HighLevel x Hubspot: Which CRM excels at WhatsApp integration?

When WhatsApp powers your sales strategy, selecting the right CRM can be the pivotal factor between sealing a deal and losing a lead. In the comparison of HighLevel vs Hubspot, you’ll find features like instant chat access, smooth message logging, AI-driven follow-ups, and user-friendly drag-and-drop workflows. However, each platform has its unique strengths in terms of customization, pricing transparency, and pipeline sophistication. Meanwhile, an emerging contender is quietly transforming the landscape of true WhatsApp integration.

Why WhatsApp CRM Integration Matters

Connecting WhatsApp directly to your CRM creates a vital link between conversations and revenue. With automated contact syncing and message logging, you eliminate manual data entry and prevent lost leads — transforming every interaction into a valuable record.

• Speed up response times by automatically triggering follow-ups and reminders as soon as a customer interacts.
• Boost engagement through personalized, template-driven messages that feel tailor-made.
• Streamline workflows with a single, unified dashboard that consolidates chats, contacts, and campaign analytics.

When your team can access every WhatsApp message alongside emails, calls, and deals, they can spend less time searching for context and more time closing sales — converting casual conversations into consistent conversions.

What is HighLevel?

HighLevel is an all-in-one marketing and sales platform designed for agencies and growing teams, allowing you to unify leads, campaigns, and customer information in one location—eliminating the stress of managing multiple tools.

By integrating WhatsApp into its workflow builder, HighLevel automates messaging sequences based on buyer behavior, such as sending appointment reminders or following up after purchases. Its user-friendly drag-and-drop campaign editor simplifies the process of creating broadcasts or follow-up funnels without any coding.

While it boasts powerful triggers and detailed reporting dashboards, some users may find customization options limited, and telecom fees can accumulate quickly. However, for agencies seeking a centralized hub that seamlessly combines WhatsApp with email, ads, and SMS, HighLevel provides a comprehensive solution.

What is Hubspot?

HubSpot offers a free CRM that consolidates all your contacts, deals, and tasks into a single, user-friendly interface—no credit card needed. It provides live chat, email tracking, meeting scheduling, and ticketing tools right from the start. With robust integrations with Marketing Hub and Service Hub, you can automate team handoffs effortlessly. Plus, as part of HubSpot's ecosystem, scaling up to paid plans for advanced automation or reporting is always an option. HubSpot’s native WhatsApp integration enables you to send and receive messages directly from the shared inbox, automate template-based notifications via workflows, and manage two-way customer interactions on a larger scale.

Feature comparison of HighLevel and Hubspot

Two-Way Messaging

HighLevel offers seamless two-way WhatsApp messaging through a unified inbox, allowing for real-time synchronization of messages, templates, and replies via native Twilio integration. This means your sales team can engage with leads without the need to switch tools. Whether responding to inbound queries or nurturing outbound conversations, all interactions remain context-rich and are tracked within the CRM, facilitating quicker deal closures.

HubSpot’s native WhatsApp integration, available on Professional and Enterprise Service Hub plans, brings two-way messaging directly to your shared conversations inbox. Agents can reply to customer inquiries with text, images, or videos, all within HubSpot. Incoming messages automatically create a new thread linked to the appropriate contact, company, deal, or ticket record. Outbound messages, whether templates or free-form, initiate 24-hour sessions to keep the conversation going. You’ll have complete visibility into session limits and conversation counts, ensuring you stay within your monthly quotas without unexpected surprises. Additionally, workflows can trigger business-initiated template messages for re-engagement or reminders, logging every interaction as a timeline event.

Template Management

With HighLevel, you can create and manage reusable WhatsApp templates featuring buttons, images, and quick replies. These templates seamlessly integrate into your automated workflows, enabling teams to maintain consistent messaging for promotions, follow-ups, or transactional updates. The approval process is streamlined, making it perfect for scaling outbound communications.

HubSpot’s WhatsApp integration (available on Professional and Enterprise Service Hub) offers a synchronized template manager directly within your CRM. Once you connect your WhatsApp Business account, all approved templates from Meta automatically sync to HubSpot’s CRM > Templates > WhatsApp tab, where you can filter by status (Ready to use, Needs personalization, Rejected), language, and category (promotional, transactional, OTP).

Automated Responses & Chatbots

Enjoy comprehensive multimedia messaging capabilities; sales reps can effortlessly send and receive images, files, videos, and voice notes through WhatsApp templates or chat. All these assets are logged and accessible in the conversation history, enabling teams to track documents and visual content clearly and efficiently.

With HubSpot’s WhatsApp integration available on Service Hub Professional and Enterprise, you can set up workflows for automated messages—such as welcome sequences, abandoned cart reminders, and delivery updates—sent directly as WhatsApp template notifications.

While HubSpot does not offer a native chatbot builder for WhatsApp, you can seamlessly integrate external chatbot platforms using Zapier or respond.io. This allows conversation flows to feed into HubSpot’s shared inbox and customer records, enabling a chatbot to qualify leads or address common inquiries before escalating to a live agent, all within your existing workflow.

Multimedia Support (Images, Videos, Files)

The platform offers comprehensive multimedia messaging capabilities, allowing sales reps to effortlessly send and receive images, files, videos, and voice notes through WhatsApp templates or chat. All shared assets are logged and accessible within the conversation history, enabling teams to track documents and visual content with ease.

HubSpot’s native WhatsApp integration (available with Service Hub Professional and Enterprise) facilitates the sending and receiving of media attachments—such as images, videos, audio, stickers, and documents up to 15 MB—directly from the conversations inbox or contact records.

Incoming media messages generate timeline events that include thumbnails and download links, allowing sales and support teams to view or forward assets seamlessly without the need to switch apps.

Contact & Lead Synchronization

Conversations initiated on WhatsApp are automatically recorded and linked to the appropriate contact or deal. HighLevel seamlessly creates new leads or updates existing records in real time, ensuring your pipeline remains current without the need for manual entry, thus streamlining your sales process.

HubSpot’s native WhatsApp integration, available on Professional and Enterprise Service Hub, instantly syncs every new WhatsApp conversation with the relevant contact record in your CRM—either creating or updating the contact based on their phone number.

Once you connect your WhatsApp Business account, only new messages will trigger this synchronization (historical chats will stay in WhatsApp), and each incoming message generates a new timeline event linked to the respective contact or associated deal. For channels that require lead capture, such as click-to-WhatsApp ads, you can automate contact creation from form submissions and continue the conversation via WhatsApp—all tracked within HubSpot.

Workflow Triggers & Notifications

WhatsApp events, such as incoming messages or clicks on template buttons, can initiate powerful workflow automations in HighLevel. With just a single customer interaction, you can send internal notifications, launch campaigns, update deal stages, or schedule follow-ups.

HubSpot’s Service Hub connects with WhatsApp through certified partners, allowing events like new messages, template sends, or delivery failures to be integrated directly into its workflow engine. This setup enables you to trigger downstream automations—like converting high-priority conversations into deals or support tickets and sending alerts to your team—ensuring that every WhatsApp exchange is transformed into an actionable signal within your CRM.

folk CRM: The Best CRM Connected to WhatsApp

If your sales team uses WhatsApp to engage leads and finalize deals, folk CRM's WhatsApp integration is a true game-changer.

With folk’s WhatsApp CRM, every conversation is automatically synced and logged—no more manual copy-pasting or lost messages. You gain complete visibility into your team's WhatsApp interactions with leads and customers, ensuring you always grasp the context behind every deal. Whether it’s a follow-up or a crucial decision point, you’ll have the full picture right at your fingertips.

But folk offers more than just WhatsApp.
It integrates seamlessly with Gmail, Outlook, LinkedIn, Google Meet, Instagram, Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), and more—allowing you to manage emails, meetings, and social interactions all in one place. Effortlessly import contacts from any channel and handle them smoothly within folk.

Here’s what truly sets folk apart: AI agents enhance your sales process by automating workflows, uncovering deal insights, and boosting productivity—freeing your team from administrative tasks so they can concentrate on closing deals. Are you ready to transform your sales operations and drive results?

Conclusion

In the realm of WhatsApp CRM integration, HighLevel excels with its all-in-one marketing tools and automation tailored for agencies, while HubSpot offers a robust, user-friendly interface with extensive support for multi-channel communication. However, folk stands out as a superior alternative, seamlessly connecting WhatsApp with other platforms like Gmail and LinkedIn, and leveraging AI to enhance productivity. With folk, you gain effortless contact management and insightful automation, empowering your sales team to focus on closing deals.

Start your 14-day free trial or book a demo today.