HubSpot review for 2025: Is it the right all-in-one platform?

You’ve probably heard of HubSpot. It’s a giant in the customer relationship management (CRM) world, known for its all-in-one approach that bundles marketing, sales, and customer service tools into a single platform. For a lot of businesses, it’s the go-to choice when they start looking for a CRM.

But is it the right choice for your business in 2024? That’s what this HubSpot review is here to help you figure out. We’re going to give you an honest look at its core features, untangle its famously complicated pricing, and see how its built-in AI actually performs. We’ll cover where it shines and, more importantly, where its limits might have you looking for something more specialized.

What is HubSpot CRM? An introduction for this HubSpot review

First things first, HubSpot isn’t just one tool. They call it a “Customer Platform” that’s built around a central (and free) CRM. This platform is made up of a few connected products called "Hubs":

• Marketing Hub: Helps you attract an audience with tools for email, landing pages, and automation.

• Sales Hub: For keeping track of deals, managing your pipeline, and talking to leads.

• Service Hub: For helping customers through ticketing and live chat.

• CMS Hub: For building and managing your website.

• Operations Hub: For syncing data between tools and automating business processes.

The whole idea is to get every team working from the same playbook, with all your customer info in one spot.

A deep dive into core features for our HubSpot review

Let’s get into the nitty-gritty of what you’d actually use day-to-day. We’ll look at what HubSpot nails and where you might hit a wall.

Sales and contact management

At its core, HubSpot wants to give you a complete timeline of your customer relationships. Every contact record becomes a single source of truth for all interactions, automatically logging emails, calls, and website visits. This 360-degree view is a huge help for sales teams because it gives them context for every single conversation. Managing deals is just as simple, with a visual, Kanban-style pipeline that lets you drag and drop deals between stages. It’s a clean and easy way to see how things are progressing.

For sales automation, HubSpot gives you handy tools like email templates for quick replies, sequences for sending automated follow-ups, and task reminders to keep everyone on track. These features are great for cutting down on repetitive work and making sure no leads slip through the cracks. It’s worth pointing out, though, that the really powerful automation ,the kind that lets you build complex, multi-step workflows ,is kept behind the much more expensive Professional and Enterprise plans.

One of HubSpot’s biggest strengths is how easy it is to use. Compared to more complicated systems like Salesforce, HubSpot feels refreshingly simple to get the hang of. Teams can often be up and running in minutes, which is a massive plus for businesses that don’t have a dedicated admin or a ton of time for training.

Marketing automation hub

HubSpot’s Marketing Hub is where the platform’s famous "inbound" philosophy really gets to work. It gives you the tools to attract, engage, and convert leads. The drag-and-drop builders for creating emails and landing pages are straightforward, letting you make professional-looking assets without needing a developer. That said, if you’re looking for slick, modern designs, the built-in templates can feel a bit basic.

The form builder is a real standout for lead generation. You can create custom forms to put on your site that funnel new leads right into your CRM. HubSpot’s segmentation is also pretty solid, letting you create "static" lists (a fixed group) or "active" lists that automatically update as contacts fit certain criteria.

The real magic is supposed to be in the visual workflow builder. You can create automated sequences that nurture leads based on what they do, like sending a targeted email after they look at your pricing page. But here’s the big catch: the free and starter plans have some serious limits. You can only string together 10 actions in a single workflow, which quickly becomes a problem as your marketing gets more complex.

Service hub and live chat

The Service Hub brings HubSpot’s CRM setup over to customer support. It has a ticketing system that works a lot like the sales pipeline, giving your support team an organized way to manage and resolve customer issues.

HubSpot also gives you live chat and a chatbot builder called "Chatflows." These are great for talking to website visitors in real-time, answering simple questions, and grabbing leads. You can set up rule-based bots to qualify leads or point people to the right resources.

However, this is where the "all-in-one" approach starts to show its cracks. HubSpot’s chatbot is designed to work with knowledge stored inside HubSpot, mostly from its own knowledge base articles. For most companies, the really important support knowledge is scattered all over the place ,in internal wikis like Confluence, project plans in Google Docs, or even past chats in Slack. HubSpot’s AI simply can’t get to this information, which means it often gives incomplete or just plain wrong answers.

For truly helpful support, you need a tool that can learn from all your company knowledge. This is where a specialized tool like eesel AI makes a world of difference. Instead of being trapped in one system, eesel works on top of the tools you already have. It connects to your help desk, help center, and all those scattered internal docs to power an AI that gives much more accurate, context-aware answers through chatbots and agent-assist tools.

The big question: How good is HubSpot’s AI?

HubSpot has jumped on the AI bandwagon, branding its tools as "Breeze AI" or "Smart CRM." The promise is to help with everything from writing marketing copy to forecasting sales. But does it live up to the hype?

A key part: HubSpot’s Breeze AI

Breeze AI is basically a collection of generative AI features built right into the HubSpot platform. Think of it as an assistant that’s always there to help with different tasks. From our own HubSpot review and what we’ve seen from others, here’s what people use it for most:

• Content Generation: It can help you draft blog posts, marketing emails, and social media updates. This can be a real time-saver for busy marketing teams.

• AI Assistant (Copilot): You can use prompts to ask it to summarize long email chains, pull reports, or find specific info in your CRM.

• Data Enrichment: Some paid add-ons use AI to automatically find and fill in company information for your contacts, but this costs extra.

For creating content and handling simple tasks inside the platform, Breeze AI is a convenient and genuinely useful feature.

Where HubSpot’s native AI falls short

While it’s handy, HubSpot’s AI has some major blind spots that show up as soon as you need more than basic help.

First, there’s the "walled garden" problem. HubSpot’s AI is a bit of a homebody ,it’s designed to work best with data that lives inside HubSpot. It has a tough time learning from the rich, messy knowledge that most support teams actually rely on, which is often in other tools like Google Docs, Confluence, or old help desk tickets in Zendesk. This means its answers are often generic and don’t have the specifics needed to solve real customer problems.

Second is the paywall. The most valuable AI features ,like predictive lead scoring, custom AI reports, and training the AI on your past support tickets ,are locked away in the Professional (€1,283/month) and Enterprise plans. This leaves smaller businesses with only the most basic AI tools, forcing a massive budget increase to get any real power.

Finally, it’s a jack-of-all-trades and a master of none. As an "all-in-one" feature, it just doesn’t have the depth of a dedicated AI support platform. It can’t do advanced things like intelligently routing tickets, making API calls to check an order status in Shopify, or running simulations on your past tickets to prove its value before you even turn it on.

This is where eesel AI offers a clear alternative. It’s built to solve these exact problems:

• Connects to Everything: eesel AI links to all your tools. It learns from your Zendesk tickets, Confluence spaces, and Google Drive to give your support team an AI that actually knows your business inside and out.

• Clear Value: Instead of forcing you into a massive platform upgrade, eesel’s pricing is based on how much you use it. You only pay for the value you get, which makes it much easier to scale.

• Built for Support: eesel offers key features that HubSpot’s AI doesn’t, like the ability to simulate performance on historical tickets, automate complex triage rules, and take actions via API calls (like issuing a refund or updating a user record). This gives your team full control and the confidence to use AI at scale.

A critical HubSpot review of its pricing

Alright, let’s tackle the elephant in a room: HubSpot’s pricing. It’s notoriously complex, and while its free plan is one of the best out there, growing your business on the platform can lead to some serious sticker shock.

The biggest problem is the "pricing cliff." There’s a huge jump from the affordable Starter plans (which begin at €9 per seat per month) to the Professional plans (which start at a whopping €1,283 per month). This gap is a major headache for growing businesses that outgrow the Starter tier’s limits but can’t stomach the massive leap in cost.

On top of that, there are hidden and add-on costs that can sneak up on you. Many users report expensive, mandatory onboarding fees that can run into the thousands. You’ll also get charged for going over your marketing contact limits, and on higher tiers, you might have to pay extra for things like a dedicated IP address for your emails.

Here’s a simplified breakdown of the "Customer Platform" bundle to give you a clearer picture:

Feature	Free Tools	Starter Customer Platform	Professional Customer Platform
Price	€0/mo	Starts at €9/mo/seat	Starts at €1,283/mo
Users Included	Up to 2 users	Starts at 1 seat	Includes 5 seats (additional seats at €45/mo)
Marketing Contacts	1,000	1,000	5,000
Marketing Automation	Very limited (e.g. form follow-up emails)	Basic automation (10 actions/workflow)	Advanced, complex workflows
AI Features	Limited Copilot	Limited Copilot	Advanced AI, lead scoring, custom reports
Support	Community Forum Only	Email & Chat Support	Phone, Email & Chat Support
Branding	HubSpot branding on assets	Branding can be removed	Branding can be removed
Popularity	–	MOST POPULAR	–

It’s worth noting that HubSpot also offers standalone Marketing Hub plans that can be purchased separately from the full Customer Platform. These plans are specifically designed for teams that only need marketing tools and don’t require the full sales, service, and operations suite.

Feature	Free Tools	Marketing Hub Starter	Marketing Hub Professional
Price	€0/mo	Starts at €9/mo/seat	Starts at €792/mo
Users Included	Up to 2 users	Starts at 1 seat	Includes 3 core seats (additional seats at €45/mo)
Marketing Contacts	1,000	1,000	5,000
Marketing Automation	Very limited (e.g. form follow-up emails)	Basic automation (10 actions/workflow)	Advanced, complex workflows
Email Marketing	Basic templates	Advanced templates & personalization	Advanced segmentation & A/B testing
Landing Pages	Basic builder	Advanced builder	Advanced builder with custom domains
SEO Tools	Basic keyword research	Advanced SEO recommendations	Advanced SEO with content strategy
Social Media	Basic scheduling	Advanced scheduling & analytics	Advanced social media management
Analytics & Reporting	Basic metrics	Advanced dashboards	Custom reports & attribution
AI Features	Limited Copilot	Limited Copilot	Advanced AI content generation
Support	Community Forum Only	Email & Chat Support	Phone, Email & Chat Support

Our final HubSpot review and verdict

So, what’s the final word? HubSpot is a fantastic and user-friendly platform, especially for businesses that can afford its pricier tiers and really want to keep their sales and marketing teams in lockstep. Its free plan is genuinely one of the best on the market and gives startups a ton of value right out of the gate.

However, the steep pricing, confusing plans, and the limits of its built-in AI mean it’s definitely not the right fit for everyone. That jump from Starter to Professional is a canyon that many small businesses simply can’t cross. If you’re looking for top-tier AI support automation without having to rip out your entire tech stack and budget, you’re better off looking at specialized tools.

An alternative to HubSpot: eesel AI

Here’s the situation many businesses find themselves in: you want powerful AI to help your customer support team, but you don’t want to be shoehorned into an expensive, one-size-fits-all platform like HubSpot just to get it.

The answer is an AI layer that works with the tools you already use and like. eesel AI is a specialized platform that plugs directly into your existing help desk (like Zendesk, Freshdesk, or Intercom) and all your other knowledge sources.

This approach gives you the best of both worlds. You can keep the CRM and help desk that work for you while adding purpose-built AI that drafts replies, routes tickets, and even fully automates resolutions. You can try eesel AI for free or book a demo and see how it can transform your support in minutes.