Crisp vs Tidio (2026)
Crisp wins on pricing shape - flat per-workspace beats Tidio's three separate meters as a team grows. Tidio wins on ecommerce polish and out-of-the-box automation. The deciding question is whether you will ever pass 4 agents or 100 AI conversations a month.
Prices and product status verified 1 September 2026. We build a competing product (Conferbot) - where it appears below, it is labeled.
Crisp and Tidio are the two most common shortlist finalists for small-business live chat in Europe and, increasingly, everywhere else. They look interchangeable in screenshots - widget, shared inbox, chatbot builder, mobile apps - which is exactly why the comparison matters: the real difference is not the feature grid, it is how each one charges you as the team grows.
At a glance
| Crisp | Tidio | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing basis | Per workspace - flat, seats bundled | Per plan + three separate meters (conversations, flows, AI) |
| Free plan | Yes - 2 agents, basic live chat, mobile apps | Yes - limited |
| Entry paid | Mini ~$45/workspace/month, 4 agents included | Starter ~$29/month (~$24 annual) |
| Mid tier | Essentials - 10 agents; native AI capped at 50 uses/month | Growth ~$59/month, 10-seat maximum |
| Top tier | Plus ~$295/workspace/month - 20 agents, unlimited AI, extra seats ~EUR 10/agent | Plus from $749/month |
| AI pricing | Included but capped at 50 uses/month below Plus | Lyro add-on, ~$39/month per 100 AI conversations |
| Best-known strength | Value at team scale; developer-friendly APIs | Shopify/ecommerce integration, fast setup |
- 4+ agents now, or hiring
- Developers will extend it via API
- You will pay Plus for unlimited AI
- Ecommerce store, 1-3 agents
- Order data inside the chat window matters daily
- Meters stay comfortable at your volume
The monthly bill, visualised
Monthly cost from the worked examples above - assumptions inline in that section.
The pricing shapes, side by side
Crisp charges for the workspace. Mini is ~$45/month with 4 agents in the price; Plus is ~$295 with 20. Adding your fifth support agent costs nothing until you cross a tier. For any team where headcount is the growth axis, this is the cheaper curve - a 10-agent team on Crisp Essentials pays a fraction of what per-seat platforms charge for the same people.
Tidio charges for usage, three ways. The plan meters conversations, automation flows meter separately, and Lyro AI meters separately again at ~$39 per 100 AI conversations. Entry is cheaper than Crisp (~$29 vs ~$45), but each meter moves independently, and the self-service ceiling arrives fast: 10 seats maximum, then a jump from $59/month Growth to $749/month Plus with nothing in between.
Neither vendor hides any of this, but the shapes reward different customers: Crisp rewards teams that grow in people, Tidio rewards teams that stay small and busy.
Both cap the AI - differently
Crisp's native AI is included in paid plans but capped at 50 uses per month below the Plus tier. Fifty AI answers a month is a demo, not a deployment - any store doing real volume blows through it in the first week, which makes ~$295/month Plus the true price of "Crisp with AI".
Tidio's Lyro is metered instead of capped: ~$39 per 100 AI conversations, purchasable in blocks. More flexible at low volume, expensive at high volume - 1,000 AI conversations a month is roughly $390 in Lyro alone.
This is the quiet pattern across SMB chat in 2026: AI advertised as a feature, then rationed as an add-on. Platforms that include AI answering in the plan price without a cap or meter (our own Conferbot does, at $19-$59/month flat) sidestep the arithmetic entirely - which is worth knowing even if you land on Crisp or Tidio anyway.
The bill at three team sizes
Same method as our other head-to-heads: real plan prices, worked through. Crisp bills per workspace; Tidio per plan plus meters (Lyro ~$39 per 100 AI conversations).
2 agents, light volume, AI curiosity
Tidio: Starter ~$24 + one Lyro block ~$39 = ~$63/month. Crisp: Mini ~$45, AI capped at 50 uses = ~$45/month if 50 AI answers suffice - which for genuine curiosity they do, and for production they do not. Effectively a tie, decided by whether the AI is decoration or workload.
6 agents, ~1,500 conversations, ~700 AI-handled
Tidio: Growth ~$59 + seven Lyro blocks ~$273 = ~$332/month. Crisp: Essentials covers the seats, but 700 AI answers demolish the 50-use cap, so the honest Crisp price is Plus at ~$295/month - unlimited AI, 20 seats. Crisp edges it, and its bill stops moving while Tidio's meter keeps running.
12 agents, serious volume
Tidio: past the 10-seat self-service cap; Plus from $749, negotiated. Crisp: still Plus ~$295 + ~EUR 10 per seat beyond 20 = ~$295-315/month. This is where per-workspace pricing wins outright - a 12-seat team pays Crisp roughly what Tidio charges a 6-seat one. (Flat-rate at a lower band exists too: Conferbot Business is $59/month with 15 seats, AI included - the same shape as Crisp Plus, one price tier down.)
Feature-by-feature
| Capability | Crisp | Tidio |
|---|---|---|
| Live chat + shared inbox | Yes, with solid mobile apps | Yes, most polished onboarding in tier |
| AI answers | Included, capped 50/month below Plus | Lyro add-on, per-100 metering |
| Chatbot / automation builder | From Mini; scenario-based | Flows - visual, metered |
| Ecommerce depth | Shopify integration, moderate | Best in tier - orders, carts, delivery in-chat |
| Knowledge base | Included (helpdesk product) | Basic |
| Developer surface | Strong - clean APIs, webhooks, plugins | Adequate, less loved |
| Channels | Email, Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp, Telegram (plan-dependent) | Email, Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp (add-ons) |
| Pricing shape | Per workspace - seats bundled | Per plan + three meters |
| Ceiling | Plus ~$295, extra seats ~EUR 10 | Plus from $749 after the $59 tier |
Switching between them
Both directions are common and neither is hard - contacts and transcripts move, and neither side's automations are complex enough for the rebuild to hurt. The asymmetries worth knowing:
Tidio to Crisp
Usually triggered by headcount - the fifth agent or the $749 quote. Expect to rebuild Flows as Crisp scenarios, and check the AI math first: leaving Lyro's meter for a 50-use cap is only an upgrade if you also budget Plus.
Crisp to Tidio
Usually triggered by ecommerce - a store that wants cart data in the chat window. Fits best at 1-3 agents; check the seat cap and meters against a busy month before moving, or the second migration follows the first within a year.
Either way, run both against the same traffic for two weeks (both have free plans; so does Conferbot - 600 conversations/month) and let response times and resolution rates decide instead of feature lists.
Decision guide by situation
| Your situation | Better fit | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Shopify/WooCommerce store, small team | Tidio | Order context in-chat is the daily win |
| 4+ agents, or hiring | Crisp | Workspace pricing; seats stop being a line item |
| AI answering is the core requirement | Crisp Plus - or a flat-AI platform | 50-use cap below Plus; Lyro meters - see vs Crisp / vs Tidio |
| Developers will extend the tool | Crisp | Cleaner API surface and plugin story |
| Multilingual European support | Crisp | Stronger i18n heritage and EU hosting posture |
Questions to ask on each vendor call
For Crisp
- "Walk me through what happens on AI use number 51" on the tier below Plus - hard stop, soft warning, or silent overage?
- "Which channels in this demo are Plus-only?" - channel availability shifts by tier more than the pricing page suggests.
- "What is the per-seat price past 20 on Plus, in our billing currency?" - the EUR 10 figure moves with exchange rates.
For Tidio
- "Show last month's bill for a customer our size" - the plan-plus-three-meters model is best understood as a real invoice, not a rate card.
- "At what conversation volume does Growth stop being available to us?"
- "What does Lyro do when it does not know?" - the escalation behaviour matters more than the resolution rate.
How this comparison was verified
All plan prices, seat counts and AI limits are drawn from both vendors' public pricing pages, tracked in our competitor research files and last human-verified on the date shown at the top - approximate figures (Crisp's ~$45 and ~$295, EUR-denominated seats) are marked as approximate because the vendors themselves vary them by currency and billing period. The worked bills show their arithmetic so you can rerun them with your own numbers. Corrections welcome via contact. Disclosure: Conferbot is our product; where it appears above, it says so.
Which one fits which team
Pick Crisp if you have or expect more than 4 agents, want APIs and webhooks a developer will not curse at, and can either live inside 50 AI uses or budget for Plus. Its per-workspace model is one of the last genuinely team-friendly pricing structures in the category.
Pick Tidio if you run a Shopify or similar store with 1-3 agents and want order management inside the chat window with minimal setup. At that size its meters rarely bite and its ecommerce depth is ahead of Crisp's.
Re-shortlist if you need unmetered AI on a small-team budget - that combination is exactly the gap both leave open. One-on-ones: Conferbot vs Crisp, Conferbot vs Tidio, and the free plan (600 conversations/month, AI included) if you want to test that claim against either.
Frequently asked questions
Is Crisp or Tidio cheaper?
Tidio is cheaper to start (~$29/month vs Crisp's ~$45 Mini) but meters conversations, flows and AI separately and caps self-service plans at 10 seats. Crisp costs more at entry but is flat per workspace - 4 agents on Mini, 10 on Essentials - so it becomes the cheaper platform as soon as headcount grows.
Does Crisp include AI for free?
Crisp's native AI is included in paid plans but capped at 50 uses per month below the Plus tier (~$295/workspace/month), where it becomes unlimited. For real support volume, Plus is effectively the price of using Crisp's AI.
How much does Tidio's Lyro AI cost?
Lyro is an add-on from roughly $39/month per 100 AI conversations, on top of the plan price. At 1,000 AI-handled conversations a month that is about $390 for the AI alone, which is where metered pricing stops being cheap.
Which is better for Shopify stores, Crisp or Tidio?
Tidio. Its Shopify integration surfaces orders, cart contents and delivery status inside the chat and remains the strongest ecommerce implementation in the SMB tier. Crisp integrates with Shopify but with less depth.
What do Crisp and Tidio both lack?
Unmetered AI on a small-team budget. Crisp caps AI at 50 uses/month below its $295 tier; Tidio meters it at ~$39 per 100 conversations. Teams that want AI answering included in a flat plan price typically end up on platforms like Conferbot ($19-$59/month per workspace, AI included, free plan with 600 conversations).
Is Crisp good for ecommerce compared to Tidio?
Crisp integrates with Shopify and handles store support fine, but Tidio's implementation is a tier deeper - order status, cart contents and delivery data surface inside the conversation. For a store where those lookups are half the ticket volume, that difference is felt daily; for service businesses it is irrelevant.
How many agents can I have on Crisp vs Tidio?
Crisp bundles agents into the workspace price: 2 free, 4 on Mini, 10 on Essentials, 20 on Plus with extra seats around EUR 10 each. Tidio caps self-service plans at 10 seats and moves larger teams to the negotiated Plus tier from $749/month. Past four or five agents the pricing structures diverge sharply in Crisp's favour.
Do Crisp and Tidio have free plans worth using?
Both do, with different limits: Crisp's covers 2 agents with basic live chat and mobile apps; Tidio's includes basic chat and limited automation. Both are enough to evaluate the inbox. Neither free tier includes meaningful AI answering - for testing that, use a trial period or a free plan that includes AI (Conferbot's covers 600 conversations a month with AI included).