On most conversation platforms the AI agent unlocks somewhere up the price list, and the bill grows with how many people you talk to. On HiQBot the agent ships on the entry plan, contacts are not counted, and nothing bills past the allowance. Underneath that, it ships tuned to six industries rather than as one general assistant you configure yourself. Below is what to check on any platform you are weighing, including where we are the wrong answer.
Competitor figures read from their own pricing pages, dated below.
The axes that matter
Sticker price is the least useful column. What decides the invoice is what a platform counts and what it does when you pass the line.
| What differs | HiQBot | What we see elsewhere |
|---|---|---|
| Where the AI agent sits | Every plan, from $49 | Commonly an upper tier. respond.io lists AI Agents from their Growth plan, $159 a month billed yearly or $199 monthly. |
| What one credit buys | One reply, at the Core level. Stronger levels think harder and draw more. | Their AI credits are drawn by the agent’s steps, so a single reply that calls a tool costs several. |
| What gets metered | AI replies only, as credits. Contacts are not counted. | respond.io meters monthly active contacts and AI credits, separately. |
| Past the allowance | AI replies pause. Nothing bills automatically. | respond.io charges $12 per 100 extra contacts on Growth, $15 per 100 on Advanced, and $15 per 1,000 extra AI credits. |
| Unused allowance | Carries two billing periods on monthly plans. | respond.io resets with the cycle. Gallabox publishes no policy. |
| Channels on the entry plan | Website chat, WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, Telegram and LINE, all six at $49. | Check where WhatsApp itself sits in the price list, not only where the AI does. |
| A channel with no AI on it | Set any channel to live chat. It skips the agent and draws no per-reply credit. | Worth asking for. It is the answer to accounts you do not want an AI touching. |
| How the agent is tuned | Six industry packs, each with its own way of qualifying and its own closing tool. | Usually one general assistant plus a flow builder you configure yourself. |
The actual argument
Price and channel lists move. These do not, because they are how the product is built rather than how it is packaged.
It ships tuned to six industries: automotive, hospitality, restaurants, SaaS, travel, and e-commerce and retail. Each pack carries its own way of qualifying and its own way of closing. The restaurant one handles menu questions, dietary questions and opening hours, and its qualifying brief opens by working out whether a guest wants a table or an order.
Not a general assistant with a flow chart bolted on.
DMs answered by the full agent, comment rules that open a DM, insights and publishing, all in the same dashboard and all on the $49 plan. Most tools in this category do Instagram DMs and stop there, or sell the comment rule as a product on its own.
Four capabilities where the category usually ships one.
Fully shipped on every plan, from $49. In Japan, Thailand and Taiwan, LINE is the app people open to message a business, the way WhatsApp is in Brazil or India. Tools that handle LINE properly are usually priced for large support organisations, and tools priced for small teams tend to skip it.
The channel most platforms at this price skip entirely.
The engine, every channel connection and the inbox are ours end to end. One consequence you can see: each channel runs its own agent, so WhatsApp can behave differently from Instagram while both land in one inbox.
Why the channels behave the same once they hit the inbox.
Side by side
Their AI Agent starts on Growth, $159 a month billed yearly or $199 monthly. Ours starts at $49.
Tiers verified 11 September 2026: Starter $79, Growth $159 and Advanced $279 a month billed yearly, or $99, $199 and $349 billed monthly. Tier for tier we sit below at all three on either basis, and the agent is not held back.
Read the respond.io comparisonAI on WhatsApp and Instagram from $248 a month billed annually, $331 billed quarterly. Ours from $49.
Prices verified 11 September 2026. Gallabox sells quarterly or yearly only, with no month-to-month option.
Read the Gallabox comparisonInstagram starts on their Advanced seat, $85 a month billed annually. Ours is on the $49 plan.
Verified 11 September 2026 on their pricing page and help centre. Seats are $29, $85 and $132 a month billed annually, and Fin bills $0.99 per outcome on top. A broader product than ours: phone, SMS, email and a public API.
Read the Intercom comparisonBills per active contact, and WhatsApp starts on Pro at $29 a month billed annually, $39 monthly. Ours: no contact count, agent on every plan.
Figures from their own pricing page as archived 6 September 2026, because their live page blocks automated readers. 250 active contacts on Essential and 2,500 on Pro, then per-contact overage. The right tool for a creator running one Instagram account.
Read the ManyChat comparisonA person to answer the conversation starts at $150 a month billed monthly. Ours: live chat from $139 billed monthly, with the agent on every plan.
Verified 11 September 2026. Hobby $40, Standard $150 and Pro $500 a month billed monthly, one AI agent per plan and $25 a month for each extra one. Strong on voice, telephony and model choice; no Telegram or LINE.
Read the Chatbase comparisonCharged per user, and the AI agent is sold through Text from $19 per user a month. Ours is on every plan from $49.
Verified 30 September 2026. Starter $19, Team $49, Business $79 per person a month billed annually, or $25, $59, $89 billed monthly. Stronger on agent tooling, Apple Messages, SMS and compliance.
Read the LiveChat comparisonNow Text’s AI Agent: 10 AI resolutions a month on Essential, refills of 50 added automatically at $49.50. Ours: 2,500 credits from $49, nothing added automatically.
Verified 30 September 2026. Essential $19 and Growth $79 per user a month billed yearly, $25 and $99 monthly. Reports sales per chat; Telegram “coming soon” and no LINE in Text’s dashboard; Instagram DMs only in what we saw.
Read the ChatBot.com comparisonSleekFlow and WATI comparisons are being written and will be linked here when they are published.
The metering argument
respond.io counts two things: monthly active contacts, meaning unique people you exchange messages with in a month, and AI credits. Verified on their pricing page on 11 September 2026, going past either is billable. Extra contacts are $12 per 100 on Growth and $15 per 100 on Advanced. Extra AI credits are $15 per 1,000.
The credits are not comparable units either. Theirs are drawn by the agent's steps, so one reply that looks something up or calls a tool spends more than one credit, and an allowance quoted in credits is worth fewer replies than it reads. A HiQBot credit is one reply at the Core level. Pick a stronger level and it thinks harder and draws more, but the level is yours to set per inbox and the page always tells you which one a number assumes.
HiQBot does not count contacts at all. Credits are prepaid, and when they run out the AI stops replying until you renew or add a pack. The number on the invoice is the number you agreed to.
Which model suits you depends on shape, not size. Many contacts each sending one message is expensive per contact and cheap in replies. Few contacts holding long conversations is the reverse. Work out which one you are before comparing headline prices.
Read on 11 September 2026, respond.io includes 5,000 AI credits on Starter and starts at 10,000, 20,000 and 40,000 on Growth, Advanced and Enterprise, with monthly active contacts unlimited on Starter and starting at 1,000 on Growth and Advanced. The worked total (3,000 contacts and 3,000 replies at $459 a month on their Growth, at their yearly-billed rate, against $139 on our Starter) is on the respond.io comparison.
Website chat, WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, Telegram, LINE. 2,500 credits.
Live chat for two seats, support agent, tickets, Jira. 6,000 credits.
Starter plus WhatsApp calling and five seats. 10,000 credits.
Stronger AI levels think harder and draw more.
Optional add-ons
None of them fire on their own. Meta bills WhatsApp message fees to your own account separately, and we do not mark those up.
Being straight about it
If any of these is load-bearing for you, buy something else. Finding out in week three is worse for both of us.
A knowledge base that syncs from your other tools. The agent answers from the documents you upload.
SMS or email as a conversation channel. Neither is built.
A public API, webhooks or Zapier. None exist for customers.
A CRM other than HubSpot. Salesforce, Pipedrive and Zendesk are not connected.
Reservation-system sync. The agent takes a booking into the dashboard; it does not read live table availability.
An AI that answers phone calls. Growth has human WhatsApp calling and transcription of voice notes, not an AI on a call.
Yes. Solo at $49 runs the same agentic engine as the other two tiers. What changes higher up is the entitlement profile: Starter adds live chat behind the agent and a support agent that resolves rather than only sells, and Growth adds WhatsApp calling, five seats and 10,000 credits.
AI replies pause until the plan renews or you add a credit pack. Nothing bills automatically. There is no overage on a HiQBot plan, which is the whole difference from a metered platform.
On monthly plans, for two billing periods, provided the renewal is paid on time. The current month is always spent first. Annual plans do not carry.
A credit pack is $20 for 1,000 credits. Voice minutes are $15 for 150. An extra live-chat agent seat is $15 a month. All three are optional and none of them fire on their own.
Yes. A number can only sit with one provider at a time, so you remove it from the current one and connect it here through Embedded Signup in the dashboard.
Put the agent on one channel for a week and compare it to the tool you are paying for. That answers more than a feature table will.