Chatbase Pricing Explained (2026): Credits, Add-Ons and Real Costs

Chatbase's pricing page is short, but the number on it is not the number on your invoice. The page opens with yearly billing switched on, the unit is a message credit whose value changes with the AI model, and a reply that looks up an order costs twice as much as one that does not.

This guide is for founders, store owners and support leads pricing Chatbase, or already on Hobby and watching credits fall faster than expected. You will be able to convert credits into answers, price every add-on, and check three worked months against your own traffic and a flat-priced plan.

PepoChat is our product; we include it where it fits and say where other tools are the better choice. Facts below were checked on vendor pages on 11 November 2026. We read Chatbase's pricing page and documentation that day and did not run a paid trial, so every figure is Chatbase's own or arithmetic on it.

How much does Chatbase cost in 2026?

Chatbase costs $40 a month for Hobby, $150 for Basic and $500 for Business on monthly billing in November 2026, or $32, $120 and $400 a month billed yearly, while Enterprise is priced by quote.

Prices from Chatbase's pricing page, checked 11 November 2026, in US dollars before tax.

The Chatbase pricing page loads with the "Yearly 20% off" toggle on, so the large figures you see first are yearly prices divided by twelve. Hobby's $32 is $384 paid up front; "Save $96 yearly" is the gap against twelve payments of $40.

Every self-serve plan includes one AI agent and 40 MB of training content, measured as extracted text rather than file size. The plans also differ in 5, 8 or 12 AI Actions per agent, 2, 4 or 6 Procedures, and 200, 500 or 1,000 test credits a month. Enterprise pricing, in the FAQ's words, "is based on a commitment to message credits, conversations, or resolutions."

Chatbase Hobby vs Basic: what does the extra $110 buy?

Moving from Hobby to Basic costs $110 more a month and buys 3,300 more credits, a third member, and the features Hobby lacks: the Chatbase Helpdesk inbox, voice and phone, API access, automatic re-sync of sources, and the Stripe, Zapier and helpdesk integrations.

Hobby is more capable than its price suggests. It includes the advanced models from every provider Chatbase lists, file attachments, basic analytics, and the Shopify, Slack, WhatsApp, Messenger, Instagram, Calendly and WordPress connections.

What Hobby cannot do is hand a chat to a person inside Chatbase, because the Helpdesk inbox starts on Basic, as do Zendesk, Salesforce, HubSpot, Freshdesk and the other helpdesk connections. Business then adds advanced analytics, source suggestions, closed tickets and Zendesk macros as training sources, 20 concurrent calls instead of 10, and two more members.

The price per credit falls as you climb: about 5.7 cents on Hobby ($40 ÷ 700), 3.75 cents on Basic ($150 ÷ 4,000) and 3.3 cents on Business ($500 ÷ 15,000). Recharge credits cost 4 cents, so on Hobby the credits you top up are cheaper than the ones in the plan.

What is a Chatbase message credit?

A Chatbase message credit is the unit deducted each time the AI agent sends a request to its AI model, and the number deducted per request depends on the model the agent uses.

A message credit is Chatbase's billing unit for AI usage: one request to a 1-credit model uses one, and stronger models use more. The pricing FAQ defines it this way:

"Each request made to the AI model costs a certain number of message credits depending on your chosen model. If you have any Actions enabled, the agent might make multiple requests to the AI model to generate the response."

Subscription credits "renew at the beginning of each calendar month, and any unused credits do not carry over", on the 1st whatever day you subscribed. Auto-recharge credits, bought on top, "do not expire and are always available." Test credits are a separate monthly pool, and test replies cost as much as real ones.

Because Chatbase counts requests rather than conversations, a long back-and-forth costs credits on every reply, unlike the per-conversation meter in our Tidio pricing explainer. The AI customer support pricing index sets Chatbase's unit beside thirty other vendors'.

How many credits does each Chatbase model use?

Each Chatbase reply costs 1, 2, 4 or 5 credits depending on the model: Auto, GPT-6 Luna and Claude 5.5 Haiku cost 1, Claude 5.5 Sonnet, GPT-6.1 Sol and Gemini 3.8 Flash cost 2, GPT-5.5 costs 4 and Claude 5.5 Opus costs 5.

Credits per model from Chatbase's FAQ and models comparison page, checked 11 November 2026. Reply counts assume no Actions.

The full list in the Chatbase FAQ puts twelve models at 2 credits, GPT-5.5 at 4, Claude 5.5 Opus at 5 and "All other models" at 1. Auto, a model option Chatbase built itself, is the default for new agents at 1 credit a message.

Chatbase's own advice is sensible. Its models comparison page says: "Test your hardest real questions against two or three tiers before committing. If the cheaper model handles them, the extra credits buy you nothing."

Why does a Chatbase Action double the credits?

A Chatbase reply that runs an Action costs twice the model's usual credits, because the agent calls the model once to run the Action and a second time to write the answer from its result.

An Action in Chatbase is a task the agent performs in another system, such as reading Calendly slots, checking a Shopify order or opening a ticket. The Actions overview states the rule: "When the AI agent triggers an Action, it uses the model twice: once to run the Action, and once to write the reply from the result."

For a month, the arithmetic is replies × model credits × (1 + the share of replies that run an Action). If a third of your replies check an order on a 2-credit model, every 1,000 replies costs about 2,667 credits, not 2,000.

Two more things add credits. Chatbase's channels documentation says attachments are charged per image and per PDF page, and again when the same message triggers an Action. And voice has its own meter: "Every voice session consumes 6 message credits per minute", plus the model's credits per reply. Chatbase's example, a 10-minute call with 15 requests on a 1-credit model, is 10 × 6 + 15 × 1 = 75 credits. Voice starts on Basic.

What happens when Chatbase credits run out?

When a Chatbase workspace runs out of message credits, the agent stops answering and shows visitors "This AI Agent is currently unavailable. If you are the owner, please check your account." until credits are added or the month renews.

There is no automatic overage. The safety net is auto-recharge: you set a threshold, and when credits fall below it Chatbase adds non-expiring credits at $40 per 1,000. Switch it on before launch if a dark widget in the last week of the month would cost more than the top-up.

Recharges also signal when to change plans: three a month on Hobby is $40 + $120 = $160 for 3,700 credits, more than Basic's $150 for 4,000.

What do Chatbase add-ons cost?

Chatbase sells auto-recharge credits at $40 per 1,000, badge removal at $99 a month, extra agents and 10 MB storage blocks at $25 a month each, and extra members at $25 a month, while custom domains are Enterprise only.

Add-on cards and the price list embedded in Chatbase's pricing page, plus its workspace settings docs, checked 11 November 2026.

Four add-on cards are visible on the pricing page; the extra-member price and the yearly prices come from the price list embedded in the same page. The workspace settings docs add three rules: "monthly plans can only include monthly add-ons, and yearly plans can only include yearly add-ons"; cancelling an add-on removes it at once and credits the unused days; and when you remove a person, "the number of extra member slots does not decrease automatically, so billing remains the same."

The badge fee matters most on small plans. A badge-free Hobby agent costs $40 + $99 = $139 a month, more than three times the plan.

Is Chatbase free?

Chatbase has no free plan on its pricing page as of November 2026; each paid plan starts with a 7-day trial, and the only free tier Chatbase mentions is where an account lands after a paid plan is cancelled.

The workspace settings docs say a cancelled plan stays active until the renewal date, "after which you'll be downgraded to the free plan", and that "Free users must subscribe to a base plan before adding any add-ons." No credit allowance is published for that free state, so treat it as a holding account, not a live website plan. The pricing page does not say whether the trial asks for a card.

Start the trial on Basic if you need to see the Helpdesk inbox or voice, because Hobby has neither.

What does Chatbase cost for a small site, a growing store and a busy SaaS?

On November 2026 list prices with monthly billing, a small site answering 500 questions pays $40 a month on Hobby, a store answering 2,000 on a 2-credit model about $230 on Basic, and a SaaS answering 6,000 with a five-person team about $320.

The three months use four assumptions:

1. Monthly billing, prices before tax, and the Chatbase badge left on.
2. Each answer is one model request, plus one more when it runs an Action.
3. Recharges are bought in 1,000-credit units at $40, as the add-on card lists them. Leftover recharge credits carry over, so a steady month averages a little less than shown.
4. No attachments or voice, and testing stays inside the plan's test credits.

Prices from Chatbase's pricing page, checked 11 November 2026, before tax.

Small site: 500 answers on Auto

The site uses the default Auto model and no Actions, so 500 × 1 = 500 credits, inside Hobby's 700. The bill is $40 a month, or $32 billed yearly, and $139 with the badge removed.

On Claude 5.5 Sonnet the same month needs 500 × 2 = 1,000 credits, 300 more than Hobby holds, so one recharge: $40 + $40 = $80. On Claude 5.5 Opus it needs 2,500 credits, so two recharges: $40 + $80 = $120, still cheaper than Basic.

Growing store: 2,000 answers, a third with an Action

The store runs Claude 5.5 Sonnet at 2 credits, and about 667 of its 2,000 answers check an order. Plain answers cost 1,333 × 2 = 2,666 credits and Action answers 667 × 4 = 2,668, so the month needs 5,334 credits.

Hobby would need five recharges: $40 + 5 × $40 = $240. Basic needs two on top of its 4,000: $150 + 2 × $40 = $230, and it adds the Helpdesk inbox so a person can take over. The model setting moves this bill more than anything else:

The Opus row is 1,333 × 5 + 667 × 10 = 13,335 credits; Basic plus ten recharges would cost $550, so Business at $500 is cheaper.

Busy SaaS: 6,000 answers, 1,000 with a Stripe Action

The SaaS keeps Auto at 1 credit, and 1,000 of its 6,000 answers check a subscription through Stripe, which starts on Basic. That is 5,000 × 1 + 1,000 × 2 = 7,000 credits.

Basic covers 4,000, so three recharges fill the gap: $150 + 3 × $40 = $270. Five support people need two members beyond Basic's three: $270 + 2 × $25 = $320. On a 2-credit model the month needs 14,000 credits, the Basic route rises to $600, and Business at $500 with five members becomes the cheaper plan.

Which Chatbase costs do people miss?

The Chatbase costs most budgets miss are the yearly prices shown first, Actions and attachments that multiply credits, a widget that stops at zero credits, and add-ons priced per agent or per member.

• The first price is a yearly one. $32 is Hobby billed at $384 a year; month to month it is $40.
• Unused credits vanish on the 1st. Only recharge credits carry over.
• Voice is metered twice. At the recharge price, Chatbase's own 75-credit, 10-minute call example costs 75 × $0.04 = $3.00.
• Testing a pricier model costs more. A 5-credit model uses test credits five times faster.
• One agent per plan. A second brand or product site needs an extra agent at $25 a month.
• 40 MB of text per agent. Four storage blocks take it to 80 MB for $100 a month.
• Removed seats still bill until you lower the extra-member count.

Who is Chatbase good value for?

Chatbase is good value for teams that need one AI agent across messaging channels, for Shopify stores that want the agent to handle orders and returns, and for teams that want to choose their model, especially on Business, where a credit costs about 3.3 cents.

Channel breadth is the clearest case. Hobby at $40 already deploys the same agent to the website, WhatsApp, Messenger, Instagram and Slack, and Basic adds voice, phone through Twilio or a SIP trunk, and the Helpdesk inbox. Commerce depth is the second: Chatbase's Shopify Actions, on Hobby, cover product search, carts, order tracking, returns and exchanges, and its Stripe Actions, from Basic, let customers change plans and update billing details in the chat.

Model choice is the third. A team can run routine questions on 1-credit Auto and keep a stronger model for a technical agent. The pricing page also lists SOC 2 Type II and GDPR, with HIPAA eligibility on Enterprise. For per-outcome billing, the other common model, see our Intercom Fin pricing explainer.

Chatbase is weaker value for a low-volume team that needs a person to take over chats, since the inbox starts at $150, and for anyone who needs the badge off on a small budget.

What do flat-priced alternatives to Chatbase cost?

Flat-priced alternatives charge a fixed number of replies or messages per plan instead of credits that vary with the model and with Actions, and near Chatbase Hobby's $40 they include PepoChat Starter, Wonderchat Starter and SiteGPT Starter.

Prices from each vendor's own pages, checked 11 November 2026.

Wonderchat's pricing page does not publish a top-up price, and Wonderchat still charges more per reply on its frontier models. SiteGPT's pricing page counts both sides of an exchange, so 4,000 messages is about 2,000 answers, and sells 5,000 extra messages for $59 a month. Chatbase vs CustomGPT vs SiteGPT compares two more rivals in depth.

What would the same three months cost on PepoChat?

On PepoChat's November 2026 plans the same three months cost $39, $78 and $188, because PepoChat counts one AI reply per answer, with no per-model credits and no extra charge when an answer runs an action.

An AI reply in PepoChat is one answer the agent generates in a visitor conversation. A reply that looks up a Shopify order or a Stripe subscription still counts once, replies your team types in the team inbox are free, and test chats are free. There is no model menu: PepoChat picks the model, so every reply costs the same.

Chatbase prices from its pricing page and PepoChat prices from its own billing page, checked 11 November 2026, monthly billing before tax.

The arithmetic: the small site's 500 replies fit Starter's 1,000, so $39 ($32.50 a month billed yearly). The store's 2,000 replies are 1,000 past Starter's allowance, so $39 + 1,000 × $0.039 = $78. The SaaS's 6,000 replies on Growth are $149 + 1,000 × $0.039 = $188, with 10 members included; Starter plus overage would be $39 + 5,000 × $0.039 = $234. To be fair to Chatbase, the store on its 1-credit Auto model costs $120, so the gap is widest when you run 2-credit models.

PepoChat also has a free plan: 100 AI replies a month with the team inbox and human handoff, after which new conversations go to the inbox instead of a dark widget. Paid plans keep answering past the allowance and bill the extra, as the billing docs explain. And the inbox, 22 prebuilt actions and Cal.com or PepoSmart booking are on every plan, where Chatbase's inbox starts at $150.

PepoChat's limits are real. The small "Powered by PepoChat" line shows on every plan and no add-on removes it, while Chatbase sells removal for $99. There is no model picker and no self-serve spend cap. It answers on the web widget and, on paid plans, by phone, with WhatsApp and Messenger in limited rollout, where Chatbase has them on Hobby. Its Shopify action finds orders by order number only, its Stripe actions do not change plans, and it is a young product with few public reviews. Our Chatbase vs PepoChat comparison covers the rest.

Plans are listed on the pricing page, and you can start a free PepoChat workspace without a card and run it next to a Chatbase trial.

What to do next

• Export last month's conversation count, estimate the share of answers that would run an Action, and multiply by your model's credits using the tables above.
• For the table-first version with a migration checklist, see the Chatbase alternative page.
• If the numbers push you to switch, our best Chatbase alternatives ranks nine options by the reason you are leaving.
• Put the same volume through PepoChat's plans, then create a free workspace, add your website as one knowledge source, and compare a week of answers with your Chatbase usage page.