Crisp
A weekend of work, and real gaps remain.
A shared inbox for small teams with a chat widget at the front: conversations from chat, email and social land in one place, priced per workspace rather than per agent.
Build me a small-team inbox with a chat widget, priced at zero per extra agent. STACK - Node with Fastify and WebSockets, SQLite via better-sqlite3 - A vanilla JS widget in a shadow root, loaded async CHANNELS - Web chat over the socket - Email in over IMAP and out over SMTP, threaded on References and a signed token - One conversation model for both; the transport is a field, not a separate table AGENTS - No seat limit; agents are rows, and the README says that is the point - Presence over the socket, with an away state after five minutes idle THE CONVERSATION - Append-only messages with author, transport and timestamp - Internal notes stored in the same thread but never sent, and visually distinct - Assignment history recorded, so who touched what is answerable VISITOR CONTEXT - Current page, referrer, coarse device bucket and a country from a local GeoIP database - Attributes pushed from the host app as JSON, shown beside the thread CANNED REPLIES AND SHORTCUTS - Snippets with variable substitution, inserted with a slash command WHAT IS NOT HERE - Co-browsing, WhatsApp, mobile apps, chatbot Include a README on the widget bundle size, the IMAP polling interval, and conversation retention.
What you lose
- Workspace pricing rather than per seat, which is most of the value for a small team
- Channels beyond chat — email, WhatsApp, Messenger — landing in one inbox
- A co-browsing and screen-sharing session started from the conversation
- Mobile apps for agents, so replies happen away from a desk
- A knowledge base and chatbot wired to the same widget
If you would rather not build
- Tidio — paid, cheaper entry, weaker email handling
The escape hatch
open source · no votes, no paid placement
Chatwoot
$0Shared inbox across email, chat and social, with canned replies and teams.
chatwoot/chatwootfree · open source
Papercups
$0Live chat widget and inbox, small enough to run on one server.
papercups-io/papercupsfree · open source
Why this verdict
our own opinion · changed only by a person
56/100
Verdict kinda at 56: one conversation model over two transports is the right design and a weekend of work. What keeps Crisp cheap is that it is already flat-priced, so the saving is smaller than it looks — and the mobile apps are what make a small team responsive.
History
tracked since 9 Aug 2026 · nothing is ever overwritten
Nothing recorded yet. This chart fills in once the page has visitors, votes or prompt copies — it will not draw a flat line to look busy.
Questions about Crisp
answered from the record above
Is Crisp free?
No — the plan we track is $45 a month. Pro at $45/month for the whole workspace rather than per seat; Unlimited is $95/month and adds automation and analytics.
Can you replace Crisp by building your own?
ALMOST. A weekend of work, and real gaps remain. Replacement score 56 out of 100, build time a weekend. Read what you lose before you decide.
How much does Crisp cost?
$45 a month on Pro — $540 a year. Recorded 9 Aug 2026.
What do you lose by replacing Crisp?
Workspace pricing rather than per seat, which is most of the value for a small team; Channels beyond chat — email, WhatsApp, Messenger — landing in one inbox; A co-browsing and screen-sharing session started from the conversation; Mobile apps for agents, so replies happen away from a desk; A knowledge base and chatbot wired to the same widget. If any of those carry weight for you, keep paying.
Is there an open-source alternative to Crisp?
Yes: Chatwoot, Papercups. The prompt on this page is for when you want it your way instead.
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