# Move from Intercom to Rinhelp

Intercom conversations, collections, articles and tags move over, at one API call per conversation. Files are the thing to watch: Intercom’s attachment links expire 30 minutes after you fetch the conversation.

| Conversations | Time to read them |
| --- | --- |
| 1,000 | about 1 minute |
| 10,000 | about 4 minutes |

Limit used: 10,000 requests a minute (a public app, per app), about 1 per conversation. Rinhelp takes up to 3,000 conversations a minute. Importing is free: it never emails your customers, never runs Rin and never counts toward a plan.

Someone in your Intercom workspace approves the MCP server’s separate permission to read conversations. For the full history, they make a private app and give its access token to your AI agent.

## Measured

| Site | Articles | Sections | Time | Conversations | Messages |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| intercom.com/help | 965 | 16 | 26 minutes, then 48 to publish | 62 | 259 |

Measured on 2026-10-29 with Claude Code over MCP: https://github.com/wilbertliu/rinhelp/issues/648

## Prompt for a chat app

Use Intercom’s official MCP server next to Rinhelp and follow https://rinhelp.com/migrate/intercom.md. It only works for US and EU workspaces. Bring my Intercom articles over first, then my recent conversations.

## Prompt for a coding agent

Read https://rinhelp.com/migrate/intercom.md and import my full Intercom history with a private app’s access token. List conversations 150 at a time with starting_after, retrieve each one, and download its files at once, before the links die. Tell me about any conversation with 500 parts, since Intercom returns only the newest 500.

## Words

| Their word | Rinhelp |
| --- | --- |
| Conversation | Conversation |
| Conversation part | Message |
| Contact | Customer |
| Collection | Section |
| Article | Article |
| Macro | Saved reply |
| Tag | Tag |

## What stays behind

- Workflows
- Inbox views and rules
- Reports
- Fin and Messenger settings

## Facts

- Retrieving one Intercom conversation returns its messages, up to 500, so most of a history costs one call per conversation. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/references/rest-api/api.intercom.io/conversations/retrieveconversation (checked 2026-10-31)
- A conversation longer than 500 messages comes back with just the newest 500. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/references/rest-api/api.intercom.io/conversations/retrieveconversation (checked 2026-10-31)
- The S3 export reaches back two years but has no transcript, so it can’t be your only source. Vendor page: https://www.intercom.com/help/en/articles/2046229-export-your-conversations-data (checked 2026-10-31)
- A public app gets 10,000 calls a minute, and the whole Intercom workspace is capped at 25,000. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/references/rest-api/errors/rate-limiting (checked 2026-10-31)
- A private app, using your own token, shares one pool with your other private apps. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/references/rest-api/errors/rate-limiting (checked 2026-10-31)
- The conversation list gives up to 150 per page, and starting_after finds the next page. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/references/rest-api/api.intercom.io/conversations/listconversations (checked 2026-10-31)
- Intercom attachment links expire after 30 minutes, so each file has to be downloaded right after its conversation is fetched. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/references/rest-api/api.intercom.io/models/file_attribute (checked 2026-10-31)
- Articles list 250 per page at most, and collections have their own list call. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/references/rest-api/api.intercom.io/articles/listarticles (checked 2026-10-31)
- Intercom’s official MCP server reads conversations, people and articles, in US and EU workspaces only. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/guides/mcp (checked 2026-10-31)
- Tags can be listed over the API once the token has permission to read tags. Vendor page: https://developers.intercom.com/docs/references/rest-api/api.intercom.io/tags/listtags (checked 2026-10-31)

## Steps

Import source: `intercom`

Connect Rinhelp's MCP server, https://mcp.rinhelp.com/mcp, then follow https://mcp.rinhelp.com/migrate.md step by step with the facts above.

1. [Connect your AI agent](https://docs.rinhelp.com/articles/98a0def1-a07d-4c34-9f19-4d168626b40c-connect-your-ai-agent)
2. [Move to Rinhelp with your AI agent](https://docs.rinhelp.com/articles/5a2a3f45-4e61-4daf-8d23-570a8bfc24a1-move-to-rinhelp-with-your-ai-agent)
3. [Import your help center articles](https://docs.rinhelp.com/articles/a79b3172-a803-44a2-9236-0ab73d56b051-import-your-help-center-articles)
4. [Keep your old help center links working](https://docs.rinhelp.com/articles/ba9cf0f3-9740-4c90-9ca5-7a9a0ef0b450-keep-your-old-help-center-links-working)
5. [Import saved replies](https://docs.rinhelp.com/articles/5d8f8400-2a36-4974-a646-c9f04a41361d-import-saved-replies)
6. [Import past conversations](https://docs.rinhelp.com/articles/7e85f2b0-336d-4774-850a-826951d9585c-import-past-conversations)
7. [Switch your support email to Rinhelp](https://docs.rinhelp.com/articles/44c7935d-ccee-409b-83ac-fa4e5f762eb0-switch-your-support-email-to-rinhelp)
8. [Replace your chat widget](https://docs.rinhelp.com/articles/031f9d71-579b-4229-8f50-3eee8e31c277-replace-your-chat-widget)

## Questions

### Could I just use Intercom’s S3 export instead?

Not by itself. It goes back two years, but it carries no message text, so your AI agent still reads the words from the API.

### Will a very long Intercom conversation come across whole?

Up to 500 messages, yes. Intercom only returns the newest 500, so your AI agent should tell you which conversations hit that number.

### How fast can Intercom go?

A public app gets 10,000 calls a minute, more than Rinhelp takes, so Rinhelp’s 3,000 conversations a minute sets the pace. A private app, using your own token, shares 10,000 calls a minute with your other private apps, and every app together stays under Intercom’s 25,000 a minute for the workspace.

By Wilbert Liu, founder of Rinhelp. Page: https://rinhelp.com/migrate/intercom