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How Much Does an AI Support Agent Cost per Resolution in 2026?
An AI support agent costs a median of $0.995 per resolution at list price in 2026, across the eight vendors that publish a per-resolution rate, with a range of $0.45 at HubSpot to $1.50 at Zendesk and Gladly. Widen the set to all 17 vendors that publish a comparable price per resolution, conversation or ticket and the range becomes $0.20 to $2.00, with a median of $0.90. We checked every figure on the vendors' own pricing pages on 24 September 2026.
Key takeaways
- The median published price for an AI support agent is $0.995 per resolution across eight vendors, ranging from $0.45 at HubSpot to $1.50 at Zendesk and Gladly.
- Across 17 AI support vendors that publish a comparable price per resolution, conversation or ticket, list prices run from $0.20 to $2.00 with a median of $0.90.
- A $0.40 per-ticket AI agent costs $0.80 per resolution when it resolves half the tickets it handles, and $1.33 when it resolves 30%.
- HubSpot's $0.45 per resolution requires a $90 Service Hub Professional seat and a one-time $1,500 onboarding fee before any AI resolution is billed.
What does each vendor charge per resolution?
These are the eight vendors that bill only, or mainly, for tickets their AI resolves. Each price is the headline per-resolution rate the vendor prints most prominently, from the AI Customer Support Pricing Index.
| Vendor | Price per resolution | What counts as a resolution | What you buy first |
|---|---|---|---|
| HubSpot | $0.45 (annual credits) | Conversation resolved without a human | $90/seat Service Hub Professional, $1,500 onboarding |
| Help Scout | $0.75 | AI chat session resolved without a human | $25/user Standard plan (annual) |
| Intercom | $0.99 | Resolution, or a completed Procedure including handoffs | $29 Essential seat (annual); $19 in a live Intercom price test |
| Lorikeet | $0.99 (Start), $0.90 (Scale) | Ticket resolved; escalations free | $2,100/mo Start plan, paid annually |
| Gorgias | $1.00 in bundle, $1.50 past it | No human reply within 72 hours | Help desk plan; AI tickets also pay the ticket fee |
| Yuma AI | $1.20 (Starter) to $0.75 (Scale) | Ticket handled end to end with no human | $14,400/yr minimum, paid upfront |
| Zendesk | $1.50 committed, $2.00 pay-as-you-go | LLM-verified automated resolution | Suite Team seat, $55/agent (annual) |
| Gladly | $1.50, plus $0.25 per AI Assist | AI Resolution | $120/team member (Shopify app) |
The two middle values are Intercom's $0.99 and Gorgias's $1.00, so the median is $0.995. The mean is $1.05. In round numbers, a resolution lists at about a dollar.
Why do per-resolution prices differ so much?
The vendors aren't selling the same event. Zendesk's resolution is LLM-verified. Gorgias counts a ticket with no human interaction for 72 hours. Intercom counts a completed Procedure even when it ends in a handoff, so a conversation a person finishes can still bill at $0.99.
Gorgias's billing documentation shows how its definition interacts with the help desk ticket fee.
The rate also sits on top of different fixed costs. HubSpot's $0.45 is the lowest rate, but you pay $1,500 once and $90 a month per seat before the first resolution. Lorikeet's $2,100 plan fee makes its effective cost $3.79 per resolution at 750 a month and $1.20 at 10,000.
A per-resolution vendor earns more only when its AI closes tickets, which lines up its incentive with yours. It also writes the definition of "resolved", so two vendors at the same rate can bill different volumes for the same month of tickets.
How do per-ticket and per-conversation prices convert to per resolution?
Nine of the 17 published vendors bill per attempt: every ticket, session or conversation the AI works on, resolved or not. Their median is $0.50. To compare one with a per-resolution rate, divide the per-attempt price by the share of tickets the AI resolves.
| Per-attempt price | AI resolves 30% | AI resolves 50% | AI resolves 70% |
|---|---|---|---|
| $0.20 (Richpanel) | $0.67 | $0.40 | $0.29 |
| $0.40 (eesel AI, Macha at a tier cap) | $1.33 | $0.80 | $0.57 |
| $0.49 (Freshworks) | $1.63 | $0.98 | $0.70 |
| $2.00 (Salesforce) | $6.67 | $4.00 | $2.86 |
At 50%, a $0.40 per-ticket agent works out to $0.80 per resolution, below Intercom's $0.99. At 30% it's $1.33, above it. Our longer comparison of the two models is in per-action versus per-resolution AI pricing.
Macha publishes the index and is in the per-attempt group. It bills per ticket whether or not the AI resolves it, and its $0.40 applies at each tier cap. Between caps the effective price is higher: 1,000 tickets land on the 1,500 tier at $599, which is $0.60 a ticket, and setup and monitoring by the Macha team are included. Macha fits teams already running Zendesk, Freshdesk, Gorgias, Front, HubSpot or Intercom who want agents working inside the existing ticket queue. If you want to pay nothing for tickets the AI fails on, a per-resolution vendor from the table above is the better fit.
How does the AI price compare with a human-handled resolution?
Zendesk's own cost per resolution guide works an example of $250,000 in monthly support costs over 50,000 resolutions, or $5.00 each, counting salaries, managers, software and overhead. Unthread's compilation of benchmarks puts human email support at $8 to $15 a ticket. Those are third-party figures, not list prices, so they sit outside the index.
Frequently asked questions
What is the average cost per AI resolution in 2026? The median list price is $0.995 and the mean is $1.05, across the eight vendors that price per resolution.
What is the cheapest price per AI resolution? Among the 32 vendors in the index, HubSpot's Breeze Customer Agent at $0.45 on annual credits, after a $90 seat and $1,500 onboarding. Richpanel's $0.20 is lower but is labeled per AI-handled conversation. Our cheapest AI support agent ranking compares full monthly totals.
Does Zendesk charge $1.50 or $2.00 per resolution? Both: $1.50 on a committed volume and $2.00 pay-as-you-go, with five resolutions included per agent a month on Suite Team.
Why do Ada, Decagon and Sierra not appear? They publish no usable list price. Their third-party estimates sit in a separate table in the index and are never ranked. The list of which AI support tools publish pricing shows what each one serves instead.
Published list prices checked 24 September 2026; full method in the Pricing Index. To price your own queue, start a trial with $50 of free usage (about 125 tickets), no credit card, no time limit, or compare tiers on the pricing page.
Simple per-ticket AI pricing
One thread with one person is one charge, however many replies it takes.
