Free CRM for Nonprofits, 5 Tools NGOs Can Actually Use

If your NGO has next to no budget, you still need somewhere to keep donor and supporter records that is not a spreadsheet. Salesforce offers ten free licences to eligible nonprofits through its Power of Us programme, but most small teams still need a dedicated IT person or a paid partner to configure and run it. We tested the genuinely free, self-serve plans again in 2026 and shortlisted five tools that handle contacts, donations and follow-ups without overwhelming your staff.

Every tool below has a permanent free tier, not a trial. We note where each one stops being free, because that is usually the detail that decides it.

Last reviewed and pricing checked against vendor websites on 20 August 2026. Free-plan limits change often, so confirm current details before you commit.

How we evaluated these tools

We checked each tool against the same six criteria, using the free tier itself rather than a sales demo. The genuine, current contact or record limit, confirmed against the vendor's own pricing page, not the headline claim. Whether it tracks giving history, communication preferences and consent the way a nonprofit relationship actually needs, not just a sales pipeline. Whether non-technical staff can be productive within a day, without formal training. Whether you can read giving trends inside the tool without exporting to a spreadsheet first. Whether you can get your data back out in a usable format if you switch tools later. And what triggers the first paid tier, and roughly what that costs, so there are no surprises once you outgrow the free plan.

The two tools that hold up as CRM software in their own right sit under Dedicated CRM Platforms below. The three that are strong on cost and ease of use but weaker on donor tracking sit under Free DIY Alternatives, genuinely useful, just not built for CRM as their primary job. Blackbaud, DonorPerfect and Bloomerang do not appear here because none offers a genuinely free tier past a trial. Zoho CRM has a free plan, but it is built for sales pipelines rather than donor tracking, so it did not clear our donor-management criterion.

The five, at a glance

If you are ready to look beyond the free tier, see our guide to choosing a CRM by organisation size or the full comparison of paid CRM platforms.

HubSpot CRM, free forever plan

Best for medium-sized NGOs with growing teams. The free plan gives you 1,000 contacts, 2 users, email templates and tracking, deal pipelines, a mobile app and basic reporting, genuinely enterprise-grade features without the price tag. The catch is the cap itself, and bulk email and workflow automation sit behind paid tiers.

SuiteCRM, community edition

Best for technically capable teams or NGOs with IT support. It is a full-featured, open-source CRM with custom modules, campaign and opportunity tracking, workflow automation and no licence fees, if you can host it yourself. Installation, updates and backups are your responsibility, so budget staff time instead of licence fees.

Airtable, free plan

Best for teams already comfortable in spreadsheets. You get 1,000 records per base, grid, calendar and kanban views of the same donor list, file attachments, real-time collaboration and ready-made nonprofit templates. It suits a team moving off Excel that wants more structure without a migration project, but the record and attachment limits arrive faster than most teams expect, so plan your base structure early.

Google Workspace for Nonprofits

Best for NGOs already living in Gmail and Drive. It is free or heavily discounted for most ACNC-registered charities, everyone on the team already knows how to use it, and Google Forms feeds donation and volunteer sign-ups straight into Sheets. It gets you running this week with no learning curve, but tracking stays manual and reporting stays basic, treat it as a starting point rather than a destination.

Notion, free plan

Best for small teams blending donor records with project work. Unlimited pages and databases, donor records linked directly to meeting notes, grants and projects, and simple views for staff who avoid spreadsheets. There is no built-in email tracking or automation, so you are building that process yourself.

What to check before you commit, in Australia

Free tools still carry obligations. The Australian Privacy Principles apply to donor data even on a free plan, so know where each tool actually stores information and make sure your privacy policy reflects it. Set roles before you import anything, free tiers often give every user full access by default, which is the most common issue we find in small NGO systems. If you process donations through a payment provider, keep receipting and gift records reconciled with your CRM so ACNC reporting does not turn into a year-end scramble.

Free CRM for Humanitarian NGOs

Most CRM reviews assume one office, one country and reliable internet. Humanitarian teams rarely work that way. Field staff often go offline for hours, so plan for a paper or form-based fallback that syncs later, HubSpot and Airtable have usable mobile apps with limited offline behaviour, Notion caches recently opened pages, and a self-hosted SuiteCRM depends entirely on your own hosting. If you fundraise in Australia and deliver overseas, decide early whether one base holds every country or each programme gets its own, Airtable's free record limit is per base, so splitting by country buys you room, while HubSpot keeps everyone in one portal. Record the original amount and currency in separate fields, since free tiers usually track a single currency and grant acquittals need a conversion you can audit later. Because rotations and short contracts mean access changes constantly, choose a tool where removing a user does not delete the records they created, and review the user list every quarter.

Keep Supporter Data Separate from Beneficiary Data

This is the single most common mistake we see when small NGOs adopt a free CRM. Donor records and programme participant records carry very different risk. Beneficiary data is often sensitive, sometimes about people in conflict or displacement settings, and a breach can put someone in danger rather than simply annoy them.

Keep beneficiary and case data out of the fundraising CRM entirely, in a separate system with its own access list. Store only what you need for the relationship you actually have, a donor needs contact details, giving history and consent, not a case note. Apply the Australian Privacy Principles as your floor, then check the rules of the country where the data was collected, since host-country law and donor requirements can be stricter. Write down who is allowed to approve an export, since free plans make it very easy for any user to download the whole contact list. Set a retention period and delete on schedule, consent from 2019 is not consent today.

A Two Week Migration Plan

You do not need a project team. In week one, export your current list, remove duplicates and dead addresses, agree a short field list (name, email, phone, supporter type, consent status, last gift), pick one tool and set up the roles before importing anything. In week two, import the cleaned list, add giving history for the last two years only, since older data rarely changes a decision, and enter one week of real activity by hand so the team feels the workflow before you judge it. Most CRM rollouts fail on habit, not features, so give it a genuine fortnight.

For the wider systems picture, our digital transformation guide covers how a CRM sits alongside monitoring, finance and reporting, or browse the free tools and templates in our resources library. If you would rather talk through which of these actually fits your team, get in touch.