Best Copper CRM Alternatives 2026

Copper built its reputation as the CRM that lives inside Google Workspace. If you’ve spent the last few years running your pipeline from a Gmail sidebar, there’s a reason you’re reading this — and it’s probably not because everything is working perfectly. Maybe your team outgrew Copper’s feature set, or the $99/user/month Business tier isn’t delivering enough value for what it costs. You’re not alone.

Why Look for Copper Alternatives?

Pricing that escalates quickly without matching value. Copper’s Professional plan runs $49/user/month, and the Business tier hits $99/user/month. For a 10-person sales team, that’s $990/month before you’ve added any extras. The problem? Even at that price, you’re getting relatively basic reporting and limited automation compared to competitors charging less. Copper removed its Starter plan in recent years, which pushed small teams toward higher tiers faster than they expected.

Feature gaps that show up as you scale. Copper works beautifully for relationship tracking and basic pipeline management. But once you need multi-pipeline reporting, advanced workflow automation, lead scoring, or built-in calling — you hit walls. Many teams find themselves bolting on third-party tools (and paying for them separately) to fill gaps that competitors include natively.

The Google Workspace lock-in becomes a limitation. Copper’s tight Google integration is its biggest strength and its biggest constraint. If any team members use Outlook, or if you acquire a company on Microsoft 365, Copper simply doesn’t work for them. And if Google ever changes its Workspace APIs (which happened in 2024), your CRM is at the mercy of those changes.

Reporting that doesn’t grow with you. Copper’s built-in reports cover the basics — pipeline value, activity tracking, conversion rates. But building custom reports with multiple dimensions, cross-object reporting, or forecasting models requires workarounds or exports to Google Sheets. For data-driven sales managers, this gets old fast.

Limited marketing and customer success tools. Copper is a sales CRM, full stop. There’s no meaningful email marketing, no landing page builder, no customer success workflows. If you want a single platform that handles the full customer lifecycle, you’ll need to look elsewhere.

HubSpot CRM

Best for: Teams that want a free CRM with room to grow

HubSpot is the most common destination for teams leaving Copper, and the reason is simple: you can move your entire team onto HubSpot’s free CRM and immediately get more features than Copper’s paid tiers offer in several categories. The free plan supports up to 1,000,000 contacts (yes, really), includes deal tracking, email templates, meeting scheduling, and basic reporting. For small teams that were paying $49/user/month on Copper, that’s a hard number to argue with.

Where HubSpot really pulls ahead is the growth path. As your team scales, you can add Sales Hub, Marketing Hub, or Service Hub individually. The marketing tools alone — email campaigns, landing pages, blog hosting, ad management — are leagues ahead of anything Copper offers. If you’ve been running your marketing out of Mailchimp while managing sales in Copper, HubSpot consolidates that into one platform.

The honest tradeoff: HubSpot’s Gmail integration is solid but not Copper-level. You’ll get email tracking, CRM sidebar, and contact logging in Gmail, but it feels like a plugin rather than a native experience. And HubSpot’s pricing for premium tiers can surprise you — Marketing Hub Professional starts at $800/month (not per user, flat rate) and charges based on marketing contacts. A 10,000-contact database at Professional tier runs around $900/month. Sales Hub is more reasonable at $100/user/month for Professional.

For most Copper refugees, HubSpot’s Starter tier at $20/user/month is the sweet spot. You get the CRM plus basic automation, simple reporting, and email tracking without the sticker shock. Start there and upgrade only when specific features justify the cost.

See our Copper vs HubSpot comparison

Read our full HubSpot review

Salesforce

Best for: Growing teams that need enterprise-grade customization

Salesforce is the nuclear option. You switch to Salesforce not because Copper has a few feature gaps — you switch because you’ve fundamentally outgrown what a lightweight CRM can do. If your sales process involves multiple product lines, complex approval workflows, territory management, or CPQ (configure-price-quote), Salesforce is built for that complexity.

The customization difference is staggering. Copper gives you a handful of custom fields and activity types. Salesforce gives you custom objects, custom apps, visual workflow builder (Flow), approval processes, and an entire development platform (Apex/Lightning). A manufacturing company that needs to track products, warranties, service contracts, and distributor relationships in the same CRM simply can’t do that in Copper. They can in Salesforce.

But let’s be real: Salesforce is a commitment. Implementation takes 4-12 weeks for most teams, and you’ll likely need a consultant for initial setup (budget $5,000-$15,000 for a basic implementation). The learning curve is real — expect 2-3 weeks before your team feels comfortable, compared to Copper’s same-day onboarding. Ongoing admin work is also a factor. Someone on your team (or an outside admin at $50-100/hour) needs to manage configurations, user permissions, and data quality.

Pricing starts at $25/user/month for Starter Suite, which is actually competitive with Copper. But most teams with the complexity that justifies Salesforce will need Pro Suite at $100/user/month or Enterprise at $165/user/month. For a 15-person team on Enterprise, you’re looking at $2,475/month plus implementation costs. The Google Workspace integration works through the Salesforce Gmail sidebar and Einstein Activity Capture — functional but not as tight as Copper’s native experience.

See our Copper vs Salesforce comparison

Read our full Salesforce review

Pipedrive

Best for: Sales-focused teams that want visual pipeline management

If you loved Copper’s simplicity but wanted more pipeline power, Pipedrive is probably your closest match. It’s built specifically for salespeople (not marketers, not service teams — salespeople), and it shows. The visual pipeline is genuinely best-in-class: drag-and-drop deals between stages, color-coded rotting indicators for stale deals, and activity-based selling that nudges reps to take their next action.

Pipedrive beats Copper on several specific fronts. Email tracking and templates are available starting at the Advanced tier ($29/user/month), along with workflow automations that Copper reserves for higher tiers. The Smart Docs feature lets you create proposals and contracts with auto-filled CRM data — something Copper doesn’t offer natively. And Pipedrive’s reporting, while not Salesforce-level, gives you deal velocity, conversion rate by stage, and revenue forecasting that’s more flexible than Copper’s standard reports.

The limitation to watch: Pipedrive has a Google Workspace integration (email sync, contact sync, calendar sync), but it’s not built on Google’s platform the way Copper is. You won’t see the same level of automatic contact enrichment and relationship tracking from your Gmail threads. If that Gmail-native experience was the primary reason you chose Copper, Pipedrive will feel like a small step back in that specific area — while stepping forward in almost everything else.

Pricing is straightforward: Essential at $14/user/month, Advanced at $29/user/month, Professional at $49/user/month, and Power at $64/user/month. Most teams switching from Copper’s Professional plan ($49/user/month) will find Pipedrive’s Advanced tier ($29/user/month) gives them equal or better functionality at a 40% discount. That’s $200/month saved on a 10-person team.

See our Copper vs Pipedrive comparison

Read our full Pipedrive review

Freshsales

Best for: Teams wanting AI-powered lead scoring on a budget

Freshsales (part of the Freshworks suite) is the alternative most people overlook, and that’s a mistake. For teams that want modern CRM features — AI lead scoring, built-in phone, SMS, chat — without paying enterprise prices, Freshsales delivers more per dollar than almost anything else on this list.

The AI angle is the headline. Freshsales’ Freddy AI scores leads based on engagement signals, suggests next best actions, and predicts deal outcomes. Copper has no equivalent feature at any price tier. For teams that are manually qualifying leads or guessing which deals to prioritize, this is a meaningful capability jump. The built-in phone dialer is another win — your reps can call directly from the CRM, and calls are automatically logged. No separate Aircall or RingCentral subscription needed.

Freshsales also plays well in a broader ecosystem. If you’re using Freshdesk for support or Freshmarketer for campaigns, data flows between them natively. This gives you a full customer lifecycle view that Copper can’t match without stitching together multiple third-party tools.

The honest downside: Freshsales’ Google Workspace integration is functional but unremarkable. You get email sync and a basic Gmail sidebar, but it doesn’t approach Copper’s level of automatic relationship mapping from your Google contacts and calendar. The UI is modern and clean, though some teams find it slightly less intuitive than Copper’s minimalist design. And while Freshworks is a well-funded company, their CRM market share is still small enough that finding experienced consultants or community resources takes more effort than with HubSpot or Salesforce.

The free plan supports up to 3 users with basic contact management and a built-in phone/chat. Growth tier at $9/user/month adds AI scoring and visual pipeline. Pro at $39/user/month brings advanced customization and workflows. For most Copper switchers, the Growth tier at $9/user/month is a steal — you’re saving $40/user/month compared to Copper Professional while gaining features Copper doesn’t have.

See our Copper vs Freshsales comparison

Read our full Freshsales review

Zoho CRM

Best for: Budget-conscious teams that want a full business suite

Zoho CRM is the Swiss Army knife option. On its own, it’s a competent and affordable CRM. But paired with Zoho’s ecosystem of 45+ business apps — Zoho Books (accounting), Zoho Desk (support), Zoho Campaigns (email marketing), Zoho Projects (project management) — it becomes a complete business operating system at a fraction of what you’d pay assembling equivalent tools separately.

Against Copper specifically, Zoho CRM wins on automation and customization at every price tier. The Standard plan ($14/user/month) includes workflow rules, scoring rules, and email insights. The Professional plan ($23/user/month) adds Blueprint — a visual process builder that enforces sales processes step by step. Copper doesn’t have anything comparable until its Business tier at $99/user/month, and even then it’s less sophisticated.

Zoho’s Google Workspace integration includes email sync, contact sync, and a Chrome extension for Gmail. It’s reasonable but not Copper-caliber. Where Zoho gets interesting is that it can also act as a Google Workspace replacement. Zoho Workplace includes email, docs, spreadsheets, and storage — so if you’re open to leaving Google entirely, Zoho can be your entire business stack for roughly $8-15/user/month total. That’s an uncommon play, but for cost-sensitive teams, it’s worth considering.

The tradeoff is the user experience. Zoho’s interface has improved significantly over the past two years, but it still feels busier and less polished than Copper’s clean design. Initial setup takes longer — plan for a full week of configuration versus Copper’s afternoon setup. And Zoho’s mobile app, while functional, isn’t as refined as Copper’s. If your team strongly values design simplicity and minimal training time, Zoho requires more patience upfront for more capability long-term.

See our Copper vs Zoho CRM comparison

Read our full Zoho CRM review

Streak

Best for: Small teams that truly live inside Gmail

Streak is the only CRM on this list that might actually be more Google-native than Copper. While Copper runs as a sidebar alongside Gmail, Streak runs inside Gmail. Your pipeline, contacts, and deal data exist as extensions of your inbox. There’s no separate tab, no separate login, no context switching whatsoever. For freelancers, solo consultants, or tiny teams of 2-5 people who process everything through email, this is as close to zero-friction CRM as exists.

Streak’s free plan is legitimately usable — you get a basic pipeline with up to 500 contacts, mail merge for up to 50 emails, and email tracking. For a solo operator who was paying $49/month for Copper, moving to Streak free saves almost $600/year with minimal feature loss in day-to-day work.

But Streak has a clear ceiling, and you’ll hit it faster than with any other option here. Reporting is bare-bones. There’s no meaningful automation engine. You can’t build multi-step workflows or complex approval processes. The Pro tier at $49/user/month adds shared pipelines, advanced reporting, and increased limits, but at that price point you’re paying Copper-level money for less capability. Streak also struggles when your CRM needs extend beyond email-centric workflows. If you’re tracking field visits, phone calls, or complex multi-stakeholder deals, Streak’s email-first architecture becomes a constraint rather than an advantage.

My honest recommendation: use Streak if you’re a team of 1-5 people, your sales process is primarily email-based, and you’re coming from Copper mainly because of cost. If you’re leaving Copper because of feature limitations, Streak won’t solve your problems — it’ll make some of them worse.

See our Copper vs Streak comparison

Read our full Streak review

Quick Comparison Table

Tool	Best For	Starting Price	Free Plan
HubSpot CRM	Free CRM with growth path	$20/user/month (Starter)	Yes — up to 1M contacts
Salesforce	Enterprise customization	$25/user/month (Starter Suite)	No (30-day trial)
Pipedrive	Visual pipeline management	$14/user/month (Essential)	No (14-day trial)
Freshsales	AI lead scoring on a budget	$9/user/month (Growth)	Yes — up to 3 users
Zoho CRM	Budget-friendly full suite	$14/user/month (Standard)	Yes — up to 3 users
Streak	Gmail-native simplicity	$49/user/month (Pro)	Yes — basic pipeline

How to Choose

If your primary reason for leaving Copper is cost, start with Freshsales Growth ($9/user/month) or Zoho CRM Standard ($14/user/month). Both deliver more features per dollar than Copper at any tier. For tiny teams, Streak’s free plan or HubSpot’s free CRM can eliminate CRM costs entirely.

If you’re leaving because you outgrew Copper’s features, the choice depends on what you need. Need better marketing tools? HubSpot. Need deeper sales pipeline management and automation? Pipedrive. Need full business suite integration? Zoho. Need enterprise-grade customization with complex objects and workflows? Salesforce.

If the Gmail-native experience is non-negotiable, Streak is your only real option for something that’s equally or more embedded in Gmail. But honestly, most people overestimate how much they need CRM-inside-Gmail versus CRM-alongside-Gmail. Every tool on this list has a Gmail integration that logs emails, syncs contacts, and shows CRM data while you’re reading messages. The difference is minutes per day, not hours.

If you’re a team of 1-10 people, Pipedrive or Freshsales will give you the best balance of power and simplicity. If you’re a team of 10-50, HubSpot or Zoho CRM offer better scaling economics. If you’re 50+, Salesforce starts to make financial and operational sense despite the higher implementation cost.

If you need to keep your team on Google Workspace tools, don’t worry — every CRM here integrates with Google Workspace. The differences are in depth, not availability. Pipedrive and HubSpot have the strongest Google integrations after Copper and Streak.

Switching Tips

Export your Copper data first. Copper lets you export contacts, companies, opportunities, and activities as CSV files. Do a full export before you start setting up your new CRM — you want a clean backup regardless of what you choose. Note that Copper exports don’t include email thread content, only activity logs.

Map your custom fields before importing. If you’ve built custom fields in Copper (deal source, industry tags, custom dropdowns), document every single one before you switch. The number-one cause of messy migrations is discovering three weeks later that a critical custom field didn’t make it over.

Plan for a 2-4 week transition. Even the simplest CRM migration takes longer than you expect. Budget one week for setup and data import, one week for testing with a small group, and one week for full team rollout. Add another week buffer for fixing the inevitable data issues.

Don’t try to replicate Copper exactly. This is the mistake I see most often. Teams spend weeks trying to make their new CRM look and behave exactly like Copper, rather than taking advantage of the new platform’s strengths. Use the migration as an opportunity to clean up your process — archive dead deals, consolidate duplicate contacts, and simplify your pipeline stages.

Watch out for Google integration gaps. Copper’s automatic contact creation from Gmail interactions is something most other CRMs don’t replicate perfectly. After migrating, you may need to manually add contacts that Copper would have captured automatically, or set up a Zapier workflow to bridge the gap.

Consider running both systems for one week. It sounds painful, but having both Copper and your new CRM active simultaneously for 5-7 business days lets you verify that nothing fell through the cracks. Most CRM trials are free or cheap enough that this overlap costs almost nothing.

Cancel Copper strategically. Copper bills annually on most plans. Check your renewal date before starting a migration — if you’re 10 months into an annual contract, you have time to migrate carefully. If you’re 2 months from renewal, start the process now so you’re not paying for another year of a CRM you’ve already replaced.

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