Deepgram vs LiveKit: voice AI pricing compared
Updated 2026-11-10 · listed A to Z, not ranked
Deepgram sells speech APIs billed by usage: speech-to-text per minute of audio (billed per second), text-to-speech per 1,000 characters, and its Voice Agent per minute of connection time. A prepaid annual Growth plan lowers the rates.
LiveKit Cloud runs real-time voice and video AI agents (WebRTC, telephony and model inference). Plans set the features; usage is billed per minute.
Listed A to Z, from deepgram.com and livekit.com. Every figure below is quoted from those pages.
- Main price table
- Flux STT English, Flux STT Multilingual, Nova-3 Monolingual, Nova-3 Multilingual
- Free option
- None in the published plan table
- Published prices
- Speech-to-text from $0.0077 per minute, Aura text-to-speech per 1,000 characters, Voice Agent per minute, and Growth plan rates.
- Main price table
- Build, Ship, Scale, Enterprise
- Free option
- Build: $0/mo, no credit card required
- Published prices
- Build $0/mo, Ship from $50/mo, Scale from $500/mo; agent sessions $0.0100/min plus inference per model.
How we checked: Prices quoted from each official pricing page: Deepgram checked Nov 10, 2026, LiveKit checked Nov 10, 2026. Taxes, usage overages and promotions can change what you pay; confirm with each provider before you buy.
How they compare
- Main price table. Deepgram lists 4 entries (Flux STT English, Flux STT Multilingual, Nova-3 Monolingual, Nova-3 Multilingual); LiveKit lists 4 (Build, Ship, Scale, Enterprise).
- Free option. Deepgram: none in the published plan table. LiveKit: Build: $0/mo, no credit card required.
- How prices are quoted. Deepgram: “Speech-to-text”. LiveKit: “Plans”.
Deepgram plans and prices
| Model | Pay as you go | Growth |
|---|---|---|
| Flux STT English | $0.0077 / min | $0.0065 / min |
| Flux STT Multilingual | $0.0078 / min | $0.0068 / min |
| Nova-3 Monolingual | $0.0077 / min | $0.0065 / min |
| Nova-3 Multilingual | $0.0092 / min | $0.0078 / min |
Add-ons are billed on top, for example speaker diarization $0.0020 / min and redaction $0.0020 / min pay as you go; smart formatting is included.
| Product | Pay as you go | Growth |
|---|---|---|
| Aura-2 TTS | $0.030 / 1k characters | $0.027 / 1k characters |
| Aura-1 TTS | $0.0150 / 1k characters | $0.0135 / 1k characters |
| Flux TTS | $0.0450 / 1k characters | $0.0450 / 1k characters |
| Voice Agent, Standard | $0.075 / min | $0.068 / min |
| Voice Agent, Custom with your own LLM and TTS | $0.050 / min | $0.041 / min |
| Voice Agent, Advanced | $0.163 / min | $0.146 / min |
Voice Agent is one rate covering speech-to-text, a managed language model and text-to-speech; bringing your own LLM or TTS lowers it.
From deepgram.com, checked Nov 10, 2026. Full breakdown: Deepgram pricing.
LiveKit plans and prices
| Plan | Price | For |
|---|---|---|
| Build | $0/mo, no credit card required | Starting a project: agent deployment, observability and simulations |
| Ship | Starting at $50/mo | Shipping to real users: team collaboration, custom voices, instant rollback |
| Scale | Starting at $500/mo | Scaling: role-based access, metrics export APIs, region pinning, private links, HIPAA |
| Enterprise | Custom | Volume pricing, shared Slack channel, SSO, support SLA |
LiveKit says its plans include monthly allotments for agent session minutes, inbound calling minutes (for US local phone numbers) and inference credits.
| Item | Rate |
|---|---|
| Agent session | $0.0100/min |
| Telephony, LiveKit US local number | $0.0100/min |
| Observability (enabled) | $0.0100/min |
| LLM example: Gemma 4 31B | $0.0014/min |
| STT example: AssemblyAI Universal-3.6 Pro Streaming | $0.0075/min |
| STT example: Deepgram Nova-3 (Monolingual) | $0.0048/min |
| TTS example: Fish Audio S2.1 Pro | $0.0090/min |
The page lists many more LLM, STT and TTS models, each with its own per-minute price; the calculator's default phone-call example totals $0.0479/min.
From livekit.com, checked Nov 10, 2026. Full breakdown: LiveKit pricing.
FAQ
How much does Deepgram cost?
Speech-to-text from $0.0077 per minute, Aura text-to-speech per 1,000 characters, Voice Agent per minute, and Growth plan rates. (checked Nov 10, 2026).
How much does LiveKit cost?
Build $0/mo, Ship from $50/mo, Scale from $500/mo; agent sessions $0.0100/min plus inference per model. (checked Nov 10, 2026).
Do Deepgram and LiveKit have a free option?
Deepgram: none in the published plan table. LiveKit: Build: $0/mo, no credit card required.
Which is better, Deepgram or LiveKit?
We do not pick a winner. The two price and package their products differently; the tables above quote each official pricing page so you can match a plan to your own usage.
Where do these prices come from?
Each vendor's own pricing page: deepgram.com (checked Nov 10, 2026) and livekit.com (checked Nov 10, 2026). Prices change; confirm on the vendor's page before you buy.
Sources (official pages, read 2026-11-10)
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