Outsourced live chat costs about $1 to $14 per chat on bundle plans, $19.95 to $40 per qualified lead on pay-per-lead plans, $249 to $799 a month on flat unlimited plans, and $1,980 to $3,900 a month for a dedicated full-time chat agent, at the rates US providers publish on their own sites. For a business handling 200 website chats a month, that is roughly $160 to $2,400 a month depending on which billing unit the vendor uses.
This guide is for the person who will sign the order: the owner of a law firm or home services company whose website chat goes unanswered after 5pm, an ecommerce operations lead who needs weekend coverage, or a support manager deciding whether to add chat headcount or buy it. We read every rate below on the provider's own pricing page on September 22, 2026. Where a provider hides its price, we say so rather than repeat a figure from somebody's blog.
How much does live chat outsourcing cost?
Most small and midsize US businesses pay between $150 and $1,000 a month for outsourced website chat, and the number depends far more on the billing unit than on the vendor's name. Five units are in use. The same month of chats can cost $159 on one and $2,400 on another, so identify the unit before you compare anything.
| Billing unit | Who uses it | What grows your bill | Cheapest when |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bundle of chats, with per-chat overage | PATLive, Ruby, Smith.ai, Davinci Virtual, HelpSquad, ChatSupport | Number of chats, whatever their outcome | Most chats are real customer questions, not spam or window shoppers |
| Per qualified lead | QualifiedChat, Juvo Leads | Number of sales leads captured | Most of your chat traffic is support or browsing that you do not want to pay for |
| Flat monthly, unlimited chats | ChatAgents; Liveforce (tiered by website visits) | Features and locations, not volume | Chat volume is high or unpredictable |
| Minutes shared with phone answering | AnswerConnect | Total minutes across calls and chats, each chat rounded up to a full minute | You already buy phone answering and chat volume is light |
| Dedicated agent per month | LTVplus, Chatdesk | Headcount | You need one trained person on your brand for a full shift, handling chat alongside email and tickets |
Live chat outsourcing pricing by provider
We checked twenty-seven providers. Thirteen publish a US price for human-staffed website chat. Six sell the service but publish nothing, and eight either no longer sell it, sell software rather than staffed chat, or could not be reached. The table covers everyone who publishes.
| Vendor | Published price (checked 2026-09-22) | Billing unit | Effective rate | Overage, fees and catches |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ChatSupport | Startup $19/mo for 25 chats; Support $49 for 50; Pro $59 for 100 | Chat bundle | $0.59 to $0.98 per chat | Extra chats $1.00 to $1.25; first month free; agent location not stated. Part of the same group as AnswerConnect |
| Davinci Virtual | 25 sessions $79/mo; 50 sessions $129; 75 sessions $199 | Chat session bundle | $2.58 to $3.16 per session | No overage rate, setup fee, hours or agent location published |
| HelpSquad | Jump Start $185/mo for 50 chats; Business $350 for 100; Advanced $600 for 200 | Flat fee with chat quota | $3.00 to $3.70 per chat | No overage rate published; AI plus human model; 24/7 or after-hours only; 14 day trial |
| Smith.ai web chat | Starter $140/mo for 20 chats; Basic $300 for 50; Pro $600 for 120; a la carte $10 per chat | Bundle of relevant chats | $5.00 to $7.00 per chat | Extra chats $5 to $7; spam, sales pitches and bare hellos are not billed; booking $1 per chat; human and AI hybrid |
| PATLive | Pay as you go $19/mo at $9.95 per chat; 25 chats $149; 50 $279; 100 $499; 200 $999; 500 $2,499; 1,000 $4,999 | Chat bundle | $4.99 to $5.96 per chat | Extra chats $5.99 to $8.95, always above the in-plan rate; US-based, fully human, 24/7 including holidays |
| Ruby | 10 chats $143/mo; 30 chats $335; 50 chats $520; 20% off when added to a receptionist plan | Chat bundle | $10.40 to $14.30 per chat | No setup or after-hours fees; 24/7; overage rate not published |
| AnswerConnect | Growth $395/mo for 300 minutes; Standard $575 for 400 minutes; live chat not listed on the $350 Entry plan | Minutes shared with calls | $1.32 to $1.44 per minute | Each chat rounded up to a full minute; extra minutes $1.85; $49.99 setup on Standard. Prices from its own PDF rate card, its /pricing URL returns 404 |
| ChatAgents | Starter $249/mo; Standard $349; Premium $799 | Flat, unlimited chats | Falls with volume | No setup fee, 30 day trial; HIPAA $50 per location on Standard; agents are not US-based by default, a US-only team is quoted separately |
| Liveforce | Basic $369/mo up to 2,000 visits; Growth $499 up to 5,000; Hyper $799 up to 10,000 ($299, $399, $699 billed yearly) | Flat, tiered by website traffic | Falls with volume | $300 one-time setup; extra seats $35/mo; AI assist from Growth |
| QualifiedChat | $19.95 per qualified sales lead | Per lead | $19.95 per lead | Support, duplicate, incomplete and existing-client chats are free; free setup; CRM integration $100/hr |
| Juvo Leads | $40 per lead | Per lead | $40 per lead | Human operators 24/7; 14 day trial; agency discounts |
| LTVplus | Non-voice support agent from $1,980/mo | Dedicated agent | About $11 to $12 per shift hour | $500/mo management fee for teams of 1 to 2; 3 month pilot, then 30 days notice; agents from 15 countries, on your schedule rather than 24/7 |
| Chatdesk | Dedicated full-time expert $3,900/mo, or $3,510 billed yearly | Dedicated agent | About $20 to $23 per shift hour | Live chat only on the Dedicated plan; the cheaper per-ticket plan covers email, social and SMS |
The six that sell staffed chat without a public price: Blazeo (its live chat tab says only "starts as low as $49/month" and every tier routes to sales; ApexChat now redirects to Blazeo), Moneypenny (request pricing), Nexa, LiveChatSquad, Specialty Answering Service and LiveChatNow. LiveAdmins blocks automated and browser checks alike, so we could not read it. Answering Legal's chat is an AI chatbot and Leadferno is texting software, so neither belongs on a comparison of staffed chat.
The hourly figures for the two dedicated-agent vendors are our arithmetic, not theirs: a full-time month is roughly 170 working hours. Blog roundups quoting "$8 to $15 an hour offshore, $25 to $45 onshore" are describing BPO contracts that almost never appear on a pricing page, which is why they do not appear in this table.
What 50 and 200 chats a month cost on each plan
Rate cards stop being abstract once you price your own volume. Below, the same two workloads on every plan that publishes enough to price them. The lead-based rows assume 30% of chats are genuine sales leads, which is a working assumption you should replace with your own ratio from last quarter's chat transcripts.
| Plan | 50 chats a month | 200 chats a month | Year one at 200 a month |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatSupport | $49 | $159 (Pro plus 100 extra at $1) | $1,908 |
| ChatAgents Starter | $249 | $249 | $2,988 |
| Liveforce Growth, billed yearly | $399 if your traffic is under 5,000 visits | $399 | $4,788 plus $300 setup |
| HelpSquad | $185 | $600 | $7,200 |
| PATLive | $279 | $999 | $11,988 |
| Smith.ai | $300 | $1,000 (Pro plus 80 extra at $5) | $12,000 |
| QualifiedChat (30% leads) | $299 (15 leads) | $1,197 (60 leads) | $14,364 |
| Juvo Leads (30% leads) | $600 (15 leads) | $2,400 (60 leads) | $28,800 |
| LTVplus, one agent | $2,480 including management fee | $2,480 | $29,760 |
| Ruby | $520 | Not published above 50 chats | Ask for a quote |
| Davinci Virtual | $129 | Not published above 75 sessions | Ask for a quote |
Three things fall out of that table. Flat unlimited plans win as volume rises, and at 200 chats ChatAgents costs a quarter of PATLive. Per-lead pricing is only cheap when leads are a small share of chats: at 30% it already costs more than PATLive's bundle, and at 10% QualifiedChat drops to about $400 a month for the same 200 chats. And a dedicated agent is the expensive way to buy chat alone but the cheap way to buy a person who also works your email queue for a full shift.
Is per chat or per lead pricing cheaper?
Per-lead pricing is cheaper when fewer than about a quarter of your chats are real sales leads, and per-chat pricing is cheaper above that. The math is simple: divide the per-lead price by the per-chat price. QualifiedChat at $19.95 against PATLive's in-plan rate of about $5.00 breaks even at one lead in four chats. Law firms and home services companies, where much of the chat traffic is existing clients checking on a matter, usually sit well under that line. An ecommerce store fielding order questions has almost no "leads" and should not be on a lead plan at all.
Watch the definition. Per-lead vendors define what counts, and QualifiedChat publishes that support, duplicate, incomplete and existing-client chats are free. Ask any lead-based vendor for the definition in writing and for a monthly export of every chat they billed, so you can audit it against your CRM. If your leads are low quality because the page is weak rather than because chat is weak, fix the page first; paying $40 a lead for traffic that should never have been on the page is the most expensive way to find out.
Are outsourced chat agents US-based?
Often not, and most pricing pages do not say either way. PATLive is the only provider in our set that states both that its agents are US-based and that it uses no AI. ChatAgents says its standard team is not US-based and quotes a US-only team separately. LTVplus recruits from fifteen countries. HelpSquad describes itself as US-managed from Pennsylvania. For a regulated or high-trust business, such as legal intake, healthcare scheduling or financial services, ask where agents sit, whether they work from a controlled office, and how chat transcripts containing personal data are stored.
Are the chat agents human or AI?
Increasingly both. Smith.ai describes its chat as live-staffed and powered by AI, HelpSquad runs an AI plus human model, and Liveforce adds AI assist from its Growth tier. That is not necessarily bad; AI drafting with a human sending can be faster and more consistent. What matters is who answers first and who is accountable for what gets said. Ask each vendor what share of chats are handled end to end by software, and whether you are billed the same rate for those. If you want software only, that is a different purchase with different pricing, covered in our guide to AI customer service software pricing.
Outsourced live chat vs hiring in-house chat agents
An in-house chat agent in the US costs a salary plus roughly a quarter to a third again in taxes and benefits, plus chat software, plus a manager's time, and still only covers one shift. Covering evenings and weekends in-house takes three to four people. That is why outsourcing wins on coverage for most small businesses: $249 to $999 a month buys 24/7 answering that would cost well over $100,000 a year to staff yourself.
In-house wins when chat is a core sales channel that needs product depth, when conversations are long and technical, or when volume is high enough that a dedicated team is cheaper per chat than any bundle. If you go that way, the hiring step is where most teams lose weeks, and it helps to screen and rank chat agent applicants before anyone sits through interviews. Use our staffing calculator to size the team for your chat volume and target response time before you compare the result against the bundles above.
What to ask before you sign a live chat outsourcing contract
- What counts as a billable chat? Smith.ai excludes spam and bare hellos; most bundle vendors do not say. On a website with bot traffic, this single definition can move your bill by a third.
- What is the overage rate? PATLive publishes overage above its in-plan rate on every tier. Ruby, Davinci and HelpSquad publish none. Get it in writing before your busy season.
- Is there a setup fee or minimum term? Liveforce charges $300 once, LTVplus requires a three month pilot, and AnswerConnect charges $49.99 on its Standard plan. Most bundle vendors run month to month.
- How do chats reach your team? Ask how a qualified chat becomes a CRM record, a booked appointment or a transferred call, and what each costs. Smith.ai charges $1 per booking; QualifiedChat bills CRM work at $100 an hour.
- Who writes and updates the script? Every vendor answers from a knowledge sheet you supply. Ask how fast they apply a change, because a stale price or policy answered 200 times a month is expensive.
Is live chat outsourcing worth it?
For most small businesses whose website chat goes unanswered outside office hours, yes, because an unanswered chat is usually a lost lead, and round-the-clock coverage starts at a few hundred dollars a month, less than a single part-time hire. It is not worth it when your chats need deep product knowledge the vendor cannot learn from a script, or when volume is so low that a chat widget with an email fallback does the job. If phone calls are the bigger leak, price that first with our answering service pricing guide, since several providers here sell phone and chat together at a discount.
Frequently asked questions
How much does it cost to outsource live chat support?
Published US rates run from about $1 per chat at the budget end to $10 to $14 per chat at premium receptionist services, with $5 to $7 per chat typical for US-staffed 24/7 providers. Flat plans start at $249 a month for unlimited chats, and a dedicated full-time chat agent costs $1,980 to $3,900 a month.
What is the cheapest live chat outsourcing service?
On published prices, ChatSupport is the cheapest per chat at under $1 on its bundles, and ChatAgents is the cheapest at high volume with unlimited chats for $249 a month. Neither publishes a US-based agent guarantee. If US-based, fully human agents are a requirement, PATLive at $4.99 to $5.96 per chat is the lowest published option we found.
Can I outsource live chat for after-hours coverage only?
Yes. HelpSquad offers off-hours and overflow coverage as an alternative to 24/7, and bundle plans at PATLive, Smith.ai and Ruby are usage-based, so if your own team handles chat during the day you only pay for the chats the vendor answers. Set the handoff in your chat software so that chats route to the vendor outside your staffed hours.
How is outsourced live chat different from a chatbot?
An outsourced chat service puts a trained person, sometimes assisted by AI, on your website chat, while a chatbot is software that answers on its own. Staffed chat costs $1 to $14 per conversation; AI chat agents usually cost cents to about $2 per resolution. Many buyers now run a bot first and hand qualified or difficult chats to a staffed service.
Do live chat outsourcing companies require a contract?
Most bundle and lead-based providers run month to month. Smith.ai asks for 30 days notice, QualifiedChat has no minimum term, and ChatAgents offers a 30 day trial. The dedicated-agent providers are the exception: LTVplus starts with a three month pilot, and Chatdesk discounts its dedicated plan for annual billing.
For the broader decision about handing support to a partner, including what should never leave your team, see our guides on customer service outsourcing costs and choosing a customer service outsourcing company.
The short version
Live chat outsourcing is sold in five incompatible units, so the headline rate tells you little. Take last month's chat log, count how many chats were real and how many were sales leads, and price that log on a bundle plan, a lead plan and a flat plan. At low volume a US-staffed bundle is usually the safe buy; past a couple of hundred chats a month, flat pricing wins unless you need US-based agents.