Intercom
Best Deal
Early Stage startups get up to 90% off year one including Advanced plan with 6 seats, 20 lite seats, and Copilot access. Free Starter plan available for small teams.
Intercom Review 2026 - Features, Pricing & Deals
Intercom is a customer service platform that combines live chat, helpdesk management, and AI-powered automation into one solution. The platform handles customer inquiries across chat, email, SMS, and WhatsApp through conversations rather than rigid ticket systems.
At its core, Intercom uses two AI systems to improve support efficiency. Fin AI Agent handles routine customer questions 24/7 by learning from your help center content, while Copilot works alongside human agents to summarize conversations, suggest replies, and provide guidance on complex issues. When Fin can't resolve something, it hands off the conversation to your team with full context.
The platform includes a shared inbox that consolidates messages from all channels, workflow automation to handle repetitive tasks, and a customizable help center that can be private or multilingual. You'll also get analytics to track both AI and human performance, plus pre-built integrations with tools like HubSpot, Salesforce, Zendesk, and Slack.
Intercom's pricing starts at $29 per seat per month for the Essential plan, which covers basic helpdesk and chat features. Advanced plans add multiple team inboxes, workflow automation, and multilingual support. The AI features are add-ons: Fin costs $0.99 per resolution with a $49.50 monthly minimum, while Copilot adds $29 per month per agent.
For early-stage startups, Intercom offers an Early Stage program with up to 90% off in the first year, including access to the Advanced plan with 6 seats, 20 lite seats, and Copilot. There's also a free Starter plan for small teams just getting started with basic live chat and outbound messaging.
Who is Intercom for?
Intercom works best for customer-focused teams that need to handle support, engagement, and messaging in one place. It saves time through AI automation while keeping conversations from feeling robotic across multiple channels.
- Customer support teams who want to automate routine queries with AI so they can focus on complex issues that require human expertise
- Small businesses and startups looking for an all-in-one solution that starts free and scales up as their support needs grow
- SaaS companies that need to onboard users, provide ongoing support, and reduce churn through better communication
- E-commerce businesses wanting real-time shopping assistance across chat, email, and WhatsApp to increase conversions
- Support managers seeking better analytics to track both AI and human performance across all channels
- Businesses already using helpdesks like Zendesk or Salesforce who want to add Fin AI Agent without switching platforms
- Non-technical teams that need an intuitive interface for setting up chat, automation, and messaging without coding
Intercom is used across technology companies, online retailers, financial services, and any business where fast, personalized customer communication directly impacts success.
Online Reviews (Last 6 Months Summarised)
Intercom gets strong praise from users who value its ability to unify customer communication across multiple channels. People consistently mention the intuitive interface that works well for non-technical teams, the reliable uptime, and the targeting features that let you personalize messages based on user behavior. The real-time chat support improves customer engagement, and the analytics give you visibility into what's working. Teams appreciate how easy it is to integrate with existing tools like Slack, Zendesk, and HubSpot.
The cost is a major issue. Small businesses and startups often find Intercom prohibitively expensive, especially once you add the AI features and scale beyond a few seats. Users report billing issues and unexpected charges that make budgeting difficult. The platform's feature set can be overwhelming to learn and master. The mobile app doesn't match the web experience. Customer support can be slow outside business hours. The chat widget customization options are more limited than expected.
Features
- Unified Helpdesk Management: Track and resolve customer support tickets through a shared inbox that consolidates messages from chat, email, SMS, and WhatsApp into one place.
- Omnichannel Live Chat: Handle customer conversations through web chat widgets, email, SMS, WhatsApp, and social media with handoffs between channels.
- Fin AI Agent: Deploy a 24/7 AI chatbot trained on your help center content that resolves customer questions automatically and hands off complex issues to human agents with full context.
- Copilot Agent Assistant: Give human agents an AI assistant that summarizes conversations, suggests replies, expands brief responses, and provides guidance to improve productivity.
- Workflow Automation: Create automated processes for repetitive tasks, smart routing of queries to the right team members, and consistent handling of common scenarios.
- Targeted Outbound Messaging: Send personalized communications based on user behavior, demographics, and customer lifecycle stages to drive engagement and retention.
- Performance Analytics: Track AI resolution rates, agent response times, conversation outcomes, and customer satisfaction with pre-built reports and custom dashboards.
- Third-Party Integrations: Connect with tools like Slack, Salesforce, Zendesk, HubSpot, Pipedrive, and GitHub through pre-built integrations or APIs for custom connections.
Pricing
- Essential Plan costs $29 per seat per month, offering a shared inbox, basic ticketing, branded Messenger chat, email support, basic help center, and pre-built reports.
- Advanced Plan priced at $85 per seat per month, adding multiple team inboxes, workflow automation, and a private multilingual help center to all Essential features.
- Expert Plan at $132 per seat per month, designed for large teams with SSO, identity management, HIPAA support, and service level agreements on top of Advanced features.
- Fin AI Agent add-on costs $0.99 per resolution with a $49.50 monthly minimum (50 resolutions), included with all seat plans or available standalone for external helpdesks.
- Copilot add-on priced at $29 per month per agent, includes 10 Copilot conversations and 10 AI auto-translation conversations free each month.
- Proactive Support Plus add-on at $99 per month includes 500 outbound messages for targeted customer engagement campaigns.
- Free Starter Plan available for small teams with basic live chat, outbound messaging, and basic audience segmentation.
- Early Stage program offers up to 90% off year one for eligible startups, including Advanced plan with 6 seats, 20 lite seats, and Copilot access.
Frequently Asked Questions
Intercom uses two separate AI systems with different pricing. Fin AI Agent costs $0.99 per successful resolution with a $49.50 monthly minimum, which covers 50 resolutions. This AI handles customer questions 24/7 using your help center content. Copilot costs $29 per month per agent and helps your human team work faster with conversation summaries, reply suggestions, and guidance. Both include free conversations each month: Copilot gives you 10 free AI conversations and 10 free auto-translations. You can add Fin to any seat plan or use it standalone with external helpdesks like Zendesk or Salesforce without paying for Intercom seats.
Can Fin AI Agent handle complex customer issues?Fin works best with common questions it can answer using your help center content. It has handled over 13 million inquiries for 4,000+ customers since launching in 2023. When it encounters something complex or outside its knowledge base, it knows to hand off the conversation to your human agents with a full summary and context. This means your team doesn't start from scratch. Many companies report Fin resolves 30-50% of routine inquiries completely on its own, letting human agents focus on problems that actually need their expertise.
How easy is it to set up Intercom for my business?Basic setup takes a few hours. You'll add a code snippet to your website or app, customize your chat widget, and build out your help center content. The more you add to your knowledge base, the smarter Fin becomes at answering questions. Users say the platform has a learning curve because it offers so many features, so plan to spend a few weeks exploring all the options and getting your team comfortable with workflows. Intercom offers guided onboarding and video tutorials to help. The interface is designed for non-technical teams, so you won't need developers for most tasks.
What integrations does Intercom support?Intercom connects with most popular business tools through pre-built integrations. You get HubSpot, Pipedrive, WhatsApp, and GitHub in the Essential plan. It also works with Salesforce, Zendesk, Slack, Trello, Shopify, and many more through direct connections or APIs. These integrations keep customer data in sync across your systems. For example, when a customer starts a chat, you can instantly see their purchase history from your CRM or order details from your e-commerce platform. If you need something custom, Intercom offers APIs for developers to build their own connections.
Is there a free version and how does the Early Stage program work?Yes, Intercom offers a free Starter plan for small teams with basic live chat, outbound messaging, and basic audience segmentation. All paid plans come with a 14-day free trial so you can test features before committing. For eligible early-stage startups, the Early Stage program offers up to 90% off in the first year. This includes the Advanced plan with 6 seats, 20 lite seats, and Copilot access. You'll need to apply and meet their criteria for early-stage companies, but it's a significant discount that makes the platform accessible when you're just starting out.
