This guide is for channels on the AI Edition. The AI Edition is a new pricing model available for subscription starting October 16, 2026.If you're on the previous pricing model (SaaS Edition), see the SaaS Edition Subscription & Billing guide.
A Channel Works AI Edition subscription has two types of charges: a plan charge and a usage charge. When you subscribe to a plan, you receive credits every month. Each feature you use deducts from those credits based on usage.
Your monthly bill on a plan is the sum of the following two charges:
Plan price: The price of your subscribed plan. It's charged once a year with annual upfront payment, or every month with monthly installments.
Usage beyond your credits: Usage after you've used up the CX and Team credits included in your plan, plus any Marketing feature usage, is billed on-demand (postpaid) on your next billing date. If you don't want on-demand billing, you can buy credits in advance as an add-on. (→ Learn more)
If your monthly usage stays within your credits, you won't pay anything beyond the plan price.
There are three paid plans: Startup, Business, and Enterprise. All plans require a 1-year contract. Each plan includes different features and a different amount of monthly credits. For plan details, see <Introducing Channel Works AI Edition>.
Plan | Monthly price (annual upfront) | Monthly credits |
|---|---|---|
Startup | ₩200,000 | CX ₩150,000 + Team ₩150,000 |
Business | ₩990,000 | CX ₩500,000 + Team ₩500,000 |
Enterprise | Custom pricing | Discussed with our Sales team |
For the Enterprise plan, contact our Sales team.
You pay the full year's plan price at once when you sign the contract. You're charged once a year, and on-demand charges are billed monthly only if you exceed your credits.
Startup: ₩200,000/month (₩2,400,000/year)
Business: ₩990,000/month (₩11,880,000/year)
The same 1-year contract is split into 12 payments, charged on your billing date each month. You're charged 12 times a year. If you exceed your credits, the plan price and on-demand usage are billed together each month.
Startup: ₩230,000/month (₩2,760,000/year)
Business: ₩1,138,500/month (₩13,662,000/year)
The prices differ, but the contract period and monthly credits are the same for both payment options.
Your contract period lasts 1 year from the day you start your subscription. Your monthly settlement date and billing date are also set to the day of the month you subscribed.
Example: Subscribe on October 5 → Contract period 2026-10-05 to 2027-10-04, settled on the 5th of every month
If you subscribe on the 28th, 29th, 30th, or 31st, your settlement and billing date is set to the last day of each month. In this case, only your first billing cycle is 2–3 days longer, and your contract period is extended by up to 3 days.
Example: Subscribed on October 28
Period | |
|---|---|
First billing cycle | 10/28 – 11/29 (33 days) |
From the second cycle | 11/30 – 12/30, 12/31 – 1/30 … (starts on the last day of each month) |
Contract period | 2026-10-28 – 2027-10-30 |
A longer billing cycle doesn't cost extra.
Annual upfront: You pay the same plan price.
Monthly installments: You pay the same amount every month, even if the first month is longer.
Your monthly credits don't increase either. You get the same amount of credits even if the first month is longer.
Free+ is a plan with a price of ₩0. Unlike paid plans, it doesn't include monthly credits, but you can use features at no cost within the free allowance. For the free allowance and on-demand billing criteria, see <How to use Free+>.
Free allowance: 2 Operator Seats, 30 Basic Seats
Usage beyond the free allowance: Available only if you've registered a payment method. It's billed on-demand (postpaid) on your next billing date.
Usage is charged for:
Operator Seats from the 3rd seat
Basic Seats from the 31st seat
Running ALF, Workflows, Marketing, and AI Marketing
Sending Kakao Consultation Talk messages, AlimTalk, SMS, and email
Phone, Voice ALF, outbound calls, and phone numbers
Credits are the usage allowance provided for each service when you subscribe to a plan. When you use a feature, the corresponding amount is deducted from your credits. Paid plans include CX credits and Team credits based on your plan, and you can also top up credits in advance. CX credits can only be used for CX features, Team credits for Team features, and Marketing credits for Marketing features.
Service | Included features |
|---|---|
CX | Operator Seats<br>Customer contacts (stored customers)<br>Chat ALF, Voice ALF, Workflows<br>Phone numbers, outbound call fees, Kakao Consultation Talk<br>Follow-up notifications (AlimTalk, SMS) |
Marketing | On-site, email, SMS, Kakao AlimTalk, Kakao Brand Message<br>AI Marketing |
Team | Basic Seats<br>AI Seats (CoS, Notebook, Drive) |
On a paid plan, you receive credits for your plan on your billing date each month. Your billing date is the day you started your paid subscription.
Example: If you subscribed on September 16, you'll receive new credits on October 16.
CX and Team credits from your paid plan are available until your next settlement date. Unused credits don't roll over and expire.
Marketing credits aren't included in paid plans by default. If you buy them as an add-on, you can use them within 1 year. Credits unused after 1 year are not refunded or rolled over.
Credits are applied at the "annual contract rate" listed in the rate table on the pricing page.
On-demand bills your usage after the fact (postpaid). Even if you have no credits or run out of credits, your features keep working. Any usage over your credits is billed on-demand on your next billing date.
It's billed together with your plan price on your next billing date.
The "on-demand rate" applies, which is higher than the annual contract rate.
To check this month's credit usage and on-demand charges, go to [Channel Settings → Subscription & Billing].
Situation: On the Startup plan, you used only 320 AI chat conversations (ALF) this month, with no usage other than seats.
Calculation:
Credit deduction: 300 conversations × ₩500 = ₩150,000 (all CX credits used)
On-demand charge: 20 conversations × ₩700 = ₩14,000 (billed on your next billing date, VAT excluded)
A seat lets a team member use Channel Talk. When someone joins the channel, they automatically use a Basic Seat. Agents and members who use AI for work turn on additional seats on top of it. There are three types of seats: Basic Seat, Operator Seat, and AI Seat.
Seat costs are calculated per billing cycle. You're charged for every member who joined the channel or had a seat turned on at any point during the cycle. Leaving the channel or turning off a seat mid-cycle doesn't reduce that cycle's cost. Reduced usage applies from the next settlement date, so turn off any seats you won't need before then.
Every team member in the channel automatically uses one Basic Seat.
Gives access to Channel Talk's core features, such as chats, messages, and notifications, as well as Team Chat.
Depending on their role, members can view customers' chat history. When invited to a chat as a follower, they can take part in both customer conversations and internal conversations.
Members can't be assigned to chats, change chat status (snooze or close), or manage tags. To use these features, turn on an Operator Seat.
A seat for agents who are assigned to, handle, and manage chats. It includes everything in the Basic Seat, plus:
Can be assigned to chat and phone conversations, and is included in automatic assignment by Workflows and routing.
Can snooze and close chats, and manage chat tags.
Can set their status to Available, Away, or Off Duty. Chats aren't automatically assigned while Away or Off Duty.
A seat for analyzing and using your Channel Talk data with AI.
Ask CoS, your AI for work, about chat, customer, and revenue data, and get analysis and suggested next actions.
Analyze data and build dashboards in Notebook. Both viewing and editing a Notebook require an AI Seat.
Upload files to Drive for CoS to reference, and connect data sources to analyze external data as well.
Only members with an AI Seat turned on can be invited when sharing Drive files and data sources.
Available from the Startup plan. (Not available on the previous pricing model or Free+.)
Once you turn on an AI Seat, it counts toward that cycle's usage even if you turn it off. It can't be transferred to another team member within the same cycle.
Seat | Free+ | Startup | Business | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Basic Seat<br>(Team credits) | 30 seats free<br>₩4,300 per extra seat (up to 100 seats) | ₩3,000 (on-demand ₩4,300) | ₩5,000 (on-demand ₩7,200) | Contact Sales |
Operator Seat<br>(CX credits) | 2 seats free<br>₩45,000 per extra seat (up to 10 seats) | ₩30,000 (on-demand ₩45,000) | ₩60,000 (on-demand ₩90,000) | Contact Sales |
AI Seat<br>(Team credits) | Not available | ₩10,000 (on-demand ₩15,000) | ₩20,000 (on-demand ₩30,000) | Contact Sales |
If you want to use Marketing features or expect usage beyond your included credits, you can buy credits in advance. These are called add-ons. Using credits lets you pay the lower "annual contract rate" instead of the on-demand rate.
On a paid plan, you can buy additional CX, Marketing, and Team credits.
Add-on contracts last 1 year.
CX and Team add-ons: Your total purchased credits are split into 12 and provided monthly. Credits unused in a monthly cycle aren't rolled over or refunded.
Marketing add-on: The full year's credits are provided at once. Credits unused within 1 year aren't rolled over or refunded.
Payment options
CX and Team add-ons: Annual upfront or monthly installments (monthly installments cost about 15% more)
Marketing add-on: Annual upfront
For detailed purchase steps, see <How to buy credits> in Getting started with a paid plan.
You can combine plans, add-ons, and on-demand to fit your needs.Let's look at three scenarios for a channel on the Startup plan with annual upfront payment.
Situation: 3 agents handle chats, and 15 team members are in the channel. 8 of them use CoS to analyze data or write drafts. This month, there were 100 AI chat conversations and 100 Workflow runs.
CX credits (₩150,000)
3 Operator Seats = ₩90,000
100 AI chat conversations = ₩50,000
100 Workflow runs = ₩7,000
Total used: ₩147,000
Team credits (₩150,000)
15 Basic Seats = ₩45,000
8 AI Seats = ₩80,000
Total used: ₩125,000
This month's charge: ₩0The plan price was already paid at signing, and both credits stayed within their limits, so there's no additional charge.
Situation: Same channel, but a seasonal promotion drove more inquiries, resulting in 400 AI chat conversations this month. All other usage is the same as Case 1.
CX credits (₩150,000)
3 Operator Seats = ₩90,000
100 Workflow runs = ₩7,000
106 AI chat conversations = ₩53,000
Total used: ₩150,000 (credits used up)
Team credits (₩150,000)
15 Basic Seats = ₩45,000
8 AI Seats = ₩80,000
Total used: ₩125,000
On-demand
294 AI chat conversations beyond credits × ₩700 = ₩205,800
This month's charge: ₩205,800Chats keep running after your credits run out, and only the excess usage is billed on-demand. You still have ₩25,000 in Team credits, but they're for a different service and can't cover CX usage.
If usage spikes for just one month, paying on-demand is the better choice. If you regularly go over every month, buying a CX add-on is better. Add-on credits use the annual contract rate (₩500 per conversation), which saves you ₩58,800 per month based on 294 conversations. Keep in mind that add-ons are 1-year contracts, credits are provided monthly, and credits unused in a month expire.
Situation: Starting this quarter, the same channel plans to send 20,000 Kakao AlimTalk messages per month. Marketing credits aren't included in plans, so you need to either buy an add-on or use on-demand.
Sending without a Marketing add-on
20,000 messages × on-demand rate ₩8.5 = ₩170,000 per month
Charged only in months you send
Sending with a Marketing add-on
20,000 messages × annual contract rate ₩6.5 = equivalent to ₩130,000 per month
The full year (₩1,560,000) is paid at once when you sign
Marketing credits are provided for the full year at once, so you can also concentrate your sends during peak seasons. However, credits unused within the contract period expire, so estimate your yearly sending volume before you buy.