Octopus CRM has no free plan. Every plan starts with a seven-day trial, and the vendor's FAQ says the trial gives "full access" to its top plan, Unlimited (checked 7 October 2026). Meet Drake, the Octopus CRM alternative we make, has a Free plan that runs one campaign a month with no credit card and no trial clock.
That trial matters because Octopus CRM pricing is a capability gate, not a volume gate. Starter, at $9.99 month-to-month, sends automated invitations. Campaign creation begins at the Advanced plan, at $21.99 month-to-month or $14.99 a month billed annually. You meet those gates only after the trial, when you pay for a lower plan.
We did exactly that. We paid for Octopus CRM's Advanced plan on 7 October 2026 and tested it on a free LinkedIn account. Campaigns and bulk messages worked. The Zapier integration and Email Finder asked us to upgrade to Unlimited. And Octopus CRM's support team confirmed by email on 8 October 2026 that the product has no tagging, notes, or inbox.
Octopus CRM is the better fit for two kinds of user: a solo user who needs only automated invitations, at $6.99 a month billed annually, and anyone working from a Premium or Recruiter account, which only the Unlimited plan supports.
Octopus CRM costs $9.99 to $39.99 a month on monthly billing, or $6.99 to $24.99 a month billed annually, across four plans with no free plan.
Octopus CRM sells four plans, and each step up adds features the plan below lacks. The table uses the labels from the plan list inside the product.
Prices verified against octopuscrm.io on 12 October 2026; feature rows checked against the in-app plan list on 8 October 2026.
The website's pricing table loads on annual billing by default. The vendor's trial wording is: "All plans come with a 7-day obligation-free trial. No credit card required, unsubscribe anytime." Agency pricing is available only by contacting the vendor.
The three Unlimited-only rows read as follows in the product (8 October 2026). Activity control sends alerts "right after our system detects the excessive activity on your LinkedIn profile." Bypass weekly invite limit sends connection requests by email once LinkedIn's weekly invitation limit is reached. Zapier integration pushes LinkedIn data to other apps, HubSpot among them.
Octopus CRM installs as a Chrome extension, listed on the Chrome Web Store as "Octopus - All-in-One LinkedIn Automation." We installed version 3.7.19. Starter covers the personal CRM, personalized invitations, and a filter for premium profiles. Everything below comes from the Advanced plan.
The product has two parts. A pop-up pulls profiles from a LinkedIn search into lists, and a web app works those lists through eight menu items: Dashboard, Connect, Message, Visit, Endorse, Billing, Contact us, and Upgrade. Octopus CRM's user manual (updated 19 May 2025) describes the same structure.
A campaign is a named list inside one of the four actions, and you build a sequence by linking campaigns. To follow up after an invitation, you link a Connect campaign to a Message campaign in the Tools window. If you searched for Octopus CRM LinkedIn automation expecting one drag-and-drop sequence builder, this is the main difference.
Runs process one profile at a time, in a progress window with a countdown to the next profile and a Stop button. On 7 October 2026 we set a Connect run to five. Four invitations went out, each with a short note. LinkedIn stopped the fifth, because free accounts can send only a limited number of personalized notes a month. That limit is LinkedIn’s, not Octopus CRM’s, and it applies to every automation tool, Meet Drake included. The same day we messaged five first-degree connections, with each first name filled in by the tool.
The Chrome Web Store listing showed 70,000 users and a rating of 4.3 out of 5 from 154 ratings on 12 October 2026. Meet Drake’s listing showed 476 users the same day, so Octopus CRM is the far more established tool. On review sites, Octopus CRM held 4.3 out of 5 from 118 reviews on G2, 4.6 from 274 on Capterra, and 3.5 from 203 on Trustpilot, all captured on 12 October 2026.
Three strengths hold up against the product and the vendor's own pages:
Two criticisms recur in Octopus CRM reviews on G2 and Capterra: Starter is thin, and the CRM is closer to a contact list than a CRM. Our test makes both more precise. Starter is narrow by design. The "Personal CRM with stats" is a dashboard of account and campaign statistics plus the action lists. Our export from it had six fields: LinkedIn URL, first name, last name, position, premium status, and date added.
Campaign creation begins at the Advanced plan, so the useful price is what your first campaign costs.
Where campaign creation first becomes available on each tool. Verified against octopuscrm.io and meetdrake.com/pricing on 12 October 2026.
This compares where campaigns first become available, not volume. Meet Drake's Free plan is capped and does not match a paid Octopus CRM plan for volume.
On price, Octopus CRM is cheaper at entry: $9.99 against $19 month-to-month, and $6.99 against $8.25 a month billed annually. Against Advanced, Meet Drake Plus costs 45% less billed annually and 14% less month-to-month.
What Advanced leaves out matters as much. There are no tags, notes, or inbox on any Octopus CRM plan, per its support team. For an inbox, Octopus CRM's own plan page points elsewhere: it promotes Dripify as "our more advanced and 100% automated LinkedIn prospecting platform," with a smart inbox among its features. The fair comparison for Plus is Octopus CRM’s Advanced plan, the first plan that creates a campaign. Meet Drake pricing lists the Free plan’s daily caps beside both Plus billing options.
Meet Drake is our product. Here is what it costs and what it does not do. Meet Drake has two plans, verified against meetdrake.com/pricing on 12 October 2026.
Free costs $0, with no credit card and no trial clock. It includes a built-in CRM with tags and notes, a unified LinkedIn inbox, and capped outreach: one campaign a month, five connection requests a day, five messages a day, and five auto likes or shares a day.
Plus costs $99 a year ($8.25 a month) or $19 a month. It removes the Free plan’s caps: unlimited campaigns, multi-message sequences with follow-ups, auto-comment, configurable human-like delays and daily caps, profile enrichment, and priority support.
That is the bundle Meet Drake is built around: campaign automation, a CRM with tags and notes, and an inbox in one Chrome extension, with all three on the Free plan.
There is no higher plan. Meet Drake is LinkedIn-only: no email outreach, no Zapier or HubSpot integration, and no team or multi-seat features. If you need multi-channel outreach or team accounts, Meet Alfred is the next step.
On account risk, the plans work differently. Free's caps add up to 15 actions a day, under the 25 actions a day Meet Drake's help center recommends for accounts without Premium or Sales Navigator (September 2026). Plus lets you set your own per-action delays and daily caps. Meet Drake reduces risk; it can't eliminate it, and LinkedIn's User Agreement restricts automated activity.
For how a permanent free plan compares with trial-only tools, free LinkedIn automation plans tracks which Chrome extensions keep sending once a trial ends.
Octopus CRM rows verified 7–8 and 12 October 2026; Meet Drake rows verified 12 October 2026; Chrome Web Store figures captured 12 October 2026.
Meet Drake's gaps here are real: a higher entry price, no integrations, no email outreach, no stated support for Premium or Recruiter accounts, and a much smaller install base. Its ratings are public on the listing for Meet Drake on the Chrome Web Store, where the count stood at 37 on 12 October 2026.
Among Octopus CRM alternatives, the right choice depends on what the tool has to do.
Choose Octopus CRM if you only need automated invitations at the lowest paid price, or if you work from a Premium or Recruiter account and need Unlimited's account support and Zapier integration.
Choose Meet Drake if you want to run a campaign before paying anything, or if you need tags, notes, and an inbox alongside unlimited campaigns for less than Octopus CRM's Advanced plan.
If you need email outreach, multi-channel sequences, or team seats, Meet Drake is not the tool; Meet Alfred is the upgrade path.
Run your first campaign free. No credit card.
Gustavo Parra is Senior SEO, Growth & Analytics Lead at Meet Drake, with 15+ years in SEO, including 5+ years in B2B SaaS. He bought and tested Octopus CRM’s Advanced plan for this review on 7–8 and 12 October 2026, and focuses on turning real platform data and firsthand product experience into practical, compliance-first guidance.
This guide is provided for educational purposes only and does not constitute legal, compliance, or professional sales advice. LinkedIn automation results vary based on your offer, audience, messaging, and execution. When using LinkedIn and any third-party tools, you are responsible for complying with LinkedIn's User Agreement, platform policies, and applicable laws, including privacy and anti-spam regulations. Meet Drake supports ethical, relationship-first outreach and encourages users to prioritize relevance, consent, and respectful communication. References to third-party products, metrics, or studies are informational and do not imply endorsement or guarantee specific outcomes.
