# Intercom

Use Intercom with your agent two ways — as a knowledge source, and as a support-handoff destination (live chat or email).

Intercom works with Foldspace in two independent ways, each set up where it belongs:

- **Knowledge base** — sync your Intercom Help Center articles into the agent's Knowledge. This is the only Intercom **connection**, and it's done in the **Knowledge** module, not in Integrations. It authenticates with an Intercom access token, so it can reach gated content. See [Adding knowledge sources](/user-guides/knowledge-sources/).
- **Support handoff** — when the agent reaches its limits (the user asks for a person, an issue can't be resolved, or sentiment turns frustrated), it escalates to your Intercom support team with a one-line summary of the problem.

## Support handoff

Like [Zendesk](/user-guides/integrations-zendesk/), Intercom offers two ways to hand off. Pick the one that matches how your team works:

| Handoff type | What happens | Use when |
| :--- | :--- | :--- |
| **Live chat** | The agent opens the Intercom Messenger on the page and seeds it with the summary, then steps aside. | You run the Intercom Messenger and staff live chat. |
| **Email** | The agent emails the summary and context to your Intercom support address instead of opening the Messenger. | You handle support asynchronously in the Intercom inbox. |

### Prerequisites

- An active Intercom subscription — with the **Messenger installed** on your site for live chat, or an Intercom support email address for the email option.
- **Offer Support Handoff** enabled in [Style & Behavior](/user-guides/building-your-agent/).

### Live chat

The live handoff is driven by the **SDK**, not an Integrations connection: you author a **Support Handoff** action and add a front-end handler that opens the Messenger with the summary. Follow the developer walkthrough:

- [Connecting Foldspace to Intercom: Automated Support Handoff](/guides/intercom-handoff/)

Test it on your own site — a staging or dev build where both the Foldspace SDK and the Intercom Messenger are loaded. You can't verify this in the [Playground](/user-guides/playground/): it runs inside the Foldspace UI, so the real Messenger isn't on the page.

### Email

When you don't staff live chat, use the **Email** handoff destination instead — no custom code. The agent emails the summary to your Intercom support address, so the escalation lands in your Intercom inbox. Configure the destination in [Support handoff](/user-guides/support-handoff/).

## Related

- [Zendesk](/user-guides/integrations-zendesk/): the same two handoff options.
- [Adding knowledge sources](/user-guides/knowledge-sources/): connect Intercom as a knowledge source.
- [Support handoff](/user-guides/support-handoff/): triggers and destinations.