Voice AI agents cost $0.04–0.16 per minute all-in
Pipecat Cloud (Daily) is the cheapest at list price, from $0.040/min. Bundled platforms like Deepgram Voice Agent API, ElevenLabs Agents, Bland AI run $0.080–$0.155/min. Each figure adds up the platform fee, speech-to-text, the LLM, text-to-speech and the phone carrier.
10platforms tracked
2026-10-15last price check
1logged price changes
| Cheapest 6 | All-in $/min |
|---|---|
| Pipecat Cloud | $0.040–$0.070 |
| LiveKit Cloud | $0.048–$0.060 |
| Cartesia | $0.060–$0.074 |
| Telnyx Voice AI Agents | $0.060–$0.070 |
| Deepgram Voice Agent API | $0.080–$0.090 |
| Vapi | $0.090–$0.140 |
All-in cost per minute, 10 platforms Click a column header to sort
| Platform | All-in $/min low | All-in $/min high | Concurrency incl. | BYO carrier / SIP | HIPAA / BAA | Billing increment | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pipecat Cloud (Daily)infra | $0.040 | $0.070 | unlimited | Yes | Unverifiedenterprise | not stated | Pipecat Cloud pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| LiveKit Cloud (Agents)infra | $0.048 | $0.060 | 5/20/50+request via dashboard | Yes | YesScale ($500/mo) | not stated | LiveKit Cloud pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| Cartesia (Sonic TTS / Managed Agents)model-provider | $0.060 | $0.074 | 3-12 managed agents (plan-dependent)Enterprise | Unverified | YesEnterprise (BAA) | not stated | Cartesia pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| Telnyx Voice AI Agentscarrier | $0.060 | $0.070 | 500 | is the carrier | Yesall plans (vendor claim) | 60s per call (voice engine) | Telnyx Voice AI Agents pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| Deepgram Voice Agent APIbundled | $0.080 | $0.090 | 45 (PAYG) / 60 (Growth) voice agent WSSEnterprise | BYO (API-level; connect via Twilio/Telnyx media streams) | YesEnterprise (BAA) | per second | Deepgram Voice Agent API pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| Vapiorchestrator | $0.090 | $0.140 | 4add-on | Yes | Yesadd-on (BAA) | not stated | Vapi pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| ElevenLabs Agentsbundled | $0.090 | $0.120 | 4-40 by planburst up to 3x at 2x rate | Yes | YesEnterprise (BAA) | not stated | ElevenLabs Agents pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| Retell AIorchestrator | $0.093 | $0.125 | 20$8/concurrent/month | Yes | YesEnterprise (BAA) | per second | Retell AI pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| Bland AIbundled | $0.130 | $0.155 | 10 / 50Enterprise | Yes | YesEnterprise (BAA) | not stated | Bland AI pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
| Synthflowbundled | — | — | custom | Yes | Unverified | not stated | Synthflow pricing pagechecked 2026-10-15 |
All-in means one minute of a US PSTN call on a mid-tier LLM. These are our estimates; each platform page lists the assumptions.
Monthly cost by vendor
| Platform | Monthly cost | Effective $/min | Notes |
|---|
Model: usage × (AI rate + carrier rate) + plan fee − included minutes + extra concurrency. Carrier rates assumed: $0.010–0.018/min on vendor numbers, $0.004–0.005/min on your own SIP trunk. If concurrency needs a contract tier, we show “Needs a higher plan” instead of a price. Synthflow isn’t included because it publishes no rate.