Cartesia vs Deepgram — Pricing, Plans, and Verified Costs (2026)
Cartesia starts at $5/mo. Deepgram uses custom pricing — request a quote to compare.
How pricing works
These two tools don't price the same way, so the headline numbers below aren't directly comparable until you plug in your own volume.
- Cartesia (Hybrid) — Cartesia is hybrid: a fixed subscription from $5/mo plus metered usage on top. Your real bill moves with volume, not seat count.
- Deepgram (Per Usage) — Deepgram bills purely on usage. There is no fixed per-seat fee, so the monthly cost depends entirely on how much you consume.
Per-minute, per-credit and per-token rates exclude any downstream model, speech or telephony costs unless the vendor states otherwise.
Voice AI research lab building state-of-the-art speech synthesis models (Sonic) with ultra-low latency (<100ms). Usage-based pricing: pay-per-character generation, entry rate around $0.017/1K characters. Enterprise custom for volume. Popular with voice agent developers who need faster-than-ElevenLabs synthesis for real-time conversations.
Voice AI infrastructure company — best-known for its speech-to-text and text-to-speech APIs used by voice agents and transcription tools. Usage-based pricing: STT starts at $0.0043/min (Nova-2), TTS starts at $0.015/1K characters. Pay-as-you-go with $200 free credit for new accounts. Enterprise custom for volume + private deployment. Powers voice agents at scale for customers like Vapi, Retell, and enterprise contact centers.
All plans compared
| Tier role | Plan | Cartesia monthly | Cartesia annual | Deepgram monthly | Deepgram annual |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free / starter | Free / Pay-as-you-go | Free | Free | Free | Free |
| Entry paid | Pro / — | $5 | $4 | — | — |
| Mid tier | Startup / — | $49 | $39 | — | — |
| Pro / power | Scale / — | $239 | $239 | — | — |
| Enterprise | Enterprise | Custom | Custom | Custom | Custom |
Tier names differ across vendors. Rows are aligned by tier role, not name. Full tier structures on each tool's page.
What each is best for
Cartesia is worth it if… developers building real-time voice agents where sub-100ms TTS latency matters (voice interruption handling, conversational feel). Sonic model is competitive with ElevenLabs on quality and faster on latency.
Deepgram is worth it if… developers building voice-first products that need low-latency speech APIs at scale. Nova-2 STT is the workhorse — best price/performance for real-time transcription.
Bottom line: Choose based on how you want to pay — Cartesia is hybrid, Deepgram is per usage.
Choose Cartesia over Deepgram if…
Choose Cartesia if…
- You're fine with a base subscription plus metered usage on top (from $5/mo).
- You match the profile Cartesia is built for: developers building real-time voice agents where sub-100ms TTS latency matters (voice interruption handling, conversational feel).
- You need a general-purpose voice agents & speech/audio option rather than a vertical-specific one.
Choose Deepgram if…
- You want to pay only for actual usage (per usage, custom pricing).
- You match the profile Deepgram is built for: developers building voice-first products that need low-latency speech APIs at scale.
- You're building for contact centers.
At a glance
| Cartesia | Deepgram | |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Entry price | $5/mo | Custom |
| Enterprise available | Yes | Yes |
| Pricing model | Hybrid | Per Usage |
| Last verified | September 20, 2026 | — |
| Full pricing | View full pricing | View full pricing |
Pricing last verified September 20, 2026. Tracked daily.