Best AI help desk software: 8 tools ranked on published evidence (October 2026)

All eight side by side: one free plan, six published entry prices, two with nothing published

Help Scout has the only permanent free plan. Zendesk, Freshdesk, Front and Gorgias offer a 14 to 30 day trial, and the other three send you to a demo. Six vendors publish an entry price, five publish what their AI costs, and the units differ: per resolution, per session, per conversation.

What this means for you: the seat price tells you little about the bill, so ask every vendor for the AI unit and how it counts one.

Sources: [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8]

What 5 agents pay: the seat bill is the small part once the AI starts answering

For 5 agents the entry plans come to $0 on Help Scout Free, $95 on Freshdesk Growth, 95 euros on Zendesk Support Team, $125 on Front Starter and Help Scout Standard, and 445 euros on Dixa Growth, which includes phone and its AI agent.

The AI costs extra. Take 200 AI-handled conversations in a month. Zendesk includes 25 resolutions for 5 agents on the entry plans, so 175 more at 2.00 euros pay as you go cost 350 euros. Help Scout charges $150 at $0.75, Gorgias $180 at $0.90, and Freshdesk nothing while you stay under 500 sessions. Front's Autopilot starts at $0.05 per conversation, a different unit from a resolution.

What this means for you: at 5 agents and 200 AI resolutions, Help Scout Standard comes to $275 a month and Zendesk Support Team to 445 euros, and the gap comes from the AI line, not the seats.

Sources: [2][1][9][3][4]

1. Help Scout: best if you run a team of 5 or fewer and want to start free

Help Scout runs the one permanent free plan on this list: 5 users, 1 inbox and 1 Docs site. The paid plans list $25 (Standard), $45 (Plus) and $75 (Pro) per user a month at the monthly rate, and the page advertises 16 percent off for annual billing.

Its AI agent, AI Answers, is an add-on at $0.75 per resolution. A resolution counts only when the customer gets an AI reply and does not escalate or ask for more help, and you can set a monthly spending cap. New accounts get 3 months of resolutions free.

Help Scout names a SOC 2 Type 2 report, hosts on AWS and signs a BAA for HIPAA.

Not for you if you have more than 25 agents or need SSO, because Standard stops at 25 users and SAML sits on Pro at $75. What this means for you: start on Free, then set the AI Answers spending cap before the 3 free months end.

Sources: [1][10]

2. Freshdesk (tied): best if you want AI sessions included before any AI fee

Freshdesk lists $19 (Growth), $55 (Pro) and $89 (Enterprise) per agent a month on annual billing. Every plan includes the first 500 sessions of its Freddy AI Agent, and further sessions cost $49 per 100. The page does not define a session as a resolved ticket.

Freddy AI Copilot, the drafting and summary assistant, is a $29 per agent add-on from Pro up. There is no free plan, and the 14-day trial opens the full Enterprise plan.

The trust center of Freshdesk names SOC 2 Type 2, ISO/IEC 27001:2022 and ISO/IEC 27701:2019. Not for you if you want the AI billed only when it resolves a ticket, or if you need a free plan. What this means for you: if you expect fewer than 500 AI sessions a month your AI line is 0, but ask how a session is counted before you rely on it.

Sources: [3][11]

2. Zendesk (tied): best if you want a published price per automated resolution and the largest app marketplace

Zendesk's pricing page, as shown to a visitor from Germany on October 10, lists 19 euros (Support Team), 55 euros (Suite Team) and 115 euros (Suite Professional) per agent a month on annual billing, or 25, 69 and 149 euros month to month. AI Agents come with every Suite and Support plan, and Zendesk bills them per automated resolution. Each agent brings 5 a month on the two cheaper plans and 10 on Suite Professional. Further ones cost 1.50 euros committed or 2.00 euros pay as you go.

Copilot is included in the 14-day trial, which opens Suite Professional, and the marketplace lists over 1,800 apps. The trust center names ISO 27001, 27017, 27018 and 27701, SOC 2 Type II audits and AWS hosting in the US, Europe and Asia-Pacific.

Not for you if you want one flat price, because Zendesk adds resolutions to the seat bill. For the tie see Zendesk vs Freshdesk. What this means for you: multiply the 5 included resolutions per agent by your team size and compare it with the AI volume you expect.

Sources: [2][12]

4. Front: best if sales, success and support share one inbox

Front says it is built for support, sales, success and operations teams, and lists 160+ integrations. Starter costs $25 per seat and month on annual billing for up to 10 seats and one channel type, Professional $65 for up to 50 seats with omnichannel, and Enterprise $105.

Front sells its AI as add-ons. Copilot costs $20 per seat on Starter and Professional and is included in Enterprise. Autopilot, the AI agent, starts at $0.05 per conversation, and the page sends you to sales for it. The 14-day trial needs no card, and the security page names SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001 and hosting in the US or EU.

Not for you if you want a price per resolution for Front's AI agent, since it bills per conversation. What this means for you: ask what Front counts as a conversation, because $0.05 per conversation does not compare with $0.75 per resolution.

Sources: [4][13][14]

5. Gorgias: best if you run an online store and want to pay by ticket volume

Gorgias prices the help desk by monthly tickets and says it is never priced per agent: $10 for 50 tickets (Starter), $50 for 300 (Basic), $300 for 2,000 (Pro) and $750 for 5,000 (Advanced) on annual billing, with extra tickets at $0.36 to $0.40. Its pricing page calls it an ecommerce platform.

The AI Agent is on every plan, and Gorgias bills it per resolved conversation at $0.90 on most plans and $1 on Starter, according to its own pricing article. A conversation handed to a human is not charged twice. The trial lasts 30 days. The security page names SOC 2 Type II and HIPAA, and the pricing FAQ names hosting on Google Cloud in the US, the EU and Australia. Our directory listed no hosting for Gorgias, and I corrected the entry.

Not for you if you do not sell online, since the product is built around store data. What this means for you: count last month's tickets first, because the tier follows the ticket count.

Sources: [5][9][15]

6. Kustomer: best if you want a sales-led platform for a large B2C or B2B team

Kustomer publishes no per-user or per-resolution price. Its pricing page offers a two-minute assessment that estimates savings and passes you to a sales rep, and only Kustomer Voice and WhatsApp Business are listed as pay as you go.

The vendor names Concierge as its AI agent, Envoy as the assistant for human agents and AI Evaluations for scoring every AI interaction. Its blog states ISO 27001, 27701 and 42001. Not for you if you need a price before a call or a free start. What this means for you: ask for the AI rate in writing, because the page names none.

Sources: [7][16][17]

7. Dixa (tied): best if phone, chat and email must run in one queue

Dixa lists Growth at 89 euros, Ultimate at 139 and Prime at 179 per agent and month, and every plan ends in Book a demo. The contact center and the Mim AI agent are in every plan. Dixa prices the AI per conversation, not per resolution, and shows no amount.

Dixa's own comparison table puts Zendesk Suite Team at 48 euros as of June 30, 2026, while Zendesk's page showed 55 euros to me on October 10, so I read vendor comparisons as dated. Data sits on AWS in Ireland, and Dixa announced SOC 2 Type II on February 19, 2024. Not for you if you want a self-serve trial. What this means for you: ask Dixa for the rate per AI conversation and what ends one.

Sources: [6][18][19]

7. Gladly (tied): best if you are a retailer that wants one AI for service and shopping

Gladly shows no price, plan names or trial. Every route on its pricing page ends in Get a demo or Contact sales. It sells Commerce AI, with a Commerce Agent that recommends products, and voice AI, and its security page names SOC 2 Type II, PCI DSS, HIPAA with a BAA, GDPR and CCPA. Not for you if you do not sell products or want to compare prices first. What this means for you: ask for a quote early, because nothing on the site lets you size the cost.

Sources: [8][20]

How I ranked the tools

Each tool got 0 to 2 points on three things, so the maximum is 6. Job fit is 2 when the vendor targets support teams in any industry and 1 when it names one segment: online stores for Gorgias, retailers for Gladly, consumer brands for Dixa. The AI score is 2 when an AI agent works on the cheapest paid plan with a published usage price, 1 when AI is named but the price needs sales, 0 for none. The free route is 2 for a free plan, 1 for a trial, 0 for a demo only. Ties break on job fit, then AI score, and a full tie shares a rank.

Transparency is a separate column and does not move the rank: 1 point each for a published entry price, a published AI usage price and a named certificate. G2, Capterra, GetApp, TrustRadius and Trustpilot answered my requests with 403 errors, and I did not work around that, so no review score enters the ranking.

Sources: [21]

Which tool fits which situation

The tree sends you to one tool. If two answers are yes, start with the one that matches your bigger cost, seats or AI.

Tools I checked and left out

Fin charges $0.99 per outcome and runs on top of an existing help desk, so it is an AI agent rather than a help desk and belongs with the AI customer service chatbots. Freshservice is an ITSM platform, TOPdesk covers IT, enterprise service and facility management, and Matrix42 sells intelligent service management with asset and endpoint management. All three serve employees rather than customers.

The rest of the niche has another main job in our directory, such as social media, translation or facility work, and I did not open those pages.

Sources: [22][23][24][25]