The short answer: a help desk for online stores, priced by tickets
Gorgias is a help desk built for e-commerce brands. It pulls email, live chat, Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and contact-form messages into one inbox and shows the shopper's orders next to each conversation. It is not a CRM. The bill follows billable tickets a month, not the number of agents. Starter is $10 a month, billed monthly only, for 50 tickets. Basic is $60 a month billed monthly or $50 a month billed annually, for 300 tickets.[1] Our verdict is simple. If you sell on Shopify, Gorgias gives you the deepest version of the product. Off Shopify, you pay the same and get less.
Gorgias started in Paris in 2015 as a Chrome extension for writing emails faster, grew into a help desk, and now describes itself as an AI-first support platform for e-commerce teams. The CRM question comes up often, and the answer stays no. Gorgias builds customer profiles from conversations and store data, with a timeline, a sidebar and notes, while CRM records arrive through integrations. HubSpot connects through a partner-built HTTP integration that shows lead details in the ticket sidebar, and Klaviyo receives ticket events such as opened and resolved tickets. Teams that run sales pipelines keep a separate CRM next to it.
What you actually buy: one helpdesk and several meters
The plan you buy is the Helpdesk: tickets, channels, a native help center, rules, macros, views, SLA policies, statistics, the app store, the REST API and Gorgias MCP. Helpdesk 2.0, released on 6 May 2026, swapped the email-style layout for a chat-bubble view with a customer timeline sidebar and AI handover summaries, and teams can switch back for 30 days. Reporting allows up to 10 dashboards of 20 charts each on every plan. New Helpdesk Performance Analytics arrived on 13 October 2026, and the old reports stay until 13 November 2026. Training through Gorgias Academy is free and needs its own account.
AI Agent is a separate subscription, billed per automated interaction, and it plays two roles. The Support Agent answers after a purchase from your help center, guidance and Shopify data, hands over to humans, and on Basic and higher runs Actions such as cancelling an order or editing an address. The Shopping Assistant works before a purchase, with product recommendations, add to cart, unique discount codes and AI answers on product pages. The older Flows, Order Management and Article Recommendations automations now come with the same subscription. Starter and Basic include 30 automated interactions a month, Pro 190 and Advanced 530.
Around those sit pieces that buyers often confuse. Convert is the paid campaigns product for onsite chat, billed per click on its own plan. Voice starts from $25 a month on annual pricing. SMS starts from $17 a month on annual pricing, and both add-ons count their own tickets. Gaia is an assistant inside Gorgias, in open beta on every plan and possibly not yet available to every account, that investigates tickets and drafts rules, macros and reports, but never writes customer replies. Gorgias MCP is different again: it lets outside assistants such as Claude or ChatGPT work in your account, with no AI Agent needed.
Pull last quarter's conversations that got any reply, including Rule auto-replies, and size the plan to that monthly volume. Team size does not change the price beyond the seat caps: 3 user seats on Starter, 500 on Basic and higher.
Shopify gets the full product; other platforms get less
On Shopify, the ticket sidebar shows the 10 most recent orders. Agents can create, duplicate, edit, cancel and refund orders, change a shipping address that writes back to Shopify, and send one-time discount codes without leaving the ticket. Edits stop at archived orders, orders older than 60 days and orders in another currency. AI Agent, the Shopping Assistant and Order Management work only with a connected Shopify store.[2] That single rule decides whether half the product exists for you. Our Gorgias for Shopify guide covers the order actions in detail.
BigCommerce connects on Basic and higher, with sidebar orders and buttons to create, duplicate and refund them, plus Flows and Article Recommendations for teams that pay for an AI Agent subscription, even though AI Agent itself does not run there. Magento 2 and Adobe Commerce need Pro or higher and bring no built-in order actions, so teams fall back on an HTTP hook to the Magento API or custom widgets. WooCommerce gets the customer profile and orders in the sidebar, but no order actions, no rule conditions and none of the automation features. None of the three gets AI Agent or Order Management. A Magento brand therefore starts on Pro at $300 a month billed annually, for a helpdesk without order buttons.
AI Agent, the Shopping Assistant and Order Management need a connected Shopify store. Magento 2 needs Pro or higher and has no built-in order actions.
How the ticket meter decides your bill
A billable ticket is any conversation where the helpdesk sends at least one message, whether a human agent, a Rule or AI Agent wrote it, and it counts once however long the thread runs.[3] That makes a Rule auto-reply billable. Newsletters, spam and auto-responders are filtered out and not billed, and neither are tickets nobody answers. Inactivity splits threads too. A customer who writes back after more than 10 days on email, or more than 3 days on chat, SMS or voice, opens a new ticket that bills again once answered.
Prices shown are what Gorgias lists for visitors in the United States, in US dollars. Your price can differ by country, currency and local taxes such as VAT.
| Plan | Account price | Tickets a month | Overage | User seats |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | $10 a month, billed monthly only | 50 | $0.40 per ticket | 3 |
| Basic | $60 a month monthly, or $50 a month billed annually | 300 | $0.40 per ticket | 500 |
| Pro | $360 a month monthly, or $300 a month billed annually | 2,000 | $0.36 per ticket | 500 |
| Advanced | $900 a month monthly, or $750 a month billed annually | 5,000 | $0.36 per ticket | 500 |
| Enterprise | Custom plan through sales, no public price | Custom | Not published | Not published |
The plan price buys tickets, not people. Two agents or 40 agents on Pro pay the same $300 a month billed annually, within the 500-seat cap. Volume moves the bill. By our arithmetic, Starter plus overage reaches the $60 monthly price of Basic at 175 tickets a month, and Basic at 400 tickets costs $100 a month on monthly billing. Annual billing costs about 17% less than a year of monthly payments on Basic, Pro and Advanced. There is no published pause at the limit, so a busy month simply bills as overage.
AI costs stack on top. Every AI Agent resolution counts as a billable helpdesk ticket and also carries the automation fee. Included interactions cost $1.00 each on monthly billing or $0.90 each on annual billing, then $1.50 per automated interaction past the limit. An interaction counts as automated only if the shopper does not reach a human within 72 hours. Resolutions by Flows, Order Management and Article Recommendations carry only the automation fee. With AI Agent, Pro costs $550 a month billed monthly or $471 a month billed annually. Our Gorgias pricing breakdown works through every plan.
There is no free plan. The trial lasts 7 days, needs no card and opens all features, but you cannot create a help center during it, outbound email is capped at 600 messages for the trial, and an account that never upgrades is deleted with its data after 90 days. Annual plans renew automatically and need written cancellation notice at least 30 days before the term ends, so set a reminder 45 to 60 days ahead. Fees are non-refundable under the Master Subscription Agreement, except where the law requires or at Gorgias's discretion. No mid-term downgrade is allowed. Uninstalling the Shopify app does not cancel.
Annual plans renew automatically; give written notice at least 30 days before the term ends and set a reminder 45 to 60 days ahead. Uninstalling the Shopify app does not cancel.
Sign-in, security and what happens to your data
Users sign in with email and password, or with Google or Microsoft SSO on every plan. Custom SSO through OpenID Connect providers such as Okta and JumpCloud starts on Advanced, and SAML SSO with SCIM provisioning belongs to the custom Enterprise plan. Two-factor authentication uses a six-digit code from an authenticator app, and when admins make it mandatory, users who skip setup are locked out after 14 days. SSO users have no password, so a first app login starts with Forgot password. The iOS and Android apps have no SSO login at all. Audit logs start on Pro and keep 12 months of events.
Gorgias holds a SOC 2 Type II report, and its Trust Center lists SOC 2, GDPR, CCPA and HIPAA.[4] HIPAA needs care. The Trust Center offers a Business Associate Agreement, while the Master Subscription Agreement says customers must not upload protected health information under that agreement, so health brands should settle the paperwork before setup. Data sits on Google Cloud in the US, the EU or Australia, closest to the merchant. Card numbers and valid Social Security numbers are masked inside tickets, with the last four digits kept.
The AI data terms have layers. Under the Master Subscription Agreement, Gorgias may use Customer Data, usage data and AI output to build and improve its own machine-learning models, but not to train third-party providers' models, and its AI providers, OpenAI and Anthropic among them, run under zero data retention. The help center adds that AI Agent learns from other brands' interactions, with safeguards. After termination, ask for an export within 45 days; Gorgias deletes customer data within 90 days. Brands with strict data policies should read those clauses before signing, not after.
How we score Gorgias
We score Gorgias on the same axes as every help desk in our catalog, where Zendesk and Freshdesk also sit. Both of those price per agent, so the real comparison hinges on whether your ticket volume or your headcount grows faster. Our Gorgias alternatives guide runs that comparison plan by plan. Our composite lands at 3.7/5, and the full breakdown follows, with the weight we give each axis.
Email, live chat, Facebook and Instagram (DMs, comments, ad comments, mentions), WhatsApp and a contact form land in one inbox on every plan, with voice and SMS as add-ons, and the Gorgias-built Shopify integration is the deepest store link in the category: the 10 most recent orders in the sidebar, create, duplicate, edit, cancel and refund orders, edit shipping addresses written back to Shopify, one-time discount codes, two-way customer notes and rule conditions on order data. Gorgias's app store lists 100+ apps (its own count) with Recharge, Loop, Skio, ShipBob, ShipStation and ShipMonk actions, Klaviyo events and review apps creating tickets, Attentive, Postscript, Aircall and Zapier; a REST API, HTTP integrations as webhooks and sidebar widgets on every plan, and a Gorgias MCP server on every plan with official connectors in the Claude and ChatGPT directories since 29 Oct 2026. Held back by being built for e-commerce only, with depth that drops off Shopify (BigCommerce from Basic without order edits, Magento 2 from Pro with no built-in order actions, WooCommerce sidebar data only), an API limit of 2 requests per second on the self-serve plans (4 on the custom plan), webhooks with a 5-second timeout and no retry on 429 or 500 errors, HubSpot and Slack only through partner-built HTTP integrations, and the Gorgias-built TikTok Shop app sunset on 30 Oct 2026.
Every plan, Starter included, gets the unified inbox, rules, macros with Shopify and Recharge actions, views (500 shared, 20 private per user), SLA policies, auto-assignment, ticket priority, teams, ticket and customer fields, intents and sentiment, ticket translation, a customer timeline, a native Help Center, statistics with up to 10 dashboards of 20 charts and live statistics; Pro adds the revenue report and audit logs (events kept 12 months), and the custom Enterprise plan unlimited Help Centers, SAML SSO and SCIM. Held back by a ceiling that general service desks do not have: 70 rules per account with no time-based trigger, 25 active ticket fields and 4 customer fields, only Open, Closed and Snoozed statuses, merges that cannot be undone, no built-in spam filter for email, revenue analytics from Pro, custom SSO from Advanced, old reports replaced by the new Helpdesk Performance Analytics since 13 Oct 2026, and a design for online stores rather than IT or B2B service.
Gorgias prices the whole account by billable tickets a month, not by agent: Starter $10 a month billed monthly only (50 tickets, 3 user seats), Basic $60 a month billed monthly or $50 a month billed annually ($600 a year; 300 tickets), Pro $360 or $300 ($3,600 a year; 2,000 tickets), Advanced $900 or $750 ($9,000 a year; 5,000 tickets); the Enterprise plan is custom through sales. Annual billing costs about 17% less (our arithmetic), team size does not change the price (up to 500 user seats from Basic), a ticket counts once however many messages follow, and spam, newsletters, auto-responders and unanswered tickets are not billed; the help center comes at no extra cost. Held back by bills that grow with volume (overage $0.40 per ticket on Starter and Basic, $0.36 on Pro and Advanced: Basic at 400 tickets is $100 a month billed monthly, our arithmetic), Rule auto-replies making a ticket billable, AI Agent on top at $1.00 per included automated interaction billed monthly or $0.90 billed annually (Pro with AI Agent $471 a month billed annually, $5,652 a year) and $1.50 each past the limit, each AI resolution also counting as a helpdesk ticket, voice from $25 a month on annual pricing or $30 monthly and SMS from $17 or $20 as add-ons, no free plan, and fees that are non-refundable under the Master Subscription Agreement, except where the law requires or at Gorgias's discretion.
Signup starts a 7-day trial with all features and no payment info, Shopify connects from the Shopify App Store and puts order data next to every conversation, macros and views handle repeat work, Helpdesk 2.0 (6 May 2026) brought a chat-style ticket view, a customer timeline and AI handover summaries with a 30-day switch back, Gaia (open beta, not yet on every account) drafts rules, macros and reports on request with rules created disabled, a Zendesk importer runs on every plan, Gorgias Academy is free, and iOS and Android apps exist. Held back by a billing meter buyers must learn (what makes a ticket billable, new tickets after 10 days on email or 3 days on chat, SMS and voice, a legacy model for older accounts), a product map of add-ons (AI Agent, Convert, Voice, SMS) with plan gates, a trial that caps outbound email and cannot create a help center, rules with no time-based trigger, interface and analytics changes in 2026, and mobile apps with no calls, no SSO login and no ticket fields.
AI Agent works as a Support Agent that answers from guidance, the help center, the website and Shopify data and runs Actions (cancel order, edit address, refund, reship, subscription changes) inside skills, and as a Shopping Assistant for product recommendations, add to cart and discount codes; it replies in 80+ languages on email, chat, SMS (with the SMS add-on), Instagram DMs, Messenger and WhatsApp (generally available 14 Oct 2026), with built-in handovers and test conversations that are not billed; Gaia (open beta, may not yet be on every account) investigates tickets and drafts rules, macros and reports, Auto QA scores tickets, and AI ticket translation, intents and sentiment come on every plan. Held back by AI Agent, Shopping Assistant and Order Management working only with a connected Shopify store, Actions and brand voice needing Basic or higher, a paid add-on priced per automated interaction (30, 30, 190 or 530 included a month, then $1.50 each) where each AI resolution also counts as a helpdesk ticket, Auto QA without custom criteria, and a Master Subscription Agreement that lets Gorgias use Customer Data to improve its own AI models (third-party providers under zero data retention, no training of their models).
SOC 2 Type II (Trust Center report dated 31 Dec 2025), GDPR and CCPA, a Business Associate Agreement offered for HIPAA, hosting on Google Cloud in the US, EU and Australia with encryption at rest and in transit and continuous backups, card numbers and SSNs obfuscated in tickets, a DPA with breach notice within 72 hours, a public status page, and standard support included by live chat in the dashboard or email. Held back by no percentage uptime SLA (the Master Subscription Agreement promises commercially reasonable efforts), a Master Subscription Agreement that says customers must not upload protected health information under it, fewer published certifications than Zendesk's, a CSM that depends on annual Shopify GMV, support as the top complaint theme on Trustpilot, partner-built apps supported by their developers, no mid-term downgrade, automatic renewal with written notice 30 days before an annual term ends, non-refundable fees, and Customer Data available on request for only 45 days after termination.
A detailed help center that publishes what buyers need to predict a bill (what makes a ticket billable, what is never billed, inactivity splits, how AI Agent and Flows are charged, the 72-hour rule, Voice and SMS ticket rules), limits for rules, macros, views, fields, statistics and AI Agent, a developer site with rate limits, OAuth2 and a dated changelog, a pricing FAQ, an MCP guide, a Master Subscription Agreement, DPA and trust center, plus the free Gorgias Academy. Held back by pages not updated: a chat-deflection article saying an AI Agent answer is not a ticket, an AI Agent pricing blog with old interaction ranges and unlimited seats, a guardrails blog with an old character limit, a roadmap listing social channels as upcoming, a developer page with an older Enterprise window, an apps page still listing the sunset TikTok Shop app, help articles that still say Automate subscription, and integration counts that differ from page to page.
Shopify App Store 4.3 from 709 reviews and Capterra 4.6 from 135; Trustpilot 2.0 from 153; App Store US 1.62 from 78 and Google Play 1.6 from 99 rate the Gorgias mobile app, not the web helpdesk; G2 was not read. Trustpilot collects mostly unhappy reviewers, so it is a map of complaints (support, billing and charges, account access, bugs, price, analytics, cancellation), not a trend. Axis score 3.6: the mean of each platform's displayed rating with at least 30 reviews, app stores included, weighted by review count (computed 3.629, rounded down to one decimal).
Weighted across the axes above (weights reflect what actually drives the decision in this category). How we score →
The platform ratings split sharply, and the split is readable. Reviewers on the Shopify App Store and Capterra are merchants describing daily work, and they rate Gorgias well. Trustpilot draws a different crowd, mostly unhappy reviewers, so we read it as a map of complaints rather than a verdict. In a sample of 100 reviews, support was the most common theme, followed by billing and charges, account and login trouble, bugs, price and analytics. Those map to real mechanics: ticket overage, AI fees, auto-renewal and the 2026 interface changes. The App Store and Google Play scores rate the mobile app, not the web helpdesk, and that app cannot place calls.
Frequently asked questions
Can I move from Zendesk to Gorgias?+
Gorgias's importer, on all plans, brings over the most recent 2 years of tickets plus macros, users, tags and ticket fields, but it asks for a Zendesk API token. Zendesk stopped new API token creation on 27 Oct 2026, and all existing Zendesk Support API tokens stop working on 30 Apr 2027, so confirm the import method with Gorgias before planning. Attachments and ratings do not come across.
Does Gorgias handle Amazon or eBay messages?+
Through ChannelReply, a partner app that brings Amazon, eBay, Etsy, Walmart, Back Market and Newegg messages into Gorgias. Partner apps set their own prices and are supported by their developers.
What uptime does Gorgias promise?+
The Master Subscription Agreement promises commercially reasonable efforts for 24/7 availability. Gorgias does not publish a percentage uptime SLA; a live status page is available.
What can the Gorgias mobile app do?+
The iOS and Android apps let agents answer tickets, but they have no SSO login, cannot place calls, cannot send images or links, and only create Email tickets.
The bottom line
Gorgias fits a Shopify brand whose support load is mostly order questions, because the order actions, AI Agent and the Shopping Assistant all assume that store. Budget by ticket volume, not team size, and add the AI meter on top once AI Agent goes live, remembering that each AI resolution also uses a ticket. Brands on Magento, BigCommerce or WooCommerce should skip it only if they need AI Agent there, since it is Shopify-only; the order-aware help desk still works, on Basic and up for BigCommerce and Pro and up for Magento 2. Teams that need a CRM or a general service desk should look elsewhere. Our score reflects that split. Real depth where it fits. Real cost risk where volume outruns the plan.
- [1] Pricing page with plan cards (Monthly, Annual, Add AI Agent states), comparison table, Voice and SMS add-ons and billing/security FAQ (2026-11) https://www.gorgias.com/pricing
- [2] Gorgias help: Which ecommerce platforms support automation features (2026-11) https://docs.gorgias.com/en-US/compatibility-of-automation-features-with-ecommerce-store-providers-1749413
- [3] Gorgias help: How Gorgias bills tickets, automated interactions, Voice and SMS add-ons, overage, splits and merges (2026-11) https://docs.gorgias.com/en-US/how-youre-billed-for-using-gorgias-199385
- [4] Gorgias Trust Center: SOC 2 Type II, GDPR, CCPA, HIPAA resources, controls and updates (2026-11) https://trust.gorgias.com/