The best AI helpdesk software in 2026, with real prices

AI helpdesk software is a support inbox with an AI agent built in that answers customers by itself and hands harder cases to a person. The inbox collects chat, email and other channels in one place; the AI agent reads your help articles and replies in seconds, at any hour.

There are two parts to price, and vendors bundle them differently:

• The helpdesk: usually priced per seat (each teammate), or per ticket at Gorgias.
• The AI agent: priced per answer it handles, and every vendor defines that answer differently. Intercom counts outcomes, Help Scout and Zendesk count resolutions, Freshdesk counts sessions, Gorgias counts automated interactions and Tidio counts Lyro conversations.

That makes sticker prices hard to compare. The table and the worked example below put them side by side at the same volume.

We picked the helpdesks that come up most for small and growing teams, then checked every price on the company’s own pricing page on October 24, 2026, with monthly and yearly billing. Starty is our product and is ranked first for one specific job: support for an AI app you build on Starty. It is not a standalone helpdesk for other websites; if you need that, start with Intercom or Help Scout.

1. 01

   Starty

   Our product · Free with 5 credits a week; Pro $25 a month; no fee on your revenue

   Best for: Support for an AI app you build and sell on Starty

   Starty builds your AI app and puts a customer agent inside it. The agent answers your users in a chat bubble and by support email, in the customer’s language, and already knows each person’s plan, payments and usage because Starty runs all three. It hands over to you only when the customer asks for a person or your approval is needed. The customer agent is part of the Business plan at $50 a month for 100 credits.

   • +No setup or connections: the agent knows each customer’s plan, payments and AI usage
   • +Refunds need your OK or follow rules you set, like an auto-approve limit
   • +Weekly knowledge gaps, with “Teach it” to update the answers

   • −Not a standalone helpdesk: it only supports products built on Starty, not other websites
   • −The customer agent needs the Business plan at $50 a month
   • −Newer than the others here, so a smaller community today
2. 02

   Intercom Fin

   Fin $0.99 per outcome. Essential seats $39 a month, or $29 billed yearly.

   Best for: SaaS companies that want the AI agent to lead

   Intercom is a helpdesk built around Fin, its AI agent. Every plan includes Fin, live chat, a shared inbox and a help center; Fin can also run on top of another helpdesk.

   • +Fin included on every plan, priced per outcome
   • +Works on its own helpdesk or with your current one
   • +14-day free trial with no card needed

   • −Advanced, with workflows, is $99 a seat monthly ($85 billed yearly)
   • −A minimum monthly commitment applies when Fin runs on another helpdesk
   • −No free plan
3. 03

   Zendesk

   Support Team $25 per agent a month, or $19 billed yearly. Suite Team $69, or $55 billed yearly.

   Best for: Larger support teams with many agents

   Zendesk is the long-standing helpdesk for bigger teams. Each plan includes a few automated resolutions per agent, and more are paid per resolution.

   • +5 automated resolutions per agent a month on Team plans, 10 on Professional
   • +14-day free trial with Suite Professional features and Copilot
   • +Committed resolutions cost less: $1.50 each

   • −Pay-as-you-go resolutions cost $2.00 each, the highest here
   • −Copilot for agents is $50 per agent a month, billed yearly, on Professional and up
4. 04

   Gorgias

   Starter $10 a month (monthly only), or $40 with AI Agent. Basic $60 a month, or $50 billed yearly.

   Best for: Shopify and ecommerce stores

   Gorgias is a helpdesk for online stores, priced by tickets rather than seats. Its AI Agent is available on every plan and you pay when it handles a conversation.

   • +Not priced per agent: Basic includes 300 tickets a month
   • +AI Agent on every plan, with 30 automated interactions on Starter and Basic
   • +7-day free trial

   • −Each AI Agent interaction also counts as a helpdesk ticket
   • −Built for ecommerce: less useful for SaaS or apps
5. 05

   Help Scout

   Free plan. Standard $30 per user a month, or $25 billed yearly. AI Answers $0.75 per resolution.

   Best for: Small teams that want a simple shared inbox

   Help Scout is an easy shared inbox with a help center and live chat. Its AI agent, AI Answers, is billed per resolution, and new accounts get it free for three months.

   • +Lowest price per AI answer here: $0.75 per resolution
   • +3 months of free, unlimited AI Answers for new accounts
   • +Free plan for 5 users, 1 inbox and 1 Docs site

   • −Plus, with advanced workflows, is $54 a user monthly ($45 billed yearly)
   • −Pro needs a sales demo
6. 06

   Freshdesk

   Growth $23 per agent a month, or $19 billed yearly, with 500 AI Agent sessions included.

   Best for: Growing teams that want lots of AI included

   Freshdesk is a ticketing helpdesk with Freddy AI Agent on every plan. The first 500 sessions are included; extra sessions cost $49 per 100.

   • +First 500 Freddy AI Agent sessions included on every plan
   • +A session covers every AI reply within 72 hours of the first email
   • +14-day free trial of the Enterprise plan

   • −Freddy AI Copilot is an extra $29 per agent a month billed yearly ($35 monthly), Pro and up
   • −Free plan not listed on its pricing page
7. 07

   Tidio

   Free plan. Starter $29 a month, or $24.17 billed yearly. Lyro AI Agent from $39 a month, or $32.50 billed yearly.

   Best for: Small online businesses starting with live chat

   Tidio is a live chat and ticketing tool with Lyro, its AI agent. The free plan covers 50 conversations and your first 50 Lyro conversations are free.

   • +Free plan with 50 billable conversations and 10 seats
   • +First 50 Lyro AI conversations free
   • +7-day free trial with no card needed

   • −Lyro is a separate add-on, from 50 AI conversations a month
   • −Starter includes 100 billable conversations a month

An outcome, a resolution, a session and an interaction are not the same thing, so read each vendor’s definition. Help Scout, for example, charges one resolution per conversation; Freshdesk counts every AI reply within 72 hours as one session.

For a small team, AI customer support costs from about $50 to a few hundred dollars a month, as of October 2026, and the AI part usually costs more than the seats once volume grows. Here is the same workload priced on four helpdesks, billed monthly.

Customer support automation means letting software answer, route and close support requests without a person doing each step. AI agents are the newest part of it; rules, saved replies and help centers are the older parts, and they still matter.

• Answering common questions from your help articles, in chat and email.
• Routing each ticket to the right person or team, with round robin or skills.
• Taking simple actions, like checking an order or resetting access, where the tool allows it.
• Handing over to a person with the conversation and context attached.
• Spotting gaps: questions the AI couldn’t answer, so you can write the missing article.

Start with your ten most common questions. If your help articles answer them well, an AI agent will too; if they don’t, no agent will fix that.

1. 01Write or update the help articles for your most common questions.
2. 02Turn the AI agent on for one channel first, usually chat.
3. 03Set handover rules: when the agent must pass a conversation to a person.
4. 04Read a sample of AI answers every week and fix the articles behind the wrong ones.
5. 05Watch your AI bill against your volume, since most tools charge per answer.

No. A classic chatbot for customer service follows a script or a decision tree; an AI agent reads your knowledge, writes its own answer and can take actions in your tools. Most tools here sell both: Tidio has Flows for scripted chats and Lyro for AI answers, for example.

Scripted chatbots are still useful for collecting an email or routing a request. For answering real questions, an AI agent does far more.

For most SaaS products, Intercom Fin or Help Scout is the best AI customer support agent: both are built for software companies, price the AI per answer and work in chat and email. Choose by team size and volume.

If your product doesn’t exist yet, there is a simpler path: build it on Starty and support comes with it. Starty builds your AI app with sign-in, Starty Payments, emails and a customer agent in place, so there is no helpdesk to connect. See the AI app builder.