Set your team size, monthly ticket volume and the number of conversations you expect AI to resolve. The calculator adds seats, the agent-assist add-on and AI usage for every help desk we cover, using each vendor's published US dollar list price with annual billing.
True-cost calculator live
seats and plan AI add-ons and AI resolutions
Zoho Desk$230Professional · $23 per agent · Agent-assist AI is included in this plan. The AI agent's usage price is not public; not in the total.
Gorgias$930Pro · $93 per agent · Volume is above the plan's included tickets; overage applied (cheaper than the next plan up). No agent-assist add-on is sold on this plan.
Estimates from vendors' published USD list prices with annual billing, verified on the date shown on this page. Taxes, discounts, onboarding fees and telephony usage are not included.
What we assume for each product
- Jira Service Management: Jira Service Management: entry tier is Standard, mid tier is Premium; Enterprise is quote-only. The calculator uses Atlassian's published averages of $20 and $51.42 per agent (monthly billing at 75 agents) for every team size, so it under-estimates teams below 75 agents on monthly billing, whose first 15 agents cost $25 or $57.30 each, and over-estimates much larger teams. Rovo is included. Premium includes 1,000 virtual-agent conversations a month, then $0.30 each, and escalated conversations count too; Standard has no virtual agent, and the $1 Customer Service Management AI agent is not modelled. Prices are those before the rise on October 13, 2026.
- Help Scout: Help Scout: entry tier is Standard, mid tier is Plus, top tier is Pro with its 10-user minimum. AI Drafts is included from Plus, so the agent-assist add-on costs nothing there and is not available on Standard. AI resolutions are billed at $0.75 each.
- Zoho Desk: Zoho Desk: entry tier is Standard, because Express is capped at 5 users; mid tier is Professional and top tier is Enterprise. Zia is included from Professional, so agent assist costs nothing there and is not available on Standard without your own API key. AI-agent usage cannot be priced, because Zoho does not publish the price of the AI credits used beyond the free token allowance.
- Freshdesk: Freshdesk: entry tier is Freshdesk Growth, mid tier is Freshdesk Pro, top tier is Freshdesk Enterprise (standalone Freshdesk, not Omni). Copilot costs $29 per agent and is not available on Growth. AI Agent sessions are priced at $49 per pack of 100 with none included monthly, and because sessions count whether or not they resolve, the real bill is higher than the resolutions entered here suggest.
- HubSpot Service Hub: HubSpot Service Hub: entry tier is Starter, mid tier is Professional, top tier is Enterprise, all on annual commitment. Breeze Assistant is included with every seat. Customer Agent resolutions cost $0.50 each; on Professional the 3,000 included credits divided by 50 credits a resolution cover the first 60 a month, and on Enterprise the first 100, assuming no other feature uses credits. Starter has no Customer Agent. The one-time onboarding fees are not included.
- Gorgias: Gorgias: no seat price, so extra agents cost nothing; the bill is the cheapest option for your ticket volume on annual billing: either the plan whose allowance covers it, or a smaller plan plus that plan's per-ticket overage. Entry starts at Basic and moves up to Pro or Advanced as volume grows, mid starts at Pro, and top is Advanced; above 5,000 tickets the calculator adds $0.36 per ticket, though Gorgias sells that volume as Enterprise by quote. Starter is left out because it is monthly-only and capped at 3 seats. The calculator always moves you to the covering plan, although paying overage on the smaller plan can be cheaper for a small overshoot. AI interactions are charged at $0.90 and also counted as tickets; interactions beyond your plan's allowance really cost $1.50, so heavy AI use is understated. No agent-assist add-on is documented.
- Intercom: Intercom: entry tier is Essential, mid tier is Advanced and top tier is Expert. Copilot is added at $29 per agent on every tier, and every Fin outcome is billed at $0.99, with no included allowance on any plan.
- Front: Front: entry tier is Starter (up to 10 seats), mid tier is Professional (up to 50 seats), top tier is Enterprise, annual only with Copilot included. Copilot costs $20 per seat on Starter and Professional. AI resolutions are billed at $0.89 each; triage and handoff conversations are not counted.
- Zendesk: Zendesk: entry tier is Suite Team, because Support Team is email-only ticketing; mid tier is Suite Professional; there is no top tier because Suite Enterprise + Copilot has no public price. Copilot is not available on Suite Team and costs $50 for every seat on Suite Professional. AI resolutions use the pricing page's committed rate of $1.50 after 5 (Suite Team) or 10 (Suite Professional) included resolutions per agent a month; the help center's newer dollar allowance is not modeled because its per-resolution prices are not public.
How the calculator works
For each product, the calculator picks the plan we treat as its entry, mid or top tier, multiplies the seat price by your number of agents, adds the agent-assist add-on for every agent if you switch it on, and adds the cost of AI resolutions after any free allowance. The arithmetic is the same code that produces the worked examples on our pricing pages and the cost criterion in our rubric, so the numbers here and on every other page agree.
Our standard scenarios are 3 agents on the entry tier and 10 and 50 agents on the mid tier, with about 250 tickets per agent a month and one ticket in five resolved by AI. They are a common starting point, not a recommendation; change them to match your team.
The three parts of the bill
- Seats. The advertised price per agent per month, on annual billing. Minimum and maximum seat counts are applied, so a plan with a minimum is charged for the minimum.
- Agent assist. A per-agent add-on such as Zendesk Copilot at $50 or Freddy AI Copilot at $29. Where a plan includes it, such as Help Scout from Plus, it adds nothing; where a plan cannot have it, the calculator says so.
- AI usage. The customer-facing AI agent, charged by the vendor's own unit: $0.75 per resolution at Help Scout, $0.99 per outcome at Intercom, packs of 100 sessions at Freshdesk. Monthly free allowances are subtracted first.
Where a vendor offers a feature without a public price, such as the credits that meter Zoho Desk's Zia AI Agents, the calculator shows that the price is not public instead of guessing. Read per-seat vs per-resolution pricing for what each unit counts.
Why tiers are not equal across vendors
Entry, mid and top are our labels, not the vendors'. We choose the plan a growing team would realistically use: for Zendesk, the entry tier is Suite Team because Support Team covers email only, and there is no top tier because the top plan has no public price. Help Scout's Plus plan stops at 50 users and its Pro plan requires at least 10, so team size can push a product into another plan or off the table. For Freshdesk we cost standalone Freshdesk, not Freshdesk Omni, which adds chat and phone at a higher price.
Two mid-tier plans at a similar price can include very different features, channels and limits. The calculator tells you what a plan costs, not that two plans do the same job. Check the plan notes in each review, and compare products head to head, for example in Zendesk vs Freshdesk.
What is not included
- Monthly billing. Prices are annual-billing rates. Paying month to month usually costs more: Help Scout Standard is $30 monthly against $25 annually.
- Taxes, currency and negotiated discounts. Buyers often pay less than list at larger volumes, and we do not model discounts.
- Other add-ons and usage, such as phone minutes, SMS, workforce management and QA bundles, extra inboxes or help centers.
- One-off allowances. Free AI credits that apply once per account, such as Freshdesk's 500 free sessions, are not spread across months.
- Unresolved AI sessions. For session-priced products the calculator assumes one session per AI resolution, so the real figure is higher if some sessions do not resolve.
- Migration, onboarding and agent time, which the migration checklist helps you budget.
Prices change, sometimes quickly: Freshworks' price list from June 2025 put 1,000 AI Agent sessions at $100, against $490 today. Every price has a source and the date we read it, listed on each pricing page; our method explains how we keep them current.
What we assume for each product
- Jira Service Management: Jira Service Management: entry tier is Standard, mid tier is Premium; Enterprise is quote-only. The calculator uses Atlassian's published averages of $20 and $51.42 per agent (monthly billing at 75 agents) for every team size, so it under-estimates teams below 75 agents on monthly billing, whose first 15 agents cost $25 or $57.30 each, and over-estimates much larger teams. Rovo is included. Premium includes 1,000 virtual-agent conversations a month, then $0.30 each, and escalated conversations count too; Standard has no virtual agent, and the $1 Customer Service Management AI agent is not modelled. Prices are those before the rise on October 13, 2026.
- Help Scout: Help Scout: entry tier is Standard, mid tier is Plus, top tier is Pro with its 10-user minimum. AI Drafts is included from Plus, so the agent-assist add-on costs nothing there and is not available on Standard. AI resolutions are billed at $0.75 each.
- Zoho Desk: Zoho Desk: entry tier is Standard, because Express is capped at 5 users; mid tier is Professional and top tier is Enterprise. Zia is included from Professional, so agent assist costs nothing there and is not available on Standard without your own API key. AI-agent usage cannot be priced, because Zoho does not publish the price of the AI credits used beyond the free token allowance.
- Freshdesk: Freshdesk: entry tier is Freshdesk Growth, mid tier is Freshdesk Pro, top tier is Freshdesk Enterprise (standalone Freshdesk, not Omni). Copilot costs $29 per agent and is not available on Growth. AI Agent sessions are priced at $49 per pack of 100 with none included monthly, and because sessions count whether or not they resolve, the real bill is higher than the resolutions entered here suggest.
- HubSpot Service Hub: HubSpot Service Hub: entry tier is Starter, mid tier is Professional, top tier is Enterprise, all on annual commitment. Breeze Assistant is included with every seat. Customer Agent resolutions cost $0.50 each; on Professional the 3,000 included credits divided by 50 credits a resolution cover the first 60 a month, and on Enterprise the first 100, assuming no other feature uses credits. Starter has no Customer Agent. The one-time onboarding fees are not included.
- Gorgias: Gorgias: no seat price, so extra agents cost nothing; the bill is the cheapest option for your ticket volume on annual billing: either the plan whose allowance covers it, or a smaller plan plus that plan's per-ticket overage. Entry starts at Basic and moves up to Pro or Advanced as volume grows, mid starts at Pro, and top is Advanced; above 5,000 tickets the calculator adds $0.36 per ticket, though Gorgias sells that volume as Enterprise by quote. Starter is left out because it is monthly-only and capped at 3 seats. The calculator always moves you to the covering plan, although paying overage on the smaller plan can be cheaper for a small overshoot. AI interactions are charged at $0.90 and also counted as tickets; interactions beyond your plan's allowance really cost $1.50, so heavy AI use is understated. No agent-assist add-on is documented.
- Intercom: Intercom: entry tier is Essential, mid tier is Advanced and top tier is Expert. Copilot is added at $29 per agent on every tier, and every Fin outcome is billed at $0.99, with no included allowance on any plan.
- Front: Front: entry tier is Starter (up to 10 seats), mid tier is Professional (up to 50 seats), top tier is Enterprise, annual only with Copilot included. Copilot costs $20 per seat on Starter and Professional. AI resolutions are billed at $0.89 each; triage and handoff conversations are not counted.
- Zendesk: Zendesk: entry tier is Suite Team, because Support Team is email-only ticketing; mid tier is Suite Professional; there is no top tier because Suite Enterprise + Copilot has no public price. Copilot is not available on Suite Team and costs $50 for every seat on Suite Professional. AI resolutions use the pricing page's committed rate of $1.50 after 5 (Suite Team) or 10 (Suite Professional) included resolutions per agent a month; the help center's newer dollar allowance is not modeled because its per-resolution prices are not public.
Frequently asked questions
Why does the calculator show a different price from the vendor's homepage?
Because the homepage shows the seat price only. The calculator adds the agent-assist add-on and AI usage, and applies minimum seat counts. It uses annual-billing list prices, so a monthly plan will cost more.
How many AI resolutions should I enter?
Start from the tickets your help center could answer on its own, then be conservative. Vendor resolution rates are claims; named-customer figures are usually lower. Our guide do you need the AI add-on? shows how to estimate it.
Why is a product missing from the results?
Either the plan for that tier has no public price, or your team is larger than the plan's maximum seats. The calculator says which. Contact the vendor for a quote in those cases.
Does a lower total mean a better choice?
No. Cost is one of six criteria in our rubric. Plans differ in channels, limits and data hosting, so use the total alongside our best help desk software ranking and the reviews.
Sources
- Zendesk pricing — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- What counts as an agent license in Zendesk — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Managing light agent seats in your Zendesk account — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Can I buy a Zendesk Copilot license for some agents only? — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- About automated resolutions for AI agents — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- About automated resolution tiers — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Managing resolution allowances — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Upgrading from automated resolutions to resolution allowances — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Main Services Agreement — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- Agreements and terms: data processing agreement, sub-processor policy, business associate agreement — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- About the Data Center Location add-on — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Regional Data Hosting Policy — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Zendesk Trust Center — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- Zendesk AI data use information — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Zendesk language support by product — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- What is being removed (updated August 2026) — Zendesk Help · September 18, 2026
- Zendesk completes acquisition of Forethought — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- About Zendesk — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- Zendesk QA — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- Fortnum & Mason customer story — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- Best Egg customer story — Zendesk · September 18, 2026
- Zendesk pricing and buyer data — Vendr · September 18, 2026
- Freshdesk pricing — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshdesk Omni pricing — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshworks price list (current as of June 13, 2025) — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Understanding Freshdesk pricing plans — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- Explore Freshdesk free plan — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- Understanding full-time vs occasional agents — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- Add and use collaborators to assist in ticketing — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- Freddy AI Agent and chatbot sessions FAQs — Freshworks Support · September 18, 2026
- Manage Freddy AI add-ons — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- Freshworks Terms of Service — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Manage languages — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- Where is your data (servers) located? — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- Freshworks Data Processing Agreement — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshworks sub-processors — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshworks Trust Center — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- HIPAA configuration guide — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- The Freddy AI trust framework — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshdesk API: rate limit — Freshworks Developers · September 18, 2026
- Freshdesk upcoming changes (December 2025 to June 2026) — Freshdesk Support · September 18, 2026
- Freshdesk Omni — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshdesk apps — Freshworks Marketplace · September 18, 2026
- Freshdesk — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshworks reports fourth quarter and full year 2025 results — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshworks reports record second quarter 2026 results — Freshworks · September 18, 2026
- Freshworks pricing and buyer data — Vendr · September 18, 2026
- Zoho Desk pricing — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Zoho Desk price list data, all currencies — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Zoho Desk edition comparison — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Managing your agent seats — Zoho Desk Help · September 18, 2026
- Zia, the AI assistant in Zoho Desk — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Zia Agents pricing — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Zoho refund policy — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Know your data center — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Compliance at Zoho — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Zoho and the GDPR — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- HIPAA compliance guide for Zoho Desk — Zoho Desk Help · September 18, 2026
- Zoho launches Zia LLM, prebuilt agents, a custom agent builder and an MCP server — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Zoho Desk integrations — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Zoho Desk product page — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- About Zoho — Zoho · September 18, 2026
- Help Scout pricing — Help Scout · September 18, 2026
- User-based billing and plans guide — Help Scout Docs · September 18, 2026
- Light users — Help Scout Docs · September 18, 2026
- Manage your contact-based plan — Help Scout Docs · September 18, 2026
- About annual payments — Help Scout Docs · September 18, 2026
- Import emails or tickets into Help Scout — Help Scout Docs · September 18, 2026
- Security at Help Scout — Help Scout Docs · September 18, 2026
- HIPAA at Help Scout — Help Scout Docs · September 18, 2026
- AI transparency — Help Scout · September 18, 2026
- About Help Scout — Help Scout · September 18, 2026
- eCatholic customer story — Help Scout · September 18, 2026
- Front pricing — Front · September 18, 2026
- Front plans and pricing — Front Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Adding and removing licenses — Front Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Guests in Front — Front Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Channel limits per license — Front Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Autopilot pricing and billing — Front Help Center · September 18, 2026
- AI Answers (legacy) — Front Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Meet Autopilot, the AI agent built for control, not chaos — Front Community · September 18, 2026
- Switch to French? (staff answer on interface languages) — Front Community · September 18, 2026
- Data location — Front Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Data Processing Addendum — Front · September 18, 2026
- List of subprocessors — Front · September 18, 2026
- Security at Front — Front · September 18, 2026
- Rate limiting — Front Developers · September 18, 2026
- About Front — Front · September 18, 2026
- Front customers — Front · September 18, 2026
- Front pricing and buyer data — Vendr · September 18, 2026
- Intercom pricing — Intercom · September 18, 2026
- Intercom plans explained — Intercom Help · September 18, 2026
- Pricing FAQs — Intercom Help · September 18, 2026
- Fin AI Agent outcomes — Intercom Help · September 18, 2026
- From resolutions to outcomes: evolving how Fin delivers value — Intercom · September 18, 2026
- Fin pricing — Fin · September 18, 2026
- Pro add-on — Intercom Help · September 18, 2026
- Proactive Support Plus add-on — Intercom Help · September 18, 2026
- Early Stage program — Intercom · September 18, 2026
- Use Intercom in your preferred language — Intercom Help · September 18, 2026
- Regional data hosting — Intercom Help · September 18, 2026
- Security at Intercom — Intercom · September 18, 2026
- Historical data migration to Intercom — Intercom Help · September 18, 2026
- Fin AI Agent — Fin · September 18, 2026
- About Fin — Fin · September 18, 2026
- Today, Intercom becomes Fin — Intercom · September 18, 2026
- Salesforce signs definitive agreement to acquire Fin — Salesforce · September 18, 2026
- Intercom pricing: buyer data — Vendr · September 18, 2026
- Service Hub pricing — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- Service Hub Preise — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- HubSpot Product & Services Catalog — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- HubSpot Service Hub pricing guide — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- HubSpot Credits — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- Understand HubSpot Credits and billing — HubSpot Knowledge Base · September 19, 2026
- AI customer service agent — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- Manage seats — HubSpot Knowledge Base · September 19, 2026
- HubSpot language offerings — HubSpot Knowledge Base · September 19, 2026
- HubSpot data centers — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- HubSpot security — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- Security and compliance — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- Sensitive data — HubSpot · September 19, 2026
- HubSpot AI cloud infrastructure FAQ — HubSpot Knowledge Base · September 19, 2026
- HubSpot Form 10-K for fiscal year 2025 — US Securities and Exchange Commission · September 19, 2026
- Gorgias pricing — Gorgias · September 18, 2026
- Voice and SMS add-on price tiers (pricing page script) — Gorgias · September 18, 2026
- How you're billed for using Gorgias — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Legacy pricing for Helpdesk and AI Agent subscribers — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Voice add-on 101 — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- SMS add-on 101 — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Import data from Zendesk — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Migrate from non-Zendesk providers — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Languages Gorgias can detect — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Set the language AI Agent replies in — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Security and privacy FAQ for Gorgias AI Agent — Gorgias Help Center · September 18, 2026
- Security at Gorgias — Gorgias · September 18, 2026
- Data Processing Agreement — Gorgias · September 18, 2026
- List of data subprocessors — Gorgias · September 18, 2026
- Gorgias AI Agent — Gorgias · September 18, 2026
- About Gorgias — Gorgias · September 18, 2026
- Gorgias customer stories — Gorgias · September 18, 2026
- Service Collection pricing — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- Cloud pricing tables (current and effective October 13, 2026) — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- Service Collection licensing — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- Rovo licensing — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- Purchasing and licensing — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- Data Center end of life — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- Manage your language preferences — Atlassian Support · September 19, 2026
- Understand data residency — Atlassian Support · September 19, 2026
- SOC 2 — Atlassian Trust Center · September 19, 2026
- ISO/IEC 27001 — Atlassian Trust Center · September 19, 2026
- HIPAA — Atlassian Trust Center · September 19, 2026
- Atlassian AI trust — Atlassian Trust Center · September 19, 2026
- Service level agreement — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- Team '25 Europe: introducing Service Collection — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- The Total Economic Impact of Jira Service Management — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- The value of AI in Jira Service Management (Forrester TEI spotlight) — Forrester Consulting · September 19, 2026
- Automating customer support with the JSM virtual agent — Atlassian · September 19, 2026
- Atlassian Form 10-K for fiscal year 2026 — US Securities and Exchange Commission · September 19, 2026
This page was researched and drafted with AI assistance from the sources listed on it. We have not run hands-on tests of these products. Method: How we review