A UK, email-first Front alternative.
Front is a multi-channel shared inbox built for collaborative email, chat, SMS and social, with no free plan and per-seat pricing in US dollars. Solves does one job well: email-first support ticketing, with owned tickets, SLAs, multi-brand and GBP team bands, designed for UK SMEs. This page is an honest comparison, including where Front is still the better choice.
Comparison figures verified on 13 June 2026. Always re-check current Front pricing before you decide.
The short answer
Who should switch from Front to Solves
Switch to Solves if you mainly used Front for collaborative support email, you want clear ticket ownership and SLAs, you run one or more brands, and you would rather pay GBP team bands than US-dollar per-seat fees. Stay on Front, or pick another omnichannel tool, if your core need is many live channels (chat, SMS, social) handled together at scale.
Front is a strong product for what it is: a shared inbox that turns email and a spread of other channels into a collaborative workspace. That breadth is also the trade-off. You pay per seat, the pricing is in US dollars, there is no permanent free plan, and a lot of the platform is there to serve channels and workflows an email-first UK team may never touch.
Solves is narrower on purpose. It takes your support addresses and turns them into owned tickets with states, priority, tags, assignment, public replies and private notes, saved replies scoped per brand or organisation-wide, first-response and resolution SLA timers, saved queue views and reports. It is multi-brand from the start, so one team can run several brands from one unified queue without juggling separate accounts.
A good fit if any of these sound familiar
- You liked Front for shared email, but rarely used its chat, SMS or social channels.
- You want firm ticket ownership and SLAs, not just a tidy shared inbox.
- You support more than one brand and want them in one queue, not one tool per brand.
- You prefer GBP invoices with VAT shown, and pricing that does not punish occasional helpers.
- You are a UK SME that values an email-first tool over a broad omnichannel suite.
Not a fit if these are your priorities
- Live chat, SMS, voice or social handled in the same inbox as email.
- A large team running many real-time channels and deep cross-channel workflows.
- Native deep integration with your personal Gmail or Outlook inbox as the main surface.
Honest comparison
Solves vs Front, side by side
Where an email-first UK desk differs from a multi-channel collaboration platform. Figures verified on the date shown; re-check Front pricing before deciding.
| Solves | Front | |
|---|---|---|
| Core shape | Email-first support ticketing | Multi-channel shared inbox and collaboration |
| Free plan | Starter GBP 29, paid from the start | No free plan; 14-day trial, eligible startups up to 6 months free |
| Pricing model | GBP team bands, ex VAT | Per seat, in US dollars |
| List pricing | Starter GBP 29, Team GBP 79, Growth GBP 149, Agency/MSP GBP 299 | Annual Starter USD 25, Professional USD 65, Enterprise USD 105 per seat/mo |
| Multi-brand | Built in: several brands, one unified queue, brand-locked sending | Available, but a collaboration tool rather than brand-first ticketing |
| SLAs | First-response and resolution timers, per-brand targets, breaching view | Available on higher tiers as part of the platform |
| Chat, SMS, social, voice | Not included, by design (email-first) | Core strength: many channels in one inbox |
| Data at rest | Encrypted at rest, per-organisation keys, metadata-only logs | See Front's own security documentation |
Competitor facts last verified 13 June 2026. Re-check the vendor's current plans before deciding.
Solves does not claim feature parity with Front and does not claim to win for larger, multi-channel teams. Front pricing is per seat in US dollars and may have changed; verify on Front's pricing page before you decide.
Be fair
Where Front is the better fit
No tool wins for everyone, and Front is genuinely better than Solves for several real situations. If you are in one of these, Front (or another omnichannel platform) is the honest recommendation.
Multi-channel collaboration at scale
Front is built to pull email, chat, SMS and social into one collaborative inbox, with shared drafts, comments, assignments and a rich rules engine across all of those channels. If your team handles real-time conversations across several channels and needs them in one place, that is Front's home ground and Solves does not compete there. Solves is email-first and has no chat, SMS, voice or social inbox.
Deep, cross-channel automation and routing
Front offers an automation and routing rules engine that spans its channels. Solves deliberately does not ship an automations or routing-rules engine yet. If your workflows depend on rules that move, tag and assign work automatically across channels at volume, Front is the stronger choice today.
A larger, US-dollar-comfortable team
Front's per-seat, US-dollar model and broad feature set suit larger teams that want one platform for many channels and are comfortable buying per seat. Solves is built for UK SMEs that want a focused email desk billed in GBP. If you are a big team needing breadth, Front is a more natural home.
Email-first, on purpose
Solves handles support email: tickets, ownership, notes, SLAs and multi-brand. It does not do live chat, phone, SMS or social inboxes. That focus is the whole point: a small UK team can run support, even across several brands, without paying for channels it never uses.
What you get with Solves
The email-first essentials, done properly
Every item below is shipped today, not a roadmap promise.
Owned email tickets
Shared inboxes become owned tickets with states (New, Open, Waiting for Customer, Snoozed, Resolved, Closed), priority, tags and assignment.
Replies and private notes
Hard separation between public replies and internal notes, with a wrong-brand send guard and stale-reply prevention.
SLA timers
First-response and resolution targets, with per-brand or organisation targets, a breaching view that surfaces overdue tickets, and ageing.
Saved queue views
New, Unassigned, Waiting, Snoozed, Breaching SLA, Resolved and All, with filters for brand, mailbox, assignee, state, priority, tag and search.
Multi-brand
Several brands with per-brand mailboxes, brand-locked sending, brand badges and filters, and contact history grouped by brand, in one queue.
Reports
Open backlog, ageing, waiting, first response, resolution and created-versus-resolved, with brand filters, so you can see where time goes.
Moving across
How a move from Front to Solves works
Forwarding-first, so you can run a pilot without cutting over your mail flow on day one.
Set up your brands and mailboxes
Create a brand for each customer-facing identity and connect its support address. Guided mailbox setup gives copyable DNS records, and live sending stays gated until verification passes or a founder override is recorded.
Forward in and reply out
Forward your support addresses into Solves and reply from the correct brand each time. The composer is locked to the ticket's brand and mailbox, so a reply for one brand cannot go out as another.
Run a pilot, then commit
Work a real queue with SLAs and saved views before you switch fully. Importing historical Freshdesk data is in pilot and not a live transfer today, so plan any history migration as a guided, hands-on step.
On migrating your data
Bringing historical tickets across from another tool is something we help with by hand during onboarding, not a one-click import that reads your old account today. Treat any data migration as a planned, guided step rather than an instant transfer.
FAQ
Front alternative questions
What is a good Front alternative according to Reddit?
Threads about Front alternatives tend to split by what people actually need. Teams who liked Front mainly for collaborative email often look for something simpler and cheaper that still owns the inbox properly. Teams who used Front as a multi-channel hub for chat, SMS and social usually need another omnichannel tool. Solves is the right fit for the first group: it is email-first support ticketing with ownership, SLAs and multi-brand, priced in GBP team bands rather than per seat. If your core need is many live channels in one app, Front or another omnichannel platform is the better answer, and we will say so plainly.
Is there a free Front alternative?
Front itself has no free plan: it offers a 14-day trial, and eligible startups can apply for up to 6 months free, but there is no permanent free tier (verified 13 June 2026). Solves has a Starter at GBP 29 covering 3 users, 1 brand, 1 mailbox and 1,000 tickets a month, which is paid rather than being free forever, so it is honest to call it a beta rather than a free-forever plan. It is built for small teams and running a small pilot, not for hiding ongoing costs.
Can a Front alternative work with Gmail?
Front connects directly to mailboxes including Gmail and Google Workspace. Solves takes a different, deliberately email-provider-neutral route: you forward your support address (such as a Google Workspace support@ alias) into Solves, and Solves sends through a verified sending setup using Postmark with copyable DNS records. So Solves works alongside Gmail or Google Workspace as your mailbox, rather than logging into your personal Gmail inbox the way a Gmail-native tool does. Live sending for each brand stays blocked until its checks pass or a founder override is recorded.
Does Solves do chat, SMS and social like Front?
No, and we are clear about it. Front is a multi-channel collaboration tool that brings email, chat, SMS and social into one shared inbox. Solves is email-first by design: tickets, ownership, private notes, SLAs and multi-brand for support email, with no live chat, phone, SMS or social inbox. If you need several live channels in one place, Front or a broader omnichannel platform is the better fit. If support email across one or more brands is the job, Solves is built for exactly that.
How does Front pricing compare with Solves?
Front is priced per seat and billed in US dollars: annual Starter USD 25, Professional USD 65 and Enterprise USD 105 per seat per month, with no free plan and a 14-day trial (verified 13 June 2026). Solves is priced in GBP team bands, ex VAT: Starter GBP 29, Team GBP 79, Growth GBP 149 and Agency/MSP GBP 299, with annual paid as twelve months for ten. Because you buy a band rather than a seat, an occasional helper who picks up overflow does not add a full seat to the bill. Always re-check current Front pricing on their site before deciding.
Try the email-first alternative
Join early access, or take a look at GBP team-band pricing first. No US-dollar per-seat surprises.