Help Scout Pricing: Plans, AI Fees and Real Team Costs
Help Scout costs $25, $45 or $75 per user a month on annual billing, plus $0.75 for every AI resolution. Here is what each plan includes, how the AI meter works, and what a real team pays.
Help Scout costs $25, $45 or $75 per user per month on annual billing (Standard, Plus, Pro), or $30, $54 and $90 if you pay monthly. There is also a Free plan with 1 Inbox and 1 Docs site. On top of seats, Help Scout's AI agent is billed at $0.75 per resolution. Prices verified on helpscout.com/pricing on November 4, 2026.
That is the whole price list. What it costs you depends on two numbers: how many people need a seat, and how many conversations you let the AI close.
Help Scout plans at a glance#
| Plan | Annual billing | Monthly billing | Who it is for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | $0 | 1 Inbox, 1 Docs site |
| Standard | $25/user/mo | $30/user/mo | Growing teams moving beyond email |
| Plus | $45/user/mo | $54/user/mo | Higher volume, more channels |
| Pro | $75/user/mo | $90/user/mo | Scale, security, compliance |
| AI agent | $0.75/resolution | $0.75/resolution | Add-on, billed monthly |
Annual billing saves about 16%. Standard and Plus have a 15-day free trial with no card. Pro is sales-led: you book a demo to trial it.
What each plan includes#
Standard: $25 per user
Multiple Inboxes, live chat and SMS, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger, multiple knowledge bases, one basic SLA policy, basic workflows, unlimited tags and saved replies, and the AI Inbox assistant.
That is a lot of channel coverage for the entry tier. The limits show up in routing and automation: one basic SLA and basic workflows only.
Plus: $45 per user
Everything in Standard, plus advanced workflows, two advanced SLA policies, a secure customer portal, unlimited AI Drafts, round robin routing, Salesforce, Jira and HubSpot integrations, internal teams, and grouping conversations by company.
Help Scout marks Plus as its popular plan. If you need round robin or a CRM integration, this is where you land.
Pro: $75 per user
Everything in Plus, plus unlimited workflows and SLA policies, multiple routing types, SSO/SAML, HIPAA compliance, up to 50 light users, a dedicated onboarding specialist and a strategic account manager.
SSO and HIPAA are the usual reasons teams move to Pro. Those two features alone triple the per-user cost from Standard.
Extra Inboxes and Docs sites
Each plan includes a set number of Inboxes and Docs sites. Extra Inboxes are $10 a month on annual billing ($12 monthly). Extra Docs sites are $20 a month ($24 monthly).
How Help Scout's AI pricing works#
Help Scout sells its AI agent as an add-on called Envoy. The FAQ on the same pricing page calls it AI Answers. Either way, the price is $0.75 per resolution, billed monthly.
The rules, from Help Scout's own FAQ:
- A resolution is one conversation the AI resolves without human help.
- It does not count if the customer escalates, searches the knowledge base, asks more questions, or clicks "I still need help."
- You pay once per conversation, even if the AI answers several questions in it.
- New accounts get 3 months of free, unlimited resolutions from the day the account is created.
- You can set a monthly spending cap. When you hit it, the AI turns off for the rest of the cycle.
The cap is worth noticing. It makes the bill predictable, but it also means customers stop getting AI answers on the day you run out of budget.
What a real team pays#
Here is a 5-person team on Plus, annual billing, letting the AI resolve 300 conversations a month after the free trial ends.
| Line item | Monthly cost |
|---|---|
| 5 users on Plus ($45) | $225 |
| 300 AI resolutions ($0.75) | $225 |
| Total | $450 a month, $5,400 a year |
Two things move that number fast:
- AI volume. Every 100 extra resolutions adds $75 a month. The better the AI gets, the bigger this line.
- Plan jumps. If one requirement, like SSO, pushes you to Pro, all 5 seats go from $45 to $75. That is $150 a month more before any AI.
Paying monthly instead of annually takes the same 5 Plus seats from $225 to $270.
Help Scout vs SupportWire on price#
SupportWire uses one plan: $19 per seat per month, billed monthly, with everything included. Each month includes 50 AI resolutions, then each one after that is $0.49. Lite seats are unlimited and free. Full details on the pricing page.
Same team, same 300 AI resolutions:
| Help Scout Plus (annual) | SupportWire | |
|---|---|---|
| 5 seats | $225 | $95 |
| AI resolutions | 300 × $0.75 = $225 | 250 × $0.49 = $122.50 (first 50 included) |
| Monthly total | $450 | $217.50 |
SupportWire charges for a resolution when the customer confirms it (a rating of 4 or more, a "this helped" click, or an agent marking it resolved), or when Kal gave a real answer and the customer stays quiet for 24 hours. Handoffs to a human are never charged. We wrote up exactly how that meter works in Paddle sells a bill, not a meter.
For the feature-by-feature view, see Help Scout vs SupportWire. If you are also weighing Intercom, the Intercom vs Help Scout comparison puts both side by side, and the Intercom pricing calculator models seats plus Fin for your team.
Is Help Scout worth the price?#
Help Scout is a good fit if your support is email-first, you want a calm shared inbox, and you will use the knowledge base. The Standard plan covers a lot of channels for $25.
It gets expensive when you need Pro-only features for a few people, or when AI resolutions climb into the hundreds a month. At that point the per-resolution fee matters as much as the seat price.
If you are already comparing tools, our list of the best Help Scout alternatives covers seven options with one honest weakness each. For the wider question of what AI support should cost, read AI customer support cost.
Frequently asked questions
As of November 4, 2026, Help Scout has a Free plan and three paid plans priced per user per month: Standard at $25, Plus at $45 and Pro at $75 on annual billing, or $30, $54 and $90 on monthly billing. Its AI agent is an add-on at $0.75 per resolution, billed monthly.
Yes. Help Scout lists a Free plan limited to 1 Inbox and 1 Docs site, and free accounts do not need a payment method. Standard and Plus also come with a 15-day free trial with no credit card.
Help Scout's AI agent costs $0.75 per resolution. A resolution is one conversation the AI closes without human help, charged once per conversation. New accounts get 3 months of free, unlimited AI resolutions, and you can set a monthly spending cap that switches the AI off when you hit it.
Usually on seats, and Help Scout's AI resolution fee is lower than Fin's. The gap depends on your seat count, plan and AI volume, so model your own numbers in the Intercom pricing calculator and compare them with the Help Scout figures here.
SupportWire is $19 per seat per month on one plan with everything included, 50 AI resolutions included each month, then $0.49 per resolution. For a 5-person team on Help Scout Plus with 300 AI resolutions a month, that is about $218 a month against $450.
Updated November 2026
