Free CRM for Small Business: Every Free Plan and Its Limits

A free CRM is a real option for a small business, not just a trial in disguise. Several vendors let you keep a shared contact list and a deal pipeline for nothing, with no time limit. The catch is always a limit: on users, on contacts or records, or on the one feature you will want next, such as mass email or a second pipeline. Below are the free plans that exist today, the exact limits each vendor publishes, and what the first paid step costs when you outgrow it. Once a free plan runs out, our guide to the best CRM for small business compares the paid plans for 5 and 10 users. Every figure comes from the vendor's own pricing page, in US dollars.

Free CRM plans: the limits compared

The chart prices the same small team, three people, on each vendor's first paid plan for a year. Bigin and Zoho CRM are the cheapest ways up; Attio's Plus plan costs five times as much as Bigin's Express. A flat-rate plan like Bitrix24's gets cheaper per person as you add the fourth and fifth user, while every other plan here is charged per seat.

Zoho CRM: the most room on a free plan

Zoho calls its free edition "forever free, for 3 users". It includes contact management, follow-up reminders, workflow automation, tasks, meetings and calls, standard reports, mobile apps, up to 10 custom email templates and 5,000 API calls a day. Zoho's edition comparison sets the data storage at 5,000 records and allows the default pipeline only.

What to watch: there is no mass email on the free edition (Standard sends 250 a day per organization), no email client integration, and exports are capped at 10 a day. Records across all modules count toward the 5,000, so leads, contacts, accounts and deals share that space.

First paid step: Standard costs $14 a user a month billed annually, or $20 month to month. It raises storage to 100,000 records, allows 5 pipelines and adds email integration and mass email, built-in calling, calendar integration and lead capture forms. For three users billed annually, that is $504 a year. Our Zoho CRM pricing guide covers the higher editions.

Choose it if you have two or three people who need to log in and expect to grow past a few hundred contacts.

HubSpot: the easiest free CRM to start

HubSpot's free CRM covers up to two users and 1,000 contacts, and HubSpot says it is free "with no expiration date" and needs no credit card. It includes contact management, deal pipelines, CRM import, a reporting dashboard and HubSpot's free marketing, sales and service tools, such as forms and landing pages.

What to watch: the 1,000-contact cap arrives quickly if you import an old mailing list, and the free tools carry HubSpot branding; removing it is one of the things Starter adds.

First paid step: Starter is $20 per seat a month without the promotion, with special pricing from $7 a seat for new customers on a monthly or annual subscription; HubSpot says the offer is for new customers only and some offers are time-limited. Starter adds required fields, permission sets, multiple currencies, no HubSpot branding and 500 HubSpot Credits. Three seats at $20 come to $720 a year. The big jump comes later, at Professional: see our HubSpot CRM pricing guide.

Choose it if you are one or two people, want something that works the day you sign up, and plan to use HubSpot's forms and email tools too. If email is the main job, compare it with the tools in our guide to email marketing for small business.

Bigin by Zoho: the cheapest step up

Bigin is Zoho's pipeline-first CRM for very small businesses. Its free plan is for a single user with 500 records, one pipeline and 3 automations. Bigin counts every row you enter across pipelines, contacts, activities and notes as a record, so 500 goes less far than it sounds. The free plan still includes the built-in phone (if you want a separate business number instead, see our virtual phone systems guide), a booking page, web forms, a business card scanner and the mobile apps.

First paid step: Express costs $7 a user a month billed annually, or $9 monthly. It raises the limit to 50,000 records with 3 team pipelines and 30 automations, and adds email and WhatsApp integration, mass email and a QuickBooks integration. Three users pay $252 a year, the lowest of any paid plan here.

Choose it if you work alone today and want the cheapest paid plan to move to once someone joins you.

EngageBay: the most users on a capped list

EngageBay's free plan is "free for teams of up to 15 members", the most generous user count here after Odoo. The trade-off is the contact cap: 250 contacts and companies. The free CRM includes contact management, deals, tasks, email tracking, appointment scheduling, Gmail and Outlook integration, live chat, 2 email sequences, 5 custom fields and 1,000 branded emails a month.

What to watch: 250 contacts is a small list. It suits a team that works a short list of large accounts, not a shop with a customer email list.

First paid step: the CRM & Sales Bay Basic plan lists at $12.99 a user a month, $11.95 paid yearly (8% off) or $11.04 for two years (15% off). It raises the cap to 500 contacts and adds multiple deal tracks, calling and third-party integrations. Three users paying yearly come to about $430 a year.

Choose it if several people need to log in and your list of active customers and prospects stays small.

Odoo: unlimited users on one app

Odoo's One App Free plan gives you one app with unlimited users, hosted on Odoo Online, and Odoo guarantees that its use is free "forever". Choose CRM as your app and the whole team can use it. If the app you choose depends on others, those come free too.

What to watch: the free plan stops at one app. Install a second one, such as invoicing or a website, and you move to the paid Standard plan, which covers every app for all your users. Add a second company or Odoo Studio and you are on the Custom plan.

First paid step: Standard costs $24.90 a user a month billed annually for the first 12 months, then $31.10; month to month it is $31.10, then $38.90. Three users pay about $896 in the first year.

Choose it if you have a larger team that only needs a CRM, or you want a path to accounting, inventory and a website in one system later. If billing clients is the next job, compare Odoo with our invoicing software picks first.

Capsule: a clean contact list for two

Capsule's free plan allows a maximum of 2 users and 250 contacts, with 5 custom fields, one sales pipeline and custom sales milestones. You can send email from your Gmail or Outlook account.

What to watch: 250 contacts is the tightest cap here alongside EngageBay, and email templates, a shared mailbox and reporting start on Starter.

First paid step: Starter costs $18 a user a month billed annually, with 30,000 contacts, email templates, basic reporting and integrations with tools such as Xero. Paid plans come with a free 14-day trial, no card required. Three users pay $648 a year.

Choose it if you want a tidy, simple contact manager for a two-person business with a short client list.

Attio: a big free record limit

Attio's free plan covers up to 3 seats and 50,000 records, with up to 3 objects, real-time contact syncing and automatic data enrichment. That is the highest record limit on any free plan here.

What to watch: the jump to paid is the steepest. Plus costs $35 a user a month billed annually ($44 monthly) and stops at 10 seats; Pro is $79 billed annually ($99 monthly). Three users on Plus pay $1,260 a year.

Choose it if you have a large database to organize, a small team, and someone comfortable shaping a flexible CRM.

Bitrix24: a free CRM inside a work suite

Bitrix24's free plan is "100% free for 1–2 users", with 5 GB of storage, a basic CRM for deals and contacts, tasks, shared calendars, and chat and video calls.

What to watch: sales pipelines, recurring deals, email integration and telephony integration are listed as additions on the paid Basic plan.

First paid step: Basic is a flat $49 a month billed annually, or $69 monthly, for the whole organization with 5 users included: $588 a year.

Choose it if you also want tasks, chat and video calls in the same tool, and expect to stay at five people or fewer.

"Free" CRMs that are really trials

Several CRMs that appear on lists of free CRMs offer only a free trial on their current pricing pages:

• Freshsales has no free plan; it offers a 21-day trial, then Growth at $9 a user a month billed annually.
• Pipedrive offers a 14-day free trial, with no credit card required. Its prices vary by region, so see our Pipedrive pricing guide.
• monday CRM offers a 14-day trial and says you then need a paid plan; see monday CRM pricing.
• folk turns on a two-week free trial of its premium features when you sign up.
• Less Annoying CRM has a 30-day free trial, then one plan at $15 a user a month.
• Streak has a free plan with email tools for Gmail, but Streak says it "does not include CRM pipelines". The CRM starts at Pro, $49 a user a month billed annually.

How to choose

1. Count the people who need to log in. One person: Bigin or any plan here. Two: HubSpot, Capsule or Bitrix24. Three: Zoho CRM or Attio. More: EngageBay (up to 15) or Odoo (unlimited, one app).
2. Count your contacts, including old ones you will import. Under 250, every plan works. Up to 1,000, HubSpot. Up to 5,000 records, Zoho CRM. Tens of thousands, Attio.
3. Check the first feature you will miss. If it is mass email, Zoho CRM and Bigin add it on their first paid plan; if it is a second pipeline, Zoho CRM Standard, Bigin Express and EngageBay Basic all add one.
4. Price the step up before you start. Moving data later is work, so pick the free plan whose paid tier you could afford: for three users that runs from $252 a year on Bigin to $1,260 on Attio.

General CRMs are not the only route: realtors, nonprofits and insurance agencies have their own tools, compared in our guides to CRM for real estate, CRM for nonprofits and CRM for insurance agents. If you are deciding for a new company rather than an existing one, our guide to CRM for startups looks at the paid plans and startup programs, and our Salesforce alternatives compare the paid tiers side by side.