Capsule CRM vs Insightly
An independent, review-free comparison compiled by the SaaSTracker editorial team. Both products are profiled in full, and neither can pay for placement here.
The short answer
Both sides assessedCapsule CRM compared with Insightly
Both put project delivery next to the pipeline. Insightly scales much further, with up to 500,000 records, sandboxes, audit logging, and unlimited permission roles, and charges $49 a user for its automation tier. Capsule does the same core job at roughly $36 with a free plan underneath it. Small service businesses should start with Capsule; firms that need permission structures and six-figure record counts belong on Insightly.
Insightly compared with Capsule CRM
Capsule also offers project boards alongside its pipeline and starts far lower at $18 per user per month with a free tier, making it the value option for small service businesses. Insightly scales further, with 500,000-record limits, sandboxes, and audit logging. Under about 15 people Capsule usually wins on price and simplicity; larger firms needing permissions and record scale grow into Insightly.
Choose Capsule CRM if
Small businesses and teams of roughly 2 to 30 people who want a clear, low-maintenance CRM with pipelines, tasks, and light delivery tracking, and who would rather have a stable independent vendor than a venture-backed platform that reprices every eighteen months.
Choose Insightly if
Small and mid-sized project-based businesses (agencies, consultancies, professional services, specialist contractors) that need the sale and the delivery to share one system, and that value record scale and permissions over deep sales automation.
Side by side
13 attributes| Attribute | Capsule CRM | Insightly |
|---|---|---|
| Category | CRM | CRM |
| Starting price | $0 for 2 users and 250 contacts, then about $18 per user per month on annual billing (Starter) (free plan available) | $29 per user per month, billed annually (Plus) (14 days trial) |
| Pricing model | Per-user subscription across a free 2-user plan and four paid plans, billed monthly or annually, with contact limits as the main scaling lever and marketing sold separately through the Transpond sibling product. | Per-user subscription across three CRM plans billed annually, with marketing automation priced by prospect volume, service ticketing priced per user, and the AppConnect integration platform priced by monthly task volume. |
| Free plan | Free plan for up to 2 users with 250 contacts, 5 custom fields, and 1 sales pipeline, which is enough to run a very small business indefinitely. | No |
| Free trial | 14 days, no credit card required | 14 days |
| Best for | Small businesses and teams of roughly 2 to 30 people who want a clear, low-maintenance CRM with pipelines, tasks, and light delivery tracking, and who would rather have a stable independent vendor than a venture-backed platform that reprices every eighteen months. | Small and mid-sized project-based businesses (agencies, consultancies, professional services, specialist contractors) that need the sale and the delivery to share one system, and that value record scale and permissions over deep sales automation. |
| Setup time | Under an hour for a working CRM: import contacts, set pipeline stages, connect the mailbox. The AI pipeline generator shortens even that. A team-wide rollout with automation and project boards is a few days rather than weeks. | A working CRM in a day or two through CSV import and pipeline configuration. Setting up project pipelines, task templates, routing rules, and dashboards so that sales and delivery genuinely connect takes 2 to 4 weeks of part-time work. |
| Learning curve | The lowest in this batch alongside Less Annoying CRM. Capsule is deliberately small, and the interface does not present options that most small businesses will never use. | Moderate. The CRM half is conventional and familiar, and the project half requires deliberate process design, since the value only appears if the opportunity-to-project handoff mirrors how the business actually delivers. |
| Platforms | Web app, iOS, Android, Gmail and Outlook integrations | Web app, iOS, Android, Gmail and Outlook integrations |
| Compliance | GDPR, UK data protection compliance, SOC 2 aligned hosting practices | SOC 2, GDPR, ISO 27001, HIPAA support on eligible configurations |
| Founded | 2009 | 2009 |
| Headquarters | Manchester, United Kingdom | San Francisco, California, United States |
| Ownership | Bootstrapped and privately held (Zestia Ltd), with no outside investment | PE-owned (Crest Rock Partners, merged with Unbounce in July 2024) |
Strengths and limitations
Capsule CRM
Strengths
- Genuinely easy to use, to the point that non-technical staff adopt it without training, which is the hardest problem in small-business CRM.
- A permanent free plan for two users, plus a clear upgrade ladder driven mostly by contact limits rather than feature removal.
- Project boards bring post-sale delivery onto the customer record at roughly a third of Insightly's price.
- Bootstrapped, profitable, independent vendor since 2009 with no investors, no acquisitions, and a track record of stable pricing.
Limitations
- No native calling and no serious email sequencing, so outbound-heavy teams need additional tools.
- No custom object types; the data model is contacts, organisations, opportunities, and projects extended by custom fields.
- Workflow automation and multiple pipelines are withheld from Starter, which makes the entry price less useful than it first appears.
- Reporting is clear but shallow, with no forecasting hierarchy or BI-grade analysis.
Insightly
Strengths
- Genuine project management inside the CRM, with opportunities converting into delivery projects that keep the customer history attached; almost nothing else in this price band does this properly.
- Generous record and storage limits (up to 500,000 records and 250 GB) compared with most small-business CRMs.
- Serious administrative controls at the top tier including sandboxes, audit logging, and serverless function authoring.
- One vendor now covers landing pages, CRM, marketing automation, and service following the 2024 Unbounce merger, which is a coherent story for marketing-led service businesses.
Limitations
- No free plan and a 14-day trial only, with an entry price double Zoho Standard for less configurability.
- The Plus plan has no workflow automation and only two permission roles, which makes $49 Professional the real starting point.
- Native sales sequencing and cadence tooling are thin; serious outbound follow-up pushes you toward the separately priced marketing product.
- Four separate subscriptions (CRM, Marketing, Service, AppConnect) make total cost of ownership opaque, and AppConnect at $249 a month is expensive for an integration layer.
Pricing compared
Capsule CRM
Per-user subscription across a free 2-user plan and four paid plans, billed monthly or annually, with contact limits as the main scaling lever and marketing sold separately through the Transpond sibling product.
- Free$0
- StarterAbout $18
- GrowthAbout $36
- AdvancedAbout $54
- UltimateAbout $72
Starter at around $18 is good value for a single-pipeline business that mostly needs a shared address book with follow-up. Growth at around $36 is where the honest comparison happens, and there it sits just below Pipedrive Growth at $39 while offering project boards and AI enrichment that Pipedrive charges extra for or omits, and giving up automation depth, sequencing, and ecosystem size in return. What you are really buying is low total cost of ownership: nothing to administer, no add-on catalogue, no credit meters, and a vendor with no investors pushing it to reprice. For a small business that values predictability, that is worth more than a feature comparison suggests.
Insightly
Per-user subscription across three CRM plans billed annually, with marketing automation priced by prospect volume, service ticketing priced per user, and the AppConnect integration platform priced by monthly task volume.
- Plus$29
- Professional$49
- Enterprise$99
Insightly is not cheap and does not pretend to be. Against pure sales CRMs it looks expensive: $49 for the automation tier where Zoho charges $23 and includes far more configuration. The value case rests entirely on the project layer. If your business genuinely delivers work after the sale and would otherwise buy a CRM plus a project tool plus an integration between them, Insightly at $49 a user is competitive and simpler. If you would never open the project module, you are paying a premium for shelf space, and the multi-product pricing around it makes the total cost harder to predict than most competitors here.
Editorial verdict on each
Capsule CRM
Capsule is the CRM to buy when you want the problem solved rather than a platform to administer. It is clear, quick to adopt, priced sensibly on contact limits rather than feature hostage-taking, and made by a bootstrapped British company that has been shipping steadily since 2009 with no investors demanding a repricing. Budget for Growth at roughly $36 a user, because workflow automation and multiple pipelines are the features most teams discover they need, and the project boards there are a real bonus for service businesses. The honest limits are that there is no sequencing, no dialer, no custom objects, and no big ecosystem. If you need those, look elsewhere. If you want a small business CRM your team will actually keep using, Capsule is one of the two or three best answers in this category.
Read the full Capsule CRM profileInsightly
Insightly is a specialist wearing a generalist's clothes. As a sales CRM it is fine and slightly expensive; as a system that carries a customer from lead to won deal to delivered project on one record, it is one of very few options a small business can buy self-serve. Agencies, consultancies, and contractors are the natural buyers, and they should budget for the $49 Professional plan because Plus has no automation and only two permission roles. Treat the surrounding product family with caution: marketing, service, and AppConnect are separate subscriptions that can triple the bill. And factor in that the company is two years into private equity ownership and a merger with Unbounce, so the combined-platform pitch is still a promise. If the project layer is not the reason you are looking, buy something cheaper.
Read the full Insightly profileCapsule CRM profile last reviewed 2026-08-22; Insightly last reviewed 2026-08-22. Pricing is compiled from public sources and can change without notice. See our methodology.