A Crisp alternative for teams whose support is email.
Crisp is a chat-first platform built around a website live-chat widget and chatbots. Solves is an email-first support desk that turns shared mailboxes into owned, timed tickets across every brand. This page is an honest comparison: where Crisp is the better choice, where Solves is, and the facts to check before you decide.
Competitor pricing and plan facts verified on 13 June 2026. Re-check the vendor pages before you decide.
The short answer
Crisp is chat-first, Solves is email-first
If you came looking for a Crisp alternative, the most useful thing we can tell you is where the two products genuinely differ, rather than claim Solves does everything Crisp does. It does not, and that is the point.
Crisp is organised around live chat: a website widget, chatbots and a multi-channel inbox that pulls chat, email and social into one place. It has a capped forever-free plan for up to two seats, then prices per workspace rather than per agent. If conversations on your website are the heart of your support, Crisp is a strong, mature choice.
Solves does one job and tries to do it well. It takes shared mailboxes such as support@, info@ and accounts@ and turns them into owned tickets with assignment, states, priority, tags, saved replies, public replies, private notes, queue views, SLA timers and reports, across several brands in one workspace. There is no chat widget, no chatbot, no social or phone, on purpose.
So the choice is not really Crisp versus Solves on a feature count. It is whether your support arrives mostly as live chat, where Crisp leads, or mostly as email across one or more brands, where an email-first desk like Solves is the cleaner fit.
Where Crisp is the better fit
If you need a website live-chat widget or chatbots, choose Crisp. Solves does not offer live chat, chatbots, social inboxes or phone, and we are not going to pretend it does. Crisp wins on those surfaces; this page is here to help you pick the right tool, not to talk you out of the right one.
Why teams look past Crisp
When an email-first desk fits better than chat-first
These are reasons to consider Solves, not claims that Crisp is worse. If chat is your channel, stay with Crisp.
Email is your real channel
If most of your support comes in by email rather than a chat widget, an email-first desk is built around that reality instead of treating the inbox as one tab among several.
You want owned tickets, not a chat feed
Solves gives every message an owner, a state, a priority and a clear history, so nothing falls through the cracks between shifts.
You run more than one brand
Each brand keeps its own mailbox, sender name, signature and saved replies, with a unified queue and a guard against replying as the wrong brand.
You price and pay in GBP
Solves bills in GBP ex VAT with VAT-visible invoices and team bands, which can be simpler to reason about than per-workspace pricing quoted in euros.
You want SLA timers that surface overdue work
First-response and resolution SLA timers, with per-brand targets and a breaching view that surfaces overdue tickets, so nothing slips quietly past its target.
You want a tight data footprint
Customer content is encrypted at rest with per-organisation keys, access is authorised-only, and logs hold metadata only, never message bodies or addresses.
Honest comparison
Crisp vs Solves at a glance
A plain comparison of scope and fit. Competitor figures verified on 13 June 2026; this is a dated snapshot, so re-check both vendors before you commit.
| Solves | Crisp | |
|---|---|---|
| Primary channel | Email-first: shared mailboxes into owned tickets | Chat-first: website live-chat widget and chatbots |
| Live chat widget | Not offered, by design | Core to the product |
| Chatbots and automated chat | Not offered | Yes, a core strength |
| Owned email tickets, notes, SLAs | Core to the product | Available alongside chat |
| Multi-brand from one queue | Yes, with per-brand mailboxes and send guard | Not its focus |
| Free plan | Starter GBP 29, paid from the start | Forever-free for up to 2 seats, capped |
| Pricing model | Per team band, GBP ex VAT | Per workspace, in euros |
| Paid entry pricing | Starter GBP 29, Team GBP 79 a month | Mini EUR 45, Essentials EUR 95, Plus EUR 295 a month |
| Social and phone channels | Not offered | Multi-channel inbox available |
Competitor facts last verified 13 June 2026. Re-check the vendor's current plans before deciding.
Solves does not claim feature parity with Crisp and is not the better choice for chat-led support. If live chat or chatbots are central to how you help customers, Crisp is the better fit. Crisp prices and plans are taken from its public pricing page on the verified date and may change.
Reading the table
What the comparison does and does not say
The table is about fit, not winners. Crisp leads clearly on live chat and chatbots, and it offers a genuine capped free plan for up to two seats, so nothing here should be read as Crisp lacking a free tier or losing on its home ground. It does not.
On free plans, both stories are honest
Crisp has a forever-free plan for up to two seats with live chat and a basic shared inbox. Solves has a Starter at GBP 29 for three users, one brand, one mailbox and up to 1,000 tickets a month, which is paid for small teams. We call ours paid rather than forever-free because that is what it is, and we hold competitors to the same standard.
On pricing, compare like with like
Crisp charges per workspace in euros: free, then Mini at EUR 45 a month, Essentials at EUR 95 and Plus at EUR 295, with Enterprise on request. Solves charges per team band in GBP ex VAT: Starter at GBP 29, Team at GBP 79, Growth at GBP 149 and Agency or MSP at GBP 299, with annual billing priced as twelve months for ten. A per-workspace model and a team-band model can land very differently depending on seat count and channel mix, so price your own scenario rather than the headline.
On scope, the line is deliberate
Solves does not do live chat, chatbots, social inboxes or phone. That is not a roadmap gap we are hiding; it is the boundary of the product. We would rather be the best small email-first desk for a UK team than a weaker copy of a chat-first platform.
How to decide
Three questions that settle it
Where do your conversations start?
If most begin in a website chat window, lean Crisp. If they begin in a shared mailbox, lean Solves. Count a typical week before you choose.
How many brands do you answer for?
One brand, chat-led, points to Crisp. Several brands, each with its own support address and identity, points to an email-first multi-brand desk like Solves.
What do you actually want to pay for?
If you want a chat widget and chatbots, that is Crisp's value. If you want owned tickets, private notes, honest UK SLAs and reports, that is what Solves charges for.
Moving by email
If you are leaving a shared inbox
Many teams evaluating Crisp are not on a helpdesk yet at all; they are running a Gmail or Outlook shared inbox and feeling the strain. If that is you, moving to Solves is straightforward today. The guided, forwarding-first mailbox setup walks you through pointing your support address at Solves and verifying it with plain-English DNS steps, so live sending only switches on once the checks pass.
A full automated importer that lifts historic tickets out of another helpdesk is still in pilot and guided, not a one-click transfer, and we will not pretend otherwise. For a team coming off a shared mailbox, that rarely matters: forwarding-first setup gets new email flowing into owned tickets quickly, and your contact history builds from there. If you need help, our pilot includes guided domain and mailbox setup.
Email-first support, set up in an afternoon
If your support is email and you want owned tickets, SLAs and multi-brand without a chat widget you will not use, start at £29 or talk to us first.
FAQ
Crisp alternative questions
Is Solves a like-for-like Crisp replacement?
No, and it would be dishonest to say so. Crisp is a chat-first platform built around a website live-chat widget, chatbots and a multi-channel shared inbox. Solves is an email-first support desk: it turns shared mailboxes such as support@ and accounts@ into owned, timed tickets. If live chat on your website is central to how you help customers, Crisp is the better fit. If your real support load arrives by email across one or more brands, Solves is built for exactly that.
Does Crisp have a free plan?
Yes. Crisp offers a forever-free plan at no cost for up to two seats, with live chat and a basic shared inbox, though it leaves out workflows and AI. We mention this because it is true and because honest comparison matters. Solves has its own Starter at GBP 29 for three users, one brand, one mailbox and up to 1,000 tickets a month; it starts at GBP 29 and is paid for small teams, not a forever-free tier.
Can Solves do live chat or chatbots like Crisp?
No. Solves does not run a website chat widget, chatbots, social inboxes or phone, and we are not planning to pretend otherwise. That is the clearest line between the two products. Crisp wins on live chat and chatbots. Solves wins when the job is owned email tickets, assignment, private notes, SLAs and running several brands from one queue.
How does Crisp pricing compare with Solves?
Crisp prices per workspace rather than per agent: a free tier, then Mini at EUR 45 a month, Essentials at EUR 95 and Plus at EUR 295, with Enterprise quoted on request, all verified on 13 June 2026. Solves prices in GBP with team bands: Starter GBP 29, Team GBP 79, Growth GBP 149 and Agency/MSP GBP 299 a month, all ex VAT, with annual billing priced as twelve months for ten. Re-check both vendors' current pages before you decide, as pricing moves.
I run support for several brands by email. Which one suits me?
Solves is built for that case. Each brand keeps its own support address, sender name, signature and saved replies, your team works every brand from one unified queue, and a hard guard stops a reply going out as the wrong brand. Crisp can field email alongside chat, but its centre of gravity is the live-chat widget. For an email-first, multi-brand UK team, Solves is the closer match.