Close vs EngageBay: Which CRM Fits a Small Sales Team?
Last verified: July 24, 2026
Independent review. If you buy through links on this page we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes our scores — how we test.
All-in-one CRM that bundles marketing, sales and support for one price
ToolsGavel verdict
Close is the sharper tool for teams whose job is calling: native Power Dialer, SMS and email keep reps in one fast interface, at a premium per seat. EngageBay is the more economical pick for a small business that wants marketing, a sales pipeline and support running off one shared contact list, with a usable free tier to start on. Pick Close for volume outbound calling; pick EngageBay to cover marketing, sales and support without three separate subscriptions.
| Criterion | Close | EngageBay |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | $19/user/mo (Solo), $9 billed annually | Free plan (250 contacts); paid from $14.99/user/mo |
| Built-in calling | Native Power Dialer plus metered per-minute calling, billed at cost | Call recording from the Growth tier up; no native predictive dialer |
| Marketing automation | None, sequences are email/SMS outreach, not campaign marketing | Automation builder, landing pages, forms and email campaigns on every paid tier |
| Support / helpdesk | Not included | Helpdesk and live chat built in, even on the free plan |
| Interface focus | One pipeline, one rep, one call at a time, built for dial speed | One contact record shared across marketing, sales and support |
| Best fit | SDR teams running high-volume outbound calling | Small businesses running marketing, sales and support on one budget |
What each one really costs
| Audited pricing | Close | EngageBay |
|---|---|---|
| Advertised price | $19/mo (Solo, billed monthly) | $14.99/user/mo |
| Real monthly cost, billed annually | $9/mo | No flat rate published |
| Real monthly cost, month-to-month | $19/mo | Not published |
| Month-to-month premium | +111% | — |
| The billing catch | $9/mo if billed annually — but Power Dialer, the feature Close markets hardest, needs Growth at $109/mo+, and built-in calling is metered separately at about $0.02/min. | — |
| Price last verified | 2026-07-13 | — |
Audited against live vendor pricing pages — full dataset in the Pricing Gap Index and the true-cost calculator.
The short answer
Close and EngageBay solve different problems for a small sales team. Close is a CRM built around outbound calling: native phone, SMS and email in one fast interface for reps working a high volume of live conversations. EngageBay is an all-in-one suite bundling marketing automation, a CRM and a helpdesk into a single subscription, priced for teams that need more than a pipeline.
If your day is dialing and email sequences, Close will feel purpose-built. If you’re running lead generation, a sales pipeline and customer support with one small team and one budget, EngageBay covers more ground for less money.
Where each pulls ahead
Close wins on calling. The Power Dialer, built-in SMS and per-minute telephony (billed at cost, around $0.02 a minute) mean reps never leave the CRM to make a call or log an outcome. The interface is fast, and reporting is built around rep activity rather than campaign metrics. What it doesn’t do is marketing: no landing pages, no automation builder, no helpdesk.
EngageBay wins on breadth and price. The free plan covers 250 contacts with email marketing, a CRM, live chat and a helpdesk, and the paid tiers scale contact limits and automation without the per-seat markup of stitching together separate marketing, CRM and support tools. What it doesn’t have is Close’s calling depth. There’s no predictive dialer, and call handling is a feature bolted onto a broader suite rather than the reason the product exists.
Our recommendation
Pick Close if the team’s job is outbound calling at volume: SDRs, account executives working a dial-heavy pipeline, or any inside sales org where the phone is the primary tool. The premium per seat and the metered calling cost are worth it because the product is built around exactly that motion.
Pick EngageBay if this is a small business that needs marketing, sales and support to share one contact record without paying for three separate subscriptions. It’s the more economical choice for a generalist SMB, and the free plan is enough to test before committing budget. Full pricing and feature detail for Close, including the Power Dialer tier breakdown, are in our Close review; EngageBay’s tier-by-tier contact caps and feature list are in our EngageBay review.