Predictable pricing for embedded real-time communication.
Start with one cloud plan — it covers your calls, meetings, recordings, in-app playback, and the full SDK. Streaming to a large audience? Add an optional broadcast add-on. Want to run it on your own servers instead? Use the self-host license. Published overage rates, opt-in with a hard spend ceiling, no surprise invoices.
Free, Pro, Scale, or Business. Calls, meetings, recordings, every SDK — priced per participant-minute.
Optional add-on
A broadcast add-on
Reserved one-to-many capacity for webinars, classes, and livestreams — priced per broadcast viewer-hour.
Or self-host
Cloud plans
Most teams only ever need a cloud plan. Pro is where production apps land — full SDK, webhooks, AV1, priority support. Scale and Business add SSO, audit logs, and enterprise support as your organisation grows.
Free$0forever
Try LevelChat — developer eval, hobby projects, proof of concept.
All plans ship the same SDK. Annual cadence saves 20% (pay for 10 months, get 12). Upgrade, downgrade, or cancel any time from the Studio Console.
Step 2 · Optional add-on
Add large-scale live streaming to any plan.
The cloud plans above cover calls, meetings, and in-app playback. Running webinars, virtual classrooms, or livestreams to a big audience? A broadcast add-on stacks on top of whichever cloud plan you pick and adds reserved one-to-many delivery — up to 25,000 concurrent viewers on the self-serve tiers. It is an optional extra, not a plan of its own.
How a cloud plan and a broadcast add-on fit together.
Your cloud plan meters interactive app usage — calls, meetings, and embedded playback. A broadcast add-on meters one-to-many livestream playback — viewers watching a webinar, class, or hosted event. The two pools are separate and billed separately; broadcast viewer-hours never draw down your cloud plan's allowance.
Works with any cloud plan
How usage works
Three meters. Plain English.
Every plan bundles a monthly allowance per meter. Going over is opt-in with a hard spend ceiling, not a surprise.
Participant-minutes, embedded playback viewer-hours, and broadcast viewer-hours.
Participant-minutes cover interactive calls and meetings. Embedded playback viewer-hours cover non-broadcast in-app playback — a recording replayed inside your product. Broadcast viewer-hours are billed separately, through a broadcast add-on, for large-scale one-to-many live streams. The base plan's viewer-hour pool and a broadcast add-on's viewer-hour pool are two separate meters; usage of one never draws down the other.
Participant-minutes
People in interactive calls × minutes. Metered by your cloud plan.
4 people in a 30-minute meeting = 120 participant-minutes.
Embedded playback viewer-hours
Hours of non-broadcast, in-app playback — e.g. a recording replayed inside your product. Metered by your cloud plan.
500 replays of a 12-minute clip = 100 embedded playback viewer-hours.
Recording storage
Stored MP4 recordings + associated assets. Metered by your cloud plan.
A 1-hour 720p recording ≈ 1.35 GB.
Broadcast viewer-hours are a fourth meter, billed by the broadcast add-on you choose — see the section.
Plan picker
Answer four questions. We'll find the cheapest plan.
No jargon — you don't need to know what an SFU, a participant-minute, or a broadcast viewer-hour is. Tell us how many meetings you run, how many people join, and whether you broadcast. We'll do the math and recommend the cheapest cloud plan (and broadcast add-on, if any) that fits.
1
What will you use LevelChat for?
2
How much will you use it?
Typical session length
3
Will you record sessions?Recording saves the session video so people can watch it later — replays, training archives, compliance. If you turn this on, we assume EVERY session is recorded end-to-end (sessions × length). No separate 'how many hours' question — the math just works.
We'll record every session end-to-end → 30 hrs/month of recording.
Keep recordings for
4
Do you broadcast to viewers who just watch?Broadcasting (a.k.a. livestreaming or webinars) is when many people watch a video without joining the call — no camera or mic, just watching. Their watch time is billed as broadcast viewer-hours through a separate broadcast add-on. Two-way calls don't count — that's regular participants.
Estimates use list overage rates and assume opt-in overage is enabled. Interactive calls are priced as participant-minutes; broadcasts are priced as broadcast viewer-hours through a separate add-on. Recording storage sizing assumes ~1.3 GB per hour of 720p video — your actual storage depends on codec and content. Free tier is never billed overage (hard-capped). Annual cadence saves 20% (pay for 10 months, get 12).
Worked examples
Three real-world estimates.
Concrete reference points for common workloads. Each shows the assumptions behind the estimate so you can sanity-check it against your own numbers.
Team collaboration app
100 users, each in 2 thirty-minute meetings a week with 4 participants.
Assumptions
Each attendee accrues 2 × 30 min = 60 minutes/week
100 users × 60 min = 6,000 participant-minutes/week
× ~4.3 weeks ≈ 26,000 participant-minutes/month
No broadcast, light recording
Or run it yourself · Self-host
Prefer your own infrastructure? Self-host LevelChat.
Self-host runs the same stack we ship to our cloud on servers you control — your data residency, your audit boundary, flat per-server pricing instead of metered usage. It is a separate licensing model from the cloud plans above.
Quotas, SDK breadth, security, support, SLA, and which broadcast add-ons each cloud plan supports — all five tiers in one matrix.
Choosing between Scale and Business? Scale is the home for high call volume — it carries more bundled participant-minutes per dollar. Business exists for the organisations that need SSO + SCIM, audit logs, a named technical contact, a higher uptime target, and pre-sales security review for their procurement process. Pick Business for those controls, not for a lower per-minute rate.
Feature
Free
Pro
Scale
Business
Enterprise
Built for
Best for
Evaluation & hobby
Production apps
High call volume
Security review & procurement
Custom & regulated
Overage
Opt-in. Hard ceiling. No surprises.
Overage is OFF by default — your usage stops at your plan's bundled allowance. Enable it per meter from Studio → Billing, and set a hard spend ceiling. We email at 75% / 100% of your ceiling; at 100% we revert to a hard cap for the rest of the period.
Meter
Pro
Scale
Business
Enterprise
Participant-minute
$0.0025/min
$0.002/min
$0.0015/min
Custom
Embedded playback viewer-hour
$0.1/hr
$0.08/hr
$0.06/hr
Custom
Recording storage
$0.02/GB-mo
$0.02/GB-mo
$0.02/GB-mo
Custom
Broadcast viewer-hours bill at the rate of the chosen broadcast add-on (Starter $0.015/hr, Growth $0.010/hr, Scale $0.008/hr). Free tier never bills overage — it's always hard-capped.
Buying with confidence
What you can rely on.
The facts a security review and a finance team ask for — stated plainly. Anything still in progress is labelled as such on our security page.
Uptime & SLA
Best-effort uptime on Free and Pro. Scale targets 99.9% and Business targets 99.95%, with contractual SLA credits available on annual Business and Enterprise contracts.
Data residency
EU by default (Frankfurt + Helsinki), with other regions selectable per room. Cross-region transfers are governed by the SCCs in our DPA.
Questions
Things people ask.
What is the difference between participant-minutes and viewer-hours?+
Participant-minutes meter interactive calls and meetings — one person connected for one minute. Embedded playback viewer-hours meter non-broadcast, in-app playback, such as a recording replayed inside your product; they are bundled with every cloud plan. Broadcast viewer-hours meter large-scale one-to-many livestreams and are billed separately through a broadcast add-on. The cloud-plan viewer-hour pool and a broadcast add-on's viewer-hour pool are two separate meters and never co-mingle.
Do I need a broadcast add-on?+
No — most apps only need a cloud plan (Free / Pro / Scale / Business). You only need a broadcast add-on if you run webinars, virtual classes, livestreams, or one-to-many sessions above 500 concurrent viewers. You can add one later without changing your cloud plan.
Should I choose Scale or Business?+
Scale is for high interactive call volume — it bundles more participant-minutes per dollar. Business is the compliance and procurement tier: it adds SSO + SCIM, audit logs, a named technical contact, a 99.95% uptime target, and pre-sales security review. Choose Business when your organisation needs those controls, not for a lower per-minute rate.
High volume, on-prem, or a procurement process?
If you're streaming above 25,000 concurrent viewers, deploying on-prem, need a custom DPA or security review, or just want to talk through which plan fits your workload — a LevelChat operator will reply within one business day.
Run the same stack on your own infrastructure — flat per-server pricing, your data stays with you.
Embedded playback viewer-hours cover non-broadcast, in-app playback — a recording replayed inside your product. Large-scale one-to-many live streams use a separate Broadcast add-on.
100 GB recording storage
All SDKs — Web, iOS, Android, RN, FlutterProduction-grade SDKs for Web (npm), iOS (SPM), Android (Maven), React Native, and Flutter. Same room API, same wire protocol, same events on every platform.
LevelChat MeetA polished, ready-to-use meeting product built on the LevelChat SDK. Sign in, create a room, share the link — anyone joins instantly from a browser. Self-host or use as-is.
Priority supportEmail support with a < 1 business day response target. Routed to the engineer who knows the area you asked about.
AV1 + simulcastAV1 codec with simulcast — half the bitrate of VP9 at the same quality, smoother on poor connections.
Webhooks for room + recording eventsSigned (HMAC) webhook deliveries for every room, participant, and recording lifecycle event. Automatic retry with exponential backoff; replay any failed batch from Studio.
SSO + SCIM provisioningSingle Sign-On (OIDC) plus SCIM 2.0 — your IdP provisions and deprovisions LevelChat workspace members automatically as people join, leave, or change roles. SAML 2.0 is on the roadmap.
Broadcast Starter
One-to-many streaming for hobbyists + small webinars.
Broadcast Starter and Growth attach to any cloud plan, including Free. Broadcast Scale requires a Scale or Business cloud plan; Broadcast Enterprise requires Business and is sized to your workload. Add or remove a broadcast add-on any time from the Studio Console — your cloud plan is unaffected.
Comfortably inside Pro's 75,000 bundled participant-minutes — with headroom for recording and growth. Free fits a smaller pilot; Scale is the move once you pass ~75,000 minutes/month.
EdTech platform
1,000 students, 20 live classes per month, ~1 hour each.
Assumptions
Students mostly watch — modelled as broadcast, not interactive
Peak ~1,000 concurrent → above Starter (500), within Growth (5,000)
Teacher + a few panelists run as participant-minutes on the base plan
Suggested
Pro + Broadcast Growth
Broadcast Growth bundles 50,000 broadcast viewer-hours — comfortably above the ~20,000 used. If classes are fully interactive (every student on camera) instead, model them as participant-minutes and size the base plan with the calculator.
Webinar product
5,000 viewers watching a single 60-minute broadcast.
Assumptions
5,000 concurrent viewers × 1 hour
= 5,000 broadcast viewer-hours for the event
Peak concurrency drives the add-on tier (5,000 ≤ Growth cap)
Base plan still required for the host/presenter side
Suggested
Pro + Broadcast Growth
Broadcast Growth covers up to 5,000 concurrent viewers and bundles 50,000 broadcast viewer-hours/month. The host side runs on any base plan — Pro is the usual starting point.
These figures are estimates for guidance only. Your exact bill depends on concurrency, how much you record, the regions you serve, and your broadcast needs — use the calculator above with your own numbers, or talk to sales for a tailored quote.
TLS 1.3 + DTLS-SRTP in transit, AES-256 at rest, optional end-to-end encryption. SOC 2 Type I complete, Type II in audit; GDPR DPA and HIPAA BAA available.
The same SDK across web, iOS, Android, React Native, and Flutter means you can migrate gradually behind a feature flag. Priority support starts on Pro; Business adds a named technical contact.
Business and Enterprise include pre-sales security review, a custom DPA where needed, and annual terms — built to clear an enterprise procurement process.
What happens if I exceed my limits, and can I cap spend?+
By default usage stops at 100% of any meter — calls and recordings refuse to start until the next period, so there is never a surprise charge. To allow overage, opt in per meter from Studio → Billing and set a hard spend ceiling. We email at 75% and 100% of that ceiling; at 100% we revert to hard-cap behaviour for the rest of the period. No charge beyond your ceiling happens without an explicit ceiling raise. The Free tier is always hard-capped.
How do I purchase or change a plan?+
Everything happens in the Studio Console. Sign up free, then upgrade, add a broadcast add-on, downgrade, or cancel from Studio → Billing — changes apply immediately with prorated billing. This page never takes a payment; the CTAs route you to the Console.
Is recording included?+
Storage is bundled per tier (2 GB Free up to 2 TB Business). Recording ingestion — the work of composing the video — is included; storage above the bundled allowance bills at $0.02/GB-month. As a rough sizing reference, a typical 1-hour recording at 720p is around 1–1.5 GB, but actual size depends on bitrate, codec, and content complexity.
Can I self-host instead of using the cloud?+
Yes — self-host is a separate per-server licensing model. Community is free, Pro Self-host is $75/server/mo, and Enterprise Self-host is $99/server/mo. Self-host uses the same SDK and dashboard — you bring your own Hetzner / AWS / on-prem infrastructure. See /self-host for the install runbook.
Is there a free trial?+
The Free tier is the free trial — no credit card, 10,000 participant-minutes per month, every paid feature available except SSO and named support. Upgrade when you outgrow the allowance.
Do you offer annual contracts?+
Annual cadence is available on every paid tier with a 20% discount (pay for 10 months, get 12). For multi-year commitments, custom volume, or contracted SLA credits, that is Enterprise — talk to sales.
Can I use LevelChat instead of Zoom Video SDK / Agora / LiveKit?+
That is the design goal. Same call shape (one-to-one, meeting, broadcast, webinar) and the same SDK across web, iOS, Android, React Native, and Flutter. Pricing is structurally lower because LevelChat runs a lean, region-aware media architecture with predictable infrastructure costs. You can migrate gradually behind a feature flag — many teams start by routing a small percentage of rooms through LevelChat before expanding.
Embedded playback viewer-hours cover non-broadcast, in-app playback — a recording replayed inside your product. Large-scale one-to-many live streams use a separate Broadcast add-on.
500 GB recording storage
All SDKs — Web, iOS, Android, RN, FlutterProduction-grade SDKs for Web (npm), iOS (SPM), Android (Maven), React Native, and Flutter. Same room API, same wire protocol, same events on every platform.
LevelChat MeetA polished, ready-to-use meeting product built on the LevelChat SDK. Sign in, create a room, share the link — anyone joins instantly from a browser. Self-host or use as-is.
SSOSingle Sign-On via OIDC (Okta, Microsoft Entra, Google Workspace and any RFC-8252-compliant IdP). Workspace members sign in with their corporate identity. SAML 2.0 is on the roadmap.
99.9% uptime targetBest-effort 99.9% uptime measured on Studio + API control plane. Real contractual SLA credits are available on annual Business + Enterprise contracts.
Audit logAppend-only record of every privileged action (member changes, key rotation, billing events) with actor, IP, and user agent. Exportable as CSV.
Audit logAppend-only record of every privileged action (member changes, key rotation, billing events) with actor, IP, and user agent. Exportable as CSV.
Named technical contactA specific engineer (not a queue) who answers your support thread, with a < 4 hour weekday response target.
Pre-sales security reviewPre-sales security review with our team for your procurement process — vendor questionnaire, SOC 2 Type I report, and a custom DPA if you need one.
99.95% uptime targetBest-effort 99.95% uptime measured on Studio + API control plane. Contractual SLA credits available on annual Enterprise contracts.
1.5M participant-minutes / month
150,000 embedded playback viewer-hours / monthEmbedded playback viewer-hours cover non-broadcast, in-app playback — a recording replayed inside your product. Large-scale one-to-many live streams use a separate Broadcast add-on.
2 TB recording storage
All SDKs — Web, iOS, Android, RN, FlutterProduction-grade SDKs for Web (npm), iOS (SPM), Android (Maven), React Native, and Flutter. Same room API, same wire protocol, same events on every platform.
LevelChat MeetA polished, ready-to-use meeting product built on the LevelChat SDK. Sign in, create a room, share the link — anyone joins instantly from a browser. Self-host or use as-is.
Overage: $0.015 / broadcast viewer-hour (opt-in)
50,000 broadcast viewer-hours / month
Multi-region edge
Priority supportEmail support with a < 1 business day response target. Routed to the engineer who knows the area you asked about.
Overage: $0.010 / broadcast viewer-hour (opt-in)
Dedicated edge routing
Priority supportEmail support with a < 1 business day response target. Routed to the engineer who knows the area you asked about.
Overage: $0.008 / broadcast viewer-hour (opt-in)
Requires Scale or Business base plan
Reserved edge pool
Contract-defined SLA
Named CSMNamed Customer Success Manager who owns your account end-to-end — onboarding, escalations, quarterly reviews.