Intercom vs Tidio
Intercom and Tidio side by side: what each one is, what it costs to start, and whether you can try it free. Everything below comes from the vendors' own sites and other public sources, not from hands-on testing.
Neither tool is ranked above the other here. These are research-based profiles, not hands-on tests. Starting price is the lowest listed paid plan per month (annual-billing equivalent where the vendor lists one), as shown on the vendor's own site when we last checked. Prices change, so confirm on the vendor's site. How this site works.
At a glance
| Intercom | Tidio | |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Customer Support & Chatbots | Customer Support & Chatbots |
| Starting price | $29/mo (checked October 2026) | Free; paid plans from $24.17/mo (checked October 2026) |
| Free tier | Not listed | Yes |
| Profile | Read profile | Read profile |
Prices are in US dollars unless shown otherwise. Confirm the current price on the vendor's site before you buy.
Key differences
Tidio lists a free tier and Intercom does not.
Tidio has the lower starting price ($24.17/mo against $29/mo for Intercom). The cheapest plan rarely has the same limits or features, so compare plans before choosing on price.
Both are in our Customer Support & Chatbots category.
About each tool
I
Intercom
Customer service platform with a shared inbox and help center, plus Fin, an AI agent for chat and email billed per outcome. Per-seat plans; 14-day free trial.
Strengths
- 14-day free trial with no credit card required
- Live chat, support email and in-app chats are listed as free and unlimited on all plans
- Fin can be used on an existing helpdesk, with no seat costs and no platform or setup fees
- No minimum seat count, and annual billing is available on all plans
- A monthly outcome limit can be set to cap Fin spending
Limitations
- Pricing is per seat; Essential has no Lite seats, and the workflow builder and round-robin assignment start at Advanced
- Intercom's own pages disagree on some figures, including Expert monthly billing and add-on prices
T
Tidio
Live chat and helpdesk with Lyro, an AI agent that answers from your content. Free plan; Starter is $24.17 a month billed annually.
Strengths
- Tidio's pricing page lists live chat, ticketing, email management, live video calls, a visual Flows builder, an AI reply assistant and Copilot on the Free plan, with 10 seats.
- Tidio's help center says Lyro works in English plus 47 other languages and can be enabled on live chat, Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp and email tickets.
- Tidio says Lyro learns from FAQ pages, uploaded files, manual Q&A pairs, URLs and solved chats, and Lyro's handoff can transfer the chat, keep it, or create a ticket with a transcript.
- Tidio says Lyro Smart Actions can handle tasks such as order updates, lead qualification and routing tickets, and Guidance lets you set tone and escalation rules; the free Lyro tier includes one Guidance item and one Smart Action, paid tiers up to three of each.
- Tidio's FAQ lists integrations with Shopify, WordPress, WooCommerce, Wix, HubSpot, Salesforce, Zendesk, Zoho CRM, Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Pipedrive, and says every plan has a 7-day free trial with no credit card.
- Tidio's FAQ says data is encrypted in transit (TLS 1.2+) and at rest (AES-256), hosted on AWS in EU data centers, and a DPA is available on request; its AI Terms say input and output are not used to train foundation models exposed to other customers, with opt-out of improvement training via support.
Limitations
- Lyro on the Free plan has a non-renewable lifetime quota of 50 conversations; monthly Lyro quotas (50 to 1,000 conversations) need the paid Lyro AI Agent add-on, from $32.50 a month. A Lyro conversation counts at the first Lyro reply in a new thread, and a thread closes after 15 minutes of inactivity, so one visitor can use several. The help article does not say what happens when a paid Lyro quota runs out.
- Features are tiered: the pricing page puts macros, advanced analytics, user permissions and automatic chat assignment at Growth, departments, custom branding and Slack notifications at Plus, and SSO, compliance features and pay-per-resolution billing at Premium; removing Tidio branding is a $16.67 a month add-on on Growth.
- The Terms of Service say Tidio is not obligated to provide a refund for any reason and that no refund covers more than three months of service; the FAQ says no refunds are given for the rest of the billing period after you cancel. The AI Terms say AI output may be inaccurate and must be verified, and Tidio's privacy policy says some data may be processed in the United States.
