A Hiver alternative for founders who live in support email

Gmail can be a familiar place to answer customers, until a teammate needs to know who owns the reply. Hiver keeps that work in Gmail or moves it into Hiver Omni. Pipp is a dedicated place for a small team to handle customer email together, with our AI and yours. Pipp AI, in beta, translates conversations, drafts replies in your style and summarizes them. Your own agent can connect over MCP at no cost and do nearly everything you can do in Pipp. Our core inbox and agent access are free forever, with unlimited teammates, inboxes and conversations. Pipp AI is free during beta and fairly priced afterward.

Hiver in Gmail puts shared support work inside Gmail. Hiver Omni is a separate platform for teams that need a broader channel mix. If you’d rather give support email its own workspace, Start using Pipp. You can start today.

The short answer

Consider Pipp if email is your main customer channel and you’d rather open a dedicated support inbox than turn Gmail into your support desk. Pipp is for founders and small teams who answer their own customers. Every teammate is free, Pipp AI is in beta, and your own agent can connect for free and send replies for you.

Keep Hiver in Gmail if your team already lives in Gmail and wants assignments, notes, rules, help content, and AI there. Choose Hiver Omni if you need a standalone platform with live chat and other channels today. The shared name does not make the two products’ channel and plan features interchangeable. Hiver’s own comparison explains the split.

Three workspaces, three fits

Hiver product and plan claims above were checked against its official Gmail pricing, Omni pricing, and Gmail product page on September 24, 2026. AI and agent facts were checked again on October 20, 2026, including Hiver’s guide to its MCP server.

Why support email deserves its own home

Gmail is familiar, and Hiver makes it a working team support space. That is a real advantage when the whole company already handles customer requests there. Pipp starts from a different idea: support email deserves its own home, even in a tiny company.

In Pipp you get unlimited shared inboxes, assignment, Open, Later and Closed states, internal notes, team roles and live presence, all free. A command palette and keyboard shortcuts keep replies quick. Undo send gives you 10 seconds to take one back. The app speaks 30 languages.

Try Pipp if you’re a founder, developer, or small support team whose day is mostly customer email. Your whole team can try it at no cost.

When to keep Hiver

Keep Hiver in Gmail if moving work out of Gmail would be the problem, not the solution. Its Growth plan already lists a help center, automations, analytics, integrations, and AI. Pro adds SLAs, CSAT, advanced analytics, and API access.

Keep or choose Hiver Omni if support spans email providers and channels beyond Gmail. Omni Growth includes a standalone workspace, email, live chat, shared inboxes, and ticketing. Pro adds a Slack support channel and more controls. Voice is an add-on. Those channels are concrete reasons to keep Hiver Omni in your shortlist.

What two seats cost

Hiver publishes the same displayed dollar seat prices for both product lines, but the included work differs. The cited pages do not identify an ISO currency. These are per user per month. Annual rates require annual billing; monthly rates are billed month to month. Both the Gmail and Omni pricing pages say plans start at two seats, and Hiver offers a seven-day Elite trial without a credit card. It does not list a permanent free plan.

Using the advertised two-seat starting point, Growth is $50 per month equivalent on annual billing, or $70 on monthly billing. However, Hiver’s purchase guide says self-serve licenses come in bundles of five. Confirm the actual minimum at checkout before budgeting for two seats. Hiver in Gmail says AI is included without add-ons or usage fees; we could not verify exact allowances or fair-use terms. Hiver Omni lists voice separately at $30 per voice seat per month, including 1,000 pooled minutes per voice seat, then $0.03 per additional minute.

Pipp’s core inbox and agent access are free forever, whether your team has two people or twenty. Pipp AI is free during beta and fairly priced afterward. We haven’t set its price yet, so we won’t put a made-up AI number next to a real Hiver bill.

Chat is on its way

Pipp handles email today. Chat is already in the works, and more is coming soon. If you need live chat today, Hiver Omni has it.

How the AI offers compare

Hiver’s built-in AI covers a lot of ground. Its Growth plans list AI Agents that resolve requests, AI Copilot, Skills and an AI Knowledge Builder, and Elite adds AI QA and AI Insights. Hiver’s pricing page shows no separate AI fee. If those tools already run your queue, Hiver has them.

Pipp AI is in beta. It translates conversations so everyone reads and writes in their own language, drafts replies in each person’s writing style and summarizes conversations. It’s free during beta and fairly priced afterward. It’s off by default, and an owner or admin can turn it on in Settings → AI. Pipp AI never sends a reply on its own.

Both products let you bring an assistant you already use. Hiver MCP connects Claude, Claude Code, Cursor, ChatGPT and other MCP clients to your Hiver email inboxes, and Hiver Omni has its own server. Hiver’s assistant can read conversations and save shared drafts for a person to review. It can’t send email. Your own agent can do more in Pipp, at no cost. Pipp works with any MCP agent, including Claude, ChatGPT (Dots), Codex, Grok and Grok Bot. It works as you, with the access you approve, and can do nearly everything you can do in Pipp: set up the workspace, domain and inboxes, invite teammates, assign, snooze and close conversations, write notes, and draft and send replies. Your teammates see what it did. Your own code can call the same 72 operations over an HTTP API.

The difference for a small team is the bill. Hiver charges per user, from $25 per user per month on annual billing. Pipp’s inbox and agent connection are free for every teammate, and Pipp AI is free during beta and paid afterward.

Switching from Hiver

There’s no automatic Hiver importer yet, so run both side by side while you switch. Pipp is free, so that costs nothing.

Hiver documents CSV exports for analytics reports on Pro and Elite. Its help page lists no report exports on Growth. A report CSV is not a complete archive of conversations, private notes, assignments, tags, and attachments.

Frequently asked questions

Is Pipp a replacement for Hiver in Gmail?

For a team that mainly wants to answer customer email together, Pipp is a strong alternative, and every teammate is free. Hiver in Gmail has rules, help content, AI, and reporting. If those run your daily operation, Hiver has them today.

Is Hiver in Gmail the same as Hiver Omni?

No. Hiver in Gmail works inside Gmail through a Chrome extension. Hiver Omni is a standalone platform that works with Gmail, Outlook, and other email providers and has a wider channel scope. Hiver describes the distinction on both pricing pages.

Does Hiver have a free plan?

The current Hiver in Gmail and Hiver Omni pricing pages list paid Growth, Pro, and Elite plans and a seven-day Elite trial, not a permanent free plan. Plans start at two seats. Check the Gmail or Omni page for current terms before buying.

Is Pipp free forever?

Yes. The core inbox is free forever, with unlimited teammates, inboxes and conversations, and so is connecting your own AI agent. Pipp AI is free during beta and fairly priced afterward. Fair daily sending limits apply.

Does Pipp offer live chat?

Pipp handles email today, and chat is already in the works. If you need live chat right now, Hiver Omni has it.

When can my team try Pipp?

Today. Sign up free, set up your inbox and invite your team.

For now, each account can create up to 3 workspaces per day. Each workspace can send up to 100 recipient deliveries per day.

Each recipient in To or Cc counts separately. An email sent to 2 people in To and 1 in Cc uses 3 deliveries. Both daily limits reset at 00:00 UTC.

If you need the limit removed, email us at hello@pipp.so.

Pipp AI is in beta and off by default. An owner or admin can turn it on in Settings → AI. Your own agent can connect at any time. Start using Pipp.

A home for the customer email you answer yourself

Your customer conversations deserve a home of their own. Pipp’s dedicated email inbox, with our AI and yours, is ready for your whole team today.

Core inbox and agent access: free forever. Pipp AI: free during beta, fairly priced afterward.

Start using Pipp ↗

Sources

We publish this comparison. Pipp is a product of Telesoft AG, a Swiss company. Hiver claims were checked against these official sources on September 24, 2026, and AI and agent claims again on October 20, 2026. Prices and packaging can change. Agent and MCP claims were rechecked on October 27, 2026.

• Hiver in Gmail pricing, for Gmail plan scope, displayed seat prices, trial, minimum seats, and product distinction
• Hiver Omni pricing, for Omni channel scope, seat prices, trial, and voice add-on
• Hiver in Gmail product page, for its Gmail-based positioning and AI inclusion statement
• Hiver reporting and analytics guide, for CSV report export eligibility and limits
• Hiver purchase guide, for self-serve seat bundles
• Hiver MCP guide for Hiver in Gmail, for supported clients, OAuth sign-in and the draft-only limit
• Hiver’s MCP guide for Hiver Omni, for the separate Omni server and email-inbox scope