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Voice AI Pricing: $0.16/min AI Processing | SignalWire
Transparent Pricing

One Price. One Invoice. No Token Math.

Voice AI platforms advertise the platform fee. The other four AI invoices arrive later. SignalWire is $0.16 per minute for all AI components.

$0.16
per minute, AI processing
1
invoice per month
2,000+
companies in production
$0
minimum commitment
The Hidden Cost Problem

What a $0.05 Headline Rate Actually Costs

Five Vendors, Five Invoices

A typical voice AI minute touches a platform fee, separate speech-to-text, a language model, text-to-speech, and telephony. Each vendor bills independently with different rate cards and billing cycles.

Token Pricing Swings 300%

Per-token costs vary with caller verbosity, AI response length, model choice, and context window size. A quiet Tuesday and a busy Thursday produce wildly different invoices.

Infrastructure You Still Have to Build

State management, vendor coordination, observability, and error handling require engineering time. That engineering cost dwarfs the per-minute savings of a cheaper headline rate.

No Way to Forecast Spend

When five variables determine cost per minute, your finance team cannot produce a reliable monthly forecast. Budgeting becomes guesswork.

Build a Voice AI Agent

from signalwire_agents import AgentBase
from signalwire_agents.core.function_result import SwaigFunctionResult

class SupportAgent(AgentBase):
    def __init__(self):
        super().__init__(name="Support Agent", route="/support")
        self.prompt_add_section("Instructions",
            body="You are a customer support agent. "
                 "Greet the caller and resolve their issue.")
        self.add_language("English", "en-US", "rime.spore:mistv2")

    @AgentBase.tool(name="check_order")
    def check_order(self, order_id: str):
        """Check the status of a customer order.

        Args:
            order_id: The order ID to look up
        """
        return SwaigFunctionResult(f"Order {order_id}: shipped, ETA April 2nd")

agent = SupportAgent()
agent.run()

Per-Token Variability vs. Flat Per-Minute

Multi-Vendor Token Pricing

  • Cost depends on how much the caller talks
  • Cost depends on AI response length and model choice
  • Cost depends on context window size and tool call count
  • Monthly bills vary 300% between quiet and peak days
  • Five invoices from five vendors

SignalWire Per-Minute Pricing

  • Flat $0.16 regardless of conversation complexity
  • Flat $0.16 regardless of model or response length
  • Flat $0.16 regardless of context window or tool calls
  • Same price every call, every day, every month
  • One invoice from one vendor

What $0.16/min AI Processing Includes

ComponentIncluded in $0.16Competitors Charge Separately
Speech-to-text (STT)Yes$0.006-0.015 per 15 seconds
Language model (LLM)Yes$0.01-0.06 per 1K tokens (variable)
Text-to-speech (TTS)Yes$0.015-0.030 per 1K characters
Orchestration and stateYesDIY or not available
Observability and analyticsYesThird-party APM required
Transport (PSTN/SIP)Billed separately at carrier rates$0.013-0.022 per minute

Monthly Cost at Scale

Monthly MinutesMulti-Vendor (avg $0.26/min)SignalWire ($0.16/min)Monthly Savings
1,000$260$160$100 (38%)
10,000$2,600$1,600$1,000 (38%)
50,000$13,000$8,000$5,000 (38%)
100,000$26,000$16,000$10,000 (38%)
500,000$130,000$80,000$50,000 (38%)

Start Building in Minutes

1

Sign up

Create a free account. No credit card required for the trial. No annual commitment.

2

Install the SDK

Run pip install signalwire-agents. Define your agent in Python or YAML.

3

Add a phone number

Provision a number from the dashboard or port your existing numbers.

4

Ship to production

Deploy your agent. Pay $0.16 per minute of AI conversation. Volume discounts when you scale.

💡
AI minutes are billed only while the AI is in the conversation. No idle charges, no per-session fees, no billing during hold or ring time.

FAQ

What does the $0.16/min include?

AI processing: speech-to-text, language model inference, text-to-speech, orchestration, state management, and observability. Transport (PSTN, SIP) is billed separately at carrier rates. One invoice covers everything.

Is there a minimum commitment?

No. Pay as you go with no annual contract and no minimum spend. Volume discounts are available when you scale.

How does per-minute billing compare to per-token?

Per-token pricing varies with caller verbosity, AI response length, and model choice. A single voice AI minute can cost $0.19 to $0.43 when you add up all the vendors. Per-minute pricing gives you one predictable number.

Can I bring my own LLM?

Yes. The platform supports external model providers. Pricing adjusts to reflect the pass-through model cost.

What happens when I outgrow pay-as-you-go?

Contact the sales team for volume pricing tiers, enterprise billing, dedicated support, and custom SLAs.

Trusted by 2,000+ Companies

One Rate. One Invoice. No Surprises.

Sign up, build an agent, and pay $0.16 per minute. No commitment. No token anxiety.