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Insightly is a popular CRM with extensive project management tools, a user-friendly interface, and affordable pricing. It'll suit most small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) wanting an accessible way to track post-sale activities, but it won’t meet the needs of larger companies seeking a CRM with myriad customization options and advanced forecasting and analytics. Read our in-depth Insightly review to learn about its core features, pricing, and ideal use cases.
Insightly CRM boasts a comprehensive set of internal and external project management tools. Its user-friendly interface will appeal to new CRM users, but companies seeking a highly adaptable platform will find it too rigid.
Price Range: Free to $99 per user, per month (14-day trial)
Ratings only tell one part of the story. Also consider scenarios where Insightly could be a successful solution — and learn why it may fall short in some situations. Continue reading to learn about the CRM’s use cases, pricing plans, key features, and user support, including what people think of the software and its alternatives. Otherwise, jump down to see our scoring logic.
If the above points sound good to you, visit Insightly to compare individual plans according to cost and features. Most paid plans come with a 14-day risk-free trial.
Should Insightly not align with your sales goals, head to our roundup of the best CRM software for a complete look at other CRMs according to cost, functions, and use cases — or skip down for a list of Insightly alternatives.
Insightly’s free-for-life plan offers basic CRM tools such as limited records for leads and contacts, email marketing, and native integrations. However, it’s limited to only two users. Subscribers can upgrade to paid plans for a broader range of features, such as Kanban views for project management, custom reports, workflows, and more. Full pricing details are below:
| Free | Plus | Professional | Enterprise | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Annual Plan Monthly Rate | $0 for up to 2 users | $29 per user, per month | $49 per user, per month | $99 per user, per month |
| Monthly Plan Monthly Rate | N/A | $35 per user, per month | $59 per user, per month | $129 per user, per month |
| Free Trial | N/A | 14 days | 14 days | Contact sales |
| Key Features | Custom fields, mass emails, integration with QuickBooks and PandaDoc, online help center access | Project management, custom reports, mobile business card scanner, standard user support | Workflow automation, lead assignment rules, custom objects, unlimited email templates | Unlimited records, storage, and dashboards — plus support for custom functions on AWS Lambda |
| Record Limit | 2,500 records | 100,000 records | 250,000 records | Unlimited records |
| File Storage | 200MB | 10GB | 100GB | Unlimited storage |
| Mass Email Sends Per Day | N/A | 2,500 sends per day | 5,000 sends per day | 10,000 sends per day |
| Custom Fields | 2 custom fields per record type | 50 custom fields per record type | 100 custom fields per record type | 200 custom fields per record type |
| Scheduled reports or smart alerts | N/A | 25 scheduled reports or smart alerts | 100 scheduled reports or smart alerts | 250 scheduled reports or smart alerts |
Unlike a lot of popular CRMs, Insightly is sparse with paid add-ons, which can be a good thing if you’re hoping to keep overall costs down. However, there are a couple of paid extras worth purchasing for telephony functionality and fully-automated app integrations.
Insightly offers two add-ons: Insightly Voice (a telephony service) and Insightly AppConnect (an expanded app integrations platform). Prices start at $35 per user, per month for Insightly Voice, and range from $249 to $3,499 per month for AppConnect.
Insightly Voice is an add-on for Insightly’s Professional or Enterprise plans that allows users to call leads and contacts from within the CRM. It also adds call routing, missed call notifications, incoming call forwarding, and call activity tracking. Insightly Voice costs $35 per user, per month and includes 500 minutes of talk time (inbound and outbound). Extra talk time can be purchased monthly at 4 cents per minute (unused minutes don’t roll over).
Insightly AppConnect streamlines integrations by enabling users to build automated workflows between Insightly CRM (Professional or Enterprise) and third-party applications without extensive coding. It includes hundreds of pre-built connectors and enables Insightly CRM to integrate with over 1,000 apps total. Prices range from $249 per month for 25,000 tasks to $3,499 per month for 500,000 tasks. A guided onboarding fee of $1,500 applies.
Meanwhile, Insightly All-in-One is a comprehensive platform that combines Insightly CRM with Insightly AppConnect, Insightly Marketing, and Insightly Service. Plans range from $349 per month (for two users) to $2,599 per month (for 10 users), with the option to add extra seats from $29 to $99 per user, per month.
Insightly is a collaborative CRM with a focus on project management, but its core CRM features offer ways to manage contacts and leads, build custom reports, and trigger basic workflows. Upgraded plans add advanced automation, email marketing tools, and customizable dashboards. Learn more about Insightly's features below:
Insightly’s built-in project management tool eases the burden of tedious data entry for busy salespeople by allowing you to convert won opportunities into post-sale projects with just a couple of clicks. Stay organized and updated by tracking milestones, metrics, deadlines, client activity, and related tasks all in one place. The user-friendly, drag-and-drop kanban interface makes it simple to move projects from one stage to the next.
Insightly earned a spot on our list of the best CRM software as the top platform for managing internal and external projects.
Insightly offers a 360-degree view of your contact data — including associated projects, social media handles, recent activity, and local time. Import 500 to 50,000 contact records at once (depending on your plan) from Gmail, Outlook, Mailchimp, and Excel. Keep your contact database tidy with Insightly's SmartMerge feature, which automatically detects duplicate information that you can either delete or merge with an existing record.
All Insightly plans come with real-time lead activity tracking and automatic social media enrichment, which adds relevant Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter handles to lead profiles. You’ll also be able to generate leads (and filter spam) with webforms that you can add to your site or WordPress blog. Upgrade your Insightly plan to add features like drag-and-drop kanban pipelines, automatic duplicate detection, and lead assignment and routing.
Insightly is a top analytical CRM for the breadth of reporting capabilities available in its paid and free tiers. All plans include a library of nine legacy reports based on opportunities and contact activities, along with a custom drag-and-drop report builder for tailored CRM metrics on projects, tasks, events, and more. Insightly’s two highest plans add report scheduling with automatic delivery to colleagues, managers, and clients.
Find out which reports your sales team should be running, and how to set them up in your desired CRM, with our complete guide to CRM reporting.
All Insightly plans include three standard dashboards (opportunities, projects, and leads) that contain four to 10 reports each. However, outside of their layouts these dashboards can’t be altered. Upgrade to Insightly Pro or Enterprise to build custom dashboards and access over 40 data visualizations based on trends, comparisons, sources, and goals. Dashboards on the Enterprise plan allow for unlimited insight cards, while Professional has a 100-card limit.
Dashboards can help you develop, manage, and meet actionable sales goals. Learn more in our comprehensive article on CRM dashboards.
Insightly is one of the top Mailchimp CRMs for its tight integration with the email marketing platform. For instance, you’ll be able to trigger a welcome email via Mailchimp when a closed deal becomes a project, then create a drip campaign to keep customers informed. Meanwhile, Insightly comes with its own native email marketing tools, including customizable templates, activity tracking (click and open rates), and scheduled email sends.
Insightly is a best operational CRM for its project-related workflows. All plans include templated activity sets for automating basic pipeline-related tasks and events. However, upgrade to Insightly Professional or Enterprise for access to broader workflow sequences and more precise triggers. For ultimate workflow flexibility, Insightly Enterprise allows developers to create custom actions in multiple coding languages through lambda functions.
Look into our comprehensive guide to CRM automation to maximize your CRM's automation capabilities so you can focus on building relationships (and revenue).
Insightly integrates with hundreds of outside apps. Only a handful of native integrations are available (like MailChimp and QuickBooks). Most apps connect to Insightly via third-party APIs or Insightly’s Public API – including Google Drive and Evernote. Expand Insightly’s integrations with a connector (like Zapier), custom app development (Enterprise only), or by subscribing to Insightly AppConnect for direct access to over 1,000 apps (from $249 per month).
Learn which apps you should add to your CRM — and how to deploy them — in our in-depth guide to CRM integration.
The Insightly mobile app is free to download for iOS and Android. It features the same project management tools as its parent software but adds mobile-exclusive functions like a built-in business card scanner, audio note recorder, and call logging. (Note that call logging and card scanning are for paid Insightly subscribers only.) Unfortunately, despite multiple software updates over the years, the Insightly app still lacks offline access.
Insightly allows you to manage files and documents related to specific contacts or projects within your account. You get 10GB of storage on the Plus plan, 100GB on the Professional plan, and unlimited storage on the Enterprise plan. You can also expand your storage capacity while streamlining operations by integrating Insightly with Google Drive, OneDrive, Box, or Dropbox.
Insightly's free plan offers access to basic CRM features, but it can only be used by two people and has limited functionality otherwise. Upgrade to one of its paid subscriptions for more features, expanded data storage, and increased contact record limits.
Insightly combines an intuitive interface with a rich feature set to satisfy novice and experienced CRM users alike. Colorful kanban boards and a straightforward layout will help newbies feel at ease, while veterans will appreciate its rich suite of sales and project management tools. All plans come with access to the knowledge base, webinars, and help center, as listed below:
| Free | Plus | Professional | Enterprise | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Knowledge Base | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
| Webinars | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
| Help Center | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
While Insightly offers a relatively flexible platform, businesses needing industry-specific software have to subscribe to more expensive tiers for unlimited records, fields, and permissions.
Insightly has three customer support tiers. All plans include access to Insightly’s knowledge base, webinars, and live chat (a hybrid of a chat bot and a human representative). Below is a breakdown of what each support plan entails:
| Free Plan Support | Standard Plan Support | Premier Success Support | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | Included with free plan | Included with paid plans | 20% of subscription ($3,000 minimum) |
| Live Chat | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
| Email Support | ✘ | ✔ | ✔ |
| Phone Support | ✘ | ✘ | ✔ |
| Dedicated Support Manager | ✘ | ✘ | ✔ |
Guided onboarding is also available for a one-time $1,500 fee and includes implementation guidance plus ongoing CRM support. It’s a requirement for Premier Success Support plan users, as it’s their introduction to the customer success manager, who’ll provide dedicated support post-onboarding. Subscribing to this plan will yield faster turnaround times via email and phone, although it can be costly for small to medium businesses to purchase both plans.
Reviews for Insightly are mostly positive. Per Capterra, more than 60% of Insightly users would recommend the platform to others. Below is a brief look at how sales professionals rate Insightly across three of the most well-known software review aggregate sites:
 |  |  |
|---|---|---|
| 4 / 5 stars | 8.4 / 10 stars | 4.2 / 5 stars |
| 600+ total reviews | 700+ total reviews | 800+ total reviews |
Insightly has glowing reviews for real users across certified sites. However, we like to go beyond the scores, so we analyzed individual reviews from current and former Insightly customers for a comprehensive overview of its benefits and shortcomings. Here’s what people like about Insightly — and what they wish it did better:
Fans of Insightly praise its ease of use, minimalist UI, and streamlined organization of sales data. Project managers appreciate Insightly’s robust project management tools for allowing them to track real-time activity and share progress with colleagues and clients. Other reasons why people like Insightly include seamless data entry; tight integration with Mailchimp, Gmail, and Outlook; and good value for money.
Several customers say Insightly’s search engine is finicky, yielding unrelated results or oversights that could potentially lead to duplicate records. Some users have also experienced lag or logouts when dealing with large volumes of data. Meanwhile, Insightly’s simple interface, combined with its lack of a native AI sales assistant, is a disadvantage for sales leaders who need a more robust CRM for complex workflows.
Insightly is an excellent CRM, especially when it comes to project management. However, your organization may need something different — whether that’s a scalable free platform, AI-powered tools, a more malleable interface, or a diverse mix of sales and marketing functions. If Insightly isn’t ticking the right boxes for you, check out the five top Insightly alternatives below:
Freshsales is a top-rated CRM for salespeople and the best Insightly alternative for companies wanting access to AI-powered sales tools and built-in telephony at an affordable cost. (Plans range from free to $69 per user, per month.) It also provides plenty of room for customization while sporting one of the cleanest interfaces on the market, although its project management features are not as robust and visual as Insightly CRM.
If you’re curious to know more about this CRM, take a look at our in-depth Freshsales review.
Zoho CRM is a leading marketing CRM known for its tight social media integration, AI workflow automation, and high level of personalization. It's a more affordable alternative to Insightly — paid plans range from $14 to $52 per user, per month, and a limited free version for up to three users is also available. However, a steep learning curve and mediocre quality of customer support make it a less desirable option for CRM newbies.
If your sales and marketing teams often work together, give our Zoho CRM review a read and find out if it’s best for your business.
HubSpot CRM is a popular free CRM that supports up to 2,500 users and offers a comprehensive suite of sales and inbound marketing tools — making it an ideal solution for small businesses seeking a scalable CRM. While HubSpot offers a more robust free plan than Insightly, upgrading to paid Sales Hub tiers for sophisticated CRM features can get expensive quickly. Pricing ranges from $18 per month for two users to $1,200 per month for 10 users.
Check out our complete HubSpot CRM review to find out more about this popular sales and marketing software, and discover how it could help your business.
Salesforce is a highly customizable platform, providing most medium to large businesses with a robust suite of features — including advanced analytics, sales forecasting, and automations for nearly every sales process. Like Insightly, Salesforce has a robust pipeline and opportunity management tools, but its pricing is more expensive. The entry-level Starter plan costs $25 per user, per month and its advanced plans range from $80 to $330 per user, per month.
Our breakdown of Insightly vs Salesforce further highlights the differences and similarities between these two CRMs.
Pipedrive is a sales-centric CRM with a focus on pipeline management. It’s priced similarly to Insightly, with plans ranging from $14 to $99 per user, per month. However, Pipedrive also offers a variety of paid extras (from $6.70 per month) that add project management, marketing, and productivity features. Pipedrive is a great choice for teams new to CRMs thanks to its intuitive UI plus 24/7 access to user support.
Read our detailed Insightly vs Pipedrive comparison to see which of these two CRMs would be a better fit for your sales needs.
For more on Insightly’s competitors, check out our Insightly alternatives article, where you'll find each platform's pricing, features, use case, and more.
In assessing Insightly, we picked out the six main categories for companies and organizations needing a CRM with a strong project management tool, sales features, and a user-friendly interface. For each category, we identified weighted subcriteria and assigned an overall score out of five to see how Insightly CRM performed across the six areas.
Insightly CRM is cloud-based software that offers teams and businesses an intuitive platform to track their post-sales activities. Its key features include a built-in project management tool with visual kanban boards, customizable pipelines, team collaboration, and sales automation. Insightly is also known for its simple interface, allowing CRM newbies and smaller teams to quickly set up and implement the software for sales, marketing, and service processes.
Insightly CRM is popular among small-to-medium-sized businesses due to its free platform and standard features for sales and post-sales operations offered at an affordable entry-level plan. It also has a minimal learning curve, ideal for beginners, while also offering a good amount of customization options. However, larger enterprises can purchase higher tiers to unlock more robust features and limits that their businesses might need.
While Insightly CRM provides comprehensive sales features and basic marketing tools, businesses needing complex workflows might find this platform lacking. Unlike its competitors such as Freshsales, Zoho, and Salesforce, Insightly doesn’t have a built-in AI assistant for stronger automations. Insightly’s customer support isn’t accessible enough unless you pay for premium plans, and its knowledge base isn’t as comprehensive as other CRM software.
Insightly has a price point and user interface that’ll appeal to small businesses new to CRM software, as well as a comprehensive set of project management tools and workflow automation options for growing companies. However, do your homework before deciding on Insightly — read in-depth reviews, seek feedback from real users, try the platform out for yourself via a free trial or a demo, and weigh other options listed in our guide to the best CRM for salespeople.
This article was written by Alison Barretta and updated by Kezia Jungco.
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