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“AI agent” got attached to almost every automation product’s marketing in the past year, which makes the category harder to shop for, not easier. The useful version of the term describes something specific: a tool that can read an inbox, decide what to do about it, and take multi-step action across other apps, without a human clicking through each step. Zapier, Make, Relevance AI, and Lindy each sell a version of that. What each one actually costs once you’re past the free tier, and where the pricing has a real trap worth knowing before you commit.
What separates an agent from a basic automation
A traditional automation (an if-this-then-that Zap, a Make scenario) follows a fixed path: trigger happens, steps run in order, no decision-making involved. An agent adds judgment to that: it reads the content of an email or a form submission, decides which of several possible actions applies, and can pull in an AI step to draft a reply, summarize something, or route a task before the workflow continues. For a small business, that distinction shows up in four common jobs: answering support tickets, qualifying inbound leads, drafting first-pass marketing content, and clearing repetitive back-office work like data entry between two systems.
| Tool | Entry price | Free tier | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Zapier | Professional $29.99/mo (750 tasks) | Yes — 100 tasks/mo, 2-step only | Connecting to the widest range of other apps (8,000+) |
| Make | Core $16/mo, or $12/mo billed annually | Yes — 1,000 credits/mo | The most usage room per dollar of the four |
| Relevance AI | Pro $19/mo, billed annually | Yes — 200 actions/mo, no BYOK | Building a custom multi-step agent from scratch |
| Lindy | Plus $49.99/mo | No — 7-day trial only | Lightweight task delegation with less setup work |
Zapier prices its two agent products on two different meters
Zapier restructured its agent pricing in 2026 into two genuinely separate products, and missing the distinction is an easy way to end up on the wrong plan. An AI step added inside an ordinary Zap consumes tasks from your regular Zapier plan, the same task pool as any other step. Zapier Agents, the standalone product built for more autonomous, ongoing agent behavior, is a separate paid add-on billed against its own meter, called activities, not tasks. If you’re only adding an occasional AI decision point to an existing Zap, the Professional plan’s 750 tasks likely covers it. If you want a standing agent running on its own, budget for the add-on separately rather than assuming your existing task allowance stretches to cover it.
Make gives you the most room before the meter runs out
Make’s free tier includes 1,000 credits a month, and its Core plan starts at $16 (or $12 billed annually), a genuinely lower entry point than Zapier’s Professional tier for comparable usage. Make’s visual, node-based workflow builder has a steeper initial learning curve than Zapier’s more linear Zap editor, but for a small business willing to spend an afternoon learning it, the credit-to-dollar ratio is hard for the other three tools here to match, especially once volume grows past a few hundred runs a month.
Relevance AI’s free tier is real, then the next step up is a cliff
Relevance AI is built specifically for constructing custom agents, multi-step workflows that research a prospect, draft outreach, and generate a report without writing code, and its free tier’s 200 actions a month is enough to actually test that, not just a locked demo. The Pro plan at $19 a month, billed annually, is priced for a solo builder. The problem shows up past that: there’s no published tier between Pro and Team, and Team runs $234 a month billed annually, or roughly $349 month-to-month. A small business that outgrows the solo Pro plan has nowhere to land except a jump most won’t be ready to justify.
Lindy skips the free tier entirely and prices like a team tool from day one
Lindy is the most expensive entry point of the four, Plus starts at $49.99 a month with only a 7-day trial ahead of it, no ongoing free tier the way Zapier, Make, and Relevance AI all offer. What that buys is genuinely less setup friction: Lindy leans toward pre-built agent templates for common jobs (inbox triage, meeting scheduling, lead follow-up) rather than the node-by-node building the other three require. For someone who wants a working agent running today without learning a workflow builder, that’s a real tradeoff worth the higher floor. For someone still deciding whether agents are worth the investment at all, the lack of a free tier makes it the wrong place to start experimenting.
What these tools solve, and what they still can’t
Genuinely useful
- Clearing repetitive, judgment-light back-office work (routing a form submission, triaging an inbox) without hiring for it.
- All four have a genuine no-cost or low-cost way to test the concept before committing budget.
- Connecting apps that don’t otherwise talk to each other, still the core value underneath the “agent” branding.
Still real limits
- An agent making a judgment call it gets wrong (a mis-routed lead, a wrong auto-reply) still needs a human checking in regularly, not a set-and-forget system.
- Pricing structures across all four are more complex than a flat subscription, and it’s easy to underestimate real monthly cost from the headline number alone.
- None of these replace a genuinely complex sales or support process; they’re built for well-defined, repeatable tasks.
Matching a tool to how you’d actually use it
- Already on Zapier, want to add one AI decision point: the AI step inside an existing Zap, no new product to learn or budget for separately.
- Comfortable learning a new tool for a better price-to-usage ratio: Make’s Core plan, especially once volume grows past what Zapier’s Professional tier covers.
- Want to build a genuinely custom multi-step agent, staying solo for now: Relevance AI’s Pro plan, with a clear eye on the Team-tier price jump before you outgrow it.
- Want a working agent today with minimal setup, budget isn’t the main constraint: Lindy, accepting there’s no free tier to test the concept first.
Related read
Setting these tools up well for a client, not just your own business, is a real service people pay for. See our guide to AI prompt engineering as a side hustle → And if drafting is what you need an agent’s output polished by, our comparison of the best AI writing assistants in 2026 → covers that half of the workflow.
Before you connect anything to real customer data
Pricing tiers, credit costs, and what counts as a “task” versus an “activity” versus an “action” all vary by provider and change as these products update quickly in this category. Confirm current terms on each provider’s own pricing page before committing. And since an agent by definition acts without a human approving each step, review what data access and permissions you’re granting it before connecting it to a live inbox, CRM, or customer database, not after something goes wrong.
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