Nathan Field
An AI receptionist costs from $0 to $899 a month on the plans vendors publish, and a small business that gets about 100 calls a month will pay roughly $70 to $240. That is what I found when I checked the pricing pages of eight AI receptionist vendors on 1 October 2026. Below are the real plans and the fees that are easy to miss.
The short answer
For 100 calls a month, the AI receptionist plans I priced cost $69.95 to $236.50. One adds a $499 setup fee. Human answering services cost $384.20 to $915 or more for the same calls. A full-time receptionist costs about $3,170 a month in median pay alone. The monthly price on the page is rarely your whole bill.
One thing first. Havstock does not sell an AI receptionist. Our AI works by chat and text only, and it does not answer phone calls. So I have no plan to push here.
How AI receptionists charge
Every vendor I checked bills in one of four ways. The billing unit matters more than the headline price, because it decides what a busy month costs you.
Per minute
You buy a bucket of minutes, then pay a set rate for each minute over. Dialzara, Rosie, My AI Front Desk and AgentZap work this way. Long calls cost more. An eight-minute caller costs eight times a caller who just asks your hours.
Per call
You pay for a set number of calls, then a rate for each extra call. Upfirst and Smith.ai's AI plans work this way. Your cost per call is the same however long the caller talks. Ask what counts as a call. Wrong numbers, hang-ups and spam can all use up your allowance.
Per caller
Goodcall counts unique customers, not calls. A customer who rings three times in a month counts once. That suits businesses where customers call back to check on a job.
Per location or per agent
Some prices are per AI "agent" (Goodcall) or per location (Slang AI). Two shops or two phone lines can mean two bills. Check this before you sign.
AI receptionist prices from the vendors' own pages
I checked every page below on 1 October 2026. Prices move fast. Some guides that rank for this search already show older prices than the vendors' own pages, so check again before you buy.
| Vendor | Bills by | Plans a month | Included | Extra use |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Smith.ai AI Receptionist | Call | Free / $150 / from $500 | 25 / 75 / 300 calls | $3.00 / $2.50 / $2.17 a call |
| Upfirst | Call | $24.95 / $59.95 / $159.95 / $299 | 30 / 90 / 300 / 600 calls | $1.50 / $1.00 / $0.75 / $0.70 a call |
| Goodcall | Caller | $79 / $129 / $249 per agent | 100 / 250 / 500 unique callers, unlimited minutes | $0.50 a caller |
| Dialzara | Minute | $29 / $99 / $199 / $349 | 60 / 220 / 500 / 1,000 minutes | $0.48 / $0.45 / $0.40 / $0.35 a minute |
| Rosie | Minute | $49 / $149 / $299 | 250 / 1,000 / 2,000 minutes | No rate shown on the page |
| My AI Front Desk | Minute | $99 | 200 minutes, plus web chat, texts and a CRM | $0.25 a minute, paid in credits |
| AgentZap | Minute | $109 / $295 / $899 | 150 / 450 / 1,500 minutes | $0.85 / $0.75 / $0.70 a minute, plus a $499 setup fee |
| Slang AI | Location | $399 / $599 per location | Not listed on the page | Not listed on the page |
A few things the table can't show:
- Free trials. Upfirst gives 14 days. Dialzara, Rosie and My AI Front Desk give 7. Smith.ai has a free AI plan with 25 calls a month, then $3.00 a call.
- Yearly billing costs less. Goodcall takes 15% off ($66, $108 and $208 a month). Upfirst takes 20% off. My AI Front Desk drops to $79 a month. Rosie gives 2 months free.
- Some features sit on higher plans. Rosie books straight into your calendar and transfers live calls from its $149 Scale plan. Its $49 plan sends booking links by text instead. Dialzara's $29 plan only does blind transfers. Warm transfers, where your team hears who is calling first, start at $99.
The same 100 calls, priced on every plan
A price list doesn't tell you what you will pay. So I priced one made-up month on each plan: 100 calls, three minutes each on average (300 minutes), from 100 different people. Swap in your own numbers from your call log.
| Service | Type | Cheapest way to cover it | Cost that month |
|---|---|---|---|
| Upfirst | AI | 90-call plan, plus 10 calls at $1.00 | $69.95 |
| Goodcall | AI | Starter, 100 unique callers | $79 |
| My AI Front Desk | AI | 200 minutes, then 100 minutes in credits ($10 free, then $10 per 1,000 credits) | $119 |
| Dialzara | AI | 220-minute plan, plus 80 minutes at $0.45 | $135 |
| Rosie | AI | Scale (1,000 minutes), as the $49 plan stops at 250 | $149 |
| Smith.ai AI Receptionist | AI | Pro (75 calls), plus 25 calls at $2.50 | $212.50 |
| AgentZap | AI | Starter (150 minutes), plus 150 minutes at $0.85 | $236.50, plus $499 setup once |
| Specialty Answering Service | People | 220-minute plan, plus 80 minutes at $1.44 | $384.20 |
| PATLive | People | 300-minute plan | $479, plus taxes and fees |
| Smith.ai receptionists | People | Basic (90 calls), plus 10 calls at $10.50 | $915 |
| Ruby | People | 200-minute plan, plus 100 minutes at a rate the page doesn't show | More than $720 |
| Full-time receptionist | Hire | Median pay, before taxes and benefits | About $3,170 |
I left Slang AI out because its page doesn't say how many calls $399 covers.
At this volume the cheapest AI plan costs less than a fifth of the cheapest human service ($69.95 against $384.20). And the spread between AI plans is wide: the most expensive is more than three times the cheapest. Same calls, same month. Only the billing unit changed.
The headline price is the least useful number on a pricing page. The billing unit decides your bill.
Setup fees, overages and other costs that are easy to miss
Setup fees
Most self-serve AI plans I checked list no setup fee. AgentZap is the exception. It charges a $499 one-time "training & setup fee", and waives it on the $295 plan if you sign up for six months. Its page also says links to software like Clio, ServiceTitan or Dentrix may need extra setup that the fee doesn't cover. If someone builds one for you, get every fee in writing.
Overage on cheap plans
Starter plans have small buckets. Upfirst's $24.95 plan covers 30 calls, then charges $1.50 a call. At 100 calls that plan costs $129.95, nearly double the $69.95 you would pay on the next plan up. Dialzara's $29 plan covers 60 minutes, then $0.48 a minute.
Price the plan you will really use, not the one on the banner.
Add-ons
Some extras are priced on their own. Rosie's website texting add-on is $50 a month for 25 conversations, then $1 each. Dialzara's outbound calling, where the AI calls people, is a separate plan from $750 a month.
Taxes, spam and contracts
PATLive's prices don't include taxes and fees. Smith.ai doesn't charge for spam calls on its receptionist plans. Upfirst, Rosie, Dialzara and My AI Front Desk all say you can cancel any time.
Cost of an answering service: human vs AI vs a hire
A human answering service uses real people who answer with your business name and follow your script. Here is what four of them charge, from their own pages on 1 October 2026:
| Service | Plans a month | Extra use | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Specialty Answering Service | $44 (no minutes) / $159 (100 min) / $269 (220 min) / $649 (500 min) | $1.54 / $1.44 / $1.44 / $1.34 a minute | Billed by the second. No setup fee. |
| PATLive | $49 (no minutes) / $99 (50 min) / $189 (100 min) / $349 (200 min) / $479 (300 min) | $2.99 / $2.29 / $2.09 / $1.99 / $1.89 a minute | 14-day free trial. US-based live receptionists. |
| Smith.ai receptionists | $300 (30 calls) / $810 (90 calls) / $2,100 (300 calls) | $11.50 / $10.50 / $8.50 a call | No setup fees. Month to month. |
| Ruby | $250 (50 min) / $395 (100 min) / $720 (200 min) / $1,725 (500 min) | No rate shown on the page | No activation, onboarding or setup fees. |
Then there is a hire. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics puts median pay for receptionists at $38,010 a year, or $18.27 an hour, in 2025 (BLS, Receptionists, page updated 27 August 2026). That is about $3,170 a month in pay, before payroll taxes and benefits. And a 40-hour week leaves 128 hours of the week with nobody on the phone.
| Option | Cost for our 100 calls | Good at | Weak at |
|---|---|---|---|
| AI receptionist | $69.95 to $236.50 | Picking up every call, any hour. Routine questions and simple bookings. | Upset or unclear callers. Real emergencies. Anything off the script. |
| Human answering service | $384.20 to $915, or more | Judgement. Worried callers. Getting urgent calls to your on-call person. | Bills climb in busy months. Only as good as the script you give them. |
| Receptionist hire | About $3,170 in pay alone | Knows your customers. Does other work between calls. | Office hours only. Lunch breaks and sick days leave gaps. |
AI wins on price and on picking up. A person still wins on judgement.
Every trade has its own mix of calls, so we wrote this comparison for five of them: the plumbing answering service guide, the HVAC answering service guide, the dental answering service guide, the law firm answering service guide, and the medical answering service guide, where privacy rules change the answer.
AI receptionist, AI chat or a person: what should answer your leads?
Leads don't only phone. They open your website chat at 10pm or text your business number. Each needs a different answer.
| Where the lead shows up | What should answer | Why |
|---|---|---|
| A phone call you can't pick up | A person or an AI receptionist. At the very least, a text back within minutes. | The caller wants help now. If nobody answers, the next business will. |
| Your website, after hours | AI chat that answers from your own facts and books a time | Website visitors often won't call at all. They read, ask, and leave if nobody replies. |
| A text to your business number | A text reply, from AI or a person | They chose text for a reason. Ringing them back can feel pushy. |
| An urgent or upset caller | A person | This is where AI is weakest and a mistake costs the most. |
This is where Havstock fits, and where it doesn't. The AI chat we set up answers website visitors and text messages from facts you approve. It books into your calendar, says it is an AI, and hands the conversation to a person when it should. It does not answer phone calls. For calls you miss, we set up a text that goes out within minutes, so the caller has a reason to wait for you. Our guide to missed call text back shows how that works.
When we set up AI chat for a client, the first thing we write is the handover rule: which questions the AI must pass to a person. Then we test it against a written list of questions before it talks to anyone. Do the same with an AI receptionist.
The cheap part is the software. The work is the rules you give it.
Missed calls can also cost you money now. Google Local Services Ads can charge for some missed calls as if they were leads.
When an AI receptionist is worth it, and when it isn't
It is usually worth trying if:
- Most of your calls are routine: opening hours, prices, directions, moving a booking.
- You miss calls because you are on a job, with a patient, or in court.
- Calls come in at night and at weekends, and right now they go to voicemail.
Be careful, or pick a person, if:
- Your calls include real emergencies. A gas smell or a flooded kitchen needs to reach your on-call person fast. Make sure the AI hands those calls straight to a human, and check which plan includes live transfers.
- Privacy rules apply. Medical offices and law firms have extra rules about who hears what. Read the medical or law firm guide first.
- You get very few calls. Ten missed calls a month may not need a receptionist at all. A text back and a callback list might do.
One more thing if you want the AI to call people, not just answer them. On 8 February 2024 the FCC ruled that calls made with AI-generated voices count as "artificial" under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (FCC news release). That puts them under the same consent rules as robocalls. Ask a lawyer before you switch on outbound AI calls.
Test it like a customer would. Call it ten times, in ten different ways, before your customers do.
Before you sign, call the AI yourself. Ask an easy question, then a messy one. Ask for a person. Describe an emergency. Then read the call summary that lands in your inbox.
How to work out your own AI receptionist cost
- Pull last month's call log from your phone provider.
- Count the calls you missed, plus the ones that came in after hours.
- Note how long those calls lasted on average.
- Count how many different people made them. That matters on per-caller plans.
- Price each plan on those numbers: what's included, plus extra use at the overage rate. Check the next plan up too, as it is often cheaper.
- Add setup fees, add-ons and any features you need that sit on a higher plan.
- Set the total against what one new customer is worth to you.
Our take
If I ran a busy service business, I would cover the phone first. For routine calls, an AI receptionist on a $70 to $150 plan is hard to argue with. For emergencies, I would want a person in the loop: my own on-call team or a human answering service. Then I would make sure website visitors and texters get an answer too.
I should be clear about a limit. I priced these plans from the vendors' own pages. I have not run each product in a live business for a month, so I can't tell you which one sounds best on a bad line. Use the free trials for that.
The phone is only one part of the job. The other part is getting people to call, chat or text in the first place, then following up until they book. That is what we do. Havstock Unlimited is a flat-fee marketing subscription: ads, your website, a CRM, missed-call texts, email follow-up and AI chat that answers and books by chat and text. It does not answer phone calls, and we are not an answering service. If your follow-up is where leads go missing, our guide to automating lead follow-up without losing the human touch is a good place to start.
At $4,995 USD a month, Havstock Unlimited will not suit a business that only needs its phones covered. If that is you, a $59.95 Upfirst plan or a $269 human plan from Specialty Answering Service will do more for you than we can.
FAQ
How much does an AI receptionist cost per month?
On vendors' own pages (1 October 2026), plans run from $0 to $899 a month. Smith.ai has a free plan for 25 calls, Upfirst starts at $24.95 and Dialzara at $29. For about 100 calls a month, the plans I priced came to $69.95 to $236.50, before any setup fee.
Which AI receptionist is the cheapest?
By sticker price, Smith.ai's free AI plan (25 calls a month, then $3.00 a call), then Upfirst at $24.95 for 30 calls and Dialzara at $29 for 60 minutes. The cheapest for you depends on your call volume. Small plans charge high overage rates, so price the plan you will really use.
Are AI receptionists worth it?
For routine calls, usually yes. They answer every call at once, any hour, for a fraction of a human service. They are weaker with upset callers and emergencies. Use one for the routine calls, make sure urgent calls reach a person, and test it yourself before customers rely on it.
Is an AI receptionist cheaper than hiring a receptionist?
Yes, by a long way. A receptionist's median pay was $38,010 a year in 2025 (US Bureau of Labor Statistics), about $3,170 a month before taxes and benefits. The AI plans I priced cost $69.95 to $236.50 for 100 calls. But a hire does far more than answer calls, and covers office hours well.
Is there a free answering service?
Not really. Smith.ai's free AI plan covers 25 calls a month, then charges $3.00 a call. Most others offer free trials instead: 14 days at Upfirst and PATLive, 7 days at Dialzara, Rosie and My AI Front Desk. Use the trial to test real calls, not just the demo.
Do AI receptionists charge setup fees?
Most self-serve plans I checked don't. AgentZap charges a $499 one-time training and setup fee, waived on its $295 plan with a six-month term. Custom builds by an agency or freelancer usually come with their own fee, so ask for every cost in writing before you agree.
How do I get an AI receptionist?
Pick a plan, then give the AI your business facts. Upfirst, for example, starts from your website. Write rules for urgent calls and who gets transfers. Forward your missed or after-hours calls to it. Then call it yourself several times before you let it answer customers.
Does Havstock sell an AI receptionist?
No. Our AI works by chat and text only. It answers website visitors and text messages, books appointments and hands over to a person, but it does not answer phone calls. For missed calls we set up an automatic text back. If you need your phone answered, use one of the services above.
An AI receptionist is now cheap enough that cost is rarely the real question. The real questions are which billing unit fits your calls, what sits behind the setup fee, and who picks up when a call is urgent. Price your own month, test the free trials, and your AI receptionist cost will hold no surprises.