Freshdesk vs Intercom 2025 (Which is Better Customer Service Software?)
While Freshdesk and Intercom are both great customer service tools, they do have some key differences. In this comparison article, we’re going to dive into the features, pricing, and customer satisfaction of each software to help you to make the decision.
Which One is Better, Freshdesk or Intercom?
The help desk software market is growing more competitive by the day. Two popular options are Intercom and Freshdesk. Both have their pros and cons, but which one is better for your business? Here are our three use cases to see which one is better.
Better Features
Based on the number of features, Freshdesk is the better option.
Better Price
Looking for the pricing, Freshdesk is a more affordable option.
People’s Choice
Based on trusted customer reviews, it’s a draw!
Overall Winner:
Freshdesk 2-0
Freshdesk vs Intercom Pros and Cons
Both Intercom and Freshdesk have their pros and cons, but one may be a better fit for your company depending on your needs. In this section, we will compare and contrast the pros and cons of both platforms to help you make the best decision for your business.
Freshdesk Pros & Cons
Pros:
- 21-day free trial
- Has everything you need for full-house customer support
- Ticket dispatch
- Help Center
- Community forums
- Social media inquiries to tickets
Cons:
- Complex pricing
- Too many features for small businesses
Intercom Pros & Cons
Pros:
- Public help center
- Intercom messenger
- Live chat for support
- Twitter, Facebook and Instagram integration
- Conversation routing bot
- Article suggestions bot
Cons:
- Price only on request
- Complex for small businesses
Freshdesk vs Intercom Price Comparison
Let’s take a look at these two’s pricing plans to see which one offers better pricing.
Freshdesk Pricing Plans
Freshdesk’s pricing comes in four tiers: Free, Growth, Pro, and Enterprise. The Free plan includes integrated ticketing across email and social channels, a knowledge base, reporting capabilities, and more. The Growth plan adds automation and access to over 1000 marketplace apps for $18 per user per month. The Pro plan includes multiple product support and custom roles for $59 per user per month. The Enterprise plan is for heavy-users.
Free — $0 per user per month
- Integrated ticketing across email and social
- Ticket Dispatch
- Knowledge Base
- Ticket Trend Report
- Out-of-the-box analytics and reporting
Growth — $18 per user per month
- Automation
- 1000+ marketplace apps
- SLA management & business hours
- Custom Email Server
- Custom SSL
Pro — $59 per user per month
- Multiple products
- Includes up to 5000 Collaborators
- Round-robin routing
- Custom Roles
- Custom Reports and Dashboards
Enterprise — $95 per user per month
Everything in Pro
- Assist bot
- Email bot
- Knowledge base approval workflow
- Auto-triage
- AI-powered social signals
Intercom Pricing Plans
Intercom’s pricing comes in three tiers: Support, Engage, and Convert. Each tier includes various features such as live chat for support, team inboxes, help articles, conversational bots, outbound messaging, and meeting booking. Pricing for each tier is available upon request.
Support — Price on request
- Live chat for support
- Team inboxes
- Tickets
- Help articles
- Conversational bots
- Resolution bot
Engage — Price on request
- Outbound email and in-product messaging
- Push messages & notifications
- Custom bots
- Mobile Carousels
- Banner messages
- Salesforce & Marketo integrations
Convert — Price on request
- Conversational chatbots
- Live chat for sales
- Smart lead qualification
- Multiple team inboxes
- Automatic meeting booking
- Conversation routing rules
Freshdesk vs Intercom Features Comparison
While these tools share some similarities, there are also some key differences. In this section, we will compare these two software programs’ features and help you decide which one is right for you.
Freshdesk Features
Freshdesk provides a number of features to improve customer service collaboration and automate tedious tasks. These features include ticket prioritization, self-service answer bots, and team task division. The software also offers analytics to help understand customer behavior and trends. In addition, the platform is secure with SSL certification enabled by default.
Ticketing
Email gets the job done, but Freshdesk’s ticketing system is designed to do more than that; it’s created for team collaboration and agent productivity. This means you can prioritize every ticket based on the keywords mentioned. Freshdesk’s Freddy AI software is integrated with ticketing, so you can eliminate boring, repetitive tasks and save time for your agents.
Self-service
Answer bots find the best answer from your knowledge base content and deliver it to customers in real-time, 24/7. These advanced features help you focus on bigger projects by taking care of small customer issues automatically. Web widgets allow live chat with a human agent on your website for more complex inquiries.
Collaboration
Freshdesk provides various features for improved collaboration among customer service teams, helping to deliver positive experiences for customers. For example, agents can easily include teammates in ticket discussions as needed, and team members can see tickets that another team is currently working on. In addition, Freshdesk allows teams to divide tasks and work on them simultaneously.
Automations
It would be amazing to come into work every day to find that all new customer inquiries have been neatly prioritized, organized, and assigned to the right agents. You wouldn’t have any
to-do lists because tedious tasks like following up with people are automated! All you and your team would need to focus on is crafting great responses for your customers.
Analytics
Use Freshdesk’s pre-made reports for quick insights to save time and effort. With a large number of useful reports, you can avoid having to do everything manually. Also, with the added ability to visualize data within the product, you can easily comprehend a lot of information and present it in a way that is efficient and digestible for those who need to see it.
Secure Help Desk
Keep your communication safe and secure with web browser-to-web server encryption. With a Freshdesk account, you get an SSL certificate enabled by default. Within 72 hours, you can have your own support domain or vanity URL up and running too. Plus, add multiple portals to your Freshdesk account–all with authenticated SSL certification.
Intercom Features
Intercom messenger
By adding the Intercom Messenger to your product, app, or website, you’re able to create meaningful engagement with your customers that will result in fruitful relationships.
Inbox
Intercom’s Inbox includes all of the essential features that support teams need to stay organized, collaborate with teammates, and reach more customers efficiently.
Customizable bots
By asking the right questions, Custom Bots prioritize and route new conversations for more efficient support. Chatbots can be tailored specifically to your business needs—connect them to your tech stack, let them automate your workflows, or have them extend your sales and support teams.
Help articles
Make it easy for your customers to find the answers they need, when they need them. With Intercom’s central answering system, you can optimize for all channels – website, mobile app, in-product messages, or chat.
Product tours
Introduce customers to your product with guided experiences that drive adoption. Intercom’s customizable product tours ensure that users get the most out of your product, leading to increased engagement and satisfaction.
Account-based marketing
When potential customers visit your website, greet them with a personalized message so that they can connect with sales while they are most interested.
People’s Choice: Freshdesk vs Intercom
One key aspect when comparing these two services is to compare how other customers rate them. Both of the software has multiple trusted reviews so it’s easy to compare which one is better.
Freshdesk Reviews
Freshdesk has an average of 4.4-star 3rd party reviews (in legit sites like G2 and Capterra). Other customers seem to love it and consider it as a great option for their customer service software needs.
Intercom Reviews
Intercom has an average of 4.4-star 3rd party reviews (in legit sites like G2 and Capterra). Other customers seem to love it and consider it as a great option for their customer service software needs.
Top 10 Customer Support Software
Now it should be clear which platform is better for your needs. In case you’re still not happy with either of them, take a look at this list of the top 10 customer support software that has similar features.
1
Best all-in-one customer support software for help desk ticketing.
Best 2025
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2
Best for Live Chat customer support with fully-fledged customer software add-ons.
Excellent
3
Best for large enterprises looking for an all-in-one customer support solution.
Excellent
5
Best for scaling customer support teams that need top-notch features.
Very Good
8
Best call center customer service software for small and large businesses.
Good
Freshdesk vs Intercom Wrap
Choosing the right help desk software can be tricky. There are a lot of factors to consider, and each product has its own unique set of features. In this article, we’ve compared two popular help desk software on the market: Intercom and Freshdesk. We’ve looked at both products from a variety of angles, including price, customer support, features, and more.
So, which one is the best? Well, that depends on your needs and budget. Ultimately, it comes down to what works best for you.
