Vapi vs Retell AI vs Bland AI: Real Voice Agent Cost per 1,000 Minutes in 2026
Prices below are USD list prices for self-serve, pay-as-you-go accounts as published on 28 September 2026. Enterprise pricing is custom for all three and is not modeled.
The short answer
The three headline rates measure different things. Vapi's $0.05/min is an orchestration fee only. Retell's "$0.07–$0.31/min" is a range built from components. Bland's $0.14 (Start), $0.12 (Build) and $0.11 (Scale) cover the language model, speech-to-text and text-to-speech, but not carrier telephony. Rebuilt into a complete stack, a lean configuration on Retell is the cheapest at every volume modeled (about $88 per 1,000 minutes), Vapi lean is about $113–$115, and Bland is $129–$154 once an illustrative carrier charge is added. At 100,000 minutes Vapi's $29-a-month Core package, which includes 10 concurrent calls, is cheaper than usage-only for the 29 lines the workload needs. For a premium model and voice, Bland's bundled rate is cheaper than the premium Vapi and Retell stacks at every volume modeled. Bland's per-day call caps, not price, decide which plan fits at 10,000 minutes.
What each headline number covers
| Vapi | Retell | Bland | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rate | $0.05/min | $0.055/min voice infrastructure + $0.015/min standard voice ($0.040 for ElevenLabs voices) + language model $0.003–$0.16/min (up to $0.32 for fast tiers) + telephony $0.015/min via Retell | Start $0.14, Build $0.12, Scale $0.11 per connected minute |
| Covers | Orchestration only | Voice engine and voice; model and telephony billed separately | LLM, speech-to-text, text-to-speech |
| Telephony | Passed through at cost, or bring your own | $0.015/min via Retell, or bring your own | Not in the per-minute rate: built-in Twilio is billed at pass-through cost; bring-your-own carrier fees are billed to you. Outbound attempts through Bland telephony carry a $0.015 minimum per attempt |
| Transfers to a human | Not itemized | Agent fee stops; telephony continues | $0.05 (Start), $0.04 (Build), $0.03 (Scale) per minute on Bland numbers; free with your own Twilio |
| Included concurrency | 4 calls with no Success Package; 10 with Core ($29/month); 30 with Pro; extra lines $10/month each | 20 calls; extra lines $8/month each | 10 (Start), 50 (Build), 100 (Scale) |
| Call caps | None published | None published | Daily / hourly: 100/100 (Start), 2,000/1,000 (Build), 5,000/1,000 (Scale). Calls over the cap are rejected, not billed |
| Monthly fee | $0 with no package; Core $29; Pro 10% of the hosting fee, $999 minimum | None | $0, $299, $499 |
| Compliance add-ons | HIPAA $2,000/month; zero data retention (ZDR) included with any Success Package (Core, Pro, Premier) | Not itemized | Not itemized on the self-serve page |
| Phone numbers | 1 included with no package, 5 with Core; additional numbers not itemized on the pricing page | $2 per number per month (reported) | Not itemized |
Vapi's package limits, concurrency add-on ($10 per line per month) and HIPAA add-on ($2,000 per month) are listed on its pricing page. Bland's caps, plan rates and the Scale tier ($0.11 plus $499) are in its billing documentation; the Scale tier is not shown on Bland's pricing page.
Method: from minutes to calls to concurrency
Assumptions, all illustrative: average call length 4 minutes; traffic on 22 business days of 8 hours; peak concurrency 3× the average.
| Monthly minutes | Calls per month | Calls per business day | Calls per hour (average) | Average concurrent calls | Peak lines used |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,000 | 250 | 11 | 1.4 | 0.09 | 1 |
| 10,000 | 2,500 | 114 | 14 | 0.95 | 3 |
| 100,000 | 25,000 | 1,136 | 142 | 9.5 | 29 |
Checks against limits: Bland Start's 100 calls/day cap is exceeded at 10,000 minutes (114/day), so Build applies from that volume; Build's 2,000/day, 1,000/hour and 50-line limits are not exceeded at 100,000 minutes. At 100,000 minutes Vapi needs 29 lines. Usage-only includes 4, so 25 extra lines cost 25 × $10 = $250 a month; Core costs $29 and includes 10, so 19 extra lines cost $29 + 19 × $10 = $219 a month, which is cheaper; Pro ($999 minimum, 30 lines) is not. Retell's 20 included lines fall short by 9 lines ($72/month). At 1,000 and 10,000 minutes the peak of 1 to 3 lines fits inside Vapi's 4 included lines. A 10-minute average call would halve the call counts and leave Start viable at 10,000 minutes.
Assembled per-minute cost
Vapi's speech-to-text, language-model and voice lines are illustrative provider prices, not Vapi charges: speech-to-text $0.004, lean language model $0.015 or premium $0.05, lean voice $0.03 or premium $0.08. The $0.014 carrier line equals the Twilio outbound rate listed on Vapi's pricing page (charged by the provider, not Vapi); Vapi lists Vonage at $0.00814 and Telnyx at $0.0055 per minute. The same $0.014 is applied to Bland as an illustrative carrier charge.
- Vapi lean: 0.05 + 0.004 + 0.015 + 0.03 + 0.014 = $0.113/min. Premium: 0.05 + 0.004 + 0.05 + 0.08 + 0.014 = $0.198/min.
- Retell lean: 0.055 + 0.015 + 0.003 (lightweight model, illustrative) + 0.015 = $0.088/min. Premium: Retell's published range ceiling, $0.31/min, used as an upper bound.
- Bland: plan rate + $0.014 illustrative carrier charge = $0.154 (Start), $0.134 (Build), $0.124 (Scale), plus the monthly plan fee.
Cost at 1,000, 10,000 and 100,000 minutes
| Monthly minutes | Vapi lean | Vapi premium | Retell lean | Retell premium | Bland (plan that fits the caps) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,000 | $113 | $198 | $88 | $310 | $154 (Start) |
| 10,000 | $1,130 | $1,980 | $880 | $3,100 | $1,639 (Build: 299 + 10,000 × 0.134) |
| 100,000 | $11,519 | $20,019 | $8,872 | $31,072 | $13,699 (Build) or $12,899 (Scale: 499 + 100,000 × 0.124) |
Formulas: Vapi at 100,000 minutes = 100,000 × rate + Core $29 + 19 extra lines × $10 ($219); Retell = 100,000 × rate + 9 × $8. Per 1,000 minutes at 100,000: Vapi lean $115.19, Retell lean $88.72, Bland Scale $129, Vapi premium $200.19, Retell premium $310.72. Vapi's HIPAA add-on adds $2,000 a month (17% of the lean Vapi bill at 100,000 minutes). Recording storage is not itemized on any of the three pages and is excluded.
What the advertised price misses
- Bland's $0.11–$0.14 is not an all-in telephony price. Carrier cost, transfers and the $0.015 outbound-attempt minimum come on top.
- Retell's $0.07 floor excludes the language model and telephony; the practical floor is about $0.088.
- Vapi's $0.05 excludes every component you actually hear.
- Compliance is fixed cost: HIPAA is $2,000 a month on Vapi regardless of volume, while zero data retention comes with any paid Success Package.
Break-even points
- Bland Build versus Start on rate alone: $299 ÷ $0.02 = 14,950 minutes a month; Scale versus Build: $200 ÷ $0.01 = 20,000 minutes. Daily caps can force the upgrade earlier.
- Vapi Core versus usage-only: Core's $29 is cheaper once peak concurrency reaches 7 lines (3 extra lines at $10 = $30 on usage-only versus $29), and it adds ZDR and 5 included phone numbers.
- Bland versus a premium Vapi or Retell stack: Bland is cheaper at all three volumes modeled.
- Retell lean versus Bland: Retell stays cheaper up to 100,000 minutes in this model.
Which workload fits
Lean stack at volume: Retell. A stack where you swap providers independently: Vapi. A premium voice and model with one predictable bill: Bland, checking daily caps first. Above roughly 50,000 minutes a month, ask all three for enterprise quotes.
Comparison limits
Vapi's package, concurrency, HIPAA and carrier-fee figures are read from its pricing page. Vapi's speech, model and voice lines and Bland's $0.014 carrier line are illustrative assumptions, and Retell's $2 phone-number price is reported by a third party. Retell's premium figure is the ceiling of its published range, not a priced configuration. Call length, business-day calendar and the 3× peak factor are assumptions; different values change concurrency charges and Bland's plan choice. Enterprise agreements, likely at 100,000 minutes a month, are not modeled.
Sources
Checked 28 September 2026, USD, US self-serve. Vapi: vapi.ai/pricing, Success Packages and add-ons. Retell: retellai.com/pricing. Bland: bland.ai/pricing, billing docs. Retell number and concurrency prices confirmed on its pricing page and reported by Zeeg.