Best AI chatbot builders for your website

Which AI chatbot builder should you pick?

All five tools let you put an AI assistant on your site that answers from your own content. They differ in purpose, billing and entry price:

• Chatbase if you want a website bot plus WhatsApp, Messenger, Instagram and Slack from the first plan, with a 7-day trial. Hobby is $32 a month billed yearly for 700 message credits and one agent.
• Botpress if you want to start free and build an agent that takes actions (refunds, account changes, hand-offs), not just answers. The Free plan gives 100 conversations a month; Plus is $150 a month billed annually.
• CustomGPT.ai if accuracy from a large document library matters most: answers cite their sources, and Standard ($89 a month billed annually) covers 10 agents and 5,000 documents per agent.
• Chatfuel if your customers write on WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger or TikTok rather than through your site. Business S starts at $18 a month billed yearly, with usage credits for AI replies.
• Text.com (HelpDesk / ChatBot) if you need live chat and ticketing for a human team, with an AI Agent taking the repeat questions. Essential is $19 per user per month billed yearly, with a 14-day trial and no card.

Estimate your monthly conversations first: every tool prices by a usage unit, and that unit decides your bill more than the headline price.

How to choose an AI chatbot builder: what we compared

Facts come from each provider's pricing and terms pages, read in October 2026, and from our reviews:

• Billing unit. Chatbase sells message credits, Botpress counts conversations plus AI spend, CustomGPT.ai counts queries, Chatfuel draws AI replies from a credit wallet, and Text.com charges per user with a monthly quota of AI resolutions. These units aren't interchangeable; the table quotes the cheapest paid plan with its billing period.
• Free plan or trial. Only Botpress has a lasting free plan. Chatbase and CustomGPT.ai offer 7-day trials (CustomGPT.ai needs a card and converts automatically), Text.com gives 14 days without a card, and Chatfuel has a trial with a starting credit balance.
• Training data. 40 MB per agent on Chatbase, 5,000 documents per agent on CustomGPT.ai Standard.
• Channels. A website widget is standard. WhatsApp, Messenger and Instagram vary by tool and plan, and WhatsApp messages carry Meta's own fees on top.
• Branding. Removing the "Powered by" badge ranges from included on Botpress Plus to $1,188 a year on Chatbase.
• Usage-based AI spend. Check what happens at the limit: Botpress buys conversation packs and AI credit automatically, Chatfuel pauses AI replies, CustomGPT.ai stops answering new queries.
• Refunds. Chatbase and Text.com say fees are non-refundable, so test the trial on your real content and real customer questions before paying.

Chatbase: the quickest website bot with messaging channels

Chatbase trains an AI agent on your documents and website pages and deploys it as a website widget or on WhatsApp, Messenger, Instagram and Slack. A built-in helpdesk lets the bot hand tickets to human staff, and AI Actions let it fetch an invoice or book a slot.

The Chatbase pricing page lists three self-serve plans, billed yearly: Hobby $32 a month (700 message credits, 2 members), Basic $120 (4,000 credits, 3 members, adds voice and telephony) and Business $400 (15,000 credits, 5 members). Each includes one agent and 40 MB of training data, and each has a 7-day trial. There is no free plan on the current pricing page.

The add-ons are where costs grow: extra credits at $40 per 1,000 (they don't expire), an extra agent at $300 a year, extra storage at $300 per 10 MB a year, and removing the "Powered by Chatbase" badge at $1,188 a year. Fees are non-refundable under the terms.

Pick Chatbase if you run one site, want the bot on messaging apps too, and prefer a setup without building flows. Look elsewhere if you need several bots on a small budget. Details in our Chatbase review.

Botpress: free to start, built for agents that take action

Botpress is an agent builder aimed at support tickets that need real work done: updating an account, correcting an order, processing a refund or escalating to a human with the context attached. You build in Botpress Studio, a visual editor, and connect Webchat, WhatsApp and Slack, plus Intercom, Zendesk, HubSpot and Salesforce.

The Botpress pricing page has a Free plan with 100 conversations a month, 3 seats and 3 AI agents, and 100 MB each of vector and file storage. Plus is $150 a month billed annually (250 conversations, $25 of AI usage, unlimited agents, white-label webchat) and Team is $750 (1,500 conversations, $150 of AI usage, unlimited seats).

AI spend is billed on top at cost. Each conversation includes $0.10 of AI usage; when a paid workspace reaches 95% of its AI spend limit, a $10 credit is bought automatically. Extra conversations come in packs of 100 ($65 on Plus, $50 on Team), added automatically at 95% of your quota; that can't be turned off.

Pick Botpress if you want to build and test free, or your bot must act inside other systems. The downside: the jump from $0 to $150 a month is steep, and the builder takes more setup than an upload-and-go tool. Our Botpress review has the full terms.

CustomGPT.ai: cited answers from large document libraries

CustomGPT.ai is a no-code tool for a "custom GPT" trained on your business content. You connect a sitemap, PDFs, Office files, YouTube, Google Drive, Notion, Zendesk or HubSpot knowledge bases, and the agent answers only from that material, linking each answer to its source. It supports 90+ languages.

The CustomGPT.ai pricing page lists Standard at $99 a month ($89 billed annually) with 10 agents, 1,000 queries a month, 3 team members, 5,000 documents per agent and 60 million words of storage. Premium is $499 ($449 annually) with 25 agents, 5,000 queries, 20,000 documents per agent, SharePoint and branding removal. Both have a 7-day trial, but a card is required and you are charged when it ends unless you cancel.

Standard shows a "Powered by CustomGPT.ai" label, and when the query cap is reached the agent stops answering new questions unless you add capacity. WhatsApp isn't listed; you deploy to a website widget, help center, live chat, Slack or the API.

Pick CustomGPT.ai if you have a large knowledge base or several bots (a site bot plus an internal assistant). Skip it if you need messaging channels or a free tier. See our CustomGPT.ai review.

Chatfuel: an AI sales agent for WhatsApp and Instagram

Chatfuel is an AI agent for businesses whose customers write in messengers: it replies to DMs and comments, qualifies leads, books appointments and sends payment links in chat. It runs on the official WhatsApp Business API, and every plan includes WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook Messenger, TikTok and a website channel.

The Chatfuel pricing page shows Business S at $18 a month billed yearly ($216 a year) with $20 of usage credits and one bot; Business plans scale to $366.67 a month with $500 of credits. Agency plans start at $90 a month for 3 bots. AI replies cost about $0.0093 each from the wallet, and WhatsApp template messages are billed at Meta's rate plus 10%. Each bot has a one-time $10 setup fee.

Unused credits don't roll over, and AI replies pause when the wallet is empty unless auto-reload is on. The trial includes a starting credit balance, but its length is not stated.

Pick Chatfuel if sales happen in WhatsApp or Instagram DMs and you run ads that open a chat. Not the best fit for a documentation-heavy support bot on your site. Our Chatfuel review covers refunds and agency plans.

Text.com (HelpDesk / ChatBot): AI plus a human support desk

Text.com, from the team behind LiveChat, HelpDesk and ChatBot, gives you an AI Agent that answers from your website, help center and files, plus live chat, ticketing and a shared inbox. The pricing page marks website chat, Messenger, Shopify and SMS as included on all plans; WhatsApp appears as an integration.

Pricing is per user: Essential is $19 per user per month billed yearly ($25 monthly) and Growth $79 ($99 monthly). The catch for a chatbot buyer is the AI quota: Essential includes 1 AI Agent and 10 AI resolutions a month, Growth 10 agents and 200 resolutions; 50 extra resolutions cost $49.50. Essential keeps chat history for 60 days, and a white-label widget is Enterprise only. The 14-day trial needs no card; paid fees are non-refundable.

Pick Text.com if people answer most chats and you want AI for the repeat questions, with tickets and e-commerce tools in the same place. Skip it if you want the bot to handle most conversations on a small budget. Read our Text.com HelpDesk / ChatBot review.

Chatbase alternatives: how the others differ

What each alternative changes:

For more AI software, browse our AI tools category.