LiveChat, Now Text, vs Intercom: Sales Chat or Support Desk

The short answer: for three or four people answering pre-sale questions on a website or shop, LiveChat is the cheaper and better-shaped tool. New customers now get it as Text, the product LiveChat's company sells in its place, at $25 per user a month on Essential with an AI agent and 10 AI resolutions included (LiveChat pricing, checked on 26 October 2026). Intercom earns its price when customers log in to a software product: in-app messages, a help centre and several team inboxes, at $29 per seat a month on Essential as a new-customer rate shown beside a struck-through $39, plus $0.99 for each outcome its Fin agent resolves (Intercom pricing). Choose Text to sell through chat; choose Intercom to support a product.

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Price your own team first:

1. Seats, then answers, at the same unit price. An extra AI answer costs the same on both: Text sells 50 resolutions for $49.50, $0.99 each, and Intercom charges $0.99 per Fin outcome (LiveChat pricing, Intercom pricing). So the gap is seats. For example, three people and 250 AI answers a month: Text Essential is 3 x $25 = $75 plus 5 packs for the 240 above the included 10, 5 x $49.50 = $247.50, so $322.50; Intercom Essential, budgeted at the struck-through $39 because the page gives the $29 no end date, is 3 x $39 = $117 plus 250 x $0.99 = $247.50, so $364.50.
2. The help desk and the account you already have. An existing LiveChat customer keeps its plan, price and login and can run a Text trial beside it (LiveChat pricing FAQ). If your tickets already live in Salesforce, HubSpot or Freshdesk, Intercom sells Fin on its own at $0.99 per outcome, with a minimum monthly commitment that its FAQ illustrates as 50 outcomes (Intercom pricing FAQ).
3. A baseline from last month. The share of chats a person had to finish, split by topic: pricing, orders, product how-to, complaints. Whichever tool you pick, that share is what its AI is meant to lower.

For a team that sells, or a team that supports

From the LiveChat pricing page and its FAQ and the Intercom pricing page and its FAQ, read on 26 October 2026, monthly and annual toggles both checked. Intercom's page opens on annual billing.

Three differences that settle it

A sales floor, or a product's front desk

Text is built for the moment before a sale: a live list of visitors with what they view and, in shops, their cart, proactive campaigns (3 on Essential, 30 on Growth) and, in its plan table, an AI sales skill and a live Shopify catalogue (LiveChat pricing). Intercom is built for customers who already use your product: its free inclusions are in-app chats, banners and tooltips, with product tours and surveys in a Proactive Support Plus add-on at $99 a month for 500 messages (Intercom pricing FAQ).

AI in the plan, or AI on the meter

Text bundles its agent into the seat price, so a small team gets some AI answers before paying anything extra. Intercom bills Fin from the first outcome, counted when a customer confirms the issue is solved, does not ask for more help after Fin replies, or when Fin completes a Procedure, handoffs included (Intercom pricing FAQ). Text counts a resolution when its AI directly solves a customer question, however many questions the chat holds (LiveChat pricing FAQ). Neither definition was written by you, so sample the conversations each meter bills.

Two languages cost the same second tier

A team in Utrecht answering in Dutch and English needs the upper plan on either side: Text's multilingual support, 48 languages with agent groups per language, starts on Growth, and Intercom's multilingual help centre starts on Advanced (LiveChat pricing FAQ, Intercom pricing). Both cost $99 a seat on monthly billing. Text's Growth includes 200 AI resolutions in that price; Intercom's Advanced includes 20 free Lite seats for colleagues who only watch.

One agent step: fifty real questions before Fin meets a customer

In Intercom, open Test and choose Generate from past conversations: Fin drafts up to 50 questions from your own inbox, answers each, and shows the content, guidance and automations behind every reply (batch testing). A batch test creates no inbox conversations and runs data connectors on test payloads, so no customer data changes (testing tools compared). The human check: the person who owns your help content rates every answer Good, Acceptable or Poor. Rating alone does not train Fin, so each Poor answer is fixed in the article or guidance it came from, then the group is rerun. Text's equivalent is its preview widget, covered in how to use LiveChat. Either agent talks to customers, so the EU AI Act wants them introduced as AI; the store support agent use case sets out the rule.

Choose LiveChat (Text) if your job is

• Turning website visitors into orders or qualified leads with a small team.
• Getting AI answers included in the seat price rather than metered from the first one.
• WhatsApp, Messenger, SMS and email in one inbox on the entry plan.

Choose Intercom if your job is

• Supporting customers inside a software product, with in-app messages and a help centre.
• Running several team inboxes, workflows and SLAs as the support team grows.
• Adding an AI agent to the Salesforce, HubSpot or Freshdesk desk you already run.

The LiveChat entry covers the switch to Text; Intercom has no entry here, so see intercom.com.

Trial both, but trial the right plan

Both trials are 14 days without a card. Text never charges when its trial ends; you choose a plan and add payment yourself (LiveChat pricing FAQ). Put the same 20 questions from last month's transcripts to both, and have one person mark every answer.

Intercom's trial includes all features, Fin and every add-on, Copilot and the $100-a-month Pro add-on among them, so the workspace your team learns on is a larger bill than the seat price it will be quoted (Intercom pricing FAQ). Before day 14, write down which add-ons you used and price only those.

If the comparison keeps widening, chat here, tickets in a help desk, leads in a CRM, the decision is about the stack and not this pair; the Startup Fixer, a one-week review I sell, maps who owns what before another seat is bought.

FAQ

Can I still buy a classic LiveChat plan?

New trials start on Text. Existing LiveChat customers keep their plan, price and login, and Text features are not added to LiveChat plans, legacy ones included (LiveChat pricing FAQ).

Does Intercom have a free plan?

No. After the 14-day trial you need at least one paid Full seat; usage such as Fin outcomes, WhatsApp and SMS is pay as you go (Intercom pricing FAQ).

How long does Text keep chat history?

60 days on Essential and unlimited on Growth, per the plan descriptions in the LiveChat pricing FAQ. If you review AI answers monthly, Essential's window is enough; for audits, it is not.