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January 21, 2026

12 MINUTES

Central vs Lindy: Executive Assistant Comparison

Compare Central AI and Lindy on AI executive assistant capabilities, setup, pricing approach, and call handling. See which platform fits your business workflow best

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Written by

Emma Houlihan

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Looking for Lindy Alternatives?

Executive Assistant Comparison

Workflow: Unified Workspace vs Configurable Automation

Processes: Learning From You vs Creating a Template

Hands-On Workload: Ask and Receive vs Configuration Maintenance

Subscription Models: Flat-Rate vs Per-Use

Oversight: In-Flow Visibility vs Log-Based Tracking

Compliance Posture: Stated Readiness vs Implementation Details

Summary & Recommendation

Key Points

Central AI’s Ask Central is a simple command box that can run multi-step actions across your connected tools, so a request becomes finished work, while Lindy relies on configured automations.

Templates and predefined flows shape how Lindy drafts and acts, while Central AI learns your writing style so replies sound like you.

Lindy schedules by running the workflow you’ve configured, while Central AI lets you drag an email or task onto your calendar to block focused time.

Key Points

Central AI’s Ask Central is a simple command box that can run multi-step actions across your connected tools, so a request becomes finished work, while Lindy relies on configured automations.

Templates and predefined flows shape how Lindy drafts and acts, while Central AI learns your writing style so replies sound like you.

Lindy schedules by running the workflow you’ve configured, while Central AI lets you drag an email or task onto your calendar to block focused time.

Looking for Lindy Alternatives?

Central AI EA keeps email, calendar, and tasks in one place, so work moves without you stitching tools together. Lindy can do a lot, but it leans on user-built workflows.

⭐️ Built For Your Businesses | ⚡ Live In Minutes | 🛡️privacy-Ready Workflows

Executive Assistant Comparison

Drowning in inbox pings and losing track of what actually matters? If you’re comparing AI executive assistants and want less tab-hopping, you’re in the right place. Here’s Central AI vs Lindy, to clarify the differences and help you choose what fits best.

Workflow: Unified Workspace vs Configurable Automation

Central AI and Lindy both aim to calm the chaos, but they take different approaches to get there. Central is built around a unified day view, while Lindy is built around workflows you configure across your tools.

With Central EA, email, meetings, and tasks sit in one workspace so you stop bouncing between tabs. It spots action items, turns emails into time blocks, and “Ask Central” can run work across connected apps.

Lindy focuses on flexible automations and custom triggers across tools. It typically drafts and asks for review before sending, which adds control, but also adds setup and tuning over time.

Central vs Lindy: Service Comparison

This table compares the service model and operational fit of Central AI and Lindy for day-to-day productivity work.

Category	Central AI	Lindy
Model	Unified EA workspace	Workflow builder with triggers, conditions, actions, and human review defaults
Setup	Connect email and calendar, then work from My Day	Pick template, connect tool,s map task,s tune rules
Support	Standard Support with personal support at higher levels	Help center community forum email or chat priority tiers
Best-fit	Executives needing one place for inbox tasks scheduling	Teams automating repeatable, well-defined workflows across many apps

TL;DR: Central is a unified daily workspace; Lindy suits configurable workflow automation with review controls.

Processes: Learning From You vs Creating a Template

Both Central AI and Lindy use AI to manage email, calendar, tasks, and workflow, but only one is built so your productivity tools talk to each other seamlessly across the day, without constant context switching.

What Is Central?

Central AI is a suite of AI assistant services built on one platform. Central EA is one product in the suite, designed to bring email, calendar, and tasks into a single My Day workspace.

It’s made for SMB owners and startup founders whose days are ruled by inbox triage, meeting churn, and constant follow-ups. You interact with the EA inside the app, using Ask Central to handle actions like scheduling meetings without hopping between tools.

With email, calendar, and tasks in one view, it’s easier to see what needs attention next and keep work moving. The result is fewer missed handoffs and less time spent re-reading threads to find the next step.

What Central’s Executive Assistant Can Do for You

Central AI helps owners and founders keep email, meetings, and tasks from taking over the day by putting the next step in front of you in one workspace.
Central helps with:

Unifies your day in one view: keeps email, calendar, and tasks together so you’re not hunting across tabs
Turns messages into next steps: pulls action items out of emails and lets you turn them into tasks you can work
Schedules focused work: drag an email or task onto your calendar to block time with the right context attached

As your workload grows, the same workspace keeps up without you adding more tools to manage it all.

What Is Lindy?

Lindy describes itself as an AI executive assistant focused on putting the inbox and meetings on autopilot. It primarily supports email triage, calendar management, and meeting coordination across connected tools.

Lindy is configured using a no-code visual builder and natural-language instructions, often starting from a template. Setup typically includes mapping tasks and connecting tools with scoped permissions.

It is positioned for busy professionals, executives, and teams that want to create and share agents. By default, it keeps users in the loop for drafted emails and operates only within mapped tasks, connected accounts, and available credits.

What Lindy Can Do for You

Lindy is an ai executive assistant for email and meetings.
It handles:

Email triage: summarizes, tags, and drafts replies for you
Meeting coordination: schedules, reschedules, and follows up on meetings
Workflow automation: runs triggers, conditions, and actions across connected tools

It is configured in a no-code builder, with review before sending by default.

Hands-On Workload: Ask and Receive vs Configuration Maintenance

Central AI and Lindy both handle incoming messages and meeting requests, but the model varies between a unified workspace and configured workflows.

How Central AI’s MyDay Works

My Day is where Central’s AI executive assistant keeps email, calendar, and tasks in one workspace, so work doesn’t stall as drafts or open threads.

In My Day, it uses what’s in front of you and what you’ve connected to spot what needs attention. It can draft replies in your voice and pull action items into tasks you can review.

When you’re ready to move something forward, Ask Central can run multi-step actions across connected tools. If details are missing, it prompts before finishing the execution.

Lindy’s Operating Model

Lindy is set up in its dashboard using templates, natural language, and a no-code builder. Agents run triggers, conditions, and actions to draft and route email work, and to schedule meetings once calendars are connected.

Setup relies on Map Tasks and Connect Tools with scoped permissions. By default, drafted emails require review before sending, and usage shows up in a Tasks view with logs and a credit monitor as work scales.

Central vs Lindy: Side-by-Side Comparison

This table compares how work moves through inboxes, calendars, and tasks, from intake through handling and review, for Central AI and Lindy.

Component	Central AI	Lindy
Workspace	My Day shows email, meetings, and tasks together	Dashboard with agents and a tasks view
Action Points	Detects email action items, suggests tasks	Runs mapped tasks, logs actions in tasks view
Automation	Drafts replies, supports scheduling, and follow-ups	Automates via triggers, conditions, actions
Integration	Ask Central executes across connected tools	Connect tools with scoped permissions
Behaviour	Ask Central commands plus drag to calendar actions	No-code builder, review before send by default

TL;DR: Both handle messages and meeting requests, but responsibility shifts between a space where you can see your day in its entirety and user-configured workflows with review gates.

Subscription Models: Flat-Rate vs Per-Use

Central AI and Lindy use different plan structures, with one offering tiered subscriptions that bundle multiple assistant services and the other running on subscriptions with usage credits, so scaling up is either a tier change or tracking credits as email and meeting activity increases.

Central Pricing

Central AI’s Executive Assistant pricing is plan-based, with a short free trial and simple monthly billing, plus an annual option if you prefer a lower effective monthly rate.

Free: 10 Day Free Trial
Starter: $29/month (or $25/month billed annually)
Standard: $49/month (or $45/month billed annually)

Each tier covers the core Executive Assistant workflow inside My Day, including turning inbox and meeting requests into drafts, tasks, and follow-through with Ask Central. Higher tiers include meeting note-taking, multiple inboxes and calendars, and auto sync with HubSpot, Pipedrive, and Salesforce.

As your needs expand, the Executive Assistant can be bundled into Central’s other AI-powered tools for more savings.

Lindy Pricing Price

Lindy pricing uses subscription plans with usage credits, with tiers based on monthly credits and features. It includes a free tier and paid plans, with enterprise pricing handled as a custom quote.

Free: After Lindy sign up, about 400 credits per month
Pro: about $49.99/month for about 5,000 credits
Business: about $199.99/month for about 20,000 credits
Enterprise: custom pricing

Credits act as the main usage cap, so Lindy cost can track usage and pause operations when credits run out. The free plan excludes some premium actions such as web browsing and phone calls, as listed on the Lindy website.

Pricing based on publicly available information as of January 2026, including Lindy reviews.

Central vs Lindy: Which Offers Better Value?

Central AI offers better overall value when email, meetings, and tasks must move together. My Day provides context, and Ask Central can convert a message into a draft, a task, or a scheduled next step.

It fits when you want a Lindy productivity assistant built in a no-code builder with triggers, with the tradeoff of mapped-task limits and review-before-send by default.

Oversight: In-Flow Visibility vs Log-Based Tracking

Central AI and Lindy both add review and control to EA work, but they use different documented safeguards for what runs automatically and what waits for approval.

How Central and Lindy Maintain Quality

In My Day, Central AI keeps email, calendar, and tasks together so you can see what’s pending. It flags action items, drafts in your voice, and turns messages into tasks or time blocks. Ask Central runs connected actions and prompts when details are missing.

The Lindy platform relies on agents you configure in a dashboard using templates and a no-code builder. It runs triggers and actions within mapped tasks, with a tasks view that shows logs and credit use. Email drafts are review-before-send by default.

In practice, one approach feels like guided work inside the day view, and the other feels like setup plus check-ins. As conditions change, Lindy’s model may require more tuning to keep workflows aligned.

Side-by-Side Comparison

This table compares how Central AI and Lindy support consistent outputs through control, visibility, execution, and personalization.

Category	Central AI	Lindy
Control	Flags action items and prompts when details are missing	Review before sending for drafted emails by default
Visibility	My Day shows email, meetings, and tasks in one view	Tasks view includes logs and a credit monitor
Execution	Ask Central can run multi-step actions across connected tools	Runs triggers and actions within mapped tasks
Personalization	Draft replies in your voice	Relies on templates
Limits	Unlimted Ask Central and drafting prompts	Pauses when credits run out; scope stays within mapped tasks

Compliance Posture: Stated Readiness vs Implementation Details

Both Central AI and Lindy speak to privacy and security, but they differ in how they present compliance and controls. Central lists encryption at rest, MFA, and customer data deletion controls, and states GDPR compliance, HIPAA approval, and SOC 2 Type II in progress.

🛡️ Central supports HIPAA- and GDPR-compliant workflows and is SOC 2 Type I certified.

Lindy cites Google Cloud hosting, least-privilege access, AES-256 at rest, TLS 1.2+ in transit, RBAC, and MFA, and it states SOC 2 Type II and GDPR alignment, while some retention details are not disclosed.

TL;DR: Central puts its compliance posture and audit path front and center, while Lindy provides more technical detail but leaves some gaps.

Summary & Recommendation

Central AI and Lindy are both built to take the edge off inbox and scheduling work, but they fit different operating styles. If you’re considering a Lindy alternative, the right choice depends on how much you want to configure, how visible you want work to be, and how often you want the system to carry tasks forward.

Choose Central AI if you want:

✅ One place to see email, meetings, and tasks without hunting
✅ Action items surfaced as tasks you can review and adjust
✅ Emails turned into calendar time blocks with a simple drag
✅ Drafts that match your voice, with edits before sending
✅ Commands that execute real steps across connected tools

Choose Lindy if you want:

✅ A no-code builder for agents with triggers, conditions, and actions
✅ Review-before-send as the default for drafted emails
✅ Lindy AI task management view with logs and credit monitoring as usage grows
✅ Work that stays within mapped tasks and connected accounts

Lindy can be a good fit for teams that like designing workflows and keeping a firm gate on what runs. If you’re an owner or team lead who wants less setup and more follow-through, Central AI is the cleaner path built around finishing work inside your day, not maintaining the machinery behind it.

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FAQ

Central vs Lindy: FAQ

How quickly can each service be set up and start handling calls?

With Central AI, you can get going quickly once you connect your email and calendar, because My Day immediately surfaces what’s pending and can start drafting, flagging action items, and shaping follow-through.

With Lindy AI, setup runs through its dashboard using templates, a no-code builder, and tool connections, then you map tasks so agents know what to run. For Lindy workflow automation, that flexibility is real, but it can mean more initial configuration before it feels fully “in motion.”

How quickly can the service be set up and start handling calls?

How quickly can each service be set up and start handling calls?

How much control do I have over how calls are handled?

With Central AI, My Day surfaces action items and can draft replies in your voice, then you review and adjust before sending. Ask Central can also run multi-step actions across connected tools, and it prompts when details are missing.

By default, the Lindy assistant reviews drafted emails before they are sent, and agents run triggers and actions only within mapped tasks and connected accounts. That keeps control tight, but it also means you’ll spend time defining what should run and where the boundaries are.

How much control do I have over how calls are handled?

How does the service handle complex or unexpected requests?

With Central AI, you see work inside My Day, where emails, meetings, and tasks sit together. Drafts, action items, and scheduled time blocks stay attached to the thread or task so you can review what changed.

With Lindy, you typically check the tasks view, where runs are logged and usage is tracked. That visibility is clear, but it can feel more like reviewing activity after it runs than seeing everything in one day flow.

How does the service handle complex or unexpected requests?

What does pricing look like at a high level?

With Central AI, Ask Central can move work forward across connected tools, and it prompts when key details are missing. In My Day, that keeps drafts, tasks, and scheduling tied to the original context so you can adjust before it proceeds.

With Lindy, agents run within mapped tasks and connected accounts, and drafted emails stay review-before-send by default. That helps avoid unexpected changes, but unusual requests may require updating the workflow logic before the agent can handle them smoothly.

What does pricing look like at a high level?

What systems or tools does it integrate with?

Central AI: Ask Central is described as executing work across connected tools such as Gmail, Slack, CRM, and Google Sheets. Central EA also supports autosync with HubSpot, Pipedrive, and Salesforce.

With Lindy, integrations depend on the tools you connect in setup, with scoped permissions, and agents run actions within those connected accounts. The file does not disclose a fixed list of integrations beyond that connection model.

What systems or tools does it integrate with?

Central AI: Ask Central is described as executing work across connected tools such as Gmail, Slack, CRM, and Google Sheets. Central EA also supports autosync with HubSpot, Pipedrive, and Salesforce.

What systems or tools does it integrate with?

Central AI: Ask Central is described as executing work across connected tools such as Gmail, Slack, CRM, and Google Sheets. Central EA also supports autosync with HubSpot, Pipedrive, and Salesforce.

What types of calls or inquiries can it handle?

With Central AI, My Day brings email, calendar, and tasks into one place, and it can flag action items and turn them into tasks you can review. It also supports turning an email or task into a scheduled time block, and Ask Central can execute multi-step actions across connected tools.

With Lindy, it supports email triage and meeting coordination, and agents can run triggers, conditions, and actions across connected tools once tasks are mapped. It is designed around configured workflows, and drafted emails stay review-before-send by default.

What types of calls or inquiries can it handle?

How are changes or updates handled over time?

With Central AI, you keep tuning through what you surface and act on in My Day, using drafts, tasks, and scheduled work as the control points. Ask Central also adapts in the moment by prompting for missing details before it completes an action.

With Lindy, adjustments happen in the dashboard by editing agents in the no-code builder, updating triggers and mapped tasks, and refining how actions run across connected tools. That makes changes explicit, but it also means upkeep as your processes evolve.

How are changes or updates handled over time?

What happens if something doesn't work as expected?

With Central AI, you can look back in My Day to see what was drafted, turned into a task, or scheduled, then adjust from there. If Ask Central is missing key details, it prompts before it finishes an execution.

With Lindy admin assistant you can review what ran in the tasks view with logs, then update the agent in the no-code builder by adjusting triggers, conditions, or mapped tasks. That gives you a clear trail, but fixes often mean editing the workflow setup.

What happens if something doesn't work as expected?

How does data security and privacy work?

Central AI documents encryption at rest and customer data deletion controls, alongside access controls like MFA. It also lists GDPR compliance, HIPAA approval, and SOC 2 status (Type I approved; Type II in progress).

Lindy states AES-256 encryption at rest and TLS 1.2+ in transit, plus RBAC and MFA. It also states SOC 2 Type II, HIPAA compliance, and GDPR alignment, while noting specific retention durations are not disclosed.

How does data security and privacy work?

What does pricing look like at a high level?

Central AI’s executive assistant is a flat monthly subscription with a 10-day free trial, offered in starter and standard with an annual billing option. Higher tiers add features like meeting note taking, multiple inboxes and calendars, and CRM autosync.

Lindy uses subscription tiers tied to monthly usage credits, including a free plan and paid tiers as credit needs grow. Their credit model can be flexible - until you hit the limit, then capacity becomes a plan math problem

What does pricing look like at a high level?

"We were drowning in calls and website chats, missing about 40% of them during patient appointments. Central's Voice and Chat agents handle everything now. We've booked 60+ new patients in the last month alone, and our front desk can finally focus on the people actually in our office."

Dr. Sarah Chen, Founder, Riverside Family Medicine