Front vs Intercom
Pick Front if your queue is mostly email that agents work on together, and you want EU hosting and SSO on a mid-tier plan. Pick Intercom if live chat is your main channel and you want an AI agent that acts on Shopify orders on whichever plan you buy. Both bill their AI agent per conversation on top of seats. Fin is part of every Intercom plan and Intercom documents its Shopify order workflows; Autopilot is an add-on on every Front plan, and Front's pages describe no order actions.
| Fact | Front | Intercom |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | $35/agent/mo | $39/agent/mo |
| Plans | Starter, Professional, Enterprise | Essential, Advanced, Expert |
| Best for | support teams, operations teams, account management teams | SaaS products, Self-serve onboarding, In-app support |
| Deployment | Cloud | Cloud |
| Headquarters | San Francisco, US | San Francisco, CA, USA |
| Founded | 2013 | 2011 |
| Facts checked |
Which one fits your team?
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Pick Intercom if
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What each costs
The team: 8 agents at an ecommerce brand, answering email, chat and Instagram, with rules-based routing and an AI agent. That rules out Front Starter (one channel type, a 10-seat cap) and Intercom Essential (no Instagram, no workflows, one team inbox). So the realistic plans are Front Professional and Intercom Advanced.
Seats, billed annually:
- Front Professional: 8 × $65 = $520 a month ($6,240 a year)
- Intercom Advanced: 8 × $85 = $680 a month ($8,160 a year)
Seats, billed monthly:
- Front Professional: 8 × $85 = $680 a month
- Intercom Advanced: 8 × $99 = $792 a month
Agent copilot for all eight:
- Front Copilot: 8 × $20 = $160 a month. Front's pricing page shows Copilot at $20 a seat a month with the billing toggle on annual and on monthly
- Intercom unlimited Copilot: 8 × $29 = $232 a month billed annually, or 8 × $35 = $280 billed monthly. The included allowance is 10 Copilot conversations per teammate a month
The AI agent, at a stated volume. Say 1,000 conversations a month reach it: 500 end with no human reply, and 500 are handed to an agent after the AI has replied.
- Front Autopilot: 500 × $0.89 resolution + 500 × $0.39 handoff = $445 + $195 = $640
- Intercom Fin: 500 × $0.99 = $495. A handoff counts as an outcome only when it ends a completed Procedure, so the 500 handoffs add anywhere from $0 to $495, for $495 to $990
Monthly total on annual billing:
- Front: $520 + $160 + $640 = $1,320
- Intercom: $680 + $232 + $495 = $1,407, rising to $1,902 if every handoff comes out of a Procedure
What the headline prices leave out:
- Front's native WhatsApp is Meta's message costs plus a 20% admin fee, on Professional and Enterprise. Phone runs through Aircall or Dialpad, which bill you separately
- Front's Enterprise plan ($105 a seat, annual only) includes Copilot, Smart QA and Smart CSAT. For this team that is 8 × $105 = $840 a month, $160 more than Professional plus Copilot ($65 + $20 = $85 a seat). An onboarding package is required on contracts over $25k
- Intercom's WhatsApp, SMS and phone are charged per message or by usage, and the rates are not on the pricing page. Get them in writing before you move a busy WhatsApp queue
- Intercom bills an outcome when a customer doesn't ask for more help after Fin replies. By that definition, a customer who gives up after Fin's reply is likely to be billed too, so ask Intercom how it treats abandoned chats
- Intercom currently shows a new-customer discount on Essential ("New customers save 35%"). It doesn't apply to Advanced, so it doesn't change this team's bill
Front plans
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed annually | What you get |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | $35 | $25 | Hard cap of 10 seats. |
| Professional | $85 | $65 | Hard cap of 50 seats. |
| Enterprise | – | $105 | Annual billing only - Front states monthly is not offered on this plan. |
Prices are an agent a month, in US dollars. Source: front.com/pricing, checked .
Intercom plans
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed annually | What you get |
|---|---|---|---|
| Essential | $39 | $29 | Fin AI Agent at $0.99 per outcome on top of seats |
| Advanced | $99 | $85 | Fin AI Agent at $0.99 per outcome. |
| Expert | $139 | $132 | Fin AI Agent at $0.99 per outcome. |
Prices are an agent a month, in US dollars. Source: intercom.com/pricing, checked .
Where the features differ
28 of the 32 features we checked on both differ in availability or the plan you need. The other 4 are the same on both. Each answer links to the page on the vendor’s own site that says so.
| Feature | Front | Intercom |
|---|---|---|
| Channels | ||
| Contact form and widget | Some planssource | Every plansource |
| Every plansource | Every plansource | |
| Live chat | Every plansource | Every plansource |
| Phone | Some plansfrom Professionalsource | Paid add-onfrom Essentialsource |
| SMS | Every plansource | Paid add-onfrom Essentialsource |
| Social DMs | Some plansfrom Professionalsource | Some plansfrom Advancedsource |
| Paid add-onfrom Professionalsource | Paid add-onfrom Essentialsource | |
| AI and automation | ||
| Agent copilot | Paid add-onsource | Paid add-onfrom Essentialsource |
| AI agent (customer-facing) | Paid add-onfrom Startersource | Every plansource |
| AI agent takes actions | Paid add-onsource | Every plansource |
| AI pricing published | Every plansource | Every plansource |
| Automation rules | Every plansource | Some plansfrom Advancedsource |
| Intent detection and routing | Every plansource | Some plansfrom Advancedsource |
| Macros and saved replies | Some plansfrom Professionalsource | Every plansource |
| Self-service | ||
| Customer portal | Some planssource | Some plansfrom Advancedsource |
| Customer-facing help centre | Every plansource | Every plansource |
| Multilingual support | Some plansfrom Enterprisesource | Some plansfrom Advancedsource |
| Workflow and admin | ||
| Collision detection | Every plansource | Every plansource |
| Native mobile app for agents | Every plansource | Every plansource |
| Public API | Every plansource | Every plansource |
| Roles and permissions | Every plansource | Some plansfrom Expertsource |
| Side conversations | Every plansource | Every plansource |
| Single sign-on | Some plansfrom Professionalsource | Some plansfrom Expertsource |
| Reporting and quality | ||
| CSAT surveys | Some plansfrom Enterprisesource | Every plansource |
| Custom reports and export | Some plansfrom Enterprisesource | Some plansfrom Advancedsource |
| QA and agent scoring | Some plansfrom Enterprisesource | Paid add-onsource |
| Reporting dashboards | Every plansource | Every plansource |
| Security and reliability | ||
| EU data residency | Every plansource | Some plansfrom Advancedsource |
AI agents
Intercom handles this better for a chat-led ecommerce queue. Fin is on Essential, Advanced and Expert at $0.99 per outcome on top of seats, charged at most once per conversation, and Intercom documents Fin for ecommerce as Procedures on Shopify's APIs covering order status, returns, refunds, exchanges and order updates or cancellations. Fin for ecommerce is listed on the entry plan. Check that Procedures are switched on for your workspace before you count on them; an older Intercom article routes access through your account manager.
Front's Autopilot is an add-on for every subscription plan, legacy plans included. Front says it "takes action in your systems" through Playbooks, which you write once in plain language. Its product page doesn't mention Shopify or orders, so anything order-related is a build you'd do yourself and test before you rely on it.
Front's billing is more granular about partial work. Every conversation is charged once at the highest level reached: $0.05 for triage, $0.39 for a handoff, $0.89 for a resolution, which means no teammate reply within 24 hours on chat, SMS and WhatsApp or 72 hours on email and the portal. The pricing page only says "starting at $0.05 per conversation", so model from the help centre article.
Shopify and order work
Intercom is stronger for teams that change orders. From the inbox an agent can refund chosen line items or shipping (shipping once per order), create a replacement order at $0.00 that leaves the original untouched, and issue a gift card capped by default at 150% of the order total, counting every gift card on that order. Discount codes can be listed, created and disabled when that setting is on. Cancelling isn't available from the inbox, and editing an order works only through a replacement or draft order, so cancellations still mean a trip to Shopify.
Front's Shopify integration, published by Front and available on all three plans, shows customer, order, refund and address information in the inbox and connects multiple stores. Its page doesn't describe refunding, cancelling or editing an order from Front. Intercom's multibrand Messenger and help center are Expert-only, so a multi-store brand that mostly looks orders up may find Front the cheaper fit.
Channels and collaboration
Front is better for teams where several people touch one conversation. Comments, shared drafts and guest accounts are built into every plan. Starter is limited to one channel type (email, chat or SMS); Professional adds Facebook, Instagram and X. SMS comes through third parties such as Twilio, and phone through Aircall or Dialpad, so a voice team pays two vendors.
Intercom is better for chat-first teams that want the channels from one vendor. Live chat and support email are free and unlimited on every plan, Instagram is a free app on Advanced and Expert, and WhatsApp, SMS and phone are Intercom's own pay-as-you-go channels. Advanced includes 20 free Lite seats, which Intercom describes as limited access for internal collaboration. Lite seats can't use Copilot.
Hosting, security and admin
Front is easier for EU buyers. Its security page offers US or EU hosting with no plan gate stated, and SAML SSO arrives on Professional. Intercom's standard workspaces are hosted in the US. EU or Australian hosting is only for new workspaces on Advanced or Expert under a contract. An existing workspace can't be moved and its conversation history doesn't migrate, so decide on region before you go live. SSO on Intercom means Expert, at $132 a seat billed annually.
Intercom publishes a 99.8% uptime SLA covering Fin and the core platform. Front's security page lists SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 but no uptime figure.
How we checked this
- Seat prices match the plan tables on this page, read from each vendor's pricing page by our weekly pricing check
- Checked 2026-10-29.
Sources
- front.com/pricing
- help.front.com/en/articles/4890624
- front.com/product/autopilot-customer-service-automation
- front.com/integrations/shopify
- front.com/security
- intercom.com/pricing
- intercom.com/help/en/articles/9121384-copilot-included-and-…
- intercom.com/help/en/articles/14420740-set-up-fin-for-ecomm…
- intercom.com/help/en/articles/14738005-manage-shopify-order…
- intercom.com/help/en/articles/6139045-connect-your-instagra…
- intercom.com/help/en/articles/6124430-regional-data-hosting
- intercom.com/security
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