respond.io is an omnichannel inbox for customer service teams: it adds phone calls, Salesforce and custom channels, and sizes its plans by monthly active contacts. ChatinFlow starts with the marketing side of the chat, comment replies, keywords, giveaways and bookings, has a free plan, and bills by the conversations it answers rather than by contacts.
| Topic | ChatinFlow | respond.io |
|---|---|---|
| What you pay for | Conversations: one person, one channel, one day, counted only when a reply goes out | Monthly active contacts, plus users beyond those included in the plan[1] |
| Free plan | Yes, one channel other than WhatsApp | No, paid plans with a trial[1] |
| Automations on the entry plan | Flows, keywords and comment replies on every plan | Workflows and AI agents start on the Growth plan[2] |
| WhatsApp fees | Billed by Meta to your own WhatsApp account | Not included in the plan; topped up on the platform and charged by Meta's usage[1] |
| Phone calls | No calls, messages only | Calls in the same inbox as chats[1] |
Checked on 2026-10-10 from public pages. Prices are left out on purpose, as they change often; follow the sources below for today's numbers.
Start free, connect Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp with Meta's sign-in, then Telegram or Viber with a bot token.
Invite your agents with the Inbox agent role, so they see conversations and contacts without touching flows or billing.
Assignment rules, business hours and away replies live in flows: assign to a person, the next free agent or nobody.
Bring your contacts in from a CSV file with tags and custom fields, then add the marketing flows respond.io did not run.
Everything you need to know before your first automation goes live.
respond.io is a trademark of its owner, used here only to name the product being compared. ChatinFlow is not affiliated with it. If something here is out of date, write to us and we will correct it. Contact us