Retell AI vs telli — Pricing, Plans, and Verified Costs (2026)
Retell AI starts at Free. telli 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.
- Retell AI (Per Usage) — Retell AI bills purely on usage — PAYG. There is no fixed per-seat fee, so the monthly cost depends entirely on how much you consume.
- telli (Per Usage) — telli bills purely on usage — Custom. 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.
AI voice agent platform. PAYG at $0.07+/min base ($10 free credits, 20 free concurrent calls); real all-in cost $0.13–0.31/min. Enterprise drops to $0.05+/min base rate. Supports GPT-5.x variants and Claude 4.5/4.6 Sonnet; Fast Tier LLM adds 1.5–2× charge for lower latency. Direct competitor to Vapi and Bland AI.
AI voice call operations platform built for outbound sales agents. Serves solar, HVAC, healthcare, real estate, insurance, and financial services with human-like voice AI and auto-dialers. Three tiers (Starter, Scale, Enterprise) with usage-based per-minute billing — quote-only. Raised $3.6M seed 2025. Berlin-founded.
All plans compared
| Tier role | Plan | Retell AI monthly | Retell AI annual | telli monthly | telli annual |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free / starter | PAYG / — | Free | Free | — | — |
| Enterprise | Enterprise / — | 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
Retell AI is worth it if… developers who want a slightly more opinionated voice stack than Vapi — bundled defaults that ship faster, with paid unlocks for premium voices and Fast Tier LLM latency. Free credits make prototyping frictionless.
telli is worth it if… outbound sales teams in appointment-heavy verticals (solar, home services, insurance) who want AI voice agents that dial and qualify at scale without hiring more SDRs. Pricing is opaque and quote-driven — expect setup support that varies by tier and per-minute rates that need negotiation.
Bottom line: Similar positioning, closer to a preference call than a strategic one.
Choose Retell AI over telli if…
Choose Retell AI if…
- You want bundled defaults that ship faster than assembling components yourself.
- You're building voice agents where developer experience and UI matter more than stack flexibility.
- You want premium voices and low-latency model tiers behind a simple paid unlock.
Choose telli if…
- You want an outbound calling agent that ships with the playbook already built.
- You're a revenue team, not an engineering team, and want speed over stack control.
- You're calling leads in solar, HVAC, insurance, or other high-intent home-services verticals.
Feature comparison
| AI Voice Agents | Retell AI | telli |
|---|---|---|
| Bring-your-own LLM | — | |
| Bring-your-own voice | Partial | |
| Multilingual (5+ languages) | ||
| Inbound + outbound | ||
| Human transfer | ||
| HIPAA | — | |
| SOC 2 | ||
| Self-serve signup | Partial |
Feature parity verified against vendor pricing and docs pages on September 10, 2026. Missing a feature? Tell us — we'll fact-check and update.
At a glance
| Retell AI | telli | |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | Yes | — |
| Entry price | Free | Custom |
| Enterprise available | Yes | — |
| Pricing model | Per Usage | Per Usage |
| Last verified | September 10, 2026 | September 10, 2026 |
| Full pricing | View full pricing | View full pricing |
Pricing last verified September 10, 2026. Tracked daily.