For teams that need a CRM, HubSpot is purpose-built for that function, but it gets expensive quickly and comes with a lot of hoops to jump through just to get basic things like email logging to work consistently. Smaller teams especially will find the costs add up fast, and even once set up, the user experience isn't great. There are also unseen costs if you need to build integrations, since HubSpot's API is harder to work with than others.

Notion, on the other hand, is fundamentally a knowledge base and documentation tool, not a CRM. While it can be bent into acting as a CRM, it takes a lot of setup, is hard to maintain, and usually leads to poor adoption unless everyone thinks the same way as the person who built the system. Teams that try to use Notion as a CRM usually end up with messy, confusing workflows and wasted time.

If you want a CRM, neither is ideal for small teams, but HubSpot at least is actually designed for that job (despite its cost and UX issues). Notion just isn't built for CRM at all and becomes a pain when forced into that role. For documentation or a company wiki, Notion is the clear pick, but for CRM, avoid both if you can, if you must pick between them, HubSpot is the only real option, but be ready for high costs and a clunky setup.

HubSpot Editor's Verdict

What is HubSpot?

If you are considering HubSpot because of price (after hearing things like 50–90% off the first year), let me stop you right now, you're playing directly into their marketing shtick (you'll see the #1 concern with HubSpot is actually price).

HubSpot was not initially built as a CRM, it was a marketing email automation platform. A powerful (and expensive) one at that, but credit where credit is due. It's just, most companies often need to start with just a CRM to streamline their business operations.

It wasn't until HubSpot realized that acquiring customers for their $20–60k+/yr marketing automation suite was a difficult sell out of the gate, that they decided to built a "free CRM" as a lead magnet (and gateway) to their expensive core product.

So if you're a startup or a team of 20 or less (that will actually be using the CRM day-to-day), we highly recommend looking at a different CRM (we've done a deep-dive on that here). Because after the first year, you will be paying 2-4x more for HubSpot than the competing solutions (even at their proposed "Year 2+ discounts").

Now if your team is quite large and considering Salesforce, we actually do recommend Hubspot in most cases. HubSpot is more user-friendly than Salesforce, and you aren't going to be totally stuck in the expensive enterprise software stack that a tool like Salesforce often requires.

We will also add that we work with HubSpot often, and Copper + Pipedrive have far superior API's to HubSpot (in that we can build the same integration in 1/2 the time), so there is a second-order unseen cost associated to HubSpot.

Key Features

Important Email Logging Notes

And finally, there's quite a bit that needs to "go right" in order for emails to automatically log from your team's inbox into HubSpot.

Replies to emails will be logged automatically on the contact's timeline if you have connected your personal email and the following is true:

1. The original email was sent through the CRM or sent from your connected email client with the sales email extension or add-in installed and the Log checkbox selected.

Example of what this looks like in Gmail

2. The original email was not sent to an email address or domain listed in your Never Log list.

3. The email address is still connected when the reply is received.

4. The reply is sent to an individual's email connected by the user who originally started the thread.

5. The sender of the reply is an existing contact in HubSpot.

(Something that most take for granted when working with a CRM like Copper, where everything just logs automatically with no prerequisites, even if the contact doesn't yet exist in the CRM, it'll go back 1 year through your team's email history and retroactively add those emails)

Notion Editor's Verdict

What is Notion?

‍Notion positions itself as an "all-in-one" workspace tool, but that doesn't mean it's ideal for "everything."

At its core, Notion is a knowledge base or wiki, designed for documenting company processes and notes. Over time, Notion has expanded its capabilities, allowing users to link notes, create databases with formulas, and more.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Good for knowledge bases and documentation.
Strong ecosystem of templates, integrations, and third-party tools built around Notion.
Good API and database structure, which makes it appealing for more technical teams.
Free tier makes it easy to experiment and test ideas.

Cons

Steep learning curve. Most teams underestimate how much setup is required.
Requires building systems from scratch, which takes significant time and ongoing maintenance.
Poor team adoption in many cases because the structure only makes sense to the person who built it.
Easy to turn into a productivity distraction, where teams spend more time designing workflows than doing work.

Key Features

All-in-One

Notion's versatility allows you to customize it into almost anything you need. This flexibility has led teams to use Notion as a CRM, project management tool, task manager, knowledge base, and more.

However, just because Notion can be adapted for various purposes doesn't always mean it should be. We often receive feedback from teams who've tried using "Notion for everything", only to find it becoming overwhelming and messy.

We regularly get emails like this.

If you want to use Notion, use it as a knowledge base/company wiki. For specific business functions like project and task management or CRM, it's usually better to opt for dedicated tools built for the job. You can find what we've listed as the best project management software and best CRM software instead.

Notion Mail & Calendar

Notion is expanding into these core parts of your workflow, but the reality is they didn’t actually build either of these products from scratch. Notion Calendar comes from Cron, and Notion Mail an email client originally called Skiff, so instead of being deeply integrated into one system, they are more so separate tools with light Notion integrations.

On the other hand, Notion Calendar is our top pick for the best calendar apps category since they've maintained a lot of the integrity from Cron, which was a calendar we loved (just don't use it as a daily planner app).

Pricing

Free: $0 per user per month. Best for individuals organizing personal projects and life.
Plus: $10/mo per user ($96/yr with annual billing). Best for small teams and professionals who want unlimited blocks, file uploads, and collaboration features.
Business: $20/mo per user ($192/yr with annual billing). Best for growing teams that need advanced collaboration, permissions, and AI-powered workspace tools.
Enterprise: Custom pricing. Includes advanced security, compliance, admin controls, and dedicated support for large organizations.