OneTimeThe email-to-ticket help desk you own forever.
Zendesk Suite Team is $55 per agent per month — a 3-person team pays around $2,000 a year, forever, and every ticket lives in Atlassian's cloud. Deskly does the same job on a $5 VPS: email-to-ticket, SLA timers, macros, CSAT, all landing in a SQLite file you own. $49, once, no matter how many agents you add.
Deskly in 60 seconds
Everything in the box
Shared inbox, SLA timers, canned replies and CSAT — self-hosted, no per-agent fees.
Email → ticket
Poll any IMAP inbox or POST to a token-protected webhook — replies thread automatically via subject markers.
Threaded SMTP replies
Answer over SMTP, threaded back to the requester, with an optional CSAT footer on every reply.
Full ticket workflow
Open / pending / solved / closed, four priorities, assignees, tags, saved views and search.
Canned responses
Macros with variable substitution — customer name, ticket id, subject and more.
Notes vs public replies
Internal notes never email the customer; @mention teammates privately.
SLA timers per priority
First-response and resolution clocks with live breach badges and a breach counter on the dashboard.
Built-in CSAT
Solved tickets email a thumbs up/down link; ratings roll up into a satisfaction score.
Ops dashboard
Tickets by status, open by priority, average first-response time, SLA breaches and CSAT %.
Deskly vs Zendesk
Zendesk charges $55/agent/mo. Here's what actually differs.
| Deskly | Zendesk | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $49 once | $55/agent/mo |
| 3 agents, 1 year | $49 | ~$1,980 |
| Email → ticket | Yes | Yes |
| SLA timers | Yes | Higher tiers only |
| Macros / canned replies | Yes | Yes |
| CSAT | Yes | Yes |
| Your data | Your SQLite file | Their cloud |
| Per-agent fees | Never | Always |
One month of Zendesk for a three-person team more than covers Deskly — and it never charges you again, however many agents you add.
Pick how you pay
Subscriptions if you want them — but the whole point is the lifetime tier.
Up and running in three steps
Buy once on Whop
One payment of $49 gets you the packaged installer, or clone the MIT source and run it yourself for free.
Deploy or run desktop
Docker-compose onto a $5 VPS for a public help desk, or run the Electron desktop build for an internal one.
Point your inbox at it
Poll an IMAP mailbox or forward mail to the webhook — incoming email becomes tickets your team can work.
Fair questions
Is it really free on GitHub?
Yes — Deskly is MIT-licensed at github.com/bensblueprints/helpdesk-tickets-mvp and always will be. The $49 buys the packaged installer, 1-click setup and updates; building from source is free.
Does it really have no per-agent pricing?
Correct. Add as many agents as you like — the price is $49 once, not per seat. That's the whole point: your team size is your business, not a billing lever.
Where does my ticket data live?
In a SQLite file on your own server. Nothing is uploaded to us or anyone else — no cloud, no telemetry, no account with us.
Is this a subscription in disguise?
No. $49 once, no renewal, no license server phoning home. Deploy it on your own VPS and it keeps working whether or not we're around.
Related tools
More pay-once apps from the OneTimeSuite catalog.
More about Deskly
Every page we publish about this app — comparisons, personas, platforms and the problems it solves.
For you
Stop renting. Own Deskly.
Shared inbox, SLA timers, canned replies and CSAT — self-hosted, no per-agent fees.
Get Deskly — $129 forever