Six CRMs make this shortlist, and the real differentiator isn't features, it's what each one charges for and how easy it is to leave. Nutshell and Capsule keep the entry price lowest with no contract, Close and folk charge more for calling or LinkedIn-driven contact enrichment, and EngageBay bundles marketing automation into a free plan. Keap goes further on automation than any of them, but that depth comes bundled with an annual contract and a $299 early-termination fee worth reading closely before you sign.
ToolsGavel's top pick:Nutshell (4.4/5, from $13/user/mo billed annually ($19 month to month)) — Nutshell's $19-a-month Foundation plan, or $13 billed annually, is the lowest annual per-seat price for a team in this group, and unlimited contacts and storage carry through every tier, including that one. Support reviewers rate it highest in the category: 4.8 out of 5 specifically for service quality. The catch: there's no sales automation and no second pipeline until Pro, a $49-a-month jump ($42 annually), and the mobile app trails well behind the desktop version.
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at no extra cost to you. Tools we partner with are listed first, but that never changes a score — how we test.
Audited prices verified against live vendor pricing pages — full dataset in the Pricing Gap Index.
1
NutshellBest all-round
★★★★★★★★★★4.4
Nutshell's $19-a-month Foundation plan, or $13 billed annually, is the lowest annual per-seat price for a team in this group, and unlimited contacts and storage carry through every tier, including that one. Support reviewers rate it highest in the category: 4.8 out of 5 specifically for service quality. The catch: there's no sales automation and no second pipeline until Pro, a $49-a-month jump ($42 annually), and the mobile app trails well behind the desktop version.
Best for: Small sales teams that want a low paid floor, unlimited contacts on every tier, and no contract to sign · from $13/user/mo billed annually ($19 month to month)
Promo codenspub-partner-1monthfree1 free month on any Nutshell subscriptionEnter the code on the billing page in Nutshell when you buy.
Verified Nov 2026
Capsule's Free plan, 250 contacts and 2 users with no card required, is generous enough for a solo founder to run a business on, and its cancellation policy adds a 14-day grace period before a closed account is deleted for good. The catch: there's no phone support at any price, and workflow automation plus two-way email sync both wait behind Growth, roughly $36 to $42 a month.
Best for: Solo founders and small teams who want a real free plan and an easy way out if it doesn't work, and who don't need phone support · from $21/user/mo
Close bakes calling, SMS and email into the pipeline itself; reps get a Power Dialer and sequences once they're on Growth ($109/mo) or Scale ($149/mo). Solo runs $19 a month, or $9 billed annually, for a single user, with no stated contract. The catch: it's the priciest per-seat CRM in this group once a team scales past Solo, and built-in calling bills separately at roughly $0.02 a minute on top of the seat.
Best for: Inside sales teams that want calling, email and CRM in one window · from $19/user/mo
Promo codeSTACK2020% off your first year on an annual plan, on top of the annual billing discountNew customers, annual plans only. Enter the code at checkout.
Verified Nov 2026 · Ends Dec 31, 2026
folk's LinkedIn Chrome extension pulls contact details straight into a Kanban pipeline, the feature reviewers cite most often for choosing it over a general CRM. One-click Gmail, Outlook, calendar and WhatsApp sync comes standard on the $30-a-month Standard tier ($24 billed annually). The catch: there's no free plan, just a 2-week trial, and automation beyond simple trigger emails waits behind Premium, which doubles the seat price to $60 a month.
Best for: Agencies and solo operators who want LinkedIn-driven contact enrichment in their CRM and don't mind paying double for automation beyond simple trigger emails · from $30/user/mo
Deal10% off for new customersApplied automatically when you sign up through our link. No code needed.
Verified Nov 2026
EngageBay bundles a CRM, marketing automation and a support helpdesk under one login, starting with a free plan that covers 250 contacts and live chat. Basic then runs $14.99 a seat, the lowest paid floor among the CRMs here that also offer a free plan, and adds SMS and lead scoring. The catch: the interface shows its age, and lower tiers cap daily email sends, a recurring deliverability complaint in user reviews.
Best for: Small businesses that want marketing automation, CRM and helpdesk on one login instead of three bills · from $14.99/user/mo
Keap is the only CRM in this group that includes full marketing automation, email, SMS and payments, at its entry tier instead of gating it behind an upsell, for one flat $320-a-month price (2 users and 1,500 contacts included). Read the terms first: that price locks into an annual contract with a $299 early-termination fee, and canceling requires a phone call placed at least 10 days in advance, not a button in the account. Trustpilot reflects that pattern at 1.1 to 1.2 out of 5 across roughly 480 to 498 reviews, mostly billing and cancellation disputes, even as Capterra's more feature-focused reviewers rate it 4.1 out of 5.
Best for: Teams that want deep email, SMS and payment automation bundled into one CRM price and are fully comfortable signing an annual contract with a real cancellation process attached · from $320/mo
Every CRM in this group prices per seat except Keap, which sells one flat rate for two included users and adds each extra seat at $39 a month. None of the five per-seat tools requires more than one seat to start; Capsule’s top Ultimate plan is the only tier anywhere in this group with a seat floor above one, at five or more. Keap doesn’t sell by the seat at all: its single flat-rate plan comes bundled with two users included.
The entry-level spread runs wide. Nutshell’s Foundation plan costs $19 a month per seat, or $13 billed annually, the lowest annual per-seat price for a team in this group. Capsule’s Starter sits at $21, or $18 annually. EngageBay’s Basic plan runs $14.99 a seat and comes with a free plan to test first. Close’s Solo tier costs $19 a month, or $9 billed annually, for a single user. folk’s Standard tier costs $30 a seat, or $24 annually, the highest per-seat price among the five tools that actually price per seat. Keap sits apart from all of them at $320 a month flat (its pricing page shows no annual price), because that price bundles email, SMS, invoicing and payment processing into the same subscription, not just a sales pipeline.
$10/seat (new-customer promo; list price $20/seat)
$7/seat (new-customer promo, year 1 only)
2 users max on Free
Not stated for Starter
Not stated
Contract and cancellation terms
Five of the six commit to nothing. Nutshell, Capsule, Close and EngageBay all bill month to month with no long-term contract, and Capsule adds a 14-day grace period that un-deletes a cancelled account if you change your mind before it’s permanently removed. folk offers month-to-month or annual billing with no stated lock-in either way.
Keap is the outlier. Its entry tier runs on an annual contract with a $299 early-termination fee, and canceling requires a phone call placed at least 10 days before the next billing date; there’s no self-service cancel button in the account. That pattern shows up in Keap’s review scores: Trustpilot rates it 1.1 to 1.2 out of 5 across roughly 480 to 498 reviews, most of them about billing and cancellation disputes, next to a 4.1-out-of-5 Capterra score built on reviews from people still actively using the automation. Read the cancellation terms before you sign, not after.
How we picked
Every price, seat minimum and contract term in this guide came from each vendor’s own pricing page or policy document, checked directly on 2026-10-30, except the Nutshell and Keap prices, which we re-checked on 2026-11-08. G2 and Capterra blocked direct access on every tool in this group; where that happened, we triangulated through independent search results and reported a range instead of a single number wherever sources disagreed. Trustpilot and Capterra scores for Keap come from two different user populations, people who canceled and people still using the product, and both are reported rather than averaged into one misleading figure.
Deals & price changes
Price changes and deals for CRM software
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Frequently asked questions
What's the cheapest CRM for a small business?
It depends on how you pay. Billed annually, Nutshell's $13 seat is the cheapest plan here for a team, with unlimited contacts on every tier; Close's Solo plan drops to $9 billed annually, but that's a single-user tier. Month to month, EngageBay's $14.99 Basic seat undercuts Nutshell's $19 and comes with a free plan to test first.
Which small business CRM has a genuinely free plan?
Capsule and EngageBay both do. Capsule's Free tier covers 250 contacts and 2 users with no time limit; EngageBay's covers the same 250 contacts but allows up to 15 members and adds live chat and a basic helpdesk. Nutshell, Close, folk and Keap all skip a standing free plan in favor of a time-limited trial.
Which of these CRMs includes marketing automation from day one?
Keap, and it's the only one that does. Its $320-a-month entry tier ships full email, SMS and workflow automation from the start, where Nutshell, Capsule, folk and EngageBay all gate real automation behind a higher tier. The catch is Keap's annual contract and $299 early-termination fee, worth weighing against the automation depth before signing.
Are any of these CRMs locked into a long-term contract?
Only Keap. Its entry tier runs on an annual contract with a $299 early-termination fee, and canceling requires a phone call placed at least 10 days before the next billing date, not a button in the account. The other five all bill month to month, or month-to-month and annual with no stated lock-in in folk's case.
