Per ticket, per AI interaction, and eight ways out
Gorgias alternative and Gorgias competitors priced per ticket for Shopify brands
Gorgias charges for every ticket and again for every AI interaction, and the AI interaction also uses a ticket. We priced eight alternatives from their own pricing pages for one Shopify brand with four agents at 1,500, 4,000 and 8,000 tickets a month.
- $1.05+
- real cost of one Gorgias AI resolution
- 8
- alternatives priced on one unit
- 2
- competitors that publish no price
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the short answer
The cheapest packaged Gorgias alternative for a four agent Shopify team at 4,000 tickets a month is Richpanel at about $1,196, then Help Scout Plus at about $1,380 and Re:amaze Pro at about $1,500, against $2,110 to $2,190 for Gorgias Advanced with its AI Agent. Gorgias wins back the lead when many people share few tickets, because it does not bill seats. Above about 700 tickets a month, a lean custom agent on a cheap helpdesk beats all of them.
Every figure assumes the AI resolves 40 percent of tickets and annual billing where a vendor offers it. Change either assumption and the order can move, which is why the math is shown below.
Why brands leave
Why Shopify brands look for a Gorgias alternative
Gorgias is a good helpdesk for Shopify, and most brands that leave say so. They leave over the invoice. Gorgias does not charge per agent. It charges per billable ticket: Pro is $300 a month for 2,000 tickets and Advanced $750 for 5,000 on annual terms ($360 and $900 paid monthly), with $0.36 for each extra ticket.
The AI Agent is a second meter, sold in bundles that work out to $1.00 an automated interaction on monthly billing and $0.90 on annual, with $0.85 listed on Advanced. The detail that surprises people is on the same page: each automated interaction also counts as a helpdesk ticket. So an AI resolution is not $0.90. It is $0.90 plus a slice of the plan, about $1.05 inside the allowance and about $1.26 once you are paying overage.
Put together, the bill grows twice with every busy week, and the AI that was meant to save money adds to both lines. Our Gorgias pricing breakdown decodes every plan and bundle, including the ticket volumes where moving up a tier is cheaper than paying overage.
4,000 tickets, of which 1,600 closed by AI
- Advanced plan, 5,000 tickets$750
- Ticket overage$0
- AI Agent, 1,600 x $0.85 to $0.90$1,360 to $1,440
- Agent seats$0
The AI line is 64 to 66 percent of the bill. The 1,600 AI tickets also sit inside the 5,000 ticket allowance.
The audit
Gorgias competitors and what their own pricing pages say
The pages ranking for this search are almost all written by one of the competitors, and each puts itself first. We do not sell a helpdesk. Prices below are US list prices read from each vendor's own page in September 2026, annual billing where offered, unless the row says otherwise.
| Helpdesk | Base price | AI price | Where it beats Gorgias |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gorgias (baseline) | Per ticket. Pro $300 for 2,000, Advanced $750 for 5,000, extra tickets $0.36. No seat charge | $0.85 to $1.00 per automated interaction, and each one also uses a ticket | This is the number to beat |
| Richpanel | $99 per seat a month, unlimited replies, no ticket metering. About 17 percent off on annual | $0.20 per AI conversation, counted per thread across email, chat, social and SMS | Small ecommerce teams with high volume; returns and exchanges module from $99 |
| Re:amaze | Basic $26.10, Pro $44.10, Plus $62.10 per seat on annual ($29, $49, $69 monthly). Starter $59 flat for 500 conversations | 5, 10 or 20 resolutions per user included, then $0.85 per resolution | Multi-brand stores that want a simple per seat bill |
| eDesk | Essential $39, Growth $89, Professional $119 per user on annual ($49, $115, $149 standard) | $0.99 per outcome, on every plan | Sellers on Amazon, eBay and other marketplaces as well as their own store |
| Help Scout | Standard $25, Plus $45, Pro $75 per user | AI Answers $0.75 per resolution, with a spend cap you set | Email-first teams; the lowest per resolution rate we found |
| Freshdesk | Growth $19, Pro $55, Enterprise $89 per agent | Freddy AI Agent, 500 sessions once per new account, then $49 per 100 sessions | Budget-led teams that want full ticketing at a low seat price |
| Zendesk | Support Team $19, Suite Team $55, Suite Professional $115 | $1.50 per verified resolution committed, $2.00 pay as you go, after a $2 to $10 monthly allowance per seat | Large teams that need voice, workforce tools and a big app marketplace |
| Intercom | Essential $29, Advanced $85, Expert $132 per seat | Fin $0.99 per outcome, 50 a month minimum | Brands with a strong help center; Fin also runs standalone on Gorgias |
| Gladly | No public price | No public price | Large retail brands buying through sales; you cannot compare it without a quote |
| Kustomer | No public price. The page says it does not post one-size-fits-all pricing | No public price | Enterprise teams; voice and WhatsApp are pay as you go at unlisted rates |
| Custom agent | Keep any helpdesk, for example Freshdesk Growth at $19 a seat | About $0.05 of model tokens per conversation, plus a 60 to 160 hour build | High volume, specific return rules, or data in systems no widget can read |
Three caveats before you use the table. Richpanel's $0.20 is per AI conversation, not per resolution, so it applies to every thread the AI touches; we charge it on every ticket below to stay conservative. Zendesk's own pages list the included automated resolutions but not the price, so its figures come from third-party reviews. And two of the best known competitors, Gladly and Kustomer, publish nothing at all, which in our experience means a sales cycle and an annual contract before you see a number.
One store, one month
Every Gorgias alternative at 4,000 tickets a month
Four agents, annual billing, AI resolving 40 percent (1,600 tickets). Where a vendor meters AI sessions or conversations rather than resolutions (Richpanel, Freshdesk), every ticket is counted. The custom agent sits on Freshdesk Growth seats with $440 to $1,750 a month of hosting, upkeep and build cost spread over 24 months. Where a range exists, the column shows the low end.
Scale it
Monthly cost at 1,500, 4,000 and 8,000 tickets
Same four agents and 40 percent AI resolution. At 8,000 tickets Gorgias would normally push you toward an Enterprise quote, so its figure is Advanced plus published overage, the ceiling before negotiation.
| Four agents, per month | 1,500 | 4,000 | 8,000 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gorgias + AI Agent | $840 (Pro) | $2,110 to $2,190 (Advanced) | $4,550 to $4,710 |
| Richpanel | $696 | $1,196 | $1,996 |
| Help Scout Plus + AI Answers | $630 | $1,380 | $2,580 |
| Re:amaze Pro + AI Agent | $652 | $1,502 | $2,862 |
| Intercom Essential + Fin | $710 | $1,700 | $3,284 |
| Freshdesk Pro + Freddy AI Agent | $710 | $1,935 | $3,895 |
| eDesk Growth + AI Agent | $950 | $1,940 | $3,524 |
| Zendesk Suite Team + AI agents | $1,090 to $1,380 | $2,590 to $3,380 | $4,990 to $6,580 |
| Custom agent, lean build | $591 | $716 | $916 |
| Custom agent, expensive build | $1,901 | $2,026 | $2,226 |
About 600 tickets
Where Richpanel ($396 of seats plus $0.20 a ticket) drops below Gorgias Pro with the AI Agent for a four agent team. Below that, Gorgias is the cheaper packaged option.
About 700 tickets
Where a lean custom agent ($516 of fixed cost with seats, plus $0.05 a conversation) crosses Gorgias. An expensive build ($1,826 fixed) needs about 3,500 to 3,700 tickets to do the same.
The AI meter is the bill
At 8,000 tickets the AI line is 60 to 96 percent of every packaged bill. A cheaper helpdesk saves hundreds; a cheaper AI meter saves thousands.
Where Gorgias wins
The seat ceiling for each cheaper alternative to Gorgias
Gorgias does not bill people, and that is a real advantage. Every seat based alternative gets more expensive each time you add an agent, while Gorgias stays flat. So for each alternative there is a team size where Gorgias becomes the cheaper tool again. These are those sizes, from the same prices and the same 40 percent AI assumption.
The practical reading: if you staff up to twenty temporary agents for November and December on a few thousand tickets, Gorgias is hard to beat. If four or five people run support all year, you are paying for flexibility you do not use.
Richpanel at 1,500 tickets
up to 5 agents
Cheaper than Gorgias up to this many seats
Help Scout at 1,500 tickets
up to 8 agents
Cheaper than Gorgias up to this many seats
Richpanel at 4,000 tickets
up to 13 agents
Cheaper than Gorgias up to this many seats
Help Scout at 4,000 tickets
up to 20 agents
Cheaper than Gorgias up to this many seats
Pick by situation
Which alternative to Gorgias fits your store
Small team, high volume
Richpanel. Seats are $99 and the AI meter is $0.20 a conversation, the lowest AI price in this audit by a wide margin. Test its answers on your own returns and order questions before you trust the number.
Mostly email, simple catalog
Help Scout. The inbox is clean, per user pricing is easy to forecast, and AI Answers at $0.75 per resolution comes with a spend cap you control.
Several brands, one team
Re:amaze. Per seat plans cover multiple storefronts, and the AI Agent includes 5 to 20 resolutions per user before $0.85 each.
Amazon and eBay as well as Shopify
eDesk. It is built for marketplace sellers, pulls order data from each channel, and charges $0.99 per AI outcome on every plan.
Large team with voice
Zendesk, or Gladly and Kustomer if you are ready for a sales cycle. You pay more per AI resolution but get voice and workforce tools.
Specific return rules, real volume
A custom agent on the helpdesk you already have. It reads Shopify orders and your returns policy and costs about $0.05 a conversation to run.
A middle path worth pricing: keep the Gorgias helpdesk and replace only the AI. Intercom sells Fin standalone on Gorgias at $0.99 per outcome, which is not cheaper than the Gorgias AI Agent, and a custom agent that writes its conversations back into Gorgias still pays for the ticket. The saving from a partial switch is real only when the AI you bring costs well under $0.85 a resolution. Our Intercom alternatives page prices the same idea from the other side, and the Freshdesk alternatives page does it for B2B ticketing teams that pay per seat.
Build it
What a custom Shopify support agent includes
Most of an ecommerce support queue is the same handful of questions: where is my order, can I change the address, how do I return this, do you have it in another size. A custom agent handles those with read access to Shopify and your carrier, write access behind limits, and a clean handoff to people for everything else. Scopes we see run 60 to 160 hours of work.
Run it on a few hundred real transcripts before it talks to a customer; our guide to evaluating an AI agent before you ship it covers the test set. The rest of the ecommerce stack, from product search to returns, is on our AI for ecommerce page.
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1
Order status and tracking
10 to 25 hoursReads the Shopify order and the carrier status, answers in one message, and knows when a delay needs a person.
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2
Returns and exchanges
15 to 40 hoursApplies your return window and conditions, creates the return or exchange, and stops at a dollar limit you set.
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3
Order edits and cancellations
10 to 30 hoursAddress changes and cancellations before fulfillment, each logged and reversible.
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4
Product and sizing answers
10 to 35 hoursAnswers from your catalog, size guides and help center, with rules for what it must not promise.
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5
Helpdesk handoff and reporting
15 to 30 hoursCreates the ticket with transcript and tags, and reports resolution rate and the questions it could not answer.
The honest version
Where BotGigs fits, and where it does not
BotGigs does not sell a helpdesk. It is where you hire the developer who builds the support agent, or who moves your macros, tags and history from Gorgias to the tool you picked above. Describe your ticket volume, your helpdesk, the Shopify actions the agent may take and the ones it may not, and get back a scoped hire brief with matched chatbot developers, their rates and their delivery location. Posting the job is $99 a month.
If you handle under about 600 tickets a month, you probably do not need us: stay on Gorgias Pro or try Richpanel. Hiring pays off when volume passes a thousand tickets, when your return rules are too specific for a packaged AI, or when a migration needs someone who has done one before. Support teams on lighter website chat should also see our Tidio alternatives comparison.
Put in the hire brief
- Monthly tickets and the share you expect AI to close
- Your helpdesk and the one you are moving to
- Shopify apps for returns, subscriptions or loyalty
- Refund and discount limits the agent may use
- Launch date, usually before your peak season
Questions
Gorgias alternative questions buyers ask
What is the best alternative to Gorgias?
For a Shopify brand with four agents and 4,000 tickets a month, Richpanel is the cheapest packaged alternative we priced at about $1,196 a month, against $2,110 to $2,190 for Gorgias Advanced with its AI Agent. Help Scout and Re:amaze follow at about $1,380 and $1,500. A custom AI agent on a low cost helpdesk is cheaper still once volume passes roughly 700 tickets a month.
Who are Gorgias competitors?
The ecommerce helpdesks most often compared with Gorgias are Richpanel, Re:amaze, eDesk, Gladly and Kustomer, plus the general helpdesks Zendesk, Freshdesk, Help Scout and Intercom. Richpanel, Re:amaze, eDesk, Zendesk, Freshdesk, Help Scout and Intercom publish prices. Gladly and Kustomer do not publish any.
Is there a cheaper alternative to Gorgias?
Yes, for small teams with real volume. Gorgias bills per ticket and again per AI interaction, and each AI interaction also uses a ticket. Seat based tools such as Richpanel, Help Scout and Re:amaze cost less for teams of up to about 5 to 20 agents, depending on volume. Gorgias wins when many people touch a small number of tickets.
Why is Gorgias so expensive?
Gorgias has two meters that both grow with volume. The helpdesk is billed per ticket, from $300 a month for 2,000 tickets on Pro to $750 for 5,000 on Advanced on annual terms, with $0.36 per extra ticket. The AI Agent adds $0.85 to $1.00 per automated interaction, and each of those also counts as a ticket, so an AI resolution costs about $1.05 to $1.26.
Is Richpanel better than Gorgias?
On price for small teams, usually yes. Richpanel charges $99 a seat and $0.20 per AI conversation, so four agents at 4,000 tickets cost about $1,196 a month against $2,110 or more on Gorgias. Gorgias is cheaper once a team grows past about 13 agents at that volume, and it has the longer Shopify action list, so test both on your own tickets.
How much does it cost to build a custom AI support agent for Shopify?
A support agent that answers from your help center, looks up Shopify orders, handles returns within limits and hands off to your helpdesk is typically 60 to 160 hours of work. With hosting and upkeep that is about $440 to $1,750 a month of fixed cost over two years, plus about $0.05 of model tokens per conversation.
Whichever tool you pick, check the vendor's rate again before signing. Helpdesk and AI prices in this category have changed several times this year, and a competitor price tracker catches a repricing before your renewal does.
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