What an AI teammate costs compared with a new hire
Published AI teammate prices run from tens to hundreds of dollars a month; an office hire costs tens of thousands a year. The honest comparison includes the time a person spends running the AI.
Contents
The question behind most searches for AI employee pricing is a comparison: whether a subscription can take on work that would otherwise need a new hire. The two numbers are rarely set side by side with their sources, and vendor pages that make the comparison seldom include the cost of the person who has to run the AI. This guide uses US government labour data and the prices vendors publish, read on the same day.
What a new hire costs the employer
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics measures what employers pay per hour worked, including benefits such as paid leave, insurance and retirement contributions.
| Group, private industry, June 2026 | Total cost per hour worked | Wages | Benefits |
|---|---|---|---|
| All private-industry workers1 | $46.89 | $32.82 | $14.07 (30.0%) |
| Office and administrative support2 | $36.73 | $25.22 | $11.51 (31.3%) |
| Sales and related2 | $35.85 | $26.99 | $8.86 (24.7%) |
For the roles AI teammates most often take on, median wages in 2025 were $38,010 a year for receptionists3 and $44,770 for customer service representatives4. Applying the benefits share for office and administrative staff, a receptionist at the median wage costs an employer roughly $55,000 a year and a customer service representative roughly $65,000. That is our calculation from the BLS figures, not a published number, and it excludes recruiting, training and office space.
The same data shows where the pressure is. The BLS projects employment of customer service representatives to fall 5% between 2025 and 2035, partly because more of their tasks are being automated4, and employment of receptionists to fall 2%3.
What an AI teammate costs
| Product | Published price | What adds to it |
|---|---|---|
| OpenLazarus | Starter $100 or Pro $300 a month, each including the same amount in AI credits5 | Managed hosting from $150 a month; optional engineering support from $4,500 a month6 |
| Lindy | $29.99 per active user a month for 3,000 credits7 | Larger credit tiers up to $9,999.50 a month; extra credits $10 per 1,000 |
| Microsoft 365 Copilot | $21 per user a month annual, $18 in the first year under a promotion running to December 31, 2026; $25.20 monthly8 | An eligible Microsoft 365 plan; Copilot Studio packs of 25,000 credits at $200 a month for broader agents9 |
| Asana AI Teammates | Included from Starter at $10.99 per user a month, annual10 | Five requests per user a month (50 per account cap on Starter and Advanced); extra at $0.50 to $0.60 per request |
| Sintra | $15.60 a month on a 12-month plan, $48.50 for one month (sale prices)11 | Credit top-ups beyond 250 a month |
| Relevance AI | Not published12 | Enterprise contract |
| 11x and Artisan | Not published1314 | Sales-led; Artisan scopes plans to leads, mailboxes and dialer seats |
On these figures, a year of OpenLazarus's Starter plan with entry-level hosting comes to $3,000, and its Pro plan with the same hosting to $5,400. A year of Lindy for one user at the base tier is about $360. Adding OpenLazarus's engineering support, at $54,000 a year at its starting price, puts that option in the same range as a hire, which is why the support tier makes sense only where engineers will build and change the system continuously.
The costs both sides leave out
A subscription price is not the cost of the work. Four items close most of the gap.
- Supervision time. Products that hold outside-facing actions for approval, as Lindy does until a job is handed over in full15, need someone to approve them. That time shrinks as limits widen, but it does not start at zero.
- Usage above the plan. Credits pay for work, and work varies. Lindy pauses credit-using actions when credits run out rather than billing extra7; Asana charges per extra request10; Microsoft bills some advanced experiences by usage8.
- Setup and integration. Connecting the teammate to the records it needs takes time or money. Relevance AI includes an embedded deployment team16; OpenLazarus starts companies of 30 or more with its engineering team17.
- Quality. Klarna's chief executive said in 2025 that AI support had been cheaper than staff but lower in quality, and the company began recruiting people again18. Errors in work that needed judgement carry a cost that no price list shows.
On the hiring side, the BLS figures exclude recruiting, onboarding and the months before a new hire is fully productive.
How to run the comparison for your company
- Measure the queue. Count the calls, emails, invoices or leads the role handles in a typical month, and the hours a person spends on them.
- Price the person. Use your own payroll figures, or the BLS cost per hour worked for the closest occupation group as a cross-check.
- Price the AI in full. Take the plan, hosting, expected credits or requests, and any support tier, for twelve months.
- Add the supervision. Estimate the hours a person will spend approving and reviewing in the first three months, and at steady state.
- Compare cost per item cleared. Divide each total by the volume of work it handles, and set aside the cases that still need a person.
The useful result is not "AI or a hire" but a split: the routine share of the queue handled by the teammate at a known cost per item, and the exceptions handled by a person whose time is no longer spent on routine work. Our ranking of AI teammates for business shows which products publish enough to run this calculation before a sales call.
Questions buyers ask
How much does an AI employee cost per month?
Among products that publish prices, Sintra starts at $15.60 a month on a 12-month sale plan, Lindy at $29.99 per active user, Microsoft 365 Copilot Business at $21 per user on an annual plan, and OpenLazarus at $100 a month for its Starter plan plus hosting from $150 a month. 11x, Artisan and Relevance AI do not publish prices.
How much does it cost to hire an office employee in the US?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics put the average employer cost of private-industry office and administrative support staff at $36.73 per hour worked in June 2026, including $11.51 in benefits. The median wage was $38,010 a year for receptionists and $44,770 for customer service representatives in 2025.
Is an AI teammate cheaper than an employee?
On subscription price alone, almost always. The full comparison adds the time a person spends setting up and reviewing the AI, usage charges above the plan, any engineering support, and the cost of errors in work that needed human judgement.
Sources
- Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026. US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 9 Sep 2026. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, Table 4: private industry by occupational and industry group. US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 9 Sep 2026. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Receptionists, Occupational Outlook Handbook. US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Customer Service Representatives, Occupational Outlook Handbook. US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Frequently asked questions. OpenLazarus. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Pricing. OpenLazarus. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Pricing. Lindy. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Microsoft 365 Copilot Business. Microsoft. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Copilot Studio pricing. Microsoft. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Pricing. Asana. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Pricing. Sintra. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Pricing. Relevance AI. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Revenue agents for frontier revenue teams. 11x. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Artisan full product guide (llms-full.txt). Artisan. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Lindy: your AI employee. Lindy. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- The home of the AI Workforce. Relevance AI. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Design your company’s operating system. OpenLazarus. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
- Klarna is hiring customer service agents after AI couldn’t cut it on calls, according to the company’s CEO. Entrepreneur, 9 May 2025. Accessed 8 Nov 2026.
Updated 8 Nov 2026: First published.