AI Voice Agent Pricing 2026: Per-Minute Rates and Plans Compared

For about 100 calls a month, roughly $28 to $166 a month, in US dollars. The cheapest on published prices is ElevenAgents, if you build it yourself; the Jobber AI Receptionist, Reception.ai, and HighLevel sit in between. Housecall Pro does not publish its CSR AI price. A human answering service for the same calls costs $479 or more. Comparing with hiring a receptionist, or working out whether it pays for itself? See how much an AI receptionist costs.

The bigger difference is how each one bills, because that decides what a busy month does to your bill:

• Per conversation: Jobber, with an allowance and a charge for each extra conversation.
• Per minute: HighLevel pay-per-use and ElevenAgents, plus phone and AI model charges.
• Per credit: Reception.ai, one credit per phone minute, from a monthly allowance.
• Flat: HighLevel's Unlimited AI plan, and Jobber's Plus plan, which includes the receptionist.
• Unpublished: Housecall Pro CSR AI, priced through a sales demo.

An AI receptionist bill can have up to four parts. Which ones apply depends on the product:

"Not listed separately" means the vendor's pricing page and help articles do not show a separate charge; it does not guarantee there is none.

The entry point for each, and what you get for it:

From getjobber.com/pricing and Jobber's Help Center (Receptionist, updated July 9, 2026; Add-on Features, updated August 13, 2026), housecallpro.com/pricing (prices shown after its plan finder questions), gohighlevel.com/pricing and HighLevel's AI Products Pricing (updated October 13, 2026), Reception.ai's Plans and Pricing documentation, and elevenlabs.io/pricing/agents, all checked October 19, 2026. Jobber and Housecall Pro also show introductory discounts that end after the first months.

To compare like with like, here is one small business taking about 100 calls a month, averaging three minutes each (300 minutes), on a US local number:

Excludes taxes, texts, call recording, and introductory discounts. Three-minute calls are an assumption; booking calls tend to run longer than quick questions. Check your own phone records for a real average.

Two things stand out. First, the cheapest options are the ones that ask the most of you: ElevenAgents is a build-your-own platform, and you set up the phone line yourself. Second, the built-in options include the job software itself; the Jobber figure buys you Jobber, and the HighLevel figure buys you a CRM and marketing platform, not just a receptionist.

Jobber is the most transparent of the two. The AI Receptionist is a $29 a month add-on, and it is included with unlimited use on the Plus plan. Its Receptionist help article (July 2026) says the add-on includes 30 conversations, with $0.79 for each one after that; its add-on features article (August 2026) says 100 conversations, so check the allowance in your own account under Account and Billing. A conversation counts when the receptionist actually engages a caller, so spam and silent calls are not charged, and texts within 24 hours count as one. You can choose to keep going and pay overage, or pause the receptionist when you hit the limit. The receptionist needs a Jobber dedicated number, available in the US, Canada, and the UK.

Housecall Pro lists CSR AI as an add-on to a paid plan but does not publish its price; you get it through a demo. Its plan prices are not shown up front either: the pricing page asks a few questions first (your industry, how many people work in the business, your goals) and then shows prices that depend on your answers.

What housecallpro.com/pricing showed on October 19, 2026, after answering its plan finder both ways. The one-person prices came with introductory offers: Basic and Essentials at $49 for the first month, Max at $99 a month for two months. Your answers, and Housecall Pro's offers, may give different numbers.

So the honest way to price Housecall Pro is to run the plan finder for your own business, then ask for the CSR AI add-on price on the demo. Our guide to measuring Housecall Pro CSR AI's results covers how to judge whether the add-on pays for itself once you have a quote.

For either, the real comparison is not the receptionist alone. If you already pay for the software, the receptionist is a small addition. If you would be signing up for Jobber or Housecall Pro just to get the receptionist, compare the whole plan price against a standalone option.

HighLevel is three layers: the Starter subscription at $97 a month, an AI Employee plan (Pay-Per-Use with no monthly fee, Growth at $50 with 100 Voice AI minutes, or Unlimited at $97), and phone charges of $1.15 a month for a local number and about 1.2 cents a minute for inbound calls. On Pay-Per-Use, a Voice AI minute costs $0.06 with an OpenAI or Cartesia voice and up to $0.215 with an ElevenLabs V3 voice.

With a standard voice, Pay-Per-Use stays cheaper than Unlimited until about 1,600 minutes a month, so most small businesses pay roughly $105 to $230 a month in total. Our HighLevel Voice AI pricing breakdown has the full rate tables, the break-even chart, and ways to keep the bill down.

Reception.ai bills in credits: one per phone minute, half a credit per minute of website or booking page conversation, and a tenth of a credit per text.

From Reception.ai's Plans and Pricing documentation, checked October 19, 2026. The 14-day trial includes 30 credits as a hard cap: when they run out, it stops answering until you upgrade.

Watch the "calls at once" column: on Basic, a second caller cannot reach the receptionist while it is on a call. Our Reception.ai review covers the trial.

ElevenAgents uses ElevenLabs' agent plans, each with included call minutes:

From elevenlabs.io/pricing/agents, checked October 19, 2026; Enterprise is priced on request. The Creator plan's first month is discounted.

Beyond the included minutes, calls cost $0.08 a minute. Two charges come on top: the AI model, billed by usage and varying by model, and the phone line, which comes from your own provider, such as Twilio at $1.15 a month for a US local number and $0.0085 a minute for inbound calls. ElevenLabs' burst pricing doubles the rate for calls above your plan's concurrency limit, if you turn it on. The ElevenLabs AI receptionist review compares the two products.

Human answering services cost far more per minute, because a person answers every call. Two well-known ones publish their prices:

From patlive.com/pricing and ruby.com/pricing, checked October 19, 2026. PATLive bills only live time on calls, not after-call notes. Ruby says AI enhancements are included at no extra cost.

For the same 300 minutes a month, PATLive's 300-minute plan is $479, and Ruby's 200-minute plan alone is $720. That is several times the AI options. What you get for it is a person: someone who can calm an upset caller, handle an odd request, and use judgment the AI does not have. Some businesses use both, with the AI on routine calls and a person for the rest. Housecall Pro's HCP Assist is one built-in version of that. More in our comparison of AI vs human answering services, or compare both with hiring a person using our receptionist cost calculator.

• Introductory prices ending. Jobber's prices in October 2026 are discounted for the first three or twelve months, Housecall Pro shows first-month promotions, and ElevenLabs discounts the first month of Creator. Budget on the regular price.
• Overage. Every allowance runs out: Jobber's conversations, Reception.ai's credits, ElevenAgents' minutes, HighLevel's Growth minutes. Jobber and Reception.ai let you choose or show what happens; check before a busy month.
• Phone lines and texts. HighLevel and ElevenAgents charge separately for numbers and minutes, and texting customers from a US local number needs carrier registration with its own fees.
• Calls at once. A cheap plan may answer only one caller at a time (Reception.ai Basic), and going above a limit can cost double (ElevenLabs burst pricing).
• Trial usage. HighLevel says usage charges can apply during its trial; Reception.ai's trial stops at its credit cap instead.
• The voice you choose. On per-minute plans, a premium voice can cost several times a standard one, such as $0.215 against $0.06 a minute on HighLevel.

For the full list of setup and running costs, see how much an AI receptionist costs.

Price is only half the decision. Which one fits how you work is covered in our comparison of the best AI voice agents for small business.

The bottom line: AI voice agent pricing in October 2026 runs from a free ElevenAgents plan to about $166 a month for 100 calls on HighLevel's pay-per-use plan, with the Jobber AI Receptionist and Reception.ai in between and Housecall Pro's CSR AI priced only on request. Jobber bills per conversation, Reception.ai per credit, and HighLevel and ElevenAgents per minute plus phone charges. A human answering service costs several times more for the same calls.