8 Best Customer Service Software for 2022
Jess served on the founding team of a successful B2B startup and has used a wide range of sales and marketing tools over the course of her 15-year career. She uses her industry knowledge to deliver the best answers to your questions about sales tools and sales management.
Jill is a writer at Fit Small Business specializing on Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software.
Customer service software centralizes various customer communication touchpoints to deliver excellent support and enhance the overall customer experience. The best customer service software utilizes an omnichannel communication approach. They provide shared inboxes, live chat, chatbots, in-app phone functionalities, social media integration, and ticketing systems. Find out which customer service software would work best for your specific business needs.
In this article, we identified the best customer service software, including their best use cases:
- Freshdesk: Best overall customer service software with all-in-one customer service management solutions, including a help desk, live chat, email, and ticketing
- Insightly Service: Ideal for those who need customer service software natively integrated with a customer relationship management (CRM) system
- Zoho Desk: Best for customer service teams who need artificial intelligence (AI) tools to boost agent productivity
- HappyFox: Excellent choice for teams that need robust automation tools for streamlining customer service needs
- HubSpot Service Hub: Best customer service software for users who need to make voice-over-internet-protocol (VoIP) calls directly from the app
- Salesforce Service Cloud: Great option for businesses that utilize social media as a key customer service platform
- Zendesk: Solid choice for users who want tools to enrich their customer profiles to deliver highly personalized support to their customers
- Really Simple Systems Service Desk: Best for users who want simple and easy-to-use customer service software
Best Customer Service Software Compared
Provider | No. of seats on the free plan | Starting price for paid plans | Free trial for paid plans | Live chat | Customer support |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Unlimited | $15 per user, per month | 21 days | ✔ | 24/5 live chat, email, & phone |
 | No free plan | $29 per user, per month | N/A | ✕ | Email & live chat for Plus; with phone support for Professional & Enterprise |
 | Up to three users | $14 per user, per month | 15 days | ✔ | Email & live chat during business hours |
 | No free plan | $29 per user, per month | N/A | ✔ | Email, live chat, & phone support during business hours |
 | Unlimited | $63 per month for two users | 14 days | ✔ | Email, live chat & phone support during business hours |
 | No free plan | $25 per user, per month | 30 days | ✔ | Free self-guided resources; premium support costs 30% of subscription |
 | No free plan | $19 per user, per month | 30 days | ✔ | 24/5 email, live chat, & phone support |
 | No free plan* | 14 days | ✕ | Email support for all plans; phone support for Professional & Enterprise plans | |
*Really Simple Systems has a CRM with a free plan for two users. The customer service add-on costs an additional $46 per month.
Are you using your customer relationship management (CRM) tool as your customer service tool? Read our guide on how to use CRM for improved customer service or take our quiz to find out which customer service software works best for you.
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Freshdesk: Best Overall Customer Service Software
Freshdesk
Overall Score: 4.86
OUT OF 5
What We Like
- Allows users to use social media to answer and resolve customer queries directly from the app
- Offers extensive omnichannel communication channels, including live chat, email, and ticketing
What's Missing
- Its Omnichannel plan doesn’t have a free version
- Doesn’t offer 24/7 customer support
Pricing Summary*
Support Desk
- Free: Unlimited user allocation
- Growth: $15 per user, per month
- Pro: $49 per user, per month
- Enterprise: $79 per user, per month
Omnichannel
- Growth: $29 per user, per month
- Pro: $59 per user, per month
- Enterprise: $99 per user, per month
Free trial for both types of plans: 21 days
Add-on:
- Additional bot sessions: $75 for 1,000 bot sessions per month
*Based on annual billing. Monthly subscriptions are also available at slightly higher rates.
Freshdesk offers users multiple communication channels, helping them manage customer queries efficiently. The channels include a help desk, live chat, email, and ticketing. It can also categorize and assign tickets to the right rep based on availability or expertise. Freshdesk automates agent workflows and resolves routine questions with bots and artificial intelligence (AI). It provides agents with 360-degree customer views and guided resolutions to improve call productivity.
However, Freshdesk’s Omnichannel support option doesn’t have a free plan. It also doesn’t provide around-the-clock customer support. Users who want a free plan that covers multiple communication channels can consider HubSpot Service Hub, while those who want access to 24/7 customer support can consider Insightly Service.
Freshdesk Features
Freshdesk offers workflow automation and 360-degree customer views to increase agent productivity. Below are features we find most beneficial for users:
- Email ticketing: Allows users to automatically convert customer emails into help desk tickets to track, prioritize, and resolve support requests in one place
- Chat and messaging: Lets users engage customers through live chat and various messaging platforms, including popular services like WhatsApp, Facebook, and Apple Business Chat
- Self-service support: Allows users to publish a branded knowledge base and add a chatbot or website widget, helping customers quickly find the answers they need on their own
- Social media integration: Lets users communicate with their customers on social channels like Facebook or Twitter, and receive notifications about important tweets from its AI-powered social signals monitor
Freshdesk dashboard shows various ticketing data, including the number of tickets raised, the amount of unresolved tickets, and the channels where the issues were raised. (Source: Freshdesk)
Insightly Service: Best Customer Service Software With Native CRM Software Integration
Insightly Service
Overall Score: 4.29
OUT OF 5
What We Like
- Seamless integration with Insightly’s CRM system
- Offers customer satisfaction surveys to help users evaluate the quality of their customer support
What's Missing
- No free plan and no free trial
- No monthly plans available
Pricing Summary*
- Plus: $29 per user, per month
- Professional: $49 per user, per month
- Enterprise: $99 per user, per month
*Only annual billing available.
Insightly Service is a service and support application built natively within Insightly’s customer relationship management (CRM) software. It provides users with a robust view of their customers, including communication and activity history—helping agents offer a more personalized approach to their servicing. It has customizable dashboard reports for tracking agent performance against key performance indicators (KPIs), and can scan keywords in tickets to get actionable insights on the nature of recurring customer issues.
However, Insightly Service has no free plan, doesn’t allow a free trial, nor month-to-month billing plans. Users who need a free plan or free trial can consider Freshdesk, while those who want month-to-month plans can consider Zoho Desk.
Insightly Service Features
Insightly Service offers a total customer view and a customizable dashboard to track agent performance. Below are features we find most beneficial for users:
- Customer satisfaction surveys: Lets users send surveys after resolving cases to get customer feedback
- Community forums: Allows businesses to create forum pages for their customers where they can post their questions and get insights from fellow users
- Knowledge base: Lets users publish instructional articles that cover general and specialized topics their customers can refer to later
- Notifications and reminders: Sends users reminders for unresolved tickets, so no issue remains unresolved
Insightly Service provides users with analytics tools that show an overall view of their team’s customer service activities. (Source: Insightly Service)
Zoho Desk: Best Customer Service Software With AI Capabilities
Zoho Desk
Overall Score: 4.25
OUT OF 5
What We Like
- Offers self-service support functionalities to help save agents time from answering basic queries
- Robust artificial intelligence (AI) functionalities
What's Missing
- Doesn’t offer 24/7 customer support
- Free plan is limited to only three users
Pricing Summary*
- Free: Up to three users
- Standard: $14 per user, per month
- Professional: $23 per user, per month
- Enterprise: $40 per user, per month
- Free trial: 15 days
*Based on annual billing. Monthly subscriptions are also available at slightly higher rates.
Zoho Desk lets users manage customer conversations across multiple channels, including email, live chat, chatbots, phone, and social media. It automates repetitive manual actions, such as routing tickets and auto-tagging them to agents based on the topic. Its AI bot helps assign support tickets, analyze customer sentiments, and spot problems in ticket traffic. It can also share relevant solutions from the knowledge base to lessen interaction with actual agents.
Zoho Desk integrates with Zoho CRM, benefiting businesses that use the CRM system as it syncs customer data between the two apps seamlessly. This makes it easier for customer service representatives to see a customer’s complete profile, including historical activities such as previous purchases and communication logs.
However, Zoho Desk doesn’t offer 24/7 customer support, and the free plan is limited to three users. Users who want around-the-clock customer support can consider Insightly Service, while those who want an unlimited user allocation for their free plan can consider HubSpot Service Hub.
Zoho Desk Features
Zoho Desk offers helpful features that automate users’ customer service activities. Below are features we find most beneficial for users:
- Self-service support: Lets businesses embed a knowledge base and user community into a user’s website and mobile app to help customers find answers quickly
- Ticket assignments: Allows users to create smart assignment rules that route high-priority tickets to available customer service reps to resolve issues faster
- Mobile access: Lets customer service managers see updates, trends, and pertinent information on ongoing cases when they are on-the-go
- Ticket trend analytics: Lets users analyze ticket traffic on a 24-hour timeline so they can determine high-peak hours when their team receives the highest volume of customer queries
Zoho Desk shows trends within a 24-hour time frame, identifying high peak hours that need the most agents. (Source: Zoho Desk)
HappyFox: Best Customer Service Software With Robust Automation Tools
HappyFox
Overall Score: 4.09
OUT OF 5
What We Like
- Provides anti-agent collision tools, preventing agents from working on the same case at the same time
- Offers automation functions that help expedite case resolutions
- Doesn’t require technical knowledge to set up
What's Missing
- No in-app caller feature
- Lowest-priced plan lacks task management feature
- No free plan and no free trial
Pricing Summary*
- Mighty: $29 per user, per month
- Fantastic: $49 per user, per month
- Enterprise: $69 per user, per month
- Enterprise Plus: $89 per user, per month
Note: Requires a minimum of 5 users for all plans
*Based on annual billing. Monthly subscriptions are also available at slightly higher rates.
HappyFox provides users with a centralized platform to handle all inbound customer queries into one ticketing system. It allows users to automatically convert email, phone, chat, social media, and web requests into tickets. HappyFox also enables users to automate entire workflows to prevent tickets from being stuck in a stage. It has an automation tool called Smart Rules that triggers actions if prescribed conditions are matched.
However, HappyFox doesn’t have a free plan or free trial, and its lowest-priced plan doesn’t have a task management feature. It also doesn’t have an in-app caller and requires integration with RingCentral. Users who want to try a customer service software for free can consider Freshdesk, while those who want a task management feature for basic plans can consider Insightly. Meanwhile, those who need an in-app caller can consider HubSpot Service Hub.
HappyFox Features
HappyFox provides users with automation features to help them keep track of all their customer service tickets. Below are features we find most beneficial for users:
- Ticket categorization: Allows users to classify inbound tickets into predefined categories, such as products, sales, and support
- Ticket queuing: Lets users create custom ticket queues by adding one or more rules to filter tickets based on priority and responsibility
- Agent collision monitoring: Enables users to avoid agent collision by showing who else in the team is viewing or acting on a ticket to avoid agent overlaps
- Ticket auto-assignments: Lets users assign tickets to currently active agents, and use load balancing algorithms to balance their team’s ticket assignments and workload
HappyFox’s dashboard shows the overall status of active tickets, including assigned and unassigned, pending, and completed tickets. (Source: HappyFox)
HubSpot Service Hub: Best Customer Service Software With VoIP Technology
HubSpot Service Hub
Overall Score: 3.74
OUT OF 5
What We Like
- Has a free option
- Allows users to make high-quality calls directly from the platform
What's Missing
- Paid pricing plans are expensive
- Free plan lacks essential features, such as knowledge base and ticket automation
Pricing Summary*
- Free: Unlimited user allocation
- Starter: $63 per month with 2 users included
- Professional: $504 per month with 5 users included
- Enterprise: $1,200 per month with 10 users included
- Free trial for paid plans: 14 days
Note: More users can be added to all paid plans for an additional cost
*Based on annual billing. Monthly subscriptions are also available at slightly higher rates.
HubSpot Service Hub provides users with essential customer service tools, such as ticketing, live chat, shared inboxes, team email, and ticket reports. It offers tools for help desk automation, a knowledge base, and customer feedback surveys for seamless customer support. It has VoIP functionality that provides excellent call quality, which customers can use directly from the app. The VoIP feature also enables them to record call logs and extract analytics.
HubSpot Service Hub can be easily connected with HubSpot CRM, bringing users’ customer service data and channels together in one integrated customer management system. It allows customer service reps to view important customer details, such as their complete profiles and lead scores.
However, HubSpot Service Hub has steep pricing plans for its paid version, while its free plan lacks some fundamental features, such as a knowledge base and ticket automation. Users who want pocket-friendly pricing options can consider Zoho Desk, while those who want a more feature-packed free plan can consider Freshdesk.
HubSpot Service Hub Features
HubSpot Service Hub provides users with omnichannel customer service tools and robust VoIP functionalities. Below are features we find most beneficial for users:
- Knowledge base: Convert frequently asked questions (FAQ) into a searchable library of help articles, videos, and documentation
- Live chat: Automatically routes customers to readily available customer service reps to get answers to their questions in real time
- Ticket routing: Allows users to route tickets to available customer service reps for faster issue resolutions
- Team inbox: Lets multiple customer service reps access a centralized inbox and take on pending cases to help expedite case resolutions
HubSpot Service Hub lets users easily create tickets and access pertinent customer information. (Source: HubSpot Service Hub)
Salesforce Service Cloud: Best Customer Service Platform for Social Customer Service
Salesforce Service Cloud
Overall Score: 3.63
OUT OF 5
What We Like
- Lets users respond to queries from social media platforms directly from the app
- Has extensive omnichannel communication tools, including email, social, and live chat
- Allows users to make calls directly from the software
What's Missing
- Does not offer a free plan; expensive to upgrade to higher-priced plans
- Monthly billing option is only available in the lowest-priced plan (the Essentials plan)
- Requires users to purchase support plans
Pricing Summary*
- Essentials: $25 per user, per month**
- Professional: $75 per user, per month
- Enterprise: $150 per user, per month
- Unlimited: $300 per user, per month
- Free trial: 30 days
*Based on annual billing.
**Essentials plan is the only plan that offers monthly billing plans.
Salesforce Service Cloud is a feature-rich customer service platform that lets users manage and route cases and tickets, customize customer service processes, access customer activity history, and extract customer service reports. It has excellent social customer service features that let users monitor, listen, and respond to customer posts on social media channels like Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
However, upgrading to a higher-priced plan in Salesforce Service Cloud requires a steep investment. Users are also tied to annual plans for its higher-priced plans. In addition, support must be purchased separately for 30% of a user’s total subscription cost. Users who want more affordable plans and monthly billing options across all plans can consider Zoho Desk, while those who want free access to customer support can consider Zendesk.
Salesforce Service Cloud Features
Salesforce Service Cloud offers users essential customer service tools, including managing customer queries from social media accounts. Below are features we find most beneficial for users:
- Social customer service: Lets users route social cases to the right agent by using keywords, classifiers, and language detection to ensure timely responses
- AI chatbots: Saves agents’ time by allowing chatbots to take action on customer queries like checking claims status or modifying orders using natural language on real-time channels like chat and messaging
- Phone integration: Allows users to make calls directly from the app and save call logs for future reference
- Intelligent routing: Lets managers distribute work based on agent skill set, availability, and capacity to handle incoming work based on their case pipeline
Salesforce Service Cloud provides a detailed overview of a business’ customer service activities. (Source: Salesforce Service Cloud)
Visit Salesforce Service Cloud
Zendesk: Best Customer Service Software That Provides Unified Customer Profiles
Zendesk
Overall Score: 3.54
OUT OF 5
What We Like
- Provides detailed customer profiles, including purchase history, web activity, and loyalty status
- Offers users rich customer profiles
- Robust customer service analytics and reporting tools
What's Missing
- No free plan and has expensive pricing options
- No phone support
Pricing Summary*
- Foundational Support: $19 per agent, per month
- Suite Team: $49 per user, per month
- Suite Growth: $79 per user, per month
- Suite Professional: $99 per user, per month
- Free trial: 30 days
*Based on annual billing. Monthly subscriptions are also available at slightly higher rates.
Zendesk’s omnichannel tools for customer service include messaging, live chat, chatbots, social media, email, and voice calls. It enables users to build an integrated help center and community forum so customers can resolve issues at their own pace while reducing agents’ working hours. It has a robust customer profile enrichment capability that builds a unified customer view where all information about a specific customer can be accessed by agents.
However, Zendesk has no free plan, and its range of pricing options are expensive. It also doesn’t offer phone support. Users who want access to a free plan or more affordable pricing plans can consider Freshdesk, while those who need phone support can consider Zoho Desk.
Zendesk Features
Zendesk provides users with essential customer service and customer profile enrichment tools. Below are features we find most beneficial for users:
- Single customer view: Gives customer service reps a single view of everything about a customer, including order history, loyalty status, and web activities
- Intelligent case routing: Offers built-in routing and intelligence features to collect critical customer details and reduce agents’ data entry; it also escalates and routes issues to the agent best suited to help
- Reporting and analytics: Lets users access real-time and historical data to analyze trends in their customer service activities
- Self-service content: Lets users create instructional materials that customers can refer to, saving agents’ time from taking actual calls
Zendesk shows an overall view of a business’ customer service activities, including created, unsolved, and solved tickets. (Source: Zendesk)
Really Simple Systems Service Desk: Best Simple Customer Service Software
Really Simple Systems Service Desk
Overall Score: 2.71
OUT OF 5
What We Like
- Has a free plan
- Offers extensive integrations via Zapier
- Simple to use
What's Missing
- Can only be added as an add-on to Really Simple Systems’ CRM software
- Does not offer phone support
Pricing Summary*
- Free: With allocation for up to 2 users
- Starter: $14 per user, per month
- Professional: $30 per user, per month
- Enterprise: $46 per user, per month
- Free trial: 14 days
Add-on:
- Service Desk: $46 per month or free with 5+ users on Enterprise Plan
*Based on annual billing. Monthly subscriptions are also available at slightly higher rates.
Really Simple Systems Service Desk is an add-on feature to its sales CRM software. It is a straightforward and intuitive system that provides users with essential customer service functionalities, such as case management, ticketing, and case prioritization. Its seamless CRM integration provides both customer service and sales staff with a holistic view of their customers, giving them all the updates they need when dealing with customers and resolving issues.
However, Really Simple Systems Service Desk is only an add-on feature to Really Simple Systems’ sales CRM software, and costs an additional $46 per month to use. It also doesn’t offer phone support. Users who need customer service software that can operate on its own can consider HappyFox. Those who want access to phone support can consider Freshdesk.
Really Simple Systems Service Desk Features
Really Simple Systems Service Desk lets users prioritize and route cases effectively for increased agent productivity. Below are features we find most beneficial for users:
- Support case creation: Allows users to create support cases directly from a web form or email, reducing the need for manual ticket creation
- Sales CRM integration: Seamlessly connects with Really Simple Systems’ Sales CRM to allow agents to see customers’ 360-profiles and offer personalized servicing
- Case prioritization: Lets users identify critical tickets or high-priority customers and set response times to fast-track resolutions on important cases
- Case reports: Provides insights by reporting on closed cases, response times, and frequently asked questions from customers
Really Simple Systems Service Desk’s dashboard shows critical customer service data, including open cases, cases by user, and types of cases. (Source: Really Simple Systems)
How We Evaluated the Best Customer Service Software
The best customer service software provides users with an integrated approach to managing and tracking customer queries. It must be able to handle various communication channels and can automatically turn customer communication into tickets to reduce manual work for customer service agents.
We found Freshdesk to be the overall top customer service software due to its case assignment and agent workflow automation features. It provides users with a 360-degree customer view and self-service support features to improve the productivity of customer service teams. It also offers a free version and a range of affordable paid plans.
The tabs below offer more insight into our evaluation process for selecting the best customer service software.
40%
Pricing
20%
General Features
15%
Ease of Use
15%
Help & Support
10%
Expert Score
40% of Overall Score
Pricing is typically the most important factor for small business owners, so reviewing the best customer service software was the most heavily weighed. We also considered the availability of a free version and other relevant add-on fees.
20% of Overall Score
The purpose of any customer service software is to provide solutions for managing customer queries and helping customer service teams deliver high-quality support. We looked at the options and evaluated which ones offer the essential features for users.
15% of Overall Score
User-friendliness and intuitiveness are two of our key considerations when choosing the best customer service software. We evaluated whether the software is easy to customize or requires a high level of technical experience to get users up to speed with using the system.
15% of Overall Score
Support is a critical part of running customer service software, especially for teams with no in-house technical person. We analyzed the types of support offered by these providers through live chat, email, and phone, as well as determined the hours when support channels are available.
10% of Overall Score
We looked through existing customer reviews on credible sites to measure the level of satisfaction current users have, as well as any problems that they typically encounter. We also added our thoughts and expert opinion on key features, value for money, and popularity.
*Percentages of overall score
