7 Best Drift Alternatives & Competitors

Drift is a conversational marketing platform that provides businesses with tools for creating chatbots, engaging with website visitors, and generating leads through real-time conversations.

But Drift has some drawbacks you need to be aware of. First, building bots with Drift can be tricky, and the chatbot builder is complex to use.

This makes it harder for users to create bots efficiently. Sometimes, new chats don’t show up on their own, and you have to refresh the page or app to see them.

This inconvenience can cause users to miss important chat messages since the system doesn’t always notify them promptly.

I’ll introduce you to 7 Drift alternatives that offer smoother bot creation processes and other advanced features to deliver a better live chat customer service experience.

1. LiveChat

Best for: sales departments, customer support teams, and eCommerce businesses

Pricing: $20/user/mo – $59/user/mo

LiveChat is a customer service platform that provides businesses with real-time chat support on their websites, enabling instant communication with visitors.

Features

• Real-time messaging
• Message sneak-peek
• Canned responses
• Pre-chat & post-chat surveys
• Customizable chat widget
• Agent rating
• Private comments in a chat
• Chat invitations
• In-chat voice, video & screen-sharing
• Chat notifications
• Chat transcripts
• Proactive chat triggers
• Chat limit
• 200+ integrations

LiveChat vs. Drift

Criteria	LiveChat	Drift
Best For	Sales and customer support teams	Customer support, sales, and marketing teams
Standout Feature	Advanced queue management	Custom chatbots
Pricing	$20/user/mo – $59/user/mo	Starts at $2,500/mo

Conclusion

LiveChat makes it easy for sales and customer support teams to quickly respond to clients and customers in real-time.

What’s great is that LiveChat automatically sends chats to the next available agent, ensuring efficient communication.

Sign up to LiveChat for free today!

Try LiveChat for free

2. LiveAgent

Best for: customer support teams

Pricing: $15/user/mo – $85/user/mo

LiveAgent is a comprehensive customer support and help desk platform that integrates various communication channels, including email, chat, and social media, into a centralized system.

Features

• Customizable chat widgets
• Canned messages
• Chat history
• Chat transcript
• Proactive chat invitations
• Chat queues
• Internal collaboration functions
• Contact forms
• Chat routing
• Agent ranking
• File sharing
• Website visitor tracking

LiveAgent vs. Drift

Criteria	LiveAgent	Drift
Best For	Customer support teams	Customer support, sales, and marketing teams
Standout Feature	Proactive chat invitations	Custom chatbots
Pricing	$15/user/mo – $85/user/mo	Starts at $2,500/mo

Conclusion

Companies use LiveAgent to capture support requests via the chat widget on the website and deliver timely and accurate responses to the issues they face.

Start your free trial of LiveAgent

Try LiveAgent for free

3. Tawk.to

Best for: customer support teams and small businesses

Pricing: Free

Tawk.to is a live chat software and messaging app that provides a chat widget that can be easily integrated into websites, allowing visitors to initiate conversations.

Features

• Canned responses
• Automated triggers
• Multiple chat handling
• Conversation archiving
• Message sneak-peek
• Ticketing system
• Customizable chat widget
• Knowledge base
• In-chat payments
• Message filtering
• Visitor banning
• Attachments
• Team inbox
• Advanced triggers
• Domain restriction
• Message export

Tawk.to vs. Drift

Criteria	Tawk.to	Drift
Best For	Customer support teams and small businesses	Customer support, sales, and marketing teams
Standout Feature	Message sneak-peek	Custom chatbots
Pricing	Free	Starts at $2,500/mo

Conclusion

Companies like using Tawk.to because it lets them talk to customers right away and learn about people visiting their website. It’s simple to set up, has customization options, and it doesn’t cost anything.

Download the free Tawk.to widget

Try tawk.to for free

4. Intercom

Best for: sales, marketing, and support teams

Pricing: $39/user/mo – $139/user/mo

Intercom is a customer messaging platform that enables businesses to communicate with their customers through various channels such as chat, email, and social media.

Features

• AI chatbot
• Automated responses
• Proactive messaging
• User segmentation
• Answer suggestions
• Custom workflows
• Inbox for real-time oversight
• Message forwarding
• Message tagging
• Custom chatbots
• Collaborative chat
• Offline messaging
• Multilingual support
• User feedback collection
• Appointment scheduling
• Reporting & analytics

Intercom vs. Drift

Criteria	Intercom	Drift
Best For	Sales, marketing, and support teams	Customer support, sales, and marketing teams
Standout Feature	Custom workflows	Custom chatbots
Pricing	$39/user/mo – $139/user/mo	Starts at $2,500/mo

Conclusion

My sales and support teams use Intercom for their live website chat to engage with customers in real-time, address inquiries, and provide assistance.

5. Zendesk

Best for: eCommerce businesses, IT help desks, sales teams, and customer support teams

Pricing: $25/user/mo – $149/user/mo

Zendesk is a customer service and engagement platform that helps businesses manage and improve their interactions with customers across various channels, including email, chat, and social media.

Features

• Chat automation
• Customizable chat widget
• User sentiment identification
• Automatic chat translation
• Pre-chat forms
• Concurrent chats
• Inactivity messages
• Unified inbox
• Self-serve tools
• Proactive messages
• Offline chat
• Visitor information list
• Intelligent routing
• Chat transfer between agents
• Operating hours

Zendesk vs. Drift

Criteria	Zendesk	Drift
Best For	eCommerce businesses, IT help desks, sales teams, and customer support teams	Customer support, sales, and marketing teams
Standout Feature	Intelligent routing to the right agents	Custom chatbots
Pricing	$25/user/mo – $149/user/mo	Starts at $2,500/mo

Conclusion

Zendesk shows you live info about visitors, can translate automatically, and has useful features like searching past conversations using the history tab.

It also starts chats with specific groups of visitors using powerful triggers.

6. ProProfs Chat

Best for: sales and customer support teams, and eCommerce businesses

Pricing: Free – $99/mo

ProProfs Chat is a live chat support platform that lets customer support teams answer with canned responses, send personalized greetings, and resolve issues quickly.

Features

• Canned responses
• Chat transfer
• Self-help articles
• Attachments
• Customizable chat widget
• Chat invitation pop-up
• Chat limit
• Individual operator greetings
• Pre-chat forms
• Customer ratings
• 50+ integrations
• Chat transcripts
• Business hours & scheduler
• Individual operator performance report
• Change color & font (CSS customization)
• Translates into 70+ languages
• On-site user behavior

ProProfs Chat vs. Drift

Criteria	ProProfs Chat	Drift
Best For	Sales and customer support teams, and eCommerce businesses	Customer support, sales, and marketing teams
Standout Feature	Advanced customization through CSS	Custom chatbots
Pricing	Free – $99/mo	Starts at $2,500/mo

Conclusion

Companies use ProProfs Chat to initiate conversations with their website visitors, answer incoming questions as fast as possible, and automate their customer support processes.

And you can achieve that with their free plan which is great for companies with a single operator.

Get started with ProProfs Chat for free

Try ProProfs Chat for free

7. HubSpot Live Chat

Best for: sales, marketing, and customer support teams, and SMBs

Pricing: Free – $99/mo

HubSpot Live Chat is a customer support and engagement tool that enables businesses to interact with website visitors in real-time and offer instant support.

Features

• Chatflows
• Concierge bots
• Conversation history
• Chat history logging
• Visitor segmentation
• Live chat reporting
• Customizable chat widget
• Conversation routing
• Attachments 
• Feedback surveys
• Post-chat feedback survey
• Appointment scheduling

HubSpot Live Chat vs. Drift

Criteria	HubSpot Live Chat	Drift
Best For	Sales, marketing, and customer support teams, and SMBs	Customer support, sales, and marketing teams
Standout Feature	Custom live chat widget	Custom chatbots
Pricing	Free – $99/mo	Starts at $2,500/mo

Conclusion

I’ve seen many businesses use Hubspot Live Chat to deliver fast responses to common questions and create targeted welcome messages for different web pages. It’s a simple tool to create personalized conversations at scale.

Get started with HubSpot Live Chat for free

Try HubSpot Live Chat for free

Which Drift alternative should I use?

For those looking for a live chat platform with features like pre-chat and post-chat surveys, proactive chat triggers, and in-chat voice, video, and screen-sharing, LiveChat can be a promising option.

If you’re part of a sales, marketing, or support team and you need a live chat tool with user segmentation, collaborative chat, and message forwarding features, LiveAgent could be a suitable pick.

A quick recap of Drift alternatives:

1. LiveChat
2. LiveAgent
3. Tawk.to
4. Intercom
5. Zendesk
6. ProProfs Chat
7. HubSpot Live Chat