ai agent builders · comparison
Best no-code AI agent builders (2026)
Short answer: OpenAI AgentKit tops our ranking (free to build, you pay only API usage when workflows run), MindStudio is the cheapest flat paid plan ($20/mo) and self-hostable, n8n is cheapest at scale and the only mainstream pick you can self-host for free, and Lindy is the most hands-off. Voiceflow, Relevance AI, Stack AI, Botpress and Gumloop round out the field on usage-based flexibility. The catch with "no-code" pricing: it hides behind credits, tasks, operations and executions that don't compare one to one. Every plan below is translated into plain math and checked against the vendor's live page.
- OpenAI AgentKit · Free to build; usage ~$0.20/1M input tokens (GPT-5.4-nano) · Teams already on the OpenAI API who want a visual agent canvas
- MindStudio · $20/mo · predictable budgeting
- Voiceflow · Custom (contact sales) · No-code chat + voice agents
- Bubble · Free, then ~$29/mo · no-code web apps
- Dify · Free, then ~$59/mo · LLM app building
- Relevance AI · Custom (contact sales) · agent teams
- Stack AI · Free, then Custom (contact sales) · Governed enterprise agents
- v0 by Vercel · Free, then ~$30/seat/mo · prompt-to-app UIs
- Botpress · $189/mo · no-code customer support bots
- Lindy · $49.99/mo · most hands-off
- n8n · €20/mo · scale + self-host
- Gumloop · $37/mo · biggest free tier
- Glide · Free, then ~$19/mo · internal business apps
- Softr · Free, then ~$49/mo · Client portals & internal tools
- CustomGPT.ai · ~$99/mo · no-code support agents
- Taskade · Free, then ~$6/mo · no-code AI agents
- LiveChat / ChatBot (Text) · $25/seat/mo · no-code support bots
- Vellum AI · Free, then ~$50/mo · personal AI assistant
Pricing decoded and verified 2026-05-30 against each vendor's live page; volatile figures flagged "verify live".
Dirr is reader-supported. If you sign up through a link here we may earn a commission. It never changes the data or the order. Numbers come from each vendor's live pricing page; volatile ones are marked verify live.
Side by side
18 builders, compared down every row. The best cell per row is marked.
// scraped weekly · every cell carries source and date · volatile cells flagged verify live
Real cost, decoded
The one-line gotcha behind each entry price.
Pricing is hard to predict because it is purely usage-based: multi-agent workflows fan out across many model and tool calls, so token spend compounds fast. ChatKit and File Search storage are free only up to 1 GB per account per month, then $0.10/GB-day. Agent Builder is still in beta, and Connector Registry is rolling out to API, ChatGPT Enterprise and Edu accounts. Full OpenAI AgentKit pricing →
The flat $20/mo is the platform fee, not your full bill: AI model tokens and services like image/video generation are metered on top at cost. Predictable platform cost, variable usage cost. Full MindStudio pricing →
It is credit-metered: the included allowance burns down at different rates depending on which LLM and features (voice, orchestration) you use, so real cost is usage-driven and can exceed the headline plan fee. Exact credit and plan numbers are surfaced inside the dashboard rather than on the public pricing page, and there is no self-hosting. Full Voiceflow pricing →
Pricing is metered by "workload units": every backend operation (searches, workflow steps, API calls) burns WU, and pay-as-you-go overage at $0.30 per 1,000 WU is more expensive than upgrading, so a single inefficient workflow or a traffic spike can quietly multiply your bill. Full Bubble pricing →
"Message credits" are not 1 credit per message: premium models like GPT-4 consume roughly 10x the credits of GPT-3.5, so the headline 5,000/10,000 credit allowances run out far faster than they look. Credits only apply to Dify-hosted models; bring your own provider API key and you bypass them entirely (paying the model vendor directly instead). Full Dify pricing →
Since late 2025 the bill has two meters: Actions (platform work, included) and Vendor Credits (the LLM cost, pass-through on top). The headline price is half the story. Full Relevance AI pricing →
The live pricing page now shows only Free and Enterprise: there is no published paid mid-tier, so any real usage means a custom sales quote with no transparent price. On-prem/VPC, SSO, and compliance are all Enterprise-only. Full Stack AI pricing →
It is not a flat per-seat tool: the seat fee only buys an equal dollar amount of token credits. Included monthly credits roll over but expire after 65 days, and the four model tiers (Mini/Pro/Max/Max Fast) cost up to 10x different per token, so a few sessions on the pricier models can blow through your monthly allotment and push you into on-demand overage. Full v0 by Vercel pricing →
Billing is per conversation, not per message, and a conversation can span many back-and-forth messages. Once you blow past your plan's included conversations you buy them in fixed packs of 100 (no partial packs), and the headline ~$150/mo Plus price requires annual billing; month-to-month it is $189/mo. Full Botpress pricing →
Credit burn is wildly uneven: one voice call (~265 credits/min) can eat a chunk of the month. Credits do not roll over, and agents pause at zero. Full Lindy pricing →
Billed per full workflow run, not per step. A 50-step workflow is one execution. Cloud list prices are in EUR, and the cheap path is self-hosting. Full n8n pricing →
Per-node rates vary enormously (standard AI 2, advanced 20, enrichment 60), and loop/bulk nodes multiply by item count, so a data-heavy flow drains the pool fast. Full Gumloop pricing →
"Updates" are metered and easy to blow past: writes synced from external sources (Google Sheets, Airtable, Excel, SQL), every server-side workflow data action, and every Glide API call each consume updates at $0.02 over your cap. Only edits to native Glide Tables/Big Tables are free, so apps built on external data or automations can rack up overage fast. Full Glide pricing →
The binding limit is "app users" (the logged-in end-users of your published app, not your editors), capped at 10/20/100/500 per tier. You almost always hit the user ceiling long before the generous record limits, forcing a full plan jump (e.g. $139 to $269/mo) just to add seats for your audience. Full Softr pricing →
The headline $99/mo is gated by a hard monthly query (conversation) cap of just 1,000; overage isn't metered cheaply — you must buy fixed add-on blocks (e.g. +2,500 queries for $375/mo), so a real-world support bot can cost 4-5x the advertised entry price. Full CustomGPT.ai pricing →
The Free plan's 3,000 AI credits are a one-time grant, not a monthly refill, so AI features effectively stop once they're spent; and API access plus custom domain are gated to the $40/mo Business tier and above, not the cheaper Pro plan. Full Taskade pricing →
The headline per-seat price includes only a tiny AI-resolution allowance (10/mo on Essential, 200/mo on Growth); once exceeded, the system auto-adds $49.50 fifty-packs of resolutions ($0.99 each) to your next invoice, so a busy bot can quietly cost far more than the seat price suggests. Full LiveChat / ChatBot (Text) pricing →
The Pro "$50/mo" buys only the hosting shell (machine size, storage, custom subdomain, static IP, priority support) and includes NO credits — every bit of actual AI work (LLM inference, web search, image gen, phone/3rd-party APIs) is billed separately as pay-as-you-go credits on BOTH the Free and Pro tiers, so your real bill is hosting + whatever your assistant consumes. Full Vellum AI pricing →
Questions
What is the cheapest no-code AI agent builder?
OpenAI AgentKit is free to build (you pay only API usage when workflows run), and n8n is free and unmetered if you self-host its Community Edition. Among flat paid plans, MindStudio ($20/mo) and Relevance AI ($29/mo) are the cheapest entry points.
Which no-code AI agent builders can you self-host?
n8n (Community Edition, free and unmetered), MindStudio and Stack AI support self-hosting. OpenAI AgentKit, Voiceflow, Relevance AI, Botpress, Lindy and Gumloop are cloud-only.
Do these tools support MCP?
Most of these builders support MCP (Model Context Protocol) as of 2026, so they can call external MCP tools and be called by assistants like Claude and ChatGPT. Check each tool's MCP row in the table below for its exact client and server support.
Which has the biggest free tier?
Gumloop gives 5,000 credits/mo on its free plan, and n8n is effectively unlimited if self-hosted. MindStudio includes 1,000 runs/mo, Relevance AI gives 200 actions, Lindy gives 400 credits, and Voiceflow, Stack AI and Botpress all have free starter tiers.