job; buy Salesforce when service has to sit on the same record as sales, marketing and commerce.
Both come from Freshworks and both price per seat annually, but they solve different problems: Freshdesk is a helpdesk that turns incoming messages into tickets with a portal, SLAs and routing, at $19, $55 and $89 per agent per month for Growth, Pro and Enterprise. Freshsales is a CRM that holds contacts, pipelines and sequences, at $9, $39 and $59 per user per month for the same three tiers. Buy Freshdesk when customers write in and someone has to answer; buy Freshsales when reps work a list and deals have stages.
Freshdesk sells a helpdesk per resolving agent: Growth $19, Pro $55 and Enterprise $89 per agent per month billed annually, with the Freddy AI Agent's first 500 sessions, ticketing, a shared inbox and portal in the base tiers and Copilot at $29 per agent. HubSpot sells a platform per seat: Sales Hub is free for up to two users, $7 per seat annually on Starter, $90 Professional and $150 Enterprise, with one-time onboarding of $1,500 and $3,500. Pick Freshdesk to run support; pick HubSpot when the seat is a seller and support is one hub among several.
Freshdesk bills support in agents and dollars: Growth at $19 per agent per month billed annually, Pro at $55 and Enterprise at $89, with Freddy AI sessions at $49 per 100 after the first 500. Jira bills work in users and dollars: free forever for 10 users, then Standard at $7.91 and Premium at $14.54 per user per month billed annually, with Enterprise quoted. One prices the person answering tickets, the other prices the person filing them.
Freshdesk prices a support helpdesk per agent in US dollars: Growth at $19 per agent per month billed annually, Pro at $55 and Enterprise at $89, with AI sessions billed at $49 per 100 after the first 500. Zoho CRM prices a sales system per user in US dollars: free for 3 users, then Standard at US$14, Professional at US$23 and Enterprise at US$40 per user per month, with local taxes added and a Monthly/Annually toggle on the page. Buy on the unit: agents against users.
Freshdesk publishes three per-agent tiers — Growth $19, Pro $55 and Enterprise $89 per agent per month billed annually — and sells AI as add-ons: Freddy AI Copilot at $29 per agent, extra AI agent sessions at $49 per 100, agent day passes at $2, $7 or $12, connector tasks at $80 per 5,000 and MCP actions at $15 per 1,000. Zendesk matches the entry price with Support Team at $19 per agent paid yearly, then climbs faster: Suite Team $55, Suite Professional $115, Suite Enterprise with Copilot quoted by sales, Copilot add-on $50 and Contact Center $83 per agent. Freshdesk is the cheaper contract once agents are counted past ten; Zendesk is the wider suite when chat, messaging and voice must ship together.
HubSpot's service tooling starts free for two users, lists Starter at $20 per seat per month ($7 for new customers billed annually), Professional at $90 per seat billed annually and Enterprise at $150 per seat, with one-time onboarding of $1,500 and $3,500 on the upper tiers. Intercom lists Essential at $29 per seat per month, Advanced at $85 and Expert at $132 with annual billing, and meters its Fin AI Agent at from $0.99 per outcome. HubSpot is cheaper per seat and bundles marketing and CRM records; Intercom is a support-first system whose AI cost follows conversation volume.
Intercom and Salesforce overlap at the customer record but start from different ends. Intercom is a support and messaging platform: Essential at $29 per seat/month, Advanced at $85, Expert at $132, plus the Fin AI Agent at $0.99 per outcome. Salesforce is a CRM: Starter Suite at $25 per user/month, Pro Suite $100, Core $195, Advanced $395, Max $550. Pick Intercom to resolve conversations, Salesforce to run the pipeline, and both if you need each side connected.
Zendesk has the cheaper entry seat and the steeper ladder. Support Team is $19 per agent a month paid yearly, Suite Team is $55, Suite Professional is $115, Suite Enterprise adds Copilot at custom pricing, and AI add-ons run at $50 and $83 per agent a month. Help Scout has a Free plan, then Standard at $25 per user a month, Plus at $45 and Pro at $75, with AI resolutions at a flat $0.75 each. Zendesk is the enterprise platform: reporting, workforce management, AI agents, quality assurance and 1,800+ marketplace apps, with pricing that starts low and rises with governance. Help Scout is the smaller, flatter product where the top plan costs $75 and includes SSO/SAML and HIPAA. Match the top of the ladder, not the entry price, to your requirement list.
Help Scout and Intercom charge for seats in different shapes. Help Scout has a Free plan and then Standard at $25 per user a month, Plus at $45 and Pro at $75, with AI resolutions at $0.75 each. Intercom starts at $29 per seat a month on Essential, which includes the Fin AI Agent at $0.99 per outcome, then Advanced at $85 per seat with 20 free Lite seats and Expert at $132 per seat with 50 free Lite seats. Help Scout is the simpler helpdesk: shared inboxes, knowledge bases, workflows and SLA policies. Intercom is a wider platform where the helpdesk and the AI agent are one product, and the AI bill is metered per resolution outcome rather than bundled into the seat.
The two vendors sell the same job with opposite pricing units. Crisp charges per workspace: a free plan, then Mini at $45/month, Essentials at $95/month and Plus at $295/month, with AI credits bundled at $0, $5, $25 and $75 across those plans and extra agent licences listed at $10 per month each. Intercom charges per seat: Essential at $29 per seat per month, Advanced at $85 and Expert at $132, and meters its AI separately at $0.99 for every conversation Fin AI Agent resolves, with Copilot at $29 per agent per month on annual billing. Crisp wins on cost shape for one big shared inbox. Intercom charges more per person but bundles workspace-wide tooling and gives 20 free Lite seats on Essential so the rest of the company is not billed as support staff.
Freshdesk is the cheaper base and the more complex bill. Growth is $19 per agent per month billed annually, Pro $55 and Enterprise $89, and the Growth tier includes the first 500 Freddy AI Agent sessions; beyond that AI is bought as sessions at $49 per 100, day passes at $2 to $12 depending on plan, connector app tasks at $80 per 5,000 and MCP actions at $15 per 1,000, with Freddy AI Copilot at $29 per agent per month. Help Scout is more expensive per user, $25, $45 and $75 per month, with a single AI line at $0.75 per resolution. Choose Freshdesk when per-agent cost and AI sessions in the entry plan matter; choose Help Scout when you want one predictable per-user price and one per-resolution AI price.
The entry prices match exactly and the ladders then diverge. Front sells Starter at $25 per seat per month for up to 10 seats, Professional at $65 for up to 50 and Enterprise at $105, with annual billing saving 24 percent, and charges for AI separately: Autopilot from $0.05 per conversation, Copilot at $20 per seat per month, Smart QA at $20 per seat and Smart CSAT at $10 per seat, with heavy add-ons like Smart QA bundled into Enterprise. Help Scout sells Standard at $25 per user per month, Plus at $45 and Pro at $75, with annual billing saving 16 percent and one AI line item, AI Answers at $0.75 per resolution. Pick Front when one shared inbox spans support, sales and operations; pick Help Scout when support is the team and the budget needs to stay in one number.
Freshdesk prices agents and meters AI in sessions: Growth is $19 per agent per month billed annually with the first 500 AI Agent sessions included, Pro is $55 and Enterprise $89, with extra sessions at $49 per 100 and Copilot at $29 per agent. Intercom prices seats higher ($29 Essential, $85 Advanced, $132 Expert billed annually) but charges its Fin agent per resolved outcome from $0.99, with a standalone agent at $99 per month including 500 messages. Freshdesk is cheaper per seat and predictable on AI; Intercom is stronger when AI resolution is the centre of the service model. Choose by whether your bottleneck is headcount cost or resolution volume.
Intercom and Zendesk now bill on the same two axes - seats and AI resolutions - but they weight them differently. Intercom's Essential tier starts at $29 per seat per month billed annually ($35 monthly) with its Fin AI Agent charged from $0.99 per resolved outcome, Advanced is $85 per seat and Expert $132. Zendesk's Support Team is $19 per agent per month paid yearly for core ticketing, Suite Team steps up to $55 with AI agents and omnichannel routing, and Suite Professional is $115. Intercom is the stronger native AI story; Zendesk is the cheaper ticketing base and the more modular add-on catalogue. Decide by whether AI resolution is your cost centre or your experiment.