Shared Inbox Statistics 2026: Five Years of Verified Pricing and Category Data

Shared inbox statistics in 2026, in one paragraph: the median entry price across the category's comparable per-seat tools is $17 per user per month, up 55% from $11 in 2021; eight of the twelve continuously tracked tools raised prices over those five years and none cut them; and AI has split the market into two pricing economies, with assisted tools staying per-seat and autonomous agents charging per resolution or by annual contract. Every figure on this page is either computed from our own five-year pricing archive, where each data point links to a web.archive.org capture, or attributed to a named primary source with a publication date.

This page exists because the category had no honest statistics resource. Search for shared inbox data and you find listicles quoting each other's unsourced numbers in a circle. So here is the alternative: fewer statistics, every one of them checkable.

How these statistics are sourced

Three rules govern everything below. First, pricing figures come from our own dataset, which has tracked the advertised entry price of every major shared inbox and support tool since 2021, with an archived capture of the vendor's own pricing page behind each data point. Second, category and email figures come from named primary sources with dates, drawn from the same verification standard as our email statistics reference. Third, anything we could not trace to a primary source was left out, and the section at the end lists the popular claims that failed that test.

All pricing figures are stated as of August 2026, per user per month on annual billing, for each vendor's cheapest paid tier, unless noted otherwise.

If you use these figures elsewhere, cite this page as the source and keep the date: prices move, this page is updated when they do, and an undated copy of a pricing statistic becomes one of the untraceable numbers this page exists to replace.

Pricing statistics: what five years of receipts show

The core dataset is the one behind our support tool pricing history, which charts every vendor year by year with the archive links exposed; this page is its statistical summary. The dataset covers 25 vendors. Twelve of them offer a directly comparable per-seat entry price in both 2021 and 2026, and that group is the basis for the aggregate figures here (tools that switched to metered, per-workspace, or contract pricing are covered separately below, because averaging them against per-seat tools would be dishonest).

Across those 12 tools, from 2021 to 2026:

The increases are anything but even. Here is every tool in the comparable set, ranked by how much its entry price grew:

Drag is in that table at +50%, and this page holds our own price rise to the same standard as everyone else's. The full year-by-year history, with the archive links behind every point, is charted here:

Three patterns worth naming in that data. The steepest risers are the Gmail-native tools that repositioned upmarket: Hiver moved from a $7 Lite plan to a $25 Growth floor, and Gmelius consolidated its cheap tiers away entirely. The flat pricers are mostly the tools whose entry tier is a deliberate on-ramp to expensive upper tiers, so the headline number stays still while the real spend moves upward. And the category's median rise of 55% comfortably outran US inflation over the same window, which our pricing charts plot directly against a CPI reference line so you can see the gap rather than take our word for it.

Beyond the comparable twelve, the dataset records what averaging would hide: Intercom shifted its model around per-resolution AI, Gorgias meters by ticket, Tidio by conversation quota, Crisp prices per workspace, Trengo moved to platform pricing, and Groove rebranded around per-ticket AI pricing. Thirteen of 25 tracked vendors no longer sell a simple comparable seat at all, which is itself one of the most telling statistics in the category.

The AI split: two pricing economies in one category

As of August 2026 the sharpest dividing line in shared inbox pricing is not price level but pricing shape. The category has split in two.

The assisted economy prices AI inside the per-seat model: the AI drafts, triages, and summarizes while the team keeps the send button. Published figures run from $12 to $24 (Drag, AI included from $18), $14 to $36 (Missive, by tier), $25 to $85 (Hiver, from the mid tier), and $25 to $105 plus add-ons (Front). Our AI shared inbox guide covers how to evaluate this class.

The agent economy prices AI by outcome instead of by seat: Intercom's Fin meters at $0.99 per resolution, Ada prices on conversation volume with a median contract of $73,500 a year, Sierra's outcome-based contracts are reported at roughly $1.50 per resolution and typically start near $150,000 a year, and Decagon publishes no pricing at all, which is also a data point. The range chart:

The statistical consequence buyers should hold onto: in the assisted economy your cost scales with team size, and in the agent economy it scales with conversation volume, which means your busiest month is your most expensive one. Our state of AI support pricing analyzes these economics in depth, and for totals at your own team size and volume, the cost calculator models 17 tools including the metered ones.

The wider email context, from named sources

Shared inboxes sit inside email at large, and the load-bearing figures there come from named research, verified on our email statistics reference: 4.48 billion people used email in 2024, heading for 4.97 billion by 2028, with 361.6 billion emails sent and received per day (Radicati Group, Email Statistics Report 2024-2028, December 2024). Workers handle roughly 112 emails a week and spend nearly 11 hours a week writing them (OnePoll survey of 8,000 workers for Slack, 2023), and email takes up 28 percent of the average interaction worker's week (McKinsey Global Institute, 2012, still the most-cited figure of its kind). Those numbers are why team email management is a category at all.

The statistics we refuse to publish

Popular "shared inbox statistics" circulate that this page deliberately omits, because we could not trace any of them to a primary source: the share of customer emails that go unanswered, the percentage of teams that miss messages in distribution lists, and various response-time averages quoted without a study behind them. They appear on many pages, always citing each other. If a primary source for any of them surfaces, this page will carry it with attribution and a date. Until then, treat uncited versions of those claims as decoration, not data.

Frequently asked questions

What is the median price of a shared inbox tool in 2026?

$17 per user per month at entry tier, as of August 2026, computed across the 12 tools our archive tracks continuously with comparable per-seat pricing. Entry prices in that set span $10 to $29, and full plan ranges reach past $100 per seat. For budgeting rather than statistics, our shared inbox pricing guide covers totals.

How much have shared inbox prices increased?

The median entry price rose 55% between 2021 and 2026, from $11 to $17 per user per month, across the 12 tools our archive tracks continuously with comparable per-seat pricing. Eight of the twelve raised prices, four held flat, and none cut. The steepest riser grew 257% over the five years.

Which shared inbox tools raised prices the most?

Hiver leads with a 257% entry-price increase from 2021 to 2026, from $7 to $25 per user per month, followed by Keeping at 133% and Gmelius at 111%. Every figure is backed by an archived capture of the vendor's own pricing page from each year.

What does AI customer support cost?

Two shapes as of August 2026. Assisted AI ships inside per-seat plans from $12 to $105 per user per month. Autonomous agents price by outcome: $0.99 per resolution (Fin), a $73,500 median annual contract (Ada), or contracts reported near $150,000 a year (Sierra). Decagon publishes no pricing.

How many emails are sent per day?

361.6 billion emails were sent and received per day in 2024, a figure projected to reach 424.2 billion by 2028 (Radicati Group, December 2024). Our email statistics reference verifies this and the other headline email figures against their original sources with dates.

Where this fits

The receipts behind every pricing figure live in the support tool pricing history and the verified breakdowns: Hiver, Front, Missive, and Gmelius, with Drag's own figures on our pricing page and the budgeting view in shared inbox pricing. The email statistics reference covers email at large under the same sourcing standard. For choosing rather than measuring: the AI shared inbox guide is the decision page, the assistant ranking is its shortlist, and the cost calculator turns any of these statistics into your own number.