How much does an AI chatbot for a website really cost per month?
The bill depends on how many chats your visitors start and on what the tool counts. A "$29 a month" plan that includes 1,000 replies covers about 166 chats of six questions each. The same 1,000 chats a month cost $75 on Chatling and $1,029 on Intercom.
Below is the monthly bill at 100, 1,000 and 5,000 chats for 13 tools and our own, worked out from public pricing pages read on 14 November 2026, with the arithmetic shown.
What do AI chatbots actually charge for?
Tools bill by four different units: per reply, per conversation, per resolution, or as a flat fee with included credit.
Per reply or credit means every answer the AI writes uses part of a monthly allowance. HelpJet, Chatling, tawk.to, Chatbase, Wonderchat, SiteGPT and AI Chat for Website work this way. Watch the word "credit": on Chatling, tawk.to and Chatbase one reply can use more than one credit, depending on the AI model. SiteGPT counts a visitor's question and the AI's answer together as one message.
Per conversation means one chat counts once, however many replies it takes. Social Intents and Tidio Lyro work this way. Tidio says a conversation counts once "even if Lyro replies a dozen times or more".
Per resolution or outcome means you pay when the tool decides the AI solved the visitor's problem, usually on top of a monthly fee per seat. Intercom ($0.99 per Fin outcome), ChatBot.com ($49.50 per 50 resolutions), HubSpot (50 credits per resolved conversation, at $10 per 1,000 credits) and Zendesk ($2.00 per automated resolution, pay as you go) work this way. Intercom now also counts an outcome when Fin completes a workflow, "including handoffs".
Crisp charges a flat monthly price and includes a dollar amount of AI credit ($5, $25 or $75) that it says covers "around" 90, 450 or 1,350 automated conversations.
| Tool | What you pay for | Extra usage costs |
|---|---|---|
| AI Chat for Website (ours) | each visitor message the AI answers | 2,000 more messages for $10 a month |
| Social Intents | each chat the AI replies in | not published |
| Chatling | credits per AI reply, 0.5 to 25 by model | 1,000 credits for $10 a month |
| SiteGPT | each question plus its answer | 5,000 messages for $59 a month ($39 billed yearly) |
| tawk.to AI Assist | credits per AI reply, 1 on Claude Haiku 4.5, 3 on the default Auto model | 1,000 credits for $30 |
| HelpJet | each bot reply | 1,000 replies for $30 |
| Chatbase | message credits per AI request, rate per model not published | 1,000 credits for $40 |
| Crisp | dollars of AI credit included in the plan | not published |
| Wonderchat | each AI reply, 1 credit on fast models | not published |
| HubSpot Professional | 50 credits per resolved conversation, 10,000 credits included | $10 per 1,000 credits |
| Tidio Lyro | each conversation the AI replies in | contact sales above 1,000 a month |
| ChatBot.com | each AI resolution, plus a fee per user | 50 resolutions for $49.50 |
| Intercom Fin | each Fin outcome, plus a fee per seat | $0.99 per outcome |
| Zendesk Suite Team | each automated resolution, 5 included per agent, plus a fee per agent | $2.00 each, pay as you go |
What does 100, 1,000 or 5,000 chats a month cost?
The table below shows the monthly bill for 100, 1,000 and 5,000 chats. Each cell is "billed monthly / billed yearly, per month".
| Tool | 100 chats | 1,000 chats | 5,000 chats |
|---|---|---|---|
| AI Chat for Website (ours) | $19 / $15.83 | $49 / $40.83 | not priced yet, see the daily limit |
| Social Intents | $49 / $39 | $79 / $69 | $132 / $99 |
| Chatling | $25 / $20.83 | $75 / $62.50 | $295 / $245.83 |
| SiteGPT | $59 / $39 | $118 / $78 | $365 / $235 |
| tawk.to AI Assist | $29 / $24.17 | $129 / $112.50 | $699 / $632.50 |
| HelpJet | $29 / $23 | $179 / $173 | $899 / $893 |
| Chatbase | $150 / $120 | $230 / $200 | $1,100 / $1,000 |
| Crisp | $95 / not published | $295 / not published | not published |
| Wonderchat | $149 / $125 | $499 / $417 | not published |
| HubSpot Professional | $100 / $90 | $500 / $490 | $2,500 / $2,490 |
| Tidio Lyro | $75 / $62.50 | $700 / $583.33 | contact sales |
| ChatBot.com | $99 / $79 | $891 / $871 | $4,851 / $4,831 |
| Intercom Fin | $138 / $128 | $1,029 / $1,019 | $4,989 / $4,979 |
| Zendesk Suite Team | $259 / $245 | $2,059 / $2,045 | $10,059 / $10,045 |
At 1,000 chats a month the bills run from $49 (ours) and $75 (Chatling) to $2,059 (Zendesk). At 100 chats most tools cost $19 to $150 a month.
The per-resolution tools (HubSpot, ChatBot.com, Intercom, Zendesk) are worked out as if every chat counts as resolved. That is the most you would pay; a chat the AI does not resolve is not charged, so the real bill is lower by that share.
HubSpot also requires a one-time onboarding fee on Professional. Its pricing page does not state the amount in US dollars; the onboarding page we were shown listed 2,500 euros or 2,180 pounds.
Crisp does not publish its yearly price or the price of extra AI credit, so those cells say "not published". Wonderchat does not publish a top-up price and its largest self-serve plan covers 10,000 replies, so 5,000 chats is not published. Tidio's self-serve Lyro prices stop at 1,000 conversations a month.
Introductory discounts are not included: Intercom shows new customers $29 a seat monthly or $19 yearly instead of $39 and $29; HubSpot's Starter has a "limited-time" discount (Starter has no Customer Agent, so it is not used here).
AI Chat for Website is our product, and its row in the table is ours. It bills per visitor message the AI answers: Free (100 a month), Starter $19 a month or $190 a year (2,000), Pro $49 or $490 (6,000), Scale $129 or $1,290 (20,000); 2,000 more messages cost $10 a month. There are no per-seat, per-conversation or per-resolution fees, and nothing is billed automatically for going over. At the limit the assistant stops answering for the rest of the month and tells visitors they can ask for a person or leave their email or phone number; handoff, the live inbox and lead emails keep working. Each website also has a daily usage limit (600,000 tokens a day on Starter, 1,000,000 on Pro and Scale; a token is a small piece of text the AI reads or writes). 5,000 chats a month on one website is about 1,000 answers a day, which fits that limit only if an answer uses 1,000 tokens or fewer. We have not measured that yet, so our 5,000-chat cell stays unpriced until we have. For the same reason we price 1,000 chats on Pro, not on Starter plus two packs ($39). It has no CRM or Zapier connection, and it answers on the website only.
How did we work out these numbers?
One chat equals six questions from the visitor, each answered by the AI. So 100 chats equal 600 AI replies, 1,000 chats equal 6,000, and 5,000 chats equal 30,000. If your visitors ask fewer questions, the per-reply tools get cheaper; the per-conversation and per-resolution tools do not change.
Where a tool charges by credit, we used its cheapest published rate on the plan in use: 1 credit per reply (Chatling and tawk.to on Claude Haiku 4.5, Wonderchat on its fast models). Chatbase does not publish its rate per model on the pricing page, so 1 credit per reply is our assumption for Chatbase.
One seat, one website. For each volume we took the cheapest mix of the vendor's own plans and add-on packs that covers it, rounded up to whole packs, separately for monthly and yearly billing. The yearly figure is the yearly price divided by 12.
SiteGPT is priced on GPT-4.1-mini; its page says GPT-4.1 messages cost 10 times as much.
Every figure can be checked against the vendor's pricing page. The working for 1,000 chats is in the table below.
| Tool | Working |
|---|---|
| AI Chat for Website (ours) | 6,000 messages = Pro's 6,000, so $49 |
| Social Intents | 1,000 conversations = Basic's 1,000, so $79 |
| Chatling | 6,000 credits = Growth's 6,000, so $75 |
| SiteGPT | Starter's 4,000 + one 5,000 pack: $59 + $59 = $118 |
| tawk.to AI Assist | Business's 5,000 + 1,000 bought: $99 + $30 = $129 |
| HelpJet | Pro's 1,000 + 5,000 bought: $29 + 5 x $30 = $179 |
| Chatbase | Basic's 4,000 + 2,000 bought: $150 + 2 x $40 = $230 |
| Crisp | Plus, "around 1,350" conversations: $295 |
| Wonderchat | 6,000 replies is over Basic's 3,000, so Scale (10,000): $499 |
| HubSpot Professional | 1,000 x 50 = 50,000 credits, minus 10,000 included = 40,000 x $0.01 = $400, + $100 seat = $500 |
| Tidio Lyro | the 1,000-conversation tier: $700 |
| ChatBot.com | Growth's 200 + 16 packs of 50: $99 + 16 x $49.50 = $891 |
| Intercom Fin | $39 seat + 1,000 x $0.99 = $1,029 |
| Zendesk Suite Team | $69 seat + (1,000 - 5) x $2.00 = $2,059 |
Why can the same tool cost three times more?
The AI model changes the cost. tawk.to's default "Auto" model costs 3 credits a reply; Claude Haiku 4.5 costs 1. So on Auto, 1,000 chats use 18,000 credits instead of 6,000. Chatling's rates run from 0.5 to 25 credits a reply, and its Free plan only offers models that cost 5 credits a reply, so its 200 free credits are about 40 replies. SiteGPT's larger model divides the allowance by 10. Chatbase says a reply that uses an Action can cost "2x the number of credits".
The plan you need for a person to take over also raises the price. SiteGPT's live inbox with "one tap to take over from the AI" is listed from Growth ($129, or $79 yearly), not Starter. HubSpot's Customer Agent is on Professional ($100 a seat), not Starter. Crisp's Mini plan does not include "AI Knowledge training" (training the AI on your own content), so the realistic Crisp entry plan is Essentials at $95.
Seats add cost for some tools. Intercom, Zendesk, HubSpot and ChatBot.com charge per team member, so a team of three pays the seat fee three times.
Removing the vendor's branding from the widget adds a monthly fee. Chatbase charges $99 a month, HelpJet $79, Chatling $35, tawk.to $29, SiteGPT $39 a month billed yearly, Tidio $16.67 a month as shown with yearly billing.
What happens when you run out?
Some tools stop answering when you hit the limit. Wonderchat states: "Your AI agent will no longer be able to respond to your end customer if you do not top-up the AI credits". HelpJet pauses at the limit unless you turn on auto-recharge, which buys $30 packs up to a monthly spend cap you set. AI Chat for Website stops answering until the next month.
Other tools keep answering and bill you after. tawk.to states: "Excess usage may result in a negative balance that you can settle later".
Some tools offer optional automatic top-up. Chatbase auto-recharge adds credits at $40 per 1,000 when you fall below a threshold you set.
Social Intents, Chatling, SiteGPT, Crisp, Tidio and ChatBot.com do not publish what happens at the limit.
Per-resolution tools have no allowance to run out of; every resolution past the included ones is billed.
Before you buy, find this on the pricing page or ask the vendor, because the answer decides whether a busy month costs you visitors or money.
Is there a free AI chatbot for a website?
Yes. Several tools offer a free plan, but the allowances are small. AI Chat for Website offers a Free plan with 100 answered messages a month, for one website (about 16 chats at six messages each). tawk.to AI Assist Hobby is free with 100 message credits a month (about 16 chats on a 1-credit model). HelpJet Free gives 100 bot replies a month; the bot pauses at the limit. Chatling Free gives 200 credits a month, about 40 replies on the models the Free plan allows. Wonderchat Free gives 50 AI replies a month.
Tidio offers the first 50 Lyro conversations for free, once, not every month. Crisp Free includes no AI credits. Chatbase does not show a free plan on its pricing page as of 14 November 2026. SiteGPT has no free plan ("7-day free trial", card required); ChatBot.com and Social Intents offer 14-day trials.
A free plan covers a test, or a site with a handful of chats a month, not a busy site.
What changed since September?
Our first check was on 22 September 2026. Several prices changed by 14 November 2026.
Chatbase no longer shows its $40 Hobby plan. The cheapest plan is now Basic at $150 a month ($120 billed yearly), with 4,000 credits; it now includes the Helpdesk inbox for human handoff. 100 chats went from $40 to $150 a month.
Wonderchat added a Starter plan ($39, or $32.50 yearly, 500 AI replies) and now states its allowances as AI replies: Basic 3,000, Scale 10,000. Counted in replies, 1,000 chats need Scale, so the figure went from $149 to $499.
HubSpot Professional now includes 10,000 credits a month instead of 3,000. 1,000 chats went from $570 to $500.
This time we could read Zendesk's US prices and its per-resolution fees, so Zendesk is worked out for the first time.
Intercom's list prices are the same, but an outcome now also counts when Fin completes a workflow "including handoffs".
tawk.to's prices are the same, but new AI agents default to a model that costs 3 credits a reply.
No change: SiteGPT, Tidio, ChatBot.com, Crisp, HelpJet, Social Intents, and our own plans.
How do you estimate your own bill?
Count chats, then replies. Run a trial for a week and divide the AI replies by the chats. Our six is an assumption; your number may be lower or higher.
Read which unit the tool bills by (the first table above) and convert your chats into it.
Check which plan includes a person taking over, if you need one, and price that plan.
Find out whether the bot stops at the limit or keeps answering and adds to the bill.
Add seats, branding removal and one-time fees.
Check the date on any price list, this one included.
Frequently asked questions
What is the cheapest AI chatbot for a website?
The lowest monthly bill depends on your volume. At 100 chats a month, AI Chat for Website costs $19, Chatling $25, and tawk.to and HelpJet $29. At 1,000 chats a month, the cheapest options in our table are AI Chat for Website at $49 and Chatling at $75.
Is per-resolution pricing cheaper than per-message pricing?
Not at the volumes in our table. At 1,000 chats, per-resolution tools cost $500 to $2,059 a month if every chat counts as resolved, while per-reply tools cost $49 to $499. If only half the chats are resolved, Intercom at 1,000 chats is $39 + 500 x $0.99 = $534.
Why does the price per reply change between AI models?
Larger models cost the vendor more, so credit-based tools charge more credits per reply for them. For example, tawk.to charges 1 to 10 or more credits per reply, and Chatling charges 0.5 to 25 credits per reply depending on the model selected.
Do I pay when the chatbot hands the visitor to a person?
On Intercom, an outcome now counts when Fin completes a workflow, including handoffs. On Zendesk, a request escalated to a human is not an automated resolution. Per-reply tools count the AI replies before the handoff.
What happens if I run out of chat credits?
Some tools stop answering, such as Wonderchat and AI Chat for Website. Others, like tawk.to, keep answering and bill you later, which can result in a negative balance. Chatbase offers optional automatic top-up. Check the vendor's policy before you buy.