HubSpot vs Pipedrive (France and Europe, 2026): which CRM for a B2B SME?

You run a B2B SME and you are hesitating between HubSpot and Pipedrive. In short, HubSpot is an all-in-one customer platform. Pipedrive is a quick and easy sales CRM. This guide gets right to the point. You will find an express summary, readable criteria, two tool sheets with concrete examples, a table with prices and functionalities, then a decision matrix to make a decision without spending a week.

Summary in 5 points

• HubSpot brings CRM, marketing, sales, and service together in one place. You can start small and activate more advanced bricks over time.
• Pipedrive is designed for salespeople. Visual pipeline, reminders, simple automations. It is very quick to adopt.
• Indicative prices: HubSpot Starter starting at $15 per seat per month, Pro $100, Enterprise $150. Pipedrive Lite 14 euros, Growth 39 euros, Premium 49 euros, and Ultimate 79 euros per seat per month annually.
• Security and governance: HubSpot handles fine permissions and custom objects well. Pipedrive Ultimate brings SSO and extended security settings.
• Prompt decision: slightly complex processes and integrated marketing, take HubSpot. Simple and go-live pipeline in one week, choose Pipedrive.

Our selection criteria

• Complexity of the process: number of objects and steps. Multi-entities and multi-countries.
• Automations and reporting: workflows, forecasts, and dashboards that are useful for everyday use.
• Marketing and customer service: emails, forms, nurturing, tickets, ABM.
• Governance and security: roles, SSO, or 2FA. Test environments.
• Integrations: compatibility with your current stack.
• Total cost over 6 to 12 months: licenses, onboarding and team time.

HubSpot: the unified customer platform

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What is changing on a daily basis

HubSpot is suitable for SMEs that want to centralize marketing, sales, and service. A prospect fills out a form, becomes a lead, receives nurturing, becomes an opportunity, then a customer followed by support. Everything is visible in the same place. Marketing sees what sales do. The sale sees what the service does. You stop copying and pasting between tools.

Forces

• Wide coverage: CRM and Sales, Marketing, Service, Service, Content and Data hubs on a single basis. Powerful automations and custom objects for custom cases.
• Progressive rise: we start with Starter, then activate the sequences, scoring, forecasts and AI if necessary without changing the tool.
• Rich ecosystem: lots of official connectors and partners.

Limits

• The cost can be upgraded to Pro and Enterprise. Simulate the total cost well before making a commitment.

When HubSpot “sounds right”

• You have a minimum of marketing (emails, content, webinars) and you want to track the value until the deal won.
• Your processes have specific characteristics (partners, subscriptions, projects), in this case, custom objects will be useful to you.
• You want clear rituals (SLAs, workflows, playbooks) and a shared customer history.

Pipedrive: the simple and effective sales CRM

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What is changing on a daily basis

Pipedrive helps the team move quickly. The pipeline is displayed in columns, you drag a deal from one stage to the next. Reminders and emails leave without friction. Managers get a legible forecast from the first week.

Forces

• Express handling: visual pipeline, standard automations and over 500 integrations. Clear plans of features that are essential to Ultimate.
• Readable rates: price per seat and per month annually. Essential features 14 euros, Growth 39 euros, Premium 49 euros, Ultimate 79 euros.
• Safety: 2FA, SSO, and alert rules on higher planes.

Limits

• It's not a complete marketing platform. For email marketing, advanced forms, and customer service, you'll be adding third-party modules or tools.

When Pipedrive “sounds right”

• You want a sales CRM up and running in a few days, with immediate adoption by the team.
• Integrated marketing is not a priority. Your needs are mainly appointments, offers and forecasts.
• You want a predictable cost per seat without complexity.

Prices and key features in 2026

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Budget tip : list what is vital for the first 3 months (sequences, forms, tickets, forecasts). Pay for actual use, not for “just in case.”

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Comparison chart of Hubspot and Pipedrive CRMs

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Fast reading:

• HubSpot if you want to industrialize the relationship from A to Z (marketing + sales + service) and absorb the complexity to come.
• Pipedrive if your priority is to sell, now, with a clear pipeline and immediate adoption.

Exemples that speak for themselves

• “SMEs 8 salespeople + 1 marketer”: you have forms, newsletters, webinars, and want to track the value until the deal won. HubSpot Starter allows you to quickly unify (emails, forms, pipelines, tickets). In 3 months, if the team follows, you will switch some bricks to Pro (richer automations), without painful migration.
• “6 commercial SMEs, no internal marketing”: the objective is clear: appointments, offers, reminders. Pipedrive Premium is deployed in days: visual pipeline, reminders, email templates, simple forecasts. As early as week 2, the director sees whether the progress rate is increasing.
• “Multi-country scale-up”: you have several BUs/pipelines, rights per team, processes that vary. HubSpot Pro/Enterprise secures governance (roles, naming, SLAs) and cross-hub analytics. Your local teams remain autonomous, the management maintains the group vision.

Hubspot, Pipedrive: how do you choose?

• Si you need to nurture leads (emails, content) and monitor the relationship from A to Z, so take HubSpot.
• Si you want to quickly equip sales with a readable pipeline and basic automations, so take Pipedrive.
• Si Security is critical, so compare HubSpot Enterprise and Pipedrive Ultimate (SSO, rules, sandbox).
• In any case : pilot 6—8 weeks (production, adoption, deals won and forecasts) before extending.

Need a pilot 6—8 weeks to decide? Do you want to test in real conditions (governance, automation, reporting pipeline) and get a go/pivot/stop verdict? Discover theHubspot approach to Growth Room.

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Ethics & transparency clause

Price guidelines are public and subject to change. Always check the publisher page before making a decision. To suggest a correction, write to us: we will update after checking.

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