I build AI phone agents for small businesses, and the first question is always the same: what will this actually cost me per month? Vendor pricing pages make that hard, because everyone meters differently: minutes, calls, "unique customers", credits. So I put 10 providers on one page and worked out the bill at three call volumes.
Every price below comes from the vendor's own pricing page, checked on 13 November 2026. The full version with sources is on the OpsThrive guide.
The short answer
- Packaged AI receptionist: $29 to $599 a month (Dialzara, Goodcall, My AI Front Desk, Rosie, NextPhone)
- Hybrid AI + human: $300 to $2,100 a month (Smith.ai)
- Voice platform you build on: about $0.08 to $0.16 per minute (Bland, Vapi, Retell)
- Human receptionist: median $18.27/hour, $38,010/year (US BLS, May 2025), about $3,170 a month in wages alone
Cheapest plan per provider
| Provider | Cheapest plan | Metered by | Setup fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dialzara | $29/mo (60 min) | Minutes, overage $0.35-0.48/min | None |
| Rosie | $49/mo (250 min) | Minutes | Not listed |
| Goodcall | $79/mo (100 customers) | Unique customers | Free demo agent |
| My AI Front Desk | $99/mo, $79 annual (200 min) | Minutes + credits, $0.25/min over | Not listed |
| NextPhone | $199/mo, $166 annual | Unlimited calls | None |
| Smith.ai | $300/mo (30 calls) | Calls, AI + humans | None |
| Bland | $0 platform fee | $0.14/min + telephony | Your build |
| Vapi | $0 to start | $0.05/min hosting + components | Your build |
| Retell | $0 to start | $0.055/min + components | Your build |
| Synthflow | From $30,000/yr | Enterprise | Quote |
What you'd pay at 100, 300 and 1,000 calls a month
Assuming 4 minutes per call. Where a vendor doesn't publish overage, I used the next plan up.
| Route | 100 calls (400 min) | 300 calls (1,200 min) | 1,000 calls (4,000 min) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dialzara | $180 | $419 | $1,399 |
| Goodcall | $79 | $129 | $299 |
| My AI Front Desk | $149 | $349 | $1,049 |
| Rosie | $149 | $299 | overage not published |
| NextPhone | $199 | $199 | $199 |
| Smith.ai | $915 | $2,100 | $8,050 |
| Bland (custom agent) | $56 + telephony | $168 + telephony | $560 + telephony |
| Vapi / Retell (custom agent) | $32-64 | $96-192 | $320-640 |
What I'd take away from this
- Packaged plans are cheapest to start, platforms are cheapest to run. Under ~150 calls a month, Goodcall or Rosie is hard to beat. Past a few hundred calls, per-minute platforms win, but someone has to build and maintain the agent.
- Overage is the real bill. Dialzara's $0.35-0.48/min above plan is 3-6x the platform rates. Size the plan for your busiest month.
- "Unlimited" removes the guesswork. NextPhone at a flat $199 is the simplest budget at high volume.
- Humans cost per call, AI costs per minute. Smith.ai's $7-10 per call is what a person in the loop costs; it doesn't scale like AI minutes.
- Telephony is extra almost everywhere on the platforms: a number plus carrier minutes (Twilio, Telnyx, Vonage).
If you're comparing these for your own business, the full guide has the per-plan tables, platform component rates and the FAQ: AI Receptionist Pricing in 2026.
