Help ScoutThe AI-driven support platform for customer-first brands
vs
KayakoAI help desk and customer support platform
Comparison · Help Desk · weekly run Nov 3
Help Scout vs Kayako
Which one do AI engines recommend, and how do they differ on price, fit and features?
The short answer
Help Scout is the stronger AI pick in Help Desk: it has a visibility score of 29.8 versus 0 for Kayako.
Choose Help Scout if…
- You want the brand AI engines rank higher (29.8 vs 0)
- You want a free plan to start
- You need HIPAA coverage
- You prefer a larger, established vendor (201–500 employees)
Choose Kayako if…
- You want a lower entry price ($1 vs $25)
- You need GDPR coverage
- Usage-based pricing suits your budget better than per seat
AI visibility side by side
Latest weekly run · Nov 3
| Metric | Help Scout | Kayako |
|---|---|---|
| Visibility score | 29.8% | 0% |
| Change vs last week | up+1.5% | no change0% |
| Rank in Help Desk | #4 | #37 |
| Share of voice | 8.2% | 0% |
| Mentions this run | 42 | 0 |
| Positive in AI answers | 38% | — |
The stronger value in each row is marked with a ✓.
Visibility score trend
Weekly runs over the last 60 days
Help Scout +1.6000000000000014pp · Kayako 0pp over 1 weekly runs.
Engine by engine
Help Scout leads on 3 of 3 engines
ChatGPT
AI Mode
Perplexity
Help ScoutKayako
Head to head in AI answers
0 engine answers name both brands
0Help Scout ranked higher
0Kayako ranked higher
Features, pricing & fit
| Dimension | Help Scout | Kayako |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Per seat | Usage-based |
| Entry price | Free; paid from $25 per seat / mo | $1 / mo |
| Free plan | Yes | No |
| Deployment | Cloud (hosted on AWS) | Cloud |
| Integrations | 100+ | — |
| Compliance | SOC 2 Type II, HIPAA | SOC 2 Type II, GDPR |
| Support | Email, Dedicated onboarding specialist, Strategic account manager | Help center, White-glove onboarding, Dedicated success manager |
| Founded | 2011 | 2001 |
| Headquarters | Boston, MA, United States | Austin, Texas, United States |
| Employees | 201–500 | 51–200 |
| Funding | Series B1 | Acquisition by ESW Capital |
| Best for | Small businesses, growing companies and non-profits that want simple, multichannel customer support | Support teams that want AI ticket automation deployed for them, either on a new help desk or on top of their existing one |
Plans side by side
Pros and cons
Themes from the AI answers that mention each brand
Help Scout
- Shared inbox with email-like, human feel
- Simple, straightforward support for small teams
- Clean, intuitive interface
- Free plan for small teams
- Free trial with full feature access
- Costs more for extra inboxes and Docs sites
- Free plan limited to 100 contacts per month
Kayako
Profile in progress.
Data collected ·ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Mode·coverage 98.8%·next run
Cite as: SlateIndex, “Help Scout vs Kayako”, https://slateindex.ai/compare/help-scout-vs-kayako, data of Nov 3, 2026. Licence: CC BY 4.0.