No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Insightly CRM vs Salesforce Essentials comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Insightly CRM
Ranking in CRM
65th
Average Rating
9.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.7
Number of Reviews
1
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Salesforce Essentials
Ranking in CRM
18th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2026, in the CRM category, the mindshare of Insightly CRM is 0.4%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Salesforce Essentials is 0.6%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
CRM Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Salesforce Essentials0.6%
Insightly CRM0.4%
Other99.0%
CRM
 

Featured Reviews

Micah Oren Feldkamp - PeerSpot reviewer
Lead Consultant for Cloud Implementations at ZeroClick.ai
Highly scalable, easy to use, flexible, and affordable
In terms of areas for improvement in Insightly, it would be the project management functionality. It can be integrated with other applications to make it more flexible, but it requires a lot of work redoing the framework from Insightly and creating more custom objects to make it do what you want. For example, in the software developer world, we use the Agile or Scrum methodology, which has a completely different project management system than Insightly. Sadly, Insightly doesn't support that well. You would need to create some custom objects in order for that to work correctly. Also, even without the Scrub methodology or other types of project management styles, Insightly needs support with how it manages its pipelines and activity sets. The access to making templated tasks is very limited. If Insightly could expand access to activity sets and create more flexible project management features, that would be a big win for the CRM. The things I would like to see as a developer and as a consultant for my clients would be more integration and more updates with the project management. When it comes to additional features, I would like to see the ability to connect other data sources inside the dashboard reporting. For example, if you would like to see your sales organization and how many activities you made on a contact, how many phone calls, emails, text messages, etc., Insightly should be able to show that information in the opportunity or the sales report. That would be very valuable, to get data from the contact, not from the opportunity, and see those data points together. Right now, they are silent. There is just a data opportunity report and a contact report. Insightly should put some type of API connection or integration to update the activity into the opportunity record to link it so you would be able to see it. Right now it is siloed but it would be useful to create API connections to automate that so that salespeople don't have to link it to the contact and the opportunity. The AI connection of automation should do that for you like in other software systems.
SB
Growth Adviser at a consultancy with 11-50 employees
Creates efficient integrations and boosts operational efficiency through comprehensive dashboards
I have experience with products such as Acronis and Huntress, though Salesforce Essentials serves a different purpose. I have had experience with Huntress for the last few months as we are an MSSP and offer Huntress to our clients. I have used Odoo and HubSpot recently, though not extensively. The main differences between Salesforce Essentials and HubSpot or Odoo is the market presence. It is comparable to the Windows versus Linux situation because both have a huge presence. They have deeper pockets so they can spend money on collecting insights and developing features. Integration and good partnerships with major companies make Salesforce Essentials better than the others.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable feature is the speed of adoption, the simple user interface, and the flexibility of use."
"I can download the data to Excel, create tables, and do whatever I want. I am very comfortable with the tool's mobile application. Its main benefit is transparency because I can share it with representatives."
"The solution helps to track the performance of salespersons before closing deals."
"The solution is very scalable and flexible. It can be customized as per the business need."
"Salesforce provides the best they have with the current version. Most of the features we need are already there, and it's very easy to use."
"The most important feature is how Salesforce Essentials brings together information from multiple channels. The nature of our complex custom product data has been challenging due to our manufacturing nature. Salesforce also allowed business processes like finance, credit lines, customer complaints, and quality issues to integrate seamlessly. I haven’t used the mobile app functionality, because we haven't fully utilized because of our preferance of more personal interactions over using mobile apps."
"In terms of features, the cloud-based solution and easy deployment are standout elements that have made a difference."
"Salesforce makes tracking every product and customer activity easy, enabling managers to monitor their products, such as key products and their peak performance."
"Their reporting and analytics features have a very significant impact on my company's operational efficiency."
 

Cons

"Project management in Insightly could use some improvement. It can be integrated with other applications to make it more flexible, but it requires a lot of work redoing the framework from Insightly and creating more custom objects to make it do what you want."
"The primary area for improvement in Salesforce Essentials is its pricing. There are other competitors, like Zoho CRM, that offer similar features at a lower cost."
"Less integration would be better. It should work independently."
"The solution could be cheaper."
"The cost of running Salesforce Essentials is significant. The licenses are expensive, and the operational costs are considerable, including the necessity to maintain a team of approximately 15 people to run the system."
"The solution's UI is not user-friendly."
"When we use mixed languages, it can be uncomfortable because there seems to be no consideration for right-to-left speakers. It feels like these tools were developed by people who only speak left-to-right languages and didn't consider other language types' needs."
"The solution needs to be more user-friendly. It's difficult for a senior to track leads when a salesperson uploads leads. The solution should also improve its integration capabilities."
"Integrating Salesforce with SAP, considering our business relies heavily on SAP for ERP, has been quite challenging due to the intricate product configurations. Unlike standard products like computers with a few options, our products have hundreds of configurable options, making the integration complex. If such integration were possible, it would have been easier to understand the unique nature of our industry and the limited number of customers who buy steel products, unlike consumer electronics."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
"The pricing is on the higher side, especially with additional costs for professional services like consultants."
"The tool is moderately priced."
"It's a perpetual license, and the subscription can be expensive."
"The pricing is a bit on the expensive side."
"Salesforce Essentials is quite expensive, almost 10 out of 10. I don't have the exact cost, but we found it to be very expensive based on our budget constraints."
"There is a need to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to the solution."
"I rate Salesforce Essentials' pricing an eight out of ten."
"We chose quarterly payments."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which CRM solutions are best for your needs.
903,118 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Construction Company
26%
Marketing Services Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Retailer
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business5
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise7
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Salesforce Essentials?
Salesforce Essentials is very expensive, but it delivers exceptional value. It is a good platform to have if you can afford it because it has numerous add-ons and modules. Anything that Salesforce ...
What needs improvement with Salesforce Essentials?
The mobile access can be improved in several ways. Salesforce Essentials operates in a table format where the entire user interface is based on tables, more specifically pivot tables. This is not v...
What is your primary use case for Salesforce Essentials?
I have experience with Salesforce Essentials' Tableau and Salesforce Marketing Cloud, but not extensively. I was more focused on their CRM platform, specifically the core CRM and sales basics. My e...
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Kings, Savanta, Nimble, 4over, Annexus Health, Atlanta Eats, Book Fuel
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Salesforce, Zoho and others in CRM. Updated: June 2026.
903,118 professionals have used our research since 2012.