Categories › Customer Support Software
Compare platform-neutral shared inbox software for small support teams by ownership, duplicate-reply protection and entry-plan limits.
Verified
6 of 6 publish a price · 3 offer a free plan · 6 offer a free trial
Why it ranks here: Help Scout combines shared Inbox ownership, private handoff notes and collision detection with a free plan for five users.
Not a fit if: you need more than 100 contacts per month on Free; Standard is the paid entry plan.
Why it ranks here: Missive pairs assigned team inboxes and collaborative drafts with a $14 annual-billing Starter tier capped at five users.
Not a fit if: you need more than five users on Starter; Productive is the next tier.
Why it ranks here: Hiver Omni connects Google, Microsoft and Zoho inboxes to a standalone shared workspace, with Growth starting at two seats.
Not a fit if: you need a one-seat plan; Hiver Omni starts at two seats.
Why it ranks here: Front gives each conversation one named assignee and lists shared inboxes from $25 per seat monthly, with a ten-seat Starter cap.
Not a fit if: you need more than ten seats on Starter; compare a higher plan.
Why it ranks here: Zendesk provides formal agent or group ticket assignment with a $19 per-agent monthly Support Team entry price on annual billing.
Not a fit if: you want a lightweight shared-conversation queue instead of formal ticket assignment.
Why it ranks here: Zoho Desk Express starts at $7 per user monthly on annual billing and sets a firm five-user limit.
Not a fit if: you need more than five users on Express, which is capped at five.
Start with Help Scout for a small team that wants a shared customer inbox, internal handoff notes and visible collision detection, with a five-user free tier. Choose Missive when collaborative email and assigned team inboxes are the center of the workflow; Starter is limited to five users, so larger small teams need a higher tier. Choose Hiver Omni when you need a standalone inbox that connects to Gmail, Outlook and other email providers; Growth has a two-seat minimum. Compare Front for a dedicated shared inbox with named conversation ownership, while checking its Starter seat cap. Zendesk suits teams that want formal ticket assignment; Zoho Desk offers a low-cost entry tier for teams of five or fewer.
This page covers products that connect customer email into a separate support workspace. For teams that want support work to stay inside Gmail, see our Gmail-specific shared inbox comparison.
| Product | Best fit | Ownership and handoff | Entry-plan boundary |
|---|---|---|---|
| Help Scout | Small teams that need customer context and a clear shared queue | Inbox assignment, internal notes and collision detection | Free: five users, one inbox and 100 contacts/month; Standard: $25/user/month |
| Missive | Teams coordinating collaborative email and follow-up | Team inboxes, assignment and internal comments | Starter: $14/user/month annually, up to five users; Productive: $24/user/month annually |
| Hiver Omni | Teams connecting Google, Microsoft or Zoho inboxes to one support workspace | Shared inboxes, ticketing and assignment with clear owners | Growth: $25/user/month annually; two-seat minimum |
| Front | Teams that want named ownership and ticket statuses in a shared workspace | One assignee per conversation; reassign or leave unassigned | Starter: $25/seat/month annually, up to ten seats |
| Zendesk | Teams that want formal ticket assignment to agents or groups | Assign tickets to a named agent or group | Support Team: $19/agent/month annually |
| Zoho Desk | Teams of five or fewer prioritizing a low published seat price | Ticket assignment and queue workflow; choose the edition for required rules | Express: $7/user/month annually, five-user cap |
Every product in this shortlist documents a shared customer-email or ticket queue and an assignment path. Help Scout is the clearest fit when the team needs explicit coordination while a colleague is replying: its documentation describes collision detection, internal notes and customer history in the shared inbox. Missive shows coworkers a reply draft in real time; the checked pages do not document a send block. Hiver Omni advertises collision detection, but the opened page does not describe its mechanics. Duplicate-reply protection remains unknown for Hiver Omni, Front, Zendesk and Zoho Desk where the checked primary pages do not specify its mechanics.
For up to five people and low contact volume, Help Scout Free includes one shared inbox and up to 100 contacts per month. Above that cap, Standard starts at $25 per user per month. Missive Starter costs $14 per user per month on annual billing and supports up to five users; a team needing more users starts at Productive, listed at $24 per user per month annually. Hiver Omni Growth lists $25 per user per month on annual billing and requires at least two seats. Front Starter lists $25 per seat per month billed annually and supports up to ten seats. Zendesk Support Team starts at $19 per agent per month billed annually. Zoho Desk Express starts at $7 per user per month billed annually, but is limited to five users. These rates use different plan boundaries; compare the included inbox, workflow and user capacity before comparing totals.
A Gmail-specific comparison already exists at Best Gmail Shared Inbox for Small Customer Support Teams 2026. Browse the full category at Customer Support Software.
Ranked by fit for a small team moving customer email into a shared queue: clear work ownership first, then documented duplicate-reply safeguards and an affordable, usable entry tier. The recommendation order reflects these documented trade-offs, not a numeric quality score. Official vendor product, help and pricing pages were checked on 2026-10-20. Unknown facts remain unknown.
| Product | Shared work ownership | Duplicate-reply safeguards | Small-team entry plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| Help Scout | Owned support conversations with teammate assignment and private notes for handoffs.[1] [2] [3] | All plans: live presence indicators plus send protection. Unseen customer replies or new teammate notes/replies stop the outgoing reply for review; the user can still choose to send it.[4] [2] | Free includes five users, one inbox and 100 contacts/month. Standard starts at $25/user/month annually, unlimited contacts. AI Answers and extra inboxes/Docs sites are separate cost components. · as of October 2026[5] [6] |
| Missive | Team inboxes allow assigning client emails to the responsible agent.[7] | Starter and above: coworkers see a reply draft in real time and can edit it together; the opened FAQ does not document a stale-send block.[8] | Starter is capped at 5 users; Productive supports up to 50. Annual prices are $14/user/month and $24/user/month respectively. · as of October 2026[9] [10] |
| Hiver | Hiver Omni is a standalone workspace; it connects inboxes from Google, Microsoft, Zoho and more.[11] [11] | Not documented[12] [11] | Hiver Omni Growth: $25 per user/month on annual billing; all plans start at two seats. · as of October 2026[11] [11] |
| Front | Shared inbox and ticketing; Starter has one channel type and up to 10 automation rules.[13] [14] | Real-time indicators show when a teammate is replying in a shared inbox, and draft content is shared and updated immediately; the opened page does not document a stale-send block.[15] | Starter $25 per seat/month, annually billed, up to 10 seats; Professional $65 up to 50 seats. AI and WhatsApp usage can add charges. · as of October 2026[13] [16] |
| Zendesk | Formal email ticketing with ticket routing, analytics dashboards, automations and triggers; Suite adds omnichannel routing.[17] [18] | Not documented | Support Team starts at $19 per agent/month paid yearly for email ticketing; Suite Team is $55 per agent/month paid yearly when the team needs the help center, messaging/live chat or telephony. Zendesk also describes seat, usage-feature and add-on charges. · as of October 2026[19] |
| Zoho Desk | Email ticketing; round-robin assignment; Enterprise adds skill-based assignment.[20] [21] | Not documented | Express is $7/user/month annually or $9 monthly, capped at five users. Standard is a different tier when a public knowledge base or more workflow capacity is required. Regional prices vary. · as of October 2026[22] [23] [24] |
Standard $25 per user/mo For growing teams looking to automate more tasks and move beyond email. Get core features like... Multiple Inboxes Live chat and SMS WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger Multiple knowledge bases One basic SLA policy Basic workflows Unlimited tags and saved replies AI Inbox assistant. Assign conversations and monitor reports based on a group of users.
From there, anyone on your team who needs to communicate with your customers can all work together in the same inbox at the same time.
The shared inbox in Help Scout has a dedicated notes feature, which allows you collaborate with your teammates on individual email conversations, without your customer knowing.
It stops the reply from being sent
Standard $25 per user/mo
Free accounts are limited to helping 100 contacts per monthly cycle.
Assignments and account-manager rules to keep every client's emails routed to the right agent.
Whenever someone starts replying to an email, coworkers will see this new reply being composed in real-time. You can even open their draft and edit it simultaneously.
Up to 5 users
Billed yearly Starter $ 14 per user/month
Hiver Omni is a standalone platform that works with Gmail, Outlook, and other email providers.
You'll see a banner above the reply box showing who's currently drafting a response.
Starter $25/seat/mo, up to 10 seats Essential capabilities to get started with single-channel support Key features include Shared inbox and ticketing AI Topics and up to 10 automation rules Basic analytics No-code public knowledge base AI add-ons available. Professional $65/seat/mo, up to 50 seats Omnichannel (email, SMS, social, etc.) Macros and up to 20 automation rules Advanced analytics. Enterprise $105/seat/mo Unlimited macros and rules Multi-language knowledge base.
A conversation can only be assigned to one user at a time.
If a teammate is working on a message in a shared inbox, you will see indicators that they are replying. Draft content is automatically shared and updated immediately.
$25/seat/mo, up to 10 seats
Support Team For teams that have outgrown a shared inbox and need core support essentials. $19 agent/month paid yearly. Starting with the basics Email and ticketing system Ticket routing Prebuilt analytics dashboards Pre-written responses Customer context Automations and triggers. Suite Team $55 agent/month paid yearly. Knowledge Base Omnichannel routing Messaging and live chat Telephony.
You can manually assign tickets using the Assignee field in the ticket properties panel, or you can use the assign link in ticket comments.
Support Team is $19 agent/month paid yearly. Suite Team is $55 agent/month paid yearly.
Round-robin assignment Allocate tickets to agents according to their current workload or in a specific order, such as alphabetically or any custom sequence. Multilingual help center Publish Knowledge Base articles in over 40 languages. Easy email ticketing, right out of the box! Zoho Desk's free plan offers three user licenses to help you start small and grow your support team.
Direct assignment to agents and teams Write rules to automatically assign tickets to specific agents based on criteria you set.
Express is limited to 5 users
Includes access to pre-built agents and up to 30M free tokens/month.
Express is limited to 5 users. $7 /user/month (billed annually).
Send a correction with a source link and we review it against the vendor's own documentation.
Suggest a correction
