The short answer
It comes down to who answers the chat
Choose AI Chat Bot if you want the AI to do the answering and people to step in only when it can't. Answers from your own pages are what every plan is made of, not an add-on: Starter is $19 a month for 1,500 customer messages. It says when it doesn't know, emails you each lead with a reminder if you miss it, and books appointments.
Stay with Tidio if people on your team answer chats live, you want Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp and email in one inbox, or you run a Shopify store and want order lookups and product recommendations in the chat. Tidio is built for that, and we don't do it.
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How we compared
We make AI Chat Bot. We compared it with Tidio using Tidio's pricing page and help center, read on October 1, 2026, and our own product as it works today. We didn't buy a Tidio plan for this page. Review quotes come from public Trustpilot and Shopify App Store pages, linked where used, and aren't a sample of all reviews. Where Tidio is the better pick, we say so.
Why people switch
Why people look for a Tidio alternative
The AI is a second bill
Tidio's plans count conversations your team answers. Lyro, the AI agent, is priced on its own per AI conversation: $39 a month for 50 ($32.50 billed yearly), $210 for 300, $700 for 1,000. Flows, the automated chat paths, are priced on their own too.
Source: Tidio pricing
The free AI runs out for good
Every account gets 50 Lyro conversations, once. Tidio's help center says that when they're used, Lyro stops working and the quota doesn't reset; a monthly quota needs a paid Lyro plan.
Monthly plans upgrade themselves
On monthly plans, when you use 95% of a quota (team conversations, Flows visitors or Lyro conversations), Tidio moves that package to the next tier automatically. You get an email at 80%. The setting is on by default and can be switched off.
Source: Tidio help: automatic upgrades
Billing complaints in reviews
Tidio scores 3.7 from 225 reviews on Trustpilot, and 24% are one star. Reviewers describe a rate doubled without notice and being moved to a higher plan, and others complain about slow support.
Source: Tidio on Trustpilot
Side by side
AI Chat Bot vs Tidio, row by row
| Feature | AI Chat Bot | Tidio |
|---|---|---|
| What AI answers cost | Included in every plan. Starter is $19 a month ($17 billed yearly) for 1,500 customer messages. | Lyro AI Agent, priced separately: from $39 a month for 50 AI conversations ($32.50 billed yearly), up to $700 for 1,000. More than that is a Plus plan, from $300 per month plus usage. |
| What counts | One customer message answered. | A Lyro conversation: a thread with at least one Lyro reply. A thread closes after 15 minutes without a message, and the next message starts a new one (help). |
| At the limit | Answers pause and the chat shows a contact form until the 1st, so visitors can still leave their details. No overage, no automatic upgrade; a top-up of 2,000 for $20 only if you switch it on. | On monthly plans the package moves up a tier at 95% unless you turn that off (help). Free Lyro stops after its 50 conversations. |
| Free plan and trial | Free for ever: 100 AI-answered customer messages a month. A 7-day trial of 200 messages first, no card. | Free: 50 team conversations a month, 10 seats, 100 Flows visitors and 50 Lyro conversations once per account. A seven-day trial, no card. |
| Live chat answered by your team | None. Up to five of you get an email with the visitor's details, and a Slack, Microsoft Teams or Google Chat channel if you set one, and you reply by phone or email. | Live chat, ticketing and an email inbox on every plan, up to 10 seats, with desktop and mobile apps. |
| How answers stay accurate | Answers come only from facts read from your pages, documents and your own answers, and each reply shows which fact it used. A factual answer with no source is blocked and passed to you. | Tidio says Lyro uses “solely your support content” (website, FAQs, Zendesk articles), steered by Guidance instructions you write. Not published: a check that blocks an answer with no source. |
| When the AI can't answer | Says so, takes the visitor's name and contact, and emails you. Answer the question once and you can email that answer to the customer who asked. A Talk to a person button sits under every reply. | Lyro hands over to your team in Tidio's live chat or inbox. A handoff straight away doesn't use a Lyro conversation. |
| Lead capture and alerts | Asks for a name, a way to reach them, what they need and up to three questions of your own; an email in seconds with a one-line summary and the page and campaign the lead came from, one reminder after 5 minutes, then your backup contact. A visitor who left an email gets a copy of what they asked, with your next opening time when you're closed. | Flows collect contact details and quote requests (100 visitors a month free, then from $29 per month for 2,000), and from Starter, offline hours collect contact details for later. |
| Bookings | Calendly, Cal.com, Acuity, Setmore and YouCanBookMe pages open inside the chat; any other booking page opens from a button. Or it offers your real free times from Google Calendar, at the appointment lengths, notice and named services you set, and reminds the customer the day before. | Not published on its pricing page. |
| Setup | Paste your website address and it reads your key pages in about a minute. Pick from 25 business types, each with its own rules already written. | Lyro learns from a website scraper, FAQ upload or scraper, and Zendesk articles. Flows are built in a visual builder or from templates. |
| Online stores | Answers shipping, returns and product questions from your pages. It can't look up an order, says so, and takes the order number for you. | Native Shopify actions (order history, cancelling orders, product recommendations) from Growth, $59 per month ($49.17 billed yearly). |
| Channels | Your website (one line of code or the WordPress plugin) and a hosted chat page. A chat follows the visitor from page to page for three hours. | Website, Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp and email, plus a chat page. |
| Measuring results | Results compares visitors who saw the assistant with a held-back group who didn't, and shows the low end of the difference in money at the customer value you enter. Customers' ratings of their chats show there too, and leads and conversations export as a spreadsheet. | Basic analytics on every plan; advanced analytics and satisfaction surveys from Growth. |
| Best fit | Small businesses that want AI to answer their website from their own facts and send them the leads, on one plan. | Teams that answer chats themselves across several channels, and Shopify stores that want order tools in the chat. |
Checked October 1, 2026, on their pricing page.
Try it on your own website
See it answer as your business
No account needed · No card · Free plan forever
Where we're the better pick
Where AI Chat Bot is the better choice
AI answers are the plan, not an add-on
There's no separate AI meter to buy, size or watch. Every plan's allowance is customer messages the assistant answers in full, from Free upward. Plans.
No surprise upgrades
When the month's allowance is used, your plan never changes by itself, and nothing extra is charged unless you switch on auto top-up. Answers pause until the 1st, and the chat shows a contact form so visitors can still leave their details.
It won't fill a gap with a guess
Every reply has to rest on a fact from your pages, documents or your own answers, and visitors see which. Before it meets a customer, the Test page shows how it answers your customers' questions, and you can fix any answer in a step. How answers work.
Leads and bookings without anyone watching a chat window
Each lead reaches up to five of you by email in seconds, and a Slack or Teams channel if you like, with a reminder after 5 minutes and your backup contact told after that. Customers who want a time get your Calendly or Cal.com page inside the chat, or your real free slots from Google Calendar with a reminder the day before. Lead alerts and bookings.
Rules for your kind of business
25 business types come with their own rules, so a roofer's assistant never promises what insurance pays and an online store's never invents a delivery date or an order status. All business types.
Where they're the better pick
Where Tidio is the better choice
Your team answers chats live
Tidio is live chat first: a shared inbox, ticketing, email and video calls for up to 10 seats, with desktop and mobile apps, even on the Free plan. We have no inbox for live replies; you answer leads by phone or email.
More channels in one place
Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp and email conversations land in the same Tidio inbox. We answer on your website and a hosted chat page only.
Deeper Shopify tools
From Growth, Tidio can check a customer's order history, cancel orders and recommend products in the chat. Ours answers from your store's pages and passes order questions to you.
Scale and a long track record
Tidio says more than 300,000 businesses use it and holds 4.8 from 1,349 reviews on the Shopify App Store. Its Premium plan adds SSO and compliance support. We're new, with no reviews yet and no SSO.
Everything AI Chat Bot does
What you get, on every plan
Answers you can trust
Answers from your website and documents
Paste your address and it reads your key pages in about a minute. Free keeps 10 pages; paid plans learn from up to 200, 1,000 or 2,500. Add price lists or brochures as PDF, Word or text files, and write your own answers to common questions. How it works.
Says when it doesn't know
An answer has to come from your facts or quote your own pages word for word. When nothing covers a question, it says so and passes it to you instead of guessing. Custom chatbot.
Stays up to date
It re-reads your website every week, or every day on Growth and Pro, and emails you when a price or policy it quotes has changed.
Answers in your customer's language
It replies in the language the visitor writes in, from the same facts, and the chat's buttons switch to that language too.
Leads, bookings and handoffs
Captures the lead
It answers first, then asks for a name, a way to reach them and what they need, plus up to three questions you choose, and keeps the full conversation with the lead. Lead generation.
Shows where each lead came from
Each lead shows the page it was asked from, the site or Google ad that brought the visitor, and any campaign tags. It's in the alert, the spreadsheet download and the webhook too.
Checks your service area
List the ZIP codes, postcodes and towns you serve. Each lead says whether it's inside or outside your area, and you choose what the assistant tells someone outside it.
Alerts in seconds, for up to five people
Each lead arrives by email with a one-line summary, at up to five addresses, and can post to a Slack, Microsoft Teams or Google Chat channel. Unanswered, one reminder follows after 5 minutes, then your backup contact is told. Urgent leads are marked urgent. Text alerts aren't live yet. Lead alerts.
Booking pages inside the chat
Calendly, Cal.com, Acuity, Setmore and YouCanBookMe pages open inside the chat, and any other booking page opens from a button. You get an alert when someone books through Calendly or Cal.com. Bookings.
Real free times from Google Calendar
Connect Google Calendar and it offers your real free times. You set the appointment length, minimum notice, how far ahead and the gap between appointments, and name your services. A customer who gives an email gets a confirmation with a calendar file, and a reminder the day before.
A person is always one tap away
A Talk to a person button sits under every reply. The assistant tries to answer first; a visitor who still wants you leaves their details, and you're emailed the question. There's no live-chat inbox: you reply by phone or email. Human handoff.
Writes back to your customer
A customer who leaves an email gets a short copy of what they asked, saying a person will follow up and, if you're closed, when you next open. When you answer a question it couldn't, you can email that answer to the customer who asked.
Sends leads to your CRM
A webhook passes each lead to Zapier or Make, and from there into HubSpot, Pipedrive, Salesforce, Google Sheets or anything else. CRM guides.
Control and proof
Check answers before customers see them
The Test page shows its answers to the questions your customers ask. Fix one in a step, and preview what an edit changes before you save it. Test and correct.
Rules for your kind of business
25 business types each come with their own rules: a roofer's assistant never promises what insurance pays, a dentist's never gives clinical advice. Each has a sample assistant you can talk to on its page. Business types.
Results measured against a control group
Hold back a small share of visitors from seeing it, and Results compares the two groups, so you see what it adds rather than every lead it touched. Enter what a customer is worth and it shows the low end of the measured range in money, with the sum written out. Customers' ratings of their chats show there too. Results.
Your data, yours to take
Download your leads and conversations as a spreadsheet, choose how long they're kept, and delete your account yourself. Security and privacy.
On your website
One line of code, or a plugin
Paste one line into any website, install the free WordPress plugin, or share your own chat page link. It's website chat: no WhatsApp, Instagram or Messenger. Chat widget.
Stays with the visitor
A conversation carries on as the visitor moves from page to page, and can be picked up again for three hours after their last message, in the same browser.
Placed where you want it
Put the bubble on the left or the right, add a line of your own text above it on desktop, hide the chat on pages you choose, and set different suggested questions for different pages.
Never in the way
It never pops open by itself, takes your colors, and goes full screen on phones so it's easy to use.
Answers around the clock
Evenings and weekends get the same answers as office hours, and urgent leads can wake you if you want them to. After hours.
Knows your holidays
Add holidays and one-off closures to your opening hours. It tells customers, offers no appointment times on a closed day, and holds your lead reminders until you next open.
Plans: Free for ever with 100 customer messages a month, after a 7-day trial of 200. Paid plans from $19 a month, no setup fee, cancel any time. Compare plans.
What it costs
What AI answers cost at the volumes a small business has
| AI conversations a month | AI Chat Bot | Tidio (Lyro) |
|---|---|---|
| 100 (about 350 messages from customers) | Starter: $19 | $75 ($62.50 billed yearly) |
| 300 (about 1,050 messages from customers) | Starter: $19 | $210 ($175 billed yearly) |
| 1,000 (about 3,500 messages from customers) | Growth: $49, covering up to 5 websites | $700 ($583.33 billed yearly) |
Tidio prices from its pricing page, read October 1, 2026. A thread that goes quiet for 15 minutes and starts again counts as a second Lyro conversation, so real use can run higher. Ours billed yearly is $17 or $43 a month. Not included above: Tidio Flows (from $29 per month for 2,000 visitors), team chat beyond the Free plan's 50 conversations (from $29 per month), and removing the badge: an add-on on Tidio's Growth plan at $20 a month ($16.67 billed yearly) and included on Plus, or $19 a month on ours.
Try it on your own website
See it answer as your business
No account needed · No card · Free plan forever
For whoever signs off
- Cost
- A flat monthly plan from $19, or the Free plan. No setup fee, no per-resolution charge. An optional top-up adds 2,000 messages for $20.
- Risk
- Try it on your own site with no account, then a 7-day trial with no card. Cancel any time; your data downloads as a spreadsheet.
- Security
- Conversations are stored in named regions with named providers, kept as long as you choose, and deleted when you delete your account. Security and privacy.
- Effort
- About a minute to read your site, a few to check its answers, one line of code or a plugin to go live.
Switching
How to switch from Tidio
Paste your website into the demo
It reads your key pages in about a minute and you can chat with it straight away, with no account. Free keeps 10 pages; paid plans learn from up to 200, 1,000 or 2,500. How it works.
Bring over what Lyro knew
Upload the files you gave Lyro as PDF, Word or text, and copy your FAQ answers into your own answers. Your Tidio chat history, contacts and Flows stay in Tidio and don't carry over.
Set alerts and bookings, then test
Choose who gets lead emails (up to five people, plus a Slack or Teams channel if you like) and add a backup contact, set your hours and holiday closures, paste your booking link or connect Google Calendar, then check its answers on the Test page. Human handoff.
Swap the widget
Remove Tidio's code or plugin, then paste our one line or install the WordPress plugin. Tidio's FAQ says plan changes take effect at the start of your next billing cycle, so plan the cancellation around it.
Questions
Questions buyers ask
Is AI Chat Bot a good Tidio alternative?
Yes, if you used Tidio mainly for Lyro and want AI answers without a separate AI bill. If your team answers chats live or you rely on Tidio's Shopify order tools, stay with Tidio. The quickest test is to try ours on your own site and ask it something your pages don't cover.
How much does Tidio cost with Lyro AI?
Tidio Starter plus the smallest Lyro plan is $68 per month, billed monthly: $29 for 100 team conversations and $39 for 50 AI conversations, as of October 1, 2026. Billed yearly that's $24.17 plus $32.50. You can also buy Lyro alone on top of the Free plan.
Is Tidio free?
Tidio's Free plan covers 50 team-answered conversations a month and 10 seats, with 50 Lyro AI conversations once per account. Ours answers 100 customer messages a month with AI, every month.
How does Tidio count a Lyro conversation?
Once per thread, however many replies Lyro sends. A thread closes after 15 minutes of silence, so a visitor who comes back later starts a new one, and a chat Lyro hands straight to your team isn't counted (Tidio help).
Can AI Chat Bot look up Shopify orders like Tidio?
No. It answers shipping, returns and product questions from your store's pages, and when someone asks about an order it says it can't see orders and takes the order number for you. Ecommerce chatbot.
Does AI Chat Bot have live chat?
Not in the sense Tidio does. Nobody types into the chat from a dashboard. When a visitor asks for a person, you get an email with their question and details within seconds, at up to five addresses, and you reply by phone or email. Human handoff.
Tidio is a trademark of its owner. AI Chat Bot isn't affiliated with or endorsed by Tidio. Competitor details come from their own public pages on the date shown and can change; tell us if something is out of date and we'll correct it.