AI Chatbot for Website Cost 2026: $49 to $150/mo

The short answer

Short answer, checked on 6 October 2026: a small business whose website chatbot gives 3,000 answers a month pays $49 to $150 a month on the plans that meter answers, billed monthly on each vendor’s 1-credit model: DocsBot $49, SiteGPT $59, tawk.to AI Assist $89, Denser $119 and Chatbase $150. Plans that meter whole conversations or resolutions cost far more at the same volume: Botpress‘s own calculator says $1,689 a month for 3,000 conversations, and ChatBot.com comes to $2,871 if every chat ends in an AI resolution. Removing the “Powered by” badge adds $29 to $99 a month where it is sold as an add-on.

Tool	Plan that covers 3,000 answers	Per month, billed monthly	Without the vendor’s badge
DocsBot	Personal (5,000 credits)	$49	$499
SiteGPT	Starter (4,000 GPT-4.1-mini messages)	$59	$118
tawk.to AI Assist	Growth $29 + 2,000 bought credits ($60)	$89	$118
Denser	Standard (7,500 queries; Starter caps at 1,500 and no overage price is published)	$119	No published price
Chatbase	Standard (4,000 credits)	$150	$249

List prices from each vendor’s pricing page or help center, read on 6 October 2026. One answer = one bot reply on the vendor’s 1-credit model (Denser: one query). Taxes not included.

What Google’s answer leaves out

When we captured Google’s AI Overview for “best ai chatbot for website” on 5 October 2026, it said of ChatBot: “Pricing starts at $19/user/month.” That is the yearly-billed price. ChatBot.com’s own pricing table, read on 6 October 2026, shows Essential at $25 per user a month billed monthly and $19 billed yearly, and that plan includes 10 AI resolutions a month. Each extra 50 cost $49.50.

The same answer called Botpress a way in “without a heavy initial cost” and tawk.to “budget-friendly”. Both have free tiers, but Botpress Plus is $189 a month billed monthly and its overage packs cannot be switched off, and tawk.to’s AI answers are a separate AI Assist plan once the free 100 message credits a month are gone. None of this shows in a “starts at” line, which is why we price a workload instead.

Why the price tags do not compare

Every vendor here meters a different thing, so two plans at the same price can buy very different amounts of chat:

Credits per message: Chatbase, DocsBot and tawk.to charge per bot reply, and the model you choose sets how many credits a reply costs.
Messages by model: SiteGPT counts GPT-4.1-mini messages, and a GPT-4.1 message counts 10 times.
Queries: Denser sells queries a month and does not define a query on its pricing page; we treat one as one answer.
Tokens: Chat Thing counts input and output tokens times a model multiplier, so no per-answer price can be read from its page.
Conversations: Botpress counts any exchange with at least two messages from the visitor in a billing month as one conversation, however many replies it holds. Tidio counts a Lyro conversation the same way from the first AI reply.
Resolutions: ChatBot.com counts a chat once, when the AI directly solved the customer’s question.

Cost per 1,000 answers on each entry plan

If you use the whole allowance of the cheapest paid plan, on the cheapest model, this is what 1,000 answers cost. Use less and the real rate per answer goes up.

Tool	Entry plan	Per month	Answers included	Per 1,000 answers
DocsBot	Personal	$49	5,000	$9.80
SiteGPT	Starter (GPT-4.1-mini)	$59	4,000	$14.75
Denser	Starter	$39	1,500	$26
tawk.to AI Assist	Growth	$29	1,000	$29
Chatbase	Hobby	$40	700	$57.14

Monthly billing, vendor list prices read on 6 October 2026. Answers = credits, messages or queries at the 1x model.

Going over the allowance is priced differently again: DocsBot adds 5,000 credits for $49 a month, SiteGPT 5,000 messages for $59 a month, tawk.to sells 1,000 credits for $30 that do not expire, and Chatbase recharges 1,000 credits for $40. Denser publishes no overage price, so the next plan up is the only route we can price.

The model you pick can multiply the bill

The prices above assume each vendor’s 1-credit model. Pick a larger one and the same traffic costs more:

On DocsBot, GPT-6.1 Sol costs 10 credits a message and GPT-6 Astra 50, so Personal’s 5,000 credits cover 500 Sol answers. Connecting your own OpenAI key brings any model back to 1x credit use, and you pay OpenAI for the tokens.
On Chatbase, Claude 5.5 Sonnet costs 2 credits a message, so 3,000 answers need 6,000 credits: Standard plus 2,000 recharge credits, $230 a month. An answer that runs an action, such as checking a calendar, can take two model requests and twice the credits.
On SiteGPT, Starter’s 4,000 GPT-4.1-mini messages become 400 GPT-4.1 messages, and 3,000 GPT-4.1 answers need Scale at $429 a month.

The seven tools, priced

DocsBot: $49 for 3,000 answers

DocsBot Personal is $49 a month ($41 a month billed annually) for 1 bot and 5,000 AI credits. Standard is $149 for 3 bots and 15,000 credits; Business is $499 for 10 bots and 60,000 credits, and it is the only plan with unbranded chat widgets. When the monthly credit limit is reached, the bot stops responding and shows visitors an error until you upgrade, add credits or the month resets.

8.3/10desk reviewFull review →

SiteGPT: $59, with no free plan

SiteGPT Starter is $59 a month or $468 a year ($39 a month) for 1 chatbot and 4,000 GPT-4.1-mini messages. Growth is $129 (10,000 messages, 2 chatbots), Scale $429 (40,000 messages, 3 chatbots). Its FAQ says plainly that there is no free plan; every paid plan starts with a 7-day trial that needs a card. Removing SiteGPT branding is a $59 a month add-on on monthly billing.

8.0/10desk reviewFull review →

tawk.to AI Assist: $89, built on a free live chat

tawk.to AI Assist is the AI layer on tawk.to’s chat widget. Hobby is free with 100 message credits a month; Growth is $29 a month or $290 a year for 1,000 credits; Business $99 for 5,000. Each AI message deducts 1 credit, and Smart Reply and AI Commands use credits too. Extra credits are $30 per 1,000 on paid plans and do not expire. When credits run out, AI Assist finishes existing conversations but does not join new ones. The Whitelabel add-on that removes the “Powered by tawk.to” badge is $29 a month. We have no review page for tawk.to yet, so the link goes to the vendor.

Denser: $119, because Starter stops at 1,500

Denser Free gives 20 queries a month with no card. Starter is $39 a month or $384 a year for 1,500 queries; Standard $119 ($1,152 a year) for 7,500; Business $399 for 15,000. Paid plans start with a 7-day trial that needs a card. The pricing page lists no overage or branding price, so a site above 1,500 queries a month moves up a plan.

8.0/10desk reviewFull review →

Chatbase: $150, and the badge costs $99 more

Chatbase Hobby is $40 a month ($32 billed annually) for 700 message credits; Standard is $150 for 4,000; Pro $500 for 15,000. Subscription credits renew on the first of each calendar month and do not carry over. Removing “Powered By Chatbase” is a $99 a month add-on, more than double Hobby. The free plan gives 50 credits a month, and its own page warns: “AI agents get deleted after 14 days of inactivity.”

5.5/10AI Assistant#6 of 15desk reviewFull review →

Chat Thing: from $14, priced in tokens

Chat Thing Basic is $14 a month or $140 a year with 3.5M message tokens; Standard $49 with 19M; Pro $99 with 38M. Branding removal is included from Standard, which makes $49 the lowest unbranded price in this article. How many answers that buys depends on the model’s multipliers and how much of your content each reply pulls in, so we cannot put it in the 3,000-answer table. When tokens run out, visitors see “No more chats available.” Extra tokens are $25 a month per 5,000,000 message tokens.

7.7/10desk reviewFull review →

Botpress: $1,689 for 3,000 conversations

Botpress Free includes 100 conversations a month with no overages. Plus is $189 a month billed monthly ($150 annually) with 250 conversations and $25 of AI usage; Team is $939 ($750 annually) with 1,500 conversations and $150 of AI usage. At 95% of the quota a pack of 100 conversations is added automatically ($65 on Plus, $50 on Team), and its FAQ answers “No.” to whether that can be turned off. AI spend past the included amount is topped up in $10 grants sold at cost. We set its calculator to 3,000 conversations: Team $1,689 a month ($1,500 annually), Plus $2,009. Botpress’s MIT-licensed GitHub repository holds its integrations, developer tools and example bots for Botpress Cloud, not the hosted product; the older self-hostable v12 is AGPL-3.0. We have no review page for Botpress yet, so the link goes to its pricing page.

ChatBot.com: $25 a seat, metered by resolution

ChatBot.com Essential is $25 per user a month ($19 billed yearly) with 10 AI resolutions a month; Growth is $99 ($79 yearly) with 200. Extra resolutions come in packs of 50 for $49.50. Its FAQ says there is no permanent free tier; the 14-day trial needs no card. If all 3,000 chats ended in an AI resolution, Growth plus 56 packs would come to $2,871 a month. White label is Enterprise only.

7.7/10desk reviewFull review →

Which plan fits your site

Under 5,000 answers a month, badge is fine: DocsBot Personal at $49.
Your own branding on a small budget: Chat Thing Standard at $49 if a token allowance suits you, or SiteGPT or tawk.to AI Assist at $118 for 3,000 answers.
Testing before you pay: the free tiers of DocsBot (100 credits), tawk.to (100 credits), Botpress (100 conversations), Chatbase (50 credits) and Denser (20 queries).
Long, multi-turn chats: a conversation meter can work for you, because one Botpress conversation can hold many replies. Price it with the vendor’s own calculator at your real chat count before you sign up.

How we checked

Every price, allowance and unit was read on 6 October 2026 on the vendor’s own pricing page, help center or docs in a rendered browser, with each billing toggle clicked and saved separately. The Botpress totals are the figures its own calculator returned. The 3,000-answer totals are our arithmetic on those list prices, using the cheapest plan that covers the workload. We did not test answer quality, and no score in the boxes below was changed for this article. The Google quotes are from our capture on 5 October 2026. Chatbots answer from your documents, the same retrieval idea our RAG framework comparison covers.

Questions people ask about AI chatbot costs

Is there a free AI chatbot for websites?

Yes, with small allowances. As of 6 October 2026: DocsBot Free gives 100 AI credits a month, tawk.to AI Assist Hobby 100 message credits, Botpress Free 100 conversations, Chatbase Free 50 message credits (agents are deleted after 14 days of inactivity) and Denser Free 20 queries. SiteGPT and ChatBot.com have no free plan, only trials.

How much does an AI chatbot for a website cost per month?

For 3,000 answers a month on monthly billing, $49 to $150 on plans that meter answers (DocsBot, SiteGPT, tawk.to, Denser, Chatbase), checked 6 October 2026. Per-conversation and per-resolution plans cost more: Botpress $1,689 for 3,000 conversations by its own calculator.

What are the top 5 AI chatbots for a small business website by price?

At 3,000 answers a month, billed monthly, on 6 October 2026: DocsBot $49, SiteGPT $59, tawk.to AI Assist $89, Denser $119 and Chatbase $150. Price is not quality; we did not test answers.

Why does the AI model change what a chatbot costs?

Credits per reply rise with model size. On DocsBot, GPT-6.1 Sol costs 10 credits a message against 1 for GPT-6 Luna; on SiteGPT a GPT-4.1 message counts 10 times a GPT-4.1-mini one; on Chatbase Claude 5.5 Sonnet costs 2 credits. Read on 6 October 2026.

What happens when a website chatbot runs out of credits?

It depends on the vendor. DocsBot’s bot stops responding and shows an error; Chat Thing’s widget shows “No more chats available.”; tawk.to finishes existing chats but does not join new ones; Botpress adds a 100-conversation pack automatically and does not let you turn that off. Checked 6 October 2026.

How much does it cost to remove the Powered by badge from a chatbot?

As of 6 October 2026: Chatbase $99 a month, SiteGPT $59 a month, tawk.to Whitelabel $29 a month. DocsBot includes unbranded widgets only on Business ($499), Chat Thing from Standard ($49), and ChatBot.com only on Enterprise.

Is Botpress open source?

Partly. Its main GitHub repository is MIT licensed but holds integrations, developer tools (CLI, SDK, API client) and example bots for Botpress Cloud, not the hosted platform. The older self-hostable v12 repository is AGPL-3.0. Checked on GitHub 6 October 2026.

Sources

Chatbase pricing, read 6 October 2026.
Chatbase docs: models comparison, read 6 October 2026.
DocsBot pricing, read 6 October 2026.
SiteGPT pricing, read 6 October 2026.
Denser pricing, read 6 October 2026.
Chat Thing pricing, read 6 October 2026.
Chat Thing docs: plans, read 6 October 2026.
Chat Thing docs: message tokens, read 6 October 2026.
Chat Thing docs: remove branding, read 6 October 2026.
ChatBot.com pricing, read 6 October 2026.
Botpress pricing, read 6 October 2026.
GitHub REST API, botpress/botpress and botpress/v12, read 6 October 2026.
tawk.to help: AI Assist plans and billing, read 6 October 2026.
tawk.to help: AI Assist message credits, read 6 October 2026.
tawk.to add-ons, read 6 October 2026.
Tidio pricing, read 6 October 2026.
Google results for “best ai chatbot for website” (our SerpAPI capture), read 5 October 2026.