Non-EU vendorHelpdesk & Customer ServiceHeadquarters: US

Gladly: sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

Gladly is a customer service platform for brands, particularly retailers, that brings service agents, shopping assistance and an AI layer into one customer conversation history. The company describes it as a single AI across the customer relationship. Brand teams configure the AI, agents work within the platform, and shoppers use it on the brand's website. Integrations and an API are offered.

Gladly Software, Inc. is based in Millbrae, California, so the provider is subject to US law. Its privacy policy describes transfers outside the UK, Switzerland and the EEA under contractual safeguards and names an EU representative under Article 27 of the GDPR. The website does not state where customer data is hosted, which cloud provider is used or whether an EU data region exists, and no sub-processor list is published. A European organisation should obtain these in writing before use. No open-source or self-hosted option is described.

See the 8 European alternatives ↓Assess your stack with Gladly pre-selected

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Sovereignty score

17 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign

Jurisdiction SOV-210
Headquartered in the US: CLOUD Act and FISA 702
Data residency SOV-30
No hosting in Europe (US)
Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-320
Key management with a non-European vendor
Freedom from lock-in SOV-640
Closed source: switching requires data migration
Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-615
Closed source, runtime with the vendor

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 11, 2026

Headquarters	US (US)Verified by hand
EU adequacy decision	Only for companies individually certified under the EU-US Data Privacy FrameworkVerified by hand
Sovereignty model	Vendor-hosted (non-EU)Verified by hand
Data hosting	USVerified by hand
Open-source	NoVerified by hand
GDPR-compliant	YesVendor-stated
Category	Helpdesk & Customer Service
Type	Product
Website	gladly.ai ↗

How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to Gladly

The European alternatives to Gladly come from our knowledge base of over 6,800 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

21 European Helpdesk & Customer Service vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with Gladly

Gladly is headquartered in the United States. US vendors fall under the CLOUD Act and FISA 702: US authorities can compel access to data, even when that data sits in a European data centre. That is the core of the jurisdictional exposure in our model.

Gladly hosts data outside the EU (US). Personal data therefore leaves the EU, which requires a transfer mechanism under the GDPR and pulls the data residency score down.

Gladly is closed source and hosted by the vendor. The encryption keys and the runtime sit with the vendor and switching requires data migration. Ask about bring-your-own-key, export options and open standards.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs Gladly together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to Gladly?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to Gladly include Aircall, ChatBot and Crisp. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to Gladly?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to Gladly include FreeScout. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is Gladly GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

Gladly is headquartered in US and hosts data in US. The vendor states it is GDPR-compliant, but the data falls under non-EU jurisdiction. For full EU data residency the EU alternatives on this page usually offer more certainty.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 11, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in Helpdesk & Customer Service

Helpdesk & Customer Service: Helpdesk software, customer support, live chat and ticketing systems. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

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