Methodology

Who runs this site

This comparison is maintained by Plugixa, the company that makes Plugixa CRM, one of the plugins compared. That is a conflict of interest, and this page explains what we do about it.

Every page carries a notice saying who maintains the site. Our plugin is marked in the tables. It is listed first in a ranking only where the checked data supports that, and its page lists its weaknesses in the same way as every other plugin's.

Where the values come from

For competing plugins, each value comes from the vendor's own material, meaning its wordpress.org listing, its feature and documentation pages, and its pricing page. Each checked value in a table links to the page it was taken from.

For Plugixa CRM, values come from reading the plugin's source code, and are linked to its public documentation. We applied the same definitions, which is why it is marked "No" for marketing automation and for invoices.

Install counts, ratings, version numbers and update dates are read from the public wordpress.org plugin API by a script, not typed in by hand. Plugixa CRM is not on wordpress.org yet, so it has no numbers there.

What the labels mean

"Yes" means the plugin does what the feature definition says. "Partial" means it does part of it, and a note says what is missing. "No" means it does not. "Not checked" means we could not confirm the value from the vendor's own pages, so we make no claim.

"Free" means the feature is in the free version. "Paid" names the lowest plan that includes it, and "Paid add-on" means it is sold as a separate extension, as far as the vendor states.

"Not checked" is not a polite "No". Many of those features probably exist. We would sooner leave a gap than guess.

Four kinds of CRM plugin

"CRM" covers very different products. A sales CRM is built around companies, deals and a pipeline. An email marketing CRM is built around a contact list, tags and automated email. A business suite adds a CRM to HR or accounting. A connector puts a form or chat on your site and keeps the CRM itself on the vendor's servers.

Each plugin is labelled with its kind, because a "No" in the pipeline rows means little for an email marketing tool, and the reverse.

What we did not do

We did not install and test every plugin by hand, and we did not run speed tests. Values reflect what vendors say about their own products.

There is no overall score and no star rating from us. The ratings shown are the public wordpress.org ratings, with the number of ratings beside them.

Prices are the ones shown on the day we checked. Where a vendor showed a promotional price, we give the regular price too. HubSpot is priced per seat per month; we show the yearly cost of one seat.

How rankings and picks are decided

Best-of pages rank plugins for one stated need. Each pick has a reason that can be checked against the feature table.

We look at what the free version includes, the price per site, how recently the plugin was updated, and its public rating and install count.

Corrections

If a value is wrong or out of date, open an issue on the GitHub repository with a link to the vendor page that shows the correct value. Vendors are welcome to do this for their own plugins.

Data and text are published under CC BY 4.0, so you may reuse them with attribution.

Found a wrong value? Open a correction.

Feature definitions

Contacts and companies

Contacts: Stores people with their details, notes and a history of what happened with them.
Companies: Stores companies (accounts) as their own records, with contacts linked to them.
Custom fields: You can add your own fields to contacts or other records.
Duplicate merge: Finds the same person or company entered twice and merges the two records.

Sales pipeline

Deals: Tracks sales opportunities with a value, a stage and an expected close date.
Kanban board: Shows deals as cards in stage columns that you drag from one stage to the next.
Several pipelines: You can run more than one pipeline, each with its own stages.
Sales forecast: Reports expected revenue, weighted by stage probability or by close date.
Lead conversion: A lead is a separate record that converts into a contact, a company or a deal once qualified.

Activities and email

Tasks: Tasks with a due date and an assignee, linked to a record.
Calendar: A calendar view of tasks, meetings or appointments inside the CRM.
Calls and meetings: Logs calls and meetings as their own activities on a record.
Email from a record: Sends a one-to-one email from a contact's record and keeps it on the record.
Incoming email: Reads a mailbox and files incoming mail against the matching records.

Marketing

Email campaigns: Sends newsletters or bulk email to a list or segment of contacts.
Marketing automation: Runs sequences or workflows triggered by events, such as a tag added or a form submitted.
Lead capture forms: Has its own forms that create contacts or leads, without a separate form plugin.

Customer support

Tickets or cases: A support queue of customer requests with a status and an owner.
Knowledge base: Help articles you write in the CRM and can show to customers.
Client portal: Customers log in on your site to see their own records, such as tickets, invoices or documents.

Team and permissions

CRM roles: Permissions set per CRM role, beyond the standard WordPress roles.
Record-level access: Limits which records or fields a user can see, for example only their own or their team's.
Change history: Keeps a log of who changed what on a record.

Reports and data

Reports: Built-in reports or dashboards on contacts, deals or activity.
CSV import and export: Imports contacts from a CSV file and exports them to one.
Webhooks: Sends a message to a URL you choose when records change.
REST API: A documented API for reading and writing CRM records from other software.

Commerce

WooCommerce: Links WooCommerce customers and their orders to CRM contacts.
Quotes and invoices: Creates quotes or invoices from the CRM.

Integrations

Form plugin integrations: Sends entries from form plugins such as Contact Form 7, WPForms or Gravity Forms into the CRM.
Calendar sync: Syncs CRM meetings or tasks with Google Calendar or Outlook.

Platform

Where your data lives: Whether records are stored in your WordPress database or on the vendor's servers.
CRM on a site page: Staff can use the CRM on a page of the site, outside wp-admin.