The short version
Most AI receptionists land somewhere between a few hundred and a couple thousand dollars a month. The spread comes from how the pricing is built, not from magic.
Ansora Starter is $500 a month, flat. One number. It answers your calls, books appointments, captures the details, and hands you clean notes. You're not watching a meter.
Flat pricing means you can forecast the bill. Per-minute pricing means the phone company sets your budget.
What drives the price
Three things move the number on any AI receptionist quote. Once you know them, every proposal you read gets easier to compare.
- Call volume. The more calls it handles, the more you'll pay under any usage-based model. Flat plans absorb this up to a cap.
- How much it does. Just answering and taking a message is cheap. Booking into your calendar, qualifying the caller, texting a follow-up, syncing to your CRM — each layer adds cost.
- Integrations. Plugging into your scheduler, your CRM, or your payment system takes setup work. Some vendors bill it up front, some fold it into the monthly.
- Setup and support. A receptionist that's actually trained on your business, your hours, your services, and your FAQs costs more to stand up than a generic bot — and it's worth it.
Vs. an answering service (the per-minute model)
Traditional answering services bill by the minute, often with a monthly minimum. That model looks cheap on a slow month and punishes you on a busy one. A single chatty caller, a long booking, a customer who needs hand-holding — the meter runs the whole time.
It also creates a quiet incentive problem: you start hoping for shorter calls, which is the opposite of what you want from your front line. And the person answering usually isn't trained on your business — they're taking a message, not moving the customer forward.
A flat AI plan flips that. Busy months don't spike the bill, and long calls don't cost you extra. You can let the conversation take the time it needs.
Per-minute pricing rewards you for fewer, shorter calls. That's backwards for a business trying to win customers.
Vs. hiring a front-desk person
A dedicated receptionist is a real person with real value — and a real cost. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the median receptionist wage around $37,230 a year (2024). That's the wage alone.
The true cost is higher once you load it: payroll taxes, benefits, paid time off, training, and the desk, phone, and software they sit behind. A common rule of thumb is that the loaded cost runs 1.25 to 1.4 times the base wage — so a ~$37k wage often means ~$46k to $52k a year all-in. Call that roughly $3,800 to $4,300 a month for one person.
And one person covers one shift. They take lunch, they get sick, they go home at 5. Calls after hours, during breaks, or when two ring at once go to voicemail. An AI receptionist answers every call, every hour, at a fraction of a single salary — not because it replaces good people, but because the phone never stops and a person can't be on it 24/7.
One front-desk hire ≈ $46k–$52k/yr loaded, covering one shift. The phone rings around the clock.
Run your own numbers
The honest answer to "what will this cost me?" depends on your call volume and what you're paying today. That's exactly what a calculator is for.
Compare your current answering-service minutes, or your front-desk salary and hours, against a flat $500/mo plan. If you're a low-volume business, an answering service might still pencil out. If your phone is busy or you're missing calls, the math usually tips the other way fast. We'd rather you see that for yourself than take our word for it.
Sources
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics — Occupational Employment and Wages, Receptionists (43-6014) — Median receptionist wage ~$37,230/yr (2024). The 1.25–1.4x loaded-cost multiplier is an illustrative industry rule of thumb, not a BLS figure.