Gorgias vs Kustomer: Which is right for your support team?

Choosing a new customer service platform feels like a massive decision, doesn’t it? As your business grows, that trusty shared inbox that used to work just fine starts to buckle. Suddenly, you’re on the hunt for something with more muscle, and two names that keep popping up are Gorgias and Kustomer. They’re both heavy hitters, but they were built with completely different game plans in mind.

Gorgias is a specialist, crafted specifically for the fast-paced world of e-commerce. Kustomer, on the other hand, takes a broader approach, billing itself as a CRM-first platform that cares about the entire customer journey. So, picking between them isn’t just about comparing feature lists; it’s about deciding on a strategy for how you want to connect with your customers. It all comes down to your business model, your team’s day-to-day needs, and where you plan to be in a few years.

This guide is a straight-up, no-fluff comparison of Gorgias vs Kustomer. We’ll get into their core features, see how they handle automation, and break down what their pricing models really mean for your budget. Let’s help you make a choice you feel good about.

What is Gorgias?

Gorgias is a customer service helpdesk built from the ground up for e-commerce brands. If you’re running a store on Shopify, BigCommerce, or Magento, Gorgias gets you. It’s designed to stop that maddening cycle of switching between a dozen tabs just to handle one ticket.

Its biggest advantage is how deeply it plugs into these e-commerce platforms. Picture this: an agent is working on a support ticket and can see the customer’s full order history, process a refund, or even edit an order without ever leaving the Gorgias dashboard. It basically turns your helpdesk into a command center for managing customer relationships and, just as importantly, for driving sales.

Beyond that, it pulls all your support channels (email, live chat, social media, SMS) into one clean view. It uses simple, rule-based automation with "macros" to knock out common questions and gives you reports that connect support work directly to revenue. It’s pretty much the go-to for direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands that want their support team to be a key player in their growth.

What is Kustomer?

Kustomer calls itself a customer service CRM platform, and that small tweak in wording makes a huge difference. While most helpdesks are all about tickets, Kustomer is all about the customer. It’s built to give you a complete, 360-degree view of every person you talk to, not just their most recent issue.

The star of the show is the "customer timeline." This feature gathers every single interaction, every email, chat, phone call, and even website visit, into a single, chronological feed. When an agent opens a conversation, they see the customer’s entire history laid out right in front of them. This gives them amazing context and helps them deliver a personal touch without ever having to ask, "Can you remind me what we talked about last time?"

Kustomer offers true omnichannel support, more complex workflow automation, and built-in CRM features that can hold a ton of customer data. It’s really built for larger teams and businesses across any industry, not just e-commerce, that need a platform that can grow with them and handle a ton of conversations.

A head-to-head comparison

Okay, introductions are over. Let’s put these two side-by-side and see how they stack up on the things that actually matter.

Core features and user experience

The first thing you’ll notice is just how different they feel to use. Gorgias is all about making e-commerce support efficient, while Kustomer is focused on giving your team deep customer context.

Gorgias is hyper-focused on e-commerce workflows, which makes its interface feel natural for DTC brands. Everything is pretty much where you’d expect it to be, so your team can get up and running quickly. But that specialization can be a downside if your business isn’t a standard online store. Kustomer is more of a generalist CRM. It gives you a lot more flexibility to build custom workflows for any industry, but all that power comes with a steeper learning curve. It doesn’t feel as "plug-and-play" for e-commerce as Gorgias does out of the box.

Both platforms bring all your channels together, but they do it differently. Kustomer is a bit better at weaving every interaction from every channel into one continuous timeline. Gorgias centralizes your channels, but it can sometimes feel like you’re managing separate conversations that happen to be in the same place. Kustomer also includes native voice support, which is a big plus over Gorgias, where you have to get it as an add-on.

Feature	Gorgias	Kustomer
Primary Focus	E-commerce Helpdesk	Customer Service CRM
Shopify Integration	Deep (edit orders, refunds in-app)	Standard (view order data)
Customer View	Ticket-centric with customer data	Holistic customer timeline
User Interface	Simple and intuitive	Feature-rich and customizable
Voice Channel	Add-on	Native Integration
Best For	Small to mid-sized DTC brands	Mid-sized to enterprise businesses

AI and automation capabilities

Automation is where you can save a ton of time and scale your support, but Gorgias and Kustomer have different ideas about how to get there.

Gorgias relies heavily on rule-based automation and macros. You set up "if this, then that" rules that trigger based on keywords in a message. This works great for the usual questions like "Where’s my order?" or "What’s your return policy?" Its AI is mainly used to figure out what a customer is asking about so it can trigger the right rule. It’s effective, for sure, but it can also be a bit rigid. You have to manually build a rule for every single scenario you want to automate.

Kustomer offers more advanced AI-powered workflows and chatbots. It can handle more complicated, multi-step conversations and uses its rich CRM data to send more personalized automated responses. The catch? Setting up Kustomer’s AI is more complicated and often means upgrading to a pricier plan or buying an add-on.

Here’s a problem they both share: their AI is trapped within their own ecosystems. They take a lot of manual setup, can get expensive, and struggle to use knowledge that lives outside of their direct integrations.

There’s a smarter way to handle AI. Instead of getting locked into one platform, a tool like eesel AI works like a smart layer that plugs right into the helpdesk you already use, whether that’s Gorgias or Kustomer. It automatically learns from your past tickets, so it understands your brand’s voice and solutions from day one. It can also unify knowledge from all your company documents in places like Google Docs, Confluence, and Notion, not just your helpdesk. Best of all, you can set it up in minutes and use its risk-free simulation mode to see exactly how it will perform before you let it talk to customers.

Pricing models and total cost of ownership

Alright, let’s talk about money. The way Gorgias and Kustomer charge for their services can really affect your budget as you scale.

Gorgias uses a ticket-based model. The entry-level plans are pretty affordable, which is a big draw for smaller businesses. The problem is that the cost can be unpredictable. A busy holiday season or a viral social media post can cause your ticket volume to explode, pushing you into expensive overage fees. You end up paying more right when you’re at your busiest.

Plan	Monthly Price	Included Tickets	Overage Cost
Starter	$10	50	+$0.40 / ticket
Basic	$60	300	+$40 / 100 tickets
Pro	$360	2,000	+$36 / 100 tickets
Advanced	$900	5,000	+$36 / 100 tickets
Enterprise	Custom	Custom	Custom

Kustomer sticks to a more traditional per-agent, per-month model. This makes your costs predictable; you know exactly what you’ll pay each month based on your team size. But the licenses themselves are more expensive, and adding new team members can get pricey fast. On top of that, many of the advanced AI and automation features that make Kustomer so appealing are locked behind expensive add-ons.

Plan	Price (per user/month, annual)	Key Features
Enterprise	$89	Omnichannel, Automations, Standard Reports
Ultimate	$139	All Enterprise features + Skills-Based Routing, Real-Time Dashboard
AI Add-on	from $0.60/conversation or $40/user/mo	AI Agents for Customers & Reps

The main lesson here is to think about the total cost. With Gorgias, keep an eye on those potential ticket overages. With Kustomer, be sure to budget for new agents and any add-ons you can’t live without.

The problem with a rip-and-replace approach

Here’s the thing about picking a new helpdesk: it often forces you to "rip and replace" your entire setup. Moving from one platform to another isn’t just about switching a subscription. It’s a huge project. You have to migrate years of customer data, retrain your whole team on a new system, and rebuild every workflow you’ve spent ages perfecting. It’s disruptive, risky, and can drag on for months.

This is where eesel AI changes the conversation. Instead of forcing you to pick a new platform and go through a painful migration, eesel just makes the tools you already use smarter. Whether you’re on Gorgias, Kustomer, Zendesk, or something else, you can plug eesel in and see results in minutes.

You can go live in minutes, not months. The whole setup is self-serve. No long sales calls or mandatory demos. You connect your helpdesk with one click, run a simulation on your past tickets to see exactly how much you can automate, and then gradually turn it on with zero risk. It’s a completely different world from the months-long implementation projects that most platforms require.

Plus, eesel brings all your scattered knowledge together. It connects to your helpdesk tickets, but also to your internal wikis in Confluence, your process docs in Google Docs, and your FAQs in Notion. This creates one reliable source of truth for the AI to use, which is something a standalone helpdesk just can’t do.

Choosing the right platform (or layer) for your needs

So, when it comes to Gorgias vs Kustomer, what’s the final verdict?

Gorgias is the clear winner for e-commerce brands, particularly those on Shopify. If you need a simple, powerful, and revenue-focused helpdesk, its deep e-commerce integrations are hard to beat.

Kustomer is the better fit for larger, more complex businesses that might not be in e-commerce. If you need a highly customizable CRM that gives you a true 360-degree view of your customers, Kustomer has the power you’re looking for.

But maybe the real question isn’t about which platform to choose. For teams that are mostly happy with their current helpdesk but are hungry for better AI and automation, there’s a third option.

Instead of replacing your whole system, why not just make it better? eesel AI gives you a flexible, powerful, and easy-to-use AI layer that works with your existing tools. It gives you full control over your automation without the migration headache. You get enterprise-level AI with a self-serve setup and clear, predictable pricing.

Ready to add a powerful AI brain to your existing helpdesk? Start your free trial or book a demo of eesel AI today.

This video provides a detailed product tour of Kustomer, highlighting its CRM-first approach and customer timeline feature.