Capsule

Capsule is one of the few entries here that seems entirely comfortable being small. There is a contact database, a sales pipeline and a task list, and the product does not spend much effort persuading you it is a platform. For a business of two or three people that mainly needs to stop losing track of conversations, that restraint is the feature.

The free tier is unusually honest about what it is. Two users, two hundred and fifty contacts, five custom fields and one pipeline — small numbers, but they include connecting a Gmail or Outlook account, which is the thing free plans in this category normally hold back. Moving to Starter at US$18 per seat raises the contact ceiling to thirty thousand and adds a shared mailbox, email templates and direct integrations.

The cost of that restraint is that depth arrives late. Workflow automation, multiple pipelines, project boards, access controls and the reporting that produces a forecast all begin at Growth, at US$36 per seat, and above Advanced at US$54 there is nowhere further to go. The tier descriptions are refreshingly specific about who each plan is for — one to five employees, then small businesses with sales teams — which makes choosing between them a shorter conversation than usual.