# SupportBee

> Email ticketing and shared inbox with a knowledge base and portal

SupportBee is a help desk built around email: messages to a support address become tickets that a team can assign, comment on privately and label, while customers only ever see ordinary email replies. It adds a knowledge base, a customer portal for tracking requests and satisfaction ratings, and is priced per seat on two plans.

- **Category:** Help Desks & Live Chat
- **Made by:** SupportBee Inc. (since 2011)
- **Website:** https://supportbee.com
- **Runs on:** Web
- **Facts last checked:** Oct 18, 2026

## Pricing

SupportBee is a paid product with a free trial, starting at $17 per seat / month, billed annually ($20 billed monthly).

- **Pricing model:** Free trial
- **Free plan:** None.
- **Free trial:** 14-day free trial, no credit card required.

| Plan | Price | What you get |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Startup | $17 per seat / month, billed annually ($20 billed monthly) | Shared inbox, snippets, 1 knowledge base and 1 team, filters, basic integrations, API access, unlimited email inboxes, satisfaction ratings and audit trails. |
| Enterprise | $21 per seat / month, billed annually ($25 billed monthly) | Everything in Startup plus enterprise integrations, business hours, the customer portal, audit log and data history, and portal access for customer groups. |

Read from https://supportbee.com/pricing on Oct 18, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with SupportBee before buying.

## Ways to pay less

- **Save 20% with annual billing** (Annual discount): SupportBee's pricing page lists a 20% saving on annual billing: Startup is $17 a seat a month billed annually against $20 monthly, and Enterprise $21 against $25. Source: https://supportbee.com/pricing

## Key features

- **Team inbox:** Emails become tickets that can be assigned to a team and then a person, with private comments, shared draft replies, labels and Gmail-style keyboard shortcuts.
- **Knowledge base:** A public or private help site with categories, inline images, file uploads, search, your own branding and domain, and an embeddable widget called Hive.
- **Customer portal:** Customers open, track and reply to their requests through a private link with no password. Included on the Enterprise plan.
- **Teams for departments:** Separate inbox views for groups such as Sales or Billing, which can be made private to their members and admins.
- **Reports and audit trail:** Performance reports by agent, team and label, customer satisfaction ratings, and a log of every action taken on a ticket.
- **Integrations and API:** Links to project tools such as Linear, Asana and GitHub Issues, CRMs such as Pipedrive, Slack notifications, webhooks and a public API on both plans.

## Good for

- Small teams outgrowing a shared Gmail or Outlook login for support
- Teams that want ticketing to look like plain email to customers
- Support run mainly over email rather than chat or social channels

## Worth knowing

- Email is the channel it is built for; the site lists no live chat, chatbot or messaging-app inboxes.
- The customer portal and business hours need the Enterprise plan; Startup includes 1 knowledge base and 1 team.
- The site lists no native desktop or mobile apps; the team works in a browser and through email notifications.
- There is no free plan after the 14-day trial.

## ToolGPA grades

**GPA: 2.4 out of 4**, graded Oct 18, 2026. SupportBee turns a support email address into a ticketing inbox: assign, label and comment privately, while customers only ever see normal email replies. A knowledge base and satisfaction ratings come with it, from $17 a seat on annual billing. It's email only, though, with no live chat, chatbot or WhatsApp, and no phone app.

- **Value for money: B.** Startup is $17 a seat a month billed annually ($20 monthly), right on the edge of the cheaper quarter of help desks. That already covers the shared inbox, a knowledge base, the API and satisfaction ratings. The customer portal and business hours need Enterprise at $21, still under the middle.
- **Free plan and trial: C.** No free plan, but a 14-day free trial with no credit card. Two weeks is long enough to run your real support email through it and decide.
- **Features: C.** Email ticketing done properly: assignment to teams then people, private comments, shared drafts, labels, a knowledge base on your own domain, a customer portal, reports and an audit trail. The gap its listing names: no live chat, chatbot or messaging-app inboxes.
- **Ease of use: C.** No App Store rating on record. Customers just see email, which keeps their side simple, but you'll route your support address into it and set up teams, labels and snippets first.
- **Platforms and integrations: B.** Web only, with Slack, Linear, Notion, Pipedrive, Asana, Trello, GitHub Issues and QuickBooks, plus webhooks and a public API on both plans. No desktop or phone app on record.

These are ToolGPA's own grades. Graded from this listing, whose facts were read from SupportBee's own pages on 18 October 2026. Not based on using the product, and shorter than our full reviews.

## Where it stands among help desk and live chat tools

- SupportBee's GPA of 2.4 is higher than 6 of the 22 other help desk and live chat tools we grade, and level with 7.
- It stands best on value for money (B, above 13 of 22) and worst on features (C, above 0).
- Its paid plans start at $17 a month for each person, against a middle price of $21.59 for the category: 4 of the 21 others that charge start lower.
- On features, ease of use and platforms it scores 2.3 out of 4. 4 tools score higher and cost less.

The category's chart of price against score: https://toolgpa.com/charts/customer-support

## Keep it, or make your own?

**Keep it.** To replace SupportBee you would be making one mailbox that several people work at once. That is not a weekend's work, with an AI app builder or without one. That makes this kind of software worth paying for, not this one in particular: 9 of the 22 other help desk and live chat tools grade higher. It costs $204 a year.

- You could make: Help desk, help center and reports: an app builder makes these well.
- You could not: One mailbox that several people work at once.
- You could not: It is priced for each person, which means accounts and billing for a team.
- You could not: It plugs into other products, Slack, Linear and Notion among them, and has an API.
- You could not: Hooks into the device itself: widgets.

A judgement by ToolGPA from this listing, by rules that are the same for every tool. Nothing was built to test it.

## Works with

Slack, Linear, Notion, Pipedrive, Asana, Trello, GitHub Issues, QuickBooks

**Tags:** Help desk, Shared inbox, Help center, Reports, Public API

## Alternatives

- [Help Scout](https://toolgpa.com/tools/help-scout): Shared inbox and help desk with a knowledge base and AI answers. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/help-scout-vs-supportbee)
- [Front](https://toolgpa.com/tools/front): Shared inbox and customer operations platform with AI and ticketing. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/front-vs-supportbee)
- [Hiver](https://toolgpa.com/tools/hiver): Shared inbox and AI help desk that runs inside Gmail or standalone. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/hiver-vs-supportbee)
- [Helpwise](https://toolgpa.com/tools/helpwise): Shared inbox for email, chat, WhatsApp and SMS with a help center. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/helpwise-vs-supportbee)
- [Freshdesk](https://toolgpa.com/tools/freshdesk): Email ticketing help desk with a knowledge base and AI agents. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/freshdesk-vs-supportbee)

## Sources

The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Oct 18, 2026:

- https://supportbee.com/pricing
- https://supportbee.com/
- https://supportbee.com/about
- https://supportbee.com/integrations
- https://supportbee.com/team-inbox-software
- https://supportbee.com/knowledge-base-support
- https://supportbee.com/customer-portal-support
- https://supportbee.com/terms

Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/supportbee
Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).