Vapi alternative
Vapi pricing, line by line, and a Vapi alternative.
Vapi is a developer platform for building voice AI agents. As of Nov 2026 it charges $0.05 a minute for hosting, passes model and speech costs through at cost, and leaves telephony to the provider that carries the call. That model suits plenty of teams. People searching for a Vapi alternative usually want something else: a builder that people outside engineering can use, more channels from one agent, or a different place to run the calls.
VocalLabs offers both routes. Build the agent in a no-code dashboard, with Copilot or over MCP, on your own provider keys and your own carrier. Or keep the agent you already run on Vapi and put its telephony on VocalStack Voice, which lists Vapi among the voice agent platforms it works with.
Dashboard · Copilot · API and MCP · Bring your own keys · Twilio, Plivo, Exotel or Vobiz · Voice, video and text
- AI agent00:00
Hi, this is Northwind Bikes. How can I help?
- Caller00:03
I ordered a helmet last week and it still has not arrived.
- AI agent00:06
Sorry about that. What is the order number?
- Caller00:09
N W 4 4 1 8.
- System00:11
Tool · HTTP request to your order API · shipped, out for delivery
- AI agent00:13
It is out for delivery today and should reach you by six this evening. Is there anything else I can help with?
- System00:19
Session logged · transcript, tool calls and provider usage
Vapi pricing, as of Nov 2026.
Vapi bills in layers: its own hosting fee per minute, the model and speech providers at cost, the carrier for transport, and optional monthly packages for support, limits and compliance.
| What Vapi charges | What it includes | |
|---|---|---|
| Usage-based, no package | $0.05/min Vapi hosting, pre-paid | $5 in free credits, no minimum minutes, 4 concurrent calls, 1 phone number, 14 days of raw data retention |
| Models and speech | Passed through at cost | Provider costs with no markup, or your own provider keys billed by the provider |
| Core package | $29/month, pre-paid | 10 concurrent calls, 5 phone numbers, 30 days retention, zero data retention option, email support |
| Pro package | 10% of the Vapi hosting fee, $999/month minimum | 30 concurrent calls, 10 phone numbers, 180 days retention, dedicated Slack support, 99% uptime SLA |
| Premier package | Custom, through sales | Custom limits, 99.9% uptime SLA, SSO and dedicated SIP |
| Transport | Charged by the provider, not Vapi | Vapi telephony and SIP free; Twilio $0.008/min inbound and $0.014/min outbound; Telnyx $0.0055/min |
| Add-ons | HIPAA $2,000/month | Extra concurrency $10 per line a month; extra organisations $20 each a month |
From vapi.ai/pricing as of Nov 2026, in US dollars. Vapi’s provider-keys documentation covers bringing your own keys. · Source: Vapi pricing
What 1,000 minutes cost on Vapi, by Vapi’s own estimate.
The hosting fee is the smallest part of most Vapi bills. The model and the voice you choose move the total more than anything Vapi charges for itself.
- Vapi hosting
- $50
- Transcriber (Deepgram)
- $10
- Model (OpenAI)
- $8–45
- Voice (ElevenLabs)
- $15–24
- Estimated total
- $82–129
Vapi’s own estimator on vapi.ai/pricing at 1,000 minutes a month, as of Nov 2026. Bars show the top of each range. Telephony is billed separately by the carrier and is not included. · Source: Vapi pricing
Vapi vs VocalLabs, side by side.
| Vapi | VocalLabs | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | A developer platform for building voice AI agents | A no-code studio for voice, video and text agents |
| How you build | Dashboard, web SDKs and a CLI; assistants, squads, tools and tests can live as files in git | Dashboard, Copilot (an AI builder that edits the agent and shows what it changed), or every action over the API and MCP |
| Model and speech costs | Passed through at cost, or billed by the provider when you bring your own keys | Your own keys only: OpenAI, Gemini, Deepgram, ElevenLabs, Sarvam and others bill you directly; VocalLabs never resells tokens or minutes |
| Platform charge | $0.05/min hosting, pre-paid; packages from $29/month | Quoted on request |
| Telephony | Vapi telephony and SIP with no transport fee; Twilio, Vonage or Telnyx billed by the provider | Your Twilio, Plivo, Exotel or Vobiz account; PSTN billing stays with the carrier |
| Channels | Phone calls, and voice inside your web app through its SDKs | Phone, browser and WhatsApp calls; text on WhatsApp, Telegram, a web widget or the API; Anam video avatars |
| Testing | Testing and simulation on every plan | Browser voice, video and text test sessions, with transcript, tool calls and provider usage |
| Compliance | Zero data retention from Core up; HIPAA as a $2,000/month add-on | VAPT, GDPR, CERT-In, AICPA SOC, ISO 27001:2022, HIPAA and CCPA; published DPA |
Vapi column from vapi.ai/pricing and docs.vapi.ai as of Nov 2026; check Vapi’s docs for channels added since. VocalLabs column describes the agent builder. To keep a Vapi agent and change only its telephony, see VocalStack Voice below. · Source: Vapi documentation
Who should switch from Vapi, and who should stay.
Vapi is a good platform. Moving only makes sense when the reason is specific.
- 01Stay
Your team lives in code
Vapi lets you keep assistants, squads, tools and tests as files in git, reviewed through pull requests, with a CLI next to the dashboard. If that is how you work, stay.
- 02Stay
The numbers already work
If $0.05 a minute plus models at cost fits your margins and your concurrency is covered, a migration costs more than it saves.
- 03Switch
Non-developers own the agent
Vapi has a dashboard too. VocalLabs adds Copilot, which rewrites the prompt, swaps models, adds tools and publishes, and shows exactly what it changed.
- 04Switch
One agent, more channels
The same prompt and tools on a phone number, in the browser, on WhatsApp and Telegram, and as a video avatar.
- 05Switch
You sell agents to clients
The VocalLabs white-label programme puts your logo, domain and reports on the console, at partner rates and your own price.
- 06Keep Vapi
The agent is fine, the calls are not
Keep the Vapi agent and change the telephony underneath it. VocalStack Voice lists Vapi among the platforms it works with.
Keep Vapi. Change the telephony underneath.
If the agent works and the phone side is the problem, there is nothing to rebuild. VocalStack Voice is the VocalLabs telephony layer for voice AI, and it is carrier-agnostic.
Moving a voice agent from Vapi to VocalLabs.
- 01
List what the agent does
Copy out the system prompt, the tools and the endpoints they call, the answers it must give word for word, and the phone numbers it uses. That is the whole agent definition.
- 02
Rebuild it in the dashboard
Paste the prompt, choose a speech pipeline (STT + LLM + TTS) or a single realtime model, and connect your own provider keys. Copilot can make the edits for you and shows what it changed.
- 03
Recreate the tools
Each tool becomes an operation tree: HTTP requests, conditions, MCP servers such as Calendly or HubSpot, handoffs to a person or another agent, and webhooks to your systems.
- 04
Test in the browser
Run voice and text test sessions from the dashboard and read the transcript, tool calls, captured fields and provider usage before anything is published.
- 05
Move one number first
Connect your Twilio, Plivo, Exotel or Vobiz account, import the DID and point inbound calls at the published agent. Move the rest once the transcripts look right.
Questions buyers ask first.
Bring the prompt. Keep your keys.
Tell us what you run on Vapi today: the prompt, the tools, your carrier and your monthly minutes. We will show you the same agent on VocalLabs, or on VocalStack Voice telephony, so you can compare on your own calls.
