Capsule
Track contacts, opportunities, tasks, and notes for a small business
The core loop is buildable, but a dependable replacement becomes a real weekend or multi-day project. For Capsule, track contacts, opportunities, tasks, and notes for a small business. The hard boundary is email integrations, workflow automation, accounting connections, and mature simplicity, plus integrations, data quality, and workflow lock-in.
Build verification: not recorded. How we judge buildability
What you give up
- email integrations, workflow automation, accounting connections, and mature simplicity
- automatic email and calendar capture
- data enrichment
- large integration ecosystem
- enterprise reporting
Why people still pay
People still pay for Capsule because CRM value compounds as the system becomes the shared memory of every customer interaction and embeds itself in the rest of the stack. The recurring cost buys deduplication, permissions, imports, sync, enrichment, email capture, automations, backups, and audit history, not just the visible interface.
Your build guide
The stack, security requirements, and agent rules for a focused replacement.
Before you start
- Runtime and tools: TypeScript, React, Node and PostgreSQL with workspace membership enforced on the server.
- Before starting: A PostgreSQL database, session authentication, two isolated example workspaces and private attachment storage.
Use these project rules and optional skill references alongside the prompt. Review each skill before adding it to your agent; the AGENTS.md export includes the same guidance.
Project rule — domain: Store Person, Organization, Relationship, Opportunity, TaskTrack and TrackInstance; applying a track twice requires confirmation and completed tasks retain their template version.
Project rule — scope and recovery: Suggest duplicates without automatically merging similar names. Start with manual notes and CSV imports; mailbox synchronization and enrichment are separate, permissioned work.
Project rule — acceptance: Merge two exact-email contact candidates after review; opportunities and activity history retain their references, and undoing the merge restores the original records.
Project rule — delivery: document real setup commands and permissions; do not claim a build, accuracy level, performance result or security certification that has not been demonstrated.
Recommended skill: supabase-postgres-best-practices — review this PostgreSQL domain schema, uniqueness constraints, transaction boundaries and access-scoped queries; Supabase hosting is not required. Follow the maintainer's installation instructions and match its requirements to the chosen runtime.
Recommended skill: web-design-guidelines — review keyboard access, focus, validation, error recovery and the readable work/review interface or HTML report. Follow the maintainer's installation instructions and match its requirements to the chosen runtime.
Implementation plan
Phase 1
Pin the working slice and create its example input: Build a relationship timeline from contacts, organizations, notes and opportunities, with reusable task tracks for onboarding a new client. Confirm setup: A PostgreSQL database, session authentication, two isolated example workspaces and private attachment storage.
Phase 2
Implement persistence and write-time invariants before decorating the UI: Store Person, Organization, Relationship, Opportunity, TaskTrack and TrackInstance; applying a track twice requires confirmation and completed tasks retain their template version.
Phase 3
Connect the working view to real saved state. Check membership on reads, mutations, attachments and exports. Keep activity history separate from editable current state; do not make private records public through search.
Phase 4
Expose the app-specific limits and recovery path in context: Suggest duplicates without automatically merging similar names. Start with manual notes and CSV imports; mailbox synchronization and enrichment are separate, permissioned work.
Phase 5
Walk through this concrete acceptance case and preserve its exported evidence: Merge two exact-email contact candidates after review; opportunities and activity history retain their references, and undoing the merge restores the original records. Finish the README and backup/restore instructions; report unfinished capabilities explicitly.
Build the following focused alternative to Capsule. This is a deliberately limited personal or small-team substitute, not parity with the paid service. WORKING SLICE Build a relationship timeline from contacts, organizations, notes and opportunities, with reusable task tracks for onboarding a new client. SETUP AND ARCHITECTURE Use TypeScript, React, Node and PostgreSQL with workspace membership enforced on the server. Prerequisites: A PostgreSQL database, session authentication, two isolated example workspaces and private attachment storage. Before integrating anything, record actual versions and permissions, plus model files or provider limits only where used, in the README; make unavailable dependencies visible rather than simulating success. DOMAIN MODEL AND INVARIANTS Store Person, Organization, Relationship, Opportunity, TaskTrack and TrackInstance; applying a track twice requires confirmation and completed tasks retain their template version. IMPLEMENTATION CONTRACT Check membership on reads, mutations, attachments and exports. Keep activity history separate from editable current state; do not make private records public through search. Provide an input/setup view, the main work view, and a review/export view appropriate to this workflow. Preserve the last saved state if a job or save fails. Include empty, loading, permission-denied, partial and retryable-error states. Log identifiers and error categories without secret values or unnecessary private content. APP-SPECIFIC BOUNDARY AND RECOVERY Suggest duplicates without automatically merging similar names. Start with manual notes and CSV imports; mailbox synchronization and enrichment are separate, permissioned work. ACCEPTANCE SCENARIO Merge two exact-email contact candidates after review; opportunities and activity history retain their references, and undoing the merge restores the original records. Also reopen the app after an interrupted operation, confirm the saved record/export remains inspectable, and document the recovery action. These are implementation acceptance requirements, not a claim that this guide has been tested. DELIVERY Deliver a runnable repository with migrations or project-format versioning, a non-sensitive example, environment/permission setup, the exact manual acceptance steps, and a backup/export-and-restore walkthrough. Implement the working slice before optional integrations; list any deferred paid-product capabilities honestly. Do not add capabilities outside the working slice just to resemble the original product. PROJECT RULES FOR AGENTS.md Keep the domain invariants above executable at the write boundary. Propose scope changes before adding providers or permissions. Never fabricate source evidence, publish results, identity matches or successful delivery. Preserve user originals and require an explicit confirmation for destructive changes or external publication.
$ open in your agent (prompt prefilled, you press enter), copy the prompt or copy or download AGENTS.md
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Alternatives to building your own
all 8 free alternatives to Capsule →· no votes, no pay-to-list · just what's real
Capsule pricing
| plan | monthly | annual (per mo) | what you get |
|---|---|---|---|
| free | $0/user | $0/user | Maximum 2 users, 250 contacts, 5 custom fields, 1 sales pipeline, 50 MB storage |
| starter | — | $18/user | 30,000 contacts, 50 custom fields, 1 sales pipeline, 10 GB file storage/user, 5 email templates, 10 AI Content Assists/monthLive page exposes monthly billing but did not publish the USD monthly amount in retrievable text; annual price is from Capsule's own current plan comparison. |
| growth | — | $36/user | 60,000 contacts, 150 custom fields, 5 sales pipelines, 30 GB storage/user; workflow automation and dashboardsLive page exposes monthly billing but did not publish the USD monthly amount in retrievable text. |
| advanced | — | $54/user | 120,000 contacts, 300 custom fields, 50 sales pipelines, 50 project boards, 50 GB storage/userLive page exposes monthly billing but did not publish the USD monthly amount in retrievable text. |
| ultimate | — | $72/user | 240,000 contacts, unlimited custom fields, at least 100 sales pipelines, 100 GB storage/user; 5+ users recommendedLive page exposes monthly billing but did not publish the USD monthly amount in retrievable text; pipeline cap differs across Capsule pages, so only the minimum directly supported figure is stated. |
free tier2 users, 250 contacts, 5 custom fields, 1 sales pipeline and 50 MB storage
billingmonthly + annual (save up to 14%)
hidden costsCapsule Marketing is a separate add-on. Contact records and storage rise by tier; the free 250-contact cap is total, and paid plans are charged per user. Monthly USD prices were not verifiable from the rendered live page.
pricing sources checked 2026-08-12 · pricing source ↗
Questions about Capsule
Can you build your own Capsule with AI?
Partly. The core loop is buildable, but a dependable replacement becomes a real weekend or multi-day project. For Capsule, track contacts, opportunities, tasks, and notes for a small business. The hard boundary is email integrations, workflow automation, accounting connections, and mature simplicity, plus integrations, data quality, and workflow lock-in.
What does the Capsule build prompt cover?
The prompt starts with this scope: Build a relationship timeline from contacts, organizations, notes and opportunities, with reusable task tracks for onboarding a new client. Full-product capabilities excluded from the comparison include: email integrations, workflow automation, accounting connections, and mature simplicity; automatic email and calendar capture; data enrichment. Follow the implementation plan and its prerequisites before expanding the build.
How do I use the prompt, AGENTS.md and agent skills?
Start with the Capsule prerequisites and stack, then copy the prompt into your coding agent. Save the project rules as AGENTS.md in the project root. Linked skills are optional packages or source instructions for specific tasks; review their current contents and install only those matching the chosen stack. A skill does not supply API credentials or verify the finished app.
How long will this Capsule project take?
The catalogue estimate is multi-day for the limited scope. Setup, integration approvals, debugging, deployment and ongoing maintenance can add time. This is an estimate, not a delivery guarantee.
What would I give up by replacing Capsule?
email integrations, workflow automation, accounting connections, and mature simplicity; automatic email and calendar capture; data enrichment; large integration ecosystem; enterprise reporting. People still pay for Capsule because CRM value compounds as the system becomes the shared memory of every customer interaction and embeds itself in the rest of the stack. The recurring cost buys deduplication, permissions, imports, sync, enrichment, email capture, automations, backups, and audit history, not just the visible interface.
What price is this guide comparing against?
The recorded Starter plan is $18/mo per seat (annual billing, per user per month), checked 2026-08-12. Check the linked pricing source before buying. Building your own also has hosting, API and maintenance costs; the recorded amount is not a guaranteed saving.
What can I use instead of building Capsule?
Twenty: A modern pipeline CRM with custom objects, views and mailbox sync; the subscription becomes a Compose file. Krayin CRM: A Laravel sales pipeline with leads, contacts and email; glossy enough, but it still wants a PHP stack. SuiteCRM: The old-school full-fat CRM: every module you remember, plus the server you now own. Compare all listed options at https://howtovibecodeit.dev/capsule-crm/alternatives. Check each option's license, hosting needs and feature limits.