Help Scout
Free planA shared inbox, help center and chat widget for small and midsize teams that support customers by email.
Best for small support teams that mostly answer email and want to start free
Facts checked November 4, 2026
The short answer
Help Scout puts customer email, chat, SMS and social messages into a shared inbox, with a Docs help center and a chat widget from the same account. The free plan covers five users, so a small team can stop answering support from personal inboxes without paying anything, and paid plans start at $25 a user a month on yearly billing. Phone support is the main gap, since calls come in through an app such as Aircall. Small teams that need SSO or HIPAA also pay extra, because those come included only on Pro, which has a 10-user minimum and no self-serve trial.
Choose it if
- You have five or fewer people answering customers and want a free shared inbox with one help center
- Most of your support arrives by email, with some chat, SMS, WhatsApp, Instagram or Messenger on top
- You want the help center and the inbox from one vendor, so the chat widget can suggest articles before a customer writes in
- You want to try an AI agent that answers chat from your help content and charges only when it resolves a conversation
- You run a tech startup under two years old with less than $1 million in yearly revenue and want six free months of the Plus plan
Skip it if
- You need a phone queue inside the help desk; Help Scout handles calls only through integrations
- You expect to reply to more than 100 different people a month, since the free plan caps contacts at 100 a month
- You need IT service management features such as asset tracking or change requests
- Your team works only in Gmail or Outlook and does not want to move to a separate inbox
- You need SSO or HIPAA compliance on a small team, because Standard and Plus charge for them as add-ons and Pro starts at 10 users
Main features
Shared inbox
Your team answers email, chat and messages from one inbox, with internal notes, @mentions, assignment and saved replies. Collision detection shows when a teammate is already viewing or replying, so two people don't answer the same customer.
Docs help center
Publish help articles on a branded site, public or for your team only, and add custom CSS if you want. The Docs report lists your most-viewed articles, article ratings and the searches that found nothing, which tells you what to write next.
Beacon chat widget
The widget sits on your site or in your app and lets customers search your articles, start a live chat or send an email form without leaving the page. You can also use it to send proactive messages and short in-app surveys.
Messaging channels
From the Standard plan, live chat, SMS, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger conversations land in the same inbox as email. Phone calls come in through integrations such as Aircall.
Workflows and SLA policies
Workflows tag, route, change status or reply to conversations on rules you set; Plus adds advanced workflows that trigger on customer properties. SLA policies track whether replies go out within your target times.
Envoy and the Scout AI agent
Scout answers chat on your site or in your app from your help centers, web pages and Google Docs, in more than 50 languages, and hands the customer to your team with the conversation intact when it can't help. You pay $0.75 only for conversations it resolves without a person.
AI tools for your team
AI Assist expands, shortens, edits or translates a reply on every paid plan. Plus and Pro add AI Drafts, which writes a reply from past conversations and help content, and AI Summarize, which turns a long thread into a few bullet points.
Customer profiles and companies
Each customer has a profile with past conversations and custom properties, and you can group contacts under the company they work for. Plus adds a view of conversations grouped by company.
Reports
Built-in reports cover volume, response times and customer ratings for each channel. History runs 30 days on Free, two years on Standard and without limit on Plus and Pro.
Mobile apps
The free iOS and Android apps let you reply with saved replies, schedule or snooze a reply, leave notes, assign conversations and run manual workflows away from your desk.
Pricing
US dollar prices from helpscout.com, checked November 4, 2026. The pricing page shows yearly prices by default; the monthly prices come from the plan data the same page loads for its Monthly toggle. Extra inboxes cost $10 a month and extra Docs sites $20 a month on yearly billing ($12 and $24 billed monthly).
Free
$0
Up to 5 users, 1 inbox, 1 Docs site with 10 articles, 100 contacts a month, 10 saved replies and 10 tags, 30 days of reports
Standard
$25 / user a month, billed yearly ($30 billed monthly)
Up to 25 users, 2 inboxes and 2 Docs sites, live chat, SMS, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger, 150 basic workflows, one SLA policy, two years of reports
Plus
$45 / user a month, billed yearly ($54 billed monthly)
Up to 50 users, 5 inboxes and 3 Docs sites, 500 advanced workflows, two SLA policies, a secure customer portal, AI Drafts, round robin routing, Salesforce, Jira and HubSpot apps
Pro
$75 / user a month, billed yearly ($90 billed monthly)
Minimum 10 users, 10 inboxes and 5 Docs sites, unlimited workflows and SLA policies, SSO and HIPAA compliance included, onboarding specialist and account manager; sold through a demo
Envoy AI Answers (add-on)
$0.75 / resolution
AI agent that answers customers from your help content; new accounts get three months of resolutions free, and you can set a monthly spending cap
Reviews
Write a reviewNo reviews yet. If you use Help Scout, yours would be the first.
Alternatives to Help Scout
| Product | Choose it instead if | Starts at |
|---|---|---|
| Freshdesk | You want full ticketing at a lower per-agent price and day passes for occasional helpers | $19 an agent a month, bi... |
Questions people ask
Is Help Scout free?
Yes. The free plan covers up to five users with one inbox, one Docs site and no payment method required. It limits you to 100 contacts a month, 10 saved replies, 10 tags, 10 help articles and one app integration, and it includes no AI tools.
How much does Help Scout cost?
On November 4, 2026, Standard cost $25 a user a month billed yearly or $30 billed monthly, Plus $45 or $54, and Pro $75 or $90 with a 10-user minimum. The Envoy AI agent is extra at $0.75 per resolution.
How does Help Scout charge for AI answers?
Envoy costs $0.75 per resolution, billed monthly. Help Scout counts a resolution only when the customer gets an AI answer and doesn't escalate, search the help center, ask more questions or ask for more help, and it charges once per conversation. New accounts get three months of resolutions free, and you can set a monthly cap that switches the AI off when you reach it.
Does Help Scout have a free trial?
Standard and Plus come with a 15-day trial with every feature and no credit card. Pro has no self-serve trial; you book a demo with the sales team.
Does Help Scout include a knowledge base?
Yes. Help Scout calls its knowledge base Docs. Free includes one Docs site with up to 10 articles, Standard two sites, Plus three and Pro five, all with unlimited articles on paid plans. Extra sites cost $20 a month on yearly billing.
Can Help Scout handle phone support?
Only through integrations. Help Scout's pricing page lists phone and voice as available via integration on every paid plan, with Aircall as an add-on on Standard and Plus and preferred Aircall pricing on Pro.
Is Help Scout HIPAA compliant?
Help Scout says it supports HIPAA compliance and holds a SOC 2 Type II report. HIPAA is included on Pro and sold as an add-on on Standard and Plus; it is not available on the free plan.
Does Help Scout have a startup discount?
Yes. New customers that are incorporated tech startups less than two years old, with under $1 million in yearly recurring revenue, can apply for six months of the Plus plan at no charge. Help Scout also offers discounts to qualifying nonprofits and B Corporations.
Sources we checked 14
- helpscout.com/pricing for plans, yearly prices, user limits, inboxes and Docs sites per plan, free plan limits, trial, Envoy pricing and resolution rules, add-ons, reporting history, phone via integration, nonprofit and B Corp discounts checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/page-data/sq/d/1145654971.json for plan price data loaded by the pricing page: monthly prices ($30, $54, $90) and yearly prices ($25, $45, $75), add-on prices checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com for product areas, 100+ integrations, iOS and Android apps, HIPAA and SOC 2 Type II checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/about for founded 2011, founders, fully remote team checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/company/legal/privacy for company name Help Scout PBC and Boston, Massachusetts address checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/company/legal/terms-of-service for Help Scout PBC is a Delaware public benefit corporation checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/apps for 100+ apps, named integrations checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/inbox for collision detection, notes, assignment, workflows, saved replies, channels, customer profiles checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/live-chat for chat widget: articles, live chat, contact forms, proactive messages, surveys checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/knowledge-base for Docs branding, public and private sites, Docs report checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/agent for Envoy and Scout: channels, sources, languages, handoff, three free months checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/copilot for AI Drafts and summaries checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/mobile for iOS and Android app features checked November 4, 2026
- helpscout.com/startups for startup offer and eligibility checked November 4, 2026