How much does a CRM cost in 2026? Real prices for a small team

This guide is for owners and team leads at small businesses who want a real number before they start a trial. We read the pricing pages, plan comparisons and help-center billing articles of 15 CRMs on October 20, 2026, and every price below links to the vendor’s own page. UnifyLoop is one of the products in the tables, and UnifyLoop wrote this guide, so check our figures against the linked pages. Vendors change prices and run pricing tests (monday CRM and Kommo both were on the day we checked), so treat these as a dated snapshot.

How is CRM pricing calculated?

CRM vendors use four pricing models: per seat, per contact tier, a flat fee per account, or a flat fee plus metered usage. The model matters more than the headline price, because it decides what makes your bill grow: hiring, a bigger list, or more calls and messages.

1. Per seat (per user)

You pay a set price for each person who logs in, every month. This is the most common model: HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, Zoho CRM, Freshsales, monday CRM, Close and Kommo all charge this way. Example: Pipedrive Growth is $39 per seat per month on annual billing, so five people cost $195 a month and ten cost $390. Pipedrive’s billing article notes that seats are charged whether or not they are assigned to anyone.

2. Per contact tier

You pay by how many contacts you store, and users are bundled in. Marketing-led tools use this model. ActiveCampaign Plus is $49 a month (annual billing) at 1,000 contacts, then $95 at 2,500, $145 at 5,000 and $189 at 10,000, per its pricing catalog. HubSpot Marketing Hub mixes the two models: seats plus a marketing-contact tier. Brevo is a cousin of this model that prices its marketing plans by monthly email volume.

3. Flat fee per account

You pay one price for the whole business, and adding a teammate costs nothing extra. GoHighLevel includes unlimited users and contacts on every plan from $97 a month. Systeme.io tiers by contact count from $17 a month with unlimited assistant accounts. ClickFunnels is flat too, but caps team members at 2, 5, 10 or 20 depending on the plan. UnifyLoop uses this model as well.

4. Flat fee plus usage

You pay a subscription and then a metered charge for calls, texts, emails or AI. GoHighLevel’s subscription covers the software, while its pricing guide bills email at $0.675 per 1,000 sends and its phone billing guide bills US outbound calls at $0.0166 a minute and texts at $0.00747 per segment plus carrier fees. Keap is a hybrid: one flat package that includes 2 users and 1,500 contacts, with extra users and contact tiers added on top. Per-seat vendors can meter usage too: Close passes calling and SMS through at Twilio rates on top of its seats.

How much do the main CRMs cost per month?

Entry paid plans run from $9 per user (Freshsales Growth, annual billing) to $25 per user (Salesforce Starter Suite), and flat-fee plans start between $17 and $97 a month for the whole account. The table shows each vendor’s entry plan and the next plan up, with the annual-billing price first and the monthly-billing price in brackets where it differs.

Notes on the table: GoHighLevel, Systeme.io and ClickFunnels show annual billing as a yearly total (10 times the monthly price). HubSpot’s Starter promo prices apply to new customers for a limited time, per its Starter page. Kommo has not published the regional US prices for Base and Advanced that apply to new customers since September 1, 2026, per its plans overview, so we left them out.

What does a CRM cost for a team of 5 for a year?

On the nine plans below, five people pay between $588 and $6,900 for their first year, before calling, texting or email usage. Each row shows its inputs so you can swap in your own team size. We used annual billing wherever a vendor offers it, list prices rather than promotions, and included onboarding fees only where the vendor makes them mandatory.

These plans are not equal, so read the total next to what each includes. Close Growth adds a power dialer and workflows that its cheaper Essentials plan lacks, per Close pricing. HubSpot Sales Hub Professional adds sequences, 3,000 calling minutes and 300 workflows over Starter, per HubSpot’s product catalog. Keap’s package includes landing pages, checkout and a texting tier for US numbers, per Keap pricing. On monthly billing the per-seat totals rise: Pipedrive Growth becomes $2,940 ($49 × 5 × 12) and Zoho CRM Professional becomes $2,100 ($35 × 5 × 12).

What hidden costs should you expect?

The extra costs that catch small teams out are onboarding fees, annual lock-ins, contact tiers, metered usage, paid add-ons and seat minimums. None of them are hidden in the legal sense: each is on the vendor’s own pricing or help pages, linked below. They are just easy to miss on a first read.

Onboarding fees

Some vendors require a one-time setup package before you can start. HubSpot charges $1,500 for Sales Hub Professional, $3,500 for Sales Hub Enterprise, $3,000 for Marketing Hub Professional and $7,000 for Marketing Hub Enterprise, per its sales and marketing pricing pages. Keap requires an implementation package shown at $500 with $1,500 struck through, per its implementation page. GoHighLevel’s $1,000 account setup is optional, and Kommo says it charges no mandatory extra fees.

Annual commitments and termination fees

A low monthly price can still mean a 12-month contract. HubSpot Professional is labelled “Commit annually” even when you pay monthly. Salesforce Pro Suite is sold only on an annual contract, and Starter is its only paid edition offered month to month, per Salesforce pricing. Keap charges a $299 early termination fee on annual contracts and asks for cancellation by phone at least 10 days before the next invoice. Kommo has no monthly billing at all: the minimum is 6 months, paid up front, and its billing FAQ says no refunds are issued for unused time except in special cases.

Contact tiers

If price follows your list size, a growing list raises the bill even when the team stays the same. HubSpot Marketing Hub Starter charges $50 per extra 1,000 marketing contacts between 1,001 and 3,000, and Professional charges $250 per extra 5,000, per the product catalog. The catalog also says going over a tier is billed immediately and the tier cannot be lowered until renewal. ActiveCampaign Plus nearly doubles from $49 to $95 a month (annual billing) when a list grows from 1,000 to 2,500 contacts. Keap prices extra contacts in tiers beyond the 1,500 included.

Usage for calls, texts and email

Calling, SMS and bulk email are usually metered on top of the subscription. GoHighLevel’s rates are listed above; US texting there also needs A2P 10DLC registration at $22.50 or $64 one time plus about $1.50 to $10.50 a month, per its 10DLC fee guide. Close bills calls at Twilio rates and says most outbound calls cost around $0.02 a minute, with numbers from about $1 a line per month, per its usage costs article. HubSpot sells extra calling at $50 a month per 1,000 minutes and SMS at $75 a month for 1,000 segments on Professional and up, per its add-ons catalog. WhatsApp has its own fees: Freshsales adds a 20% markup to Meta’s per-message charges, per its WhatsApp pricing article.

Paid add-ons

Some features you might assume are included cost extra. ActiveCampaign’s deals and pipelines are a CRM add-on: $39 a month on Plus with annual billing ($49 monthly), per its pricing catalog. Pipedrive’s email marketing (Campaigns) is a paid add-on on every plan, from $13.33 a month on annual billing, and Web Visitors starts at $41 a month, per Pipedrive pricing. Salesforce Pro Suite charges $25 per user per month for API access, per its add-ons page. Close’s Call Assistant (recording, transcripts and summaries) is $50 a month per organization plus $0.02 per transcribed minute.

Seat minimums and seat buckets

Per-seat plans do not always let you buy the exact number of seats you need. monday CRM sells seats in buckets with a minimum of 3, then 5, 10, 15 and up, so a team of 4 buys 5 seats and a team of 6 buys 10, per its plans article. Kommo requires every user in a workspace to be on the same plan. HubSpot prices all Core Seats at the highest edition you own if you mix editions, per its product and services catalog.

How much does UnifyLoop cost?

UnifyLoop charges one flat monthly fee per workspace with unlimited users: Starter $49, Growth $99 and Scale $249 a month, plus a Free plan for up to 3 users. Plans differ by email volume, sending domains, calling minutes and dialer seats; dialer seats are the only per-person count, because each needs a phone line. Billing is monthly only for now, with no onboarding fee, no contract and full CSV export. Phone numbers are $1.15 a month each at cost from prepaid credit, or you can bring your own Twilio account. What it does not have yet: SMS (coming soon), native mobile apps, a public API and Gmail or Outlook mailbox sync. Full plan limits are on the pricing page.

How do you estimate your own CRM cost?

Work out a first-year total, not a monthly price, using the same inputs for every vendor on your shortlist.

1. Count the people who need to log in in 12 months, not today. On per-seat plans, multiply by the seat price and round up to any seat bucket or minimum.
2. Count your contacts and how fast the list grows. On contact-tier plans, price the tier you will reach by month 12, not the one you start in.
3. Pick the plan that has the features you need on day one. Check that automations, email sync, pipelines and reporting are on that plan, not a higher tier or an add-on.
4. Add one-time fees: required onboarding, migration or setup packages.
5. Add add-ons you would buy anyway: email marketing, pipelines, extra automations, API access, call recording.
6. Estimate usage: calling minutes, texts, email sends, WhatsApp messages and AI credits a month, multiplied by the vendor’s published rates, plus phone number and texting registration fees.
7. Check the contract terms: annual commitment, prepay period, termination fee, refund policy and how to cancel.
8. Compare monthly and annual billing. Annual saves money but locks you in; price both before you choose.