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Free CRM software refers to CRM tools that offer a free-for-life option and paid tiers you can upgrade into, but don't include CRMs with free trials only. While many free options are limited compared to paid alternatives, there are good free CRMs that provide pipeline tools, contact management capabilities, reporting dashboards, marketing features, and more. To identify the most robust and usable free CRMs, we evaluated the top CRM software to determine the best options.
Here are the six best free CRM software options and their primary use cases:
While some may score high in one category, we found that the overall best free CRM option is HubSpot CRM, also emerging as the winner for features and customization. To find out how we evaluated each CRM software and to see their primary use cases, pricing plans, and key features, jump down to our explanation below.
Note: All per-user prices are with a one-year commitment unless noted.
Offers a robust mix of free tools for sales and marketing with strong customization capabilities.
HubSpot CRM is a robust free CRM that offers a mix of sales and marketing tools to help you manage your contacts and engage with them. Complete sales tasks directly within a contact’s record and monitor new deals with its free pipeline feature. Integrate with its Marketing Hub for web forms and landing pages and its Service Hub for help desk tickets and chat bots. Upgrade to custom reporting and sales analytics to monitor the overall health of your pipelines.
While HubSpot CRM is a great free option, its upgrades can be pricey, especially if you need advanced marketing tools. If you’re someone looking for a CRM with affordable upgrades and robust marketing features, try Zoho CRM, which is our top marketing software.
Helps you identify high-intent leads and the best next strategies to engage with them.
Freshsales is our top-rated overall CRM that helps you qualify leads who are most likely to become your paying customers. Prioritize your contacts based on their stars and ranking determined by Freddy AI according to their profile, engagement levels, and more. Then, set up sales sequences with steps to nurture your contacts and engage with them via phone, chat, and email. Upgrade for more advanced contact scoring and AI-based forecasting insights.
Even though Freshsales is great for scalability, its free tier only supports up to three users. If you need a robust and unlimited free option, try HubSpot CRM.
Helps you organize and manage your contacts across multiple communication channels.
Zoho CRM is our top contact management software and offers robust sales and marketing features in its basic tier. Manage your contacts in its multipurpose digital contact book and create connections, log sales activities, and create tasks to engage with them. Then use its sales automation to create simple workflows for setting up calls or meetings, and leverage its marketing tools to create drip campaigns with customizable email templates.
That said, while Zoho CRM’s free tier is solid, it's missing many of the social media marketing and advanced sales features that the CRM is known for. If you don't want to pay for these extra marketing features, check out HubSpot CRM.
Provides robust sales and task management features, including team collaboration functionality.
Bitrix24 is a sales, marketing, and team collaboration CRM offering unlimited users, contacts, and leads in its free tier. While you need to upgrade for advanced features like social media ad management, its free option offers a visual pipeline and team collaboration tools such as a company workspace to set up your live feed, chats, phone calls, and video calls in one place. You can also sync calendars or reports with your team and send updates to leadership.
Bitrix24 offers a solid free option, but the interface is hard to use and most of its premium marketing and sales features are locked behind a paywall. If you need a robust free version with a better user experience, check out HubSpot CRM.
Offers advanced sales, marketing, and service tools without additional cost.
EngageBay is a user-friendly CRM that offers robust tools for your sales, marketing, and service operations. Manage your sales process with its contact and deal management features, and identify high-intent leads through predictive lead scoring and segmentation tools. Then, engage with them via social media, live chat, and email campaigns. Once they convert to customers, set appointments with them or resolve issues with the ticketing management feature.
EngageBay offers a solid mix of free sales, marketing, and service features. However, its paid tiers require a two-year commitment for their largest discount. If you only need basic workflow automation and the option of scaling later, try Zoho CRM instead.
Provides basic pipeline management and a separate project management pipeline.
Insightly CRM offers basic contact and pipeline management as well as a separate pipeline for ongoing project management. Create seamless post-sale transitions by converting opportunities to projects on one visual dashboard after the deal is closed. Then, tailor those projects using custom fields and page layouts, which you can share with your team. Visualize and monitor your project’s workflow by setting milestones on colorful kanban boards.
Although Insightly CRM is a good solution for project management, it’s not user-friendly with its complicated interface and hard-to-find free tier information. If you’re someone who needs an intuitive interface and easily accessible information, try EngageBay.
The best options for free CRM platforms include these functions:
Organize and manage your leads and customer data in an easily accessible location without having to pay an additional cost.
While many CRMs offer a free trial for their paid services, we only considered CRMs with truly free-for-life tiers and paid upgrade options. To determine the best free CRM software, we identified six weighted scoring categories and scored each software in every category to determine an overall score out of five. Also identified were primary use-cases for each top option. Check out our specific evaluation criteria and weights below:
The best free CRM software options are scalable, easy to learn, and have a solid range of features. Thus, those three criteria hold the most weight in our final rankings. We also took into consideration the advanced features offered, customer support accessibility, and level of customization to finalize our list.
We looked into how many users a free CRM supports, what features are included in a free plan, and the types of customer support available without additional cost. We also evaluated the free trial length and starting prices for paid plans.
We assessed every free CRM’s core features for things like contact management, pipeline management, activity tracking, and CRM reporting.
We evaluated how accessible, user-friendly, and generally easy to implement each free CRM is through real user reviews on sites like G2, Capterra, and TrustRadius. We also looked into their knowledge base or the free resources offered.
Does the CRM offer tools like lead scoring and distribution, sales forecasting, a live chat builder, and artificial intelligence?
We examined feedback from verified users on G2 and Capterra and checked how accessible user support via phone, email, and chat is for non-paying users.
We looked into each CRM’s capability to create multiple pipelines, custom reports and dashboards, and web forms. We also considered how each free option seamlessly integrates with apps for Google, social media, and more.
The best free CRM software provides salespeople with the essentials they need to help grow their client base — and in some cases can even scale along with a business. The six free CRM options on our list will suit the needs of small businesses seeking access to reliable sales or marketing software without breaking the bank. If you’re looking to upgrade for more robust CRM features, check out our independent review of the best CRM software for salespeople.
Alison is a Philadelphia-based technology writer for Selling Signals. She has 15 years of experience in the digital space, and her specialties include comparison guides and reviews across CRM, ecommerce, and various SaaS products. In her free time, Alison has received two HubSpot certifications plus a TEFL certification, as well as leads an online martial arts learning program.
Selling Signals delivers actionable advice for sales and marketing professionals. Learn strategies that help you hit targets, strengthen customer relationships, and win more business. Get expert advice on lead generation, sales processes, CRM software, sales management, and account management directly to your inbox.
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