Introducing GudDesk: The Open-Source Intercom Alternative

Customer support tools have a problem. They're either expensive, locked-in, or both. When we needed a modern messaging platform for our own projects, we kept running into the same wall: pay $50+ per seat per month for features that should be table stakes, or duct-tape together a dozen open-source tools that don't talk to each other.

So we built GudDesk.

What is GudDesk?

GudDesk is a complete customer messaging platform — live chat, shared inbox, knowledge base, AI agents, and workflow automations — all bundled into a single open-source project licensed under GPL-3.0.

Think of it as the Intercom experience without the Intercom price tag.

Why We Built It

Three things frustrated us about the current landscape:

1. Per-seat pricing is broken. Your entire team should be able to jump into a conversation without your CFO having a panic attack.
2. AI should be a first-class citizen. Not an upsell. Not an add-on. Baked in from day one.
3. You should own your data. Full stop. Self-host it, export it, move it wherever you want.

GudDesk addresses all three.

What's Included

Out of the box, you get:

• Live Chat Widget — A lightweight, embeddable widget you can drop into any site with two lines of code.
• Shared Inbox — Email, chat, and bot conversations unified in a single view for your whole team.
• Knowledge Base — Write help articles, organize them into collections, and let your AI agents suggest them automatically.
• AI Agents — Three built-in agents (GudBot, TriageBot, OnboardBot) that actually resolve tickets — not just parrot canned replies.
• Automations — Route, tag, assign, and escalate without lifting a finger.
• Plugin API — Build custom integrations or install community plugins from the marketplace.

Free for Small Teams

GudDesk is free to use for teams of up to 3 agents. No credit card required, no feature gates on the free tier, no time-limited trials. If you're a startup or a small team, you can run your entire support operation on GudDesk without paying a cent.

For larger teams, our Pro plan adds advanced AI features, priority support, and custom branding removal.

Self-Hostable

Every line of GudDesk is open source. Clone the repo, run docker compose up, and you've got a fully functional instance running on your own infrastructure. Your data never leaves your servers.

What's Next

We're just getting started. Here's what's on the roadmap:

• Slack and Teams integrations — Reply to customers from where your team already works.
• Custom agent builder — A visual editor for creating AI agent workflows.
• Mobile app — Native iOS and Android apps for on-the-go support.
• Multilingual knowledge base — Auto-translate articles for global teams.

We'd love for you to try GudDesk and tell us what you think. Star us on GitHub, file an issue, or just say hi on Twitter.

Let's build better support together.