Choosing a shared inbox comes down to one question: will your team keep working inside Gmail, or move into a separate app? Tools that live in Gmail change the least. Email-first team apps add collaboration. Full help desks add tickets, chat and help centres. Decide that, then send the same real customer emails through each trial.
Picture three people answering the same support address from Gmail. Someone replies twice, someone misses a message, and nobody knows who's on it. That's the problem Gmelius solves inside Gmail, and it's the problem every tool below solves in its own way. Here are nine alternatives, in no particular order.
Stay in Gmail, or move to a separate inbox?
The tool you're leaving sits inside Gmail, so your team never had to learn a new app. That's the first thing to decide, because it splits the options cleanly.
- Stay in Gmail if your team's small, already lives in Gmail all day and mostly handles email.
- Move to an email-first team app if you want comments, assignments and shared drafts but still think in emails.
- Move to a help desk if customers reach you by chat, WhatsApp or social as well as email, or if you want a help centre.
One older name you'll see on lists like this is Groove. Its old address, groovehq.com, now lands on a page for Helply, so it's left out here.
Nine shared inbox tools at a glance
| Tool | Kind of tool | Good for |
|---|---|---|
| Chatwoot | Open-source support platform | Self-hosted or cloud support across chat and email |
| Drag | Shared inbox in Gmail | Teams who'd rather not learn a new app |
| FreeScout | Open-source help desk | A lightweight help desk on your own server |
| Front | Customer operations platform | Support, sales and ops sharing customer work |
| Help Scout | Support platform | Shared inbox, help centre and AI agent together |
| Helpwise | Small business customer service | Small businesses handling all customer messages |
| Missive | Email-first team app | Teams who run on email and want to collaborate |
| Spike | AI email platform | AI-sorted inboxes with team spaces |
| Trengo | Omnichannel shared inbox | WhatsApp, email, chat, social and voice in one inbox |
All nine tools, alphabetically
In no particular order of preference.
Chatwoot
Best for: Teams wanting open-source customer support across live chat, email, WhatsApp and social, which they can self-host or run on the vendor's cloud.
Drag
Best for: Gmail teams who want a shared inbox inside Gmail with an AI assistant called Varley that drafts, tags and resolves, and asks first, the vendor says.
FreeScout
Best for: Technical small teams wanting a free, open-source help desk and shared inbox built with PHP and Laravel that they host themselves.
Front
Best for: Companies where support, sales and operations teams, plus AI agents, all work on customer requests in one place.
Help Scout
Best for: Customer-first brands wanting a shared inbox, an AI agent and a help centre in one support platform.
Helpwise
Best for: Small businesses that want one customer service platform for all their customer communication, aimed at serving people rather than tickets, in the vendor's words.
Missive
Best for: Email-heavy teams who want to see what's going on and who's doing what, without changing how they work, per the vendor.
Spike
Best for: People who want an email app with AI inbox sorting, summaries and team spaces, showing important messages first.
Trengo
Best for: Customer teams handling WhatsApp, email, live chat, social and voice who want every channel in one shared inbox.
Where each tool sits: Gmail, email apps or help desks
Inside Gmail. Drag keeps your team in Gmail and adds a shared inbox with AI help on top. It's the closest swap if you don't want anyone to learn a new screen.
Email-first team apps. Missive and Spike are separate apps built around email. The first leans on collaboration, so you can see who's handling what. The second leans on AI sorting and summaries, with team spaces alongside.
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Shared inboxes and help desks. Help Scout, Front, Helpwise, Trengo, Chatwoot and FreeScout move you out of Gmail into a dedicated support or customer-messaging tool. Two of them, the open-source pair, can run on your own server. The rest are hosted, and they differ mainly in which channels they pull in and whether they add a help centre.
If you're moving into a help desk, my guide to help desk software for small businesses covers that side in more depth. If what you need is mainly outbound email from Gmail, my list of Gmail mail merge extensions is a better fit.
The ten-email trial
Feature pages won't tell you how a shared inbox feels on a busy Monday. This will.
- Pick ten real customer emails from recent weeks, including one angry one and one with an attachment.
- Forward the same ten into each trial.
- Have two people work them at the same time and watch for collisions or double replies.
- Assign, comment on and close each one, then search for one of them a day later.
- Ask the team which inbox they'd open first on Monday morning, and trust the answer.
My advice for small teams sharing one inbox
Don't jump to a full help desk just because it has more features. If almost everything comes in by email and your team likes Gmail, staying put with a Gmail-based shared inbox will cause the least friction, and friction is what kills new tools. Move to an email-first app when the team needs to talk about messages more than answer them.
Go to a help desk when customers reach you on more than one channel, or when you want a help centre to cut repeat questions. And if you'd rather own your data, look hard at the open-source pair, but only if someone's happy to host and update them.
Do you make a shared inbox or help desk tool? Tool makers can ask to be considered for a featured place on this list.
Want your tool on this list? Featured spots and reviews here are paid partnerships. Here's how to partner with me.
Frequently asked questions
What's a shared inbox?
It's one inbox, such as a support or sales address, that several people work from together. Each message can be assigned, commented on and tracked, so nobody replies twice and nothing gets missed.
Can I keep using Gmail with a shared inbox tool?
Yes. Some tools work inside Gmail, so your team doesn't have to move. Others are separate apps that connect to your Gmail account and pull the messages in.
Is a help desk the same as a shared inbox?
Not quite. A shared inbox is mainly about email. A help desk usually adds tickets, more channels such as live chat and WhatsApp, reporting and a help centre.
Are there open-source shared inbox tools?
Yes. Two tools on this list are open source and can run on your own server, though you'll need someone to install, back up and update them.
What happened to Groove?
Its old web address now takes you to a page for a product called Helply. Check that company's own site for what it offers today before you add it to a shortlist.
How long does it take to switch shared inbox tools?
Connecting an email address is quick. The slow part is rebuilding rules, saved replies and tags, so list those before you start and move them first.
