Capsule CRM Pricing UK Explained 2026
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What Capsule CRM Actually Costs in the UK
Capsule CRM pricing UK is simpler than most guides make it, because of one thing nearly all of them get wrong: Capsule bills UK customers in pounds. There is no exchange rate to track and no foreign transaction fee to budget for.
Here is the full picture, then what forces you up a tier, and the one upgrade decision where it is easy to spend £15 per user per month more than you need to.
Capsule CRM Pricing UK: What Each Plan Costs
| Plan | Annual (per user/month) | Monthly (per user/month) | Contacts | Users |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | £0 | £0 | 250 | 2 maximum |
| Starter | £14 | £18 | 30,000 | No cap, priced per user |
| Growth | £27 | £34 | 60,000 | No cap, priced per user |
| Advanced | £42 | £52 | 120,000 | No cap, priced per user |
| Ultimate | Not published | Not published | Not published | 5 or more |
Ultimate is sold through Capsule’s sales team rather than self-serve, and the contact limit and price are not published. Any article quoting you a figure for it is guessing.
Note what “no cap” means on the paid tiers: there is no ceiling on how many people you can add, but you pay for every one. A five-person team on Growth is £135 a month on annual billing, not £27.
You Are Billed in Pounds, Not Dollars
This is worth stating plainly because it is the most common error in writing about Capsule, and it changes how the whole decision feels.
Capsule’s pricing page carries a currency selector with three options: US and International in dollars, UK and Europe in pounds, and Europe in euros. Choose UK and Europe and you are billed in sterling at the figures above. No FX exposure, no card fees, a predictable number in your accounts each month.
Why So Many Guides Say Otherwise
The page defaults to US dollars. Anyone writing about Capsule from outside the UK, or who simply never clicks the selector, sees dollar figures and reasonably concludes that is what you pay. Convert $18 at whatever rate, add a warning about bank charges, and you have the article that is all over the search results.
It is wrong, and in a useful direction: the real UK price is a fixed sterling figure rather than a moving target.
The VAT Question
Capsule does not state on its pricing page whether the figures are inclusive or exclusive of VAT. Assume they are likely to be quoted before VAT, as most UK software pricing is, and check at checkout before you build the number into a budget. If you are VAT-registered it is recoverable either way, so this matters mainly for the headline figure in your forecast.
The Plans, and What You Actually Outgrow
Free
Two users, 250 contacts, £0, no time limit. It is a real free tier rather than a trial: five custom fields, one sales pipeline, custom sales milestones and task categories, and mail connection to Gmail or Outlook.
The 250-contact ceiling is the binding constraint and it arrives faster than people expect, because it counts everyone — clients, past clients, prospects who never bought, suppliers. A year of normal activity can clear it.
Suits: testing the software properly, or a genuinely new sole trader.
Starter, £14 a user
Contacts jump to 30,000, which is the end of the contact problem for almost every small business. You also get email templates, a shared mailbox, basic reporting, premium integrations, goals, custom activity types and an AI pipeline generator.
The move from Free to Starter is driven by contact volume, essentially always. Features are rarely the reason.
Suits: a sole trader or small team with an active client list who want a proper CRM without complexity.
Growth, £27 a user
This is the significant tier, and more significant than most descriptions suggest.
Growth adds workflow automation, advanced sales reporting, reporting dashboards, email sync, team and access controls, and — the part that matters below — multiple sales pipelines and project boards. It is also where the AI features arrive: business enrichment, contact enrichment, summaries and meeting prep in beta. Contacts double to 60,000.
Suits: anyone doing repetitive manual follow-up, running more than one sales process, or coordinating a team.
Advanced, £42 a user
Contacts rise to 120,000, and the pipeline allowance rises to 50 sales pipelines and 50 project boards.
That is the real differentiator, and it is a ceiling rather than a capability. If you need three pipelines, Growth already does it.
Suits: larger operations with many parallel processes, or anyone genuinely running dozens of pipelines.
Ultimate
Five users minimum, priced on application. The published draws are a dedicated account manager, custom training and Capsule’s enhanced AI tooling.
For most UK small businesses this is not the right conversation. If you have a team large enough that hands-on onboarding would pay for itself, ask Capsule for a quote rather than working from any published figure.
The Pipeline Mistake That Costs £15 a User
Worth isolating, because a lot of published advice gets it backwards.
You will frequently read that multiple pipelines are the Advanced feature, and that needing a second pipeline is what pushes you from Growth to Advanced. It is not. Multiple sales pipelines and project boards are included in Growth. Advanced raises the allowance to 50 of each.
So a recruitment firm wanting one pipeline for clients and one for candidates, or a services business separating new business from renewals, needs Growth at £27, not Advanced at £42. Act on the common version of the advice and you overpay by £15 per user per month: for a four-person team, £720 a year for a ceiling you will never approach.
The genuine reasons to choose Advanced are the 120,000 contact limit and a real need for dozens of distinct pipelines.
What Actually Triggers an Upgrade
- Contact volume, which is the main driver and almost the only reason anyone leaves the free plan
- Automation and AI, both of which arrive at Growth and are the usual reason to pass Starter
- The pipeline and board ceiling, which pushes to Advanced only once you need many of them
- Hands-on support, which is Ultimate’s offer
Email Marketing Is a Separate Subscription
Capsule does not include email marketing, and this does catch people out, because several competitors bundle it.
Campaigns, newsletters and automated sequences run through Transpond by Capsule, a separate product with its own subscription that integrates closely with the CRM. Capsule’s own pages list the marketing add-on as starting from a paid monthly figure, so plan on it being an additional line rather than a free extra at the level most businesses need.
If you already run Mailchimp, Brevo or similar, nothing forces you to move; the comparison in our guide to Transpond versus Brevo covers that choice. What matters for budgeting is that the CRM price above is the CRM only.
A related point for UK users: sending marketing email to your CRM contacts is governed by PECR and UK GDPR rather than by what the software lets you do. Importing a contact list into a campaign tool is exactly where businesses get this wrong, and our guide to GDPR rules for email marketing sets out the soft opt-in conditions and the corporate subscriber distinction.
Annual Versus Monthly
Annual billing saves between roughly 16% and 19% depending on the tier: 18% on Starter, 16% on Growth, 19% on Advanced.
In cash terms, a three-person team on Growth pays £972 a year on annual billing against £1,152 monthly, a saving of £180. You can switch between the two, so monthly is a sensible way to run the first few months while you decide.
Is It Worth It for UK Small Businesses?
Capsule is one of the better-judged CRMs at this end of the market. It is not overloaded with features nobody uses, the interface is clean, and you can be running properly in an afternoon without a consultant. At £14 and £27 a user it is fairly priced against Pipedrive and Zoho CRM, and the sterling billing removes a layer of annoyance that several competitors still impose.
Three UK-specific points:
It is not accounting software. Capsule has nothing to do with Making Tax Digital, which is your bookkeeping tool’s job. It does integrate with Xero and QuickBooks, which is useful for seeing invoices and payment history against a contact record, but the integration is a convenience rather than a compliance feature.
Email marketing is extra, as above.
Migration is the real cost. The subscription is rarely what makes or breaks a CRM move; getting clean data out of spreadsheets is. Our guide to migrating from spreadsheets to a CRM covers the field mapping and date formatting that cause most of the pain, and Capsule’s own comparison against alternatives is in our Capsule versus Freshworks write-up.
FAQ
Is Capsule CRM free forever?
Yes. The free plan has no time limit, and runs indefinitely with two users and 250 contacts. The contact ceiling is what moves people on, usually within months of real use.
Am I billed in pounds or dollars?
Pounds, provided you set the currency selector to UK and Europe. The page defaults to dollars, which is why so much published guidance claims UK customers pay in USD. Set it correctly and your billing is in sterling at a fixed figure.
Which plan do I need for more than one sales pipeline?
Growth. Multiple sales pipelines and project boards are included at £27 a user. Advanced raises the allowance to 50 of each, which is a different requirement entirely.
Can I switch between monthly and annual billing?
Yes. Annual is roughly 16% to 19% cheaper depending on the tier, so it is worth moving once you have decided to stay.
Does Capsule include email marketing?
No. That is Transpond by Capsule, a separate subscription. The two integrate well, but they are billed separately and you should budget for both.
Is there a charity discount?
Capsule has offered discounted pricing to registered charities and non-profits in the past, but there is no standard published rate. Ask them directly. There is no small-team discount, since pricing is per user regardless of headcount.
What does Ultimate cost?
Capsule does not publish it. It is sold through their sales team with a five-user minimum, and the draw is a dedicated account manager, custom training and the enhanced AI tooling. Treat any specific figure you see quoted elsewhere with suspicion.
Capsule CRM Pricing UK: The Bottom Line
Free for 250 contacts, £14 a user for 30,000, £27 for automation and multiple pipelines, £42 for the higher ceilings, and Ultimate on application. Billed in pounds once you set the currency selector, with roughly 16% to 19% off for paying annually.
The decision most people get wrong is Growth against Advanced. Multiple pipelines are a Growth feature, so unless you genuinely need dozens of them or more than 60,000 contacts, Growth is the ceiling of what most UK small businesses require.
And budget for Transpond separately if you intend to send campaigns, because the CRM price covers the CRM alone.
Pricing and features correct at time of writing. Plans and capabilities are subject to change — always confirm current details on the provider’s website before purchasing.