Price posture · July 2026

Best customer support software for free

AI's answer · live, with web access

Contested

88/100 slot score

100% of answers name it

#2 avg. position

+4 ahead of Freshdesk

Zoho Desk leads the free customer support software question with the highest slot score and universal presence across all 12 answers, but the slot remains contested.

Zoho Desk scores 88 and appears in 100% of answers at an average position of 2, with four mentions from every model tested. Freshdesk is nearly its equal at 84 and also hits 100% coverage, making these two the consistent co-anchors of every answer regardless of how the question was phrased. HubSpot shows up in 67% of answers but leans heavily on Gemini and Perplexity, with ChatGPT citing it only once, while ChatGPT pushes FyneDesk to the top spot in all four of its own answers despite that brand appearing nowhere else. The contested status means no single brand controls enough of the weighted recommendation share to own this question outright, so a challenger with strong review coverage and consistent sourcing across all three models could realistically displace either of the leaders.

AI-generated analysis of the July 2026 measurements.

The full field

Every brand recommended for this question, from 12 answers across ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini.

#	Brand	Slot score	Appears in	Avg. position
1	Zoho Desk	88	100%	#2
2	Freshdesk	84	100%	#3
3	HubSpot	56	67%	#3
4	Tawk.to	38	58%	#5
5	FyneDesk	33	33%	1st
6	ProProfs Help Desk	30	42%	#4
7	Spiceworks	29	42%	#5
8	SparrowDesk	28	33%	#3

Slot score is position-weighted, 0 to 100: being recommended first counts far more than a trailing mention. "Appears in" is the share of answers naming the brand at all.

Other surfaces

Model memory (same assistants, no web access) Freshdesk (differs: without the web, the models say Freshdesk)

Google AI Mode (the real surface, scraped) Freshdesk then HubSpot, LiveAgent

Google AI Overviews (the real surface, scraped) Google shows no AI Overview for this question

The main measurement above is the assistants' real answers with live web access. These rows show the same question on other surfaces: the models' bare memory, and Google's own AI search experiences.

How this was measured

ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini each answered this question in two phrasings, several times each, with live web access and citations: the closest API-reachable version of the real assistant experience (no personalization or account memory, which no vendor can provide). Model-memory answers (no web) are measured separately and shown above as a comparison surface. A brand counts once per answer that recommends it. The exact questions:

"What's the best customer support software for someone who needs a genuinely free plan?"
"We're not able to spend anything yet, so we need a real free plan, not a trial. Which customer support software should we use?"

Part of the Customer Support ranking. Method details on the methodology page. Rankings reflect measured AI answers, not paid placement.

Best customer support software for free

The full field

Other surfaces

How this was measured

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