So the per-seat number is easy to find. It's also the least useful part of the answer. Price is the thing buyers raise most; 17 of the 20 sales reps we surveyed hear it in nearly every conversation. But when a deal stalls on cost, it's rarely the monthly figure. It's the terms around it, and that's what this
What the per-user price looks like
Our own pricing is a fair map of the small-business market. The free plan covers one user, 500 records, and a single pipeline, enough to run a solo operation. Express, at $7 per user per month billed annually, adds email sync, more pipelines, and workflow automation, and it's where most small teams land. Premier, at $12, deepens the automation and customization. Bigin 360, at $18, raises the limits substantially and bundles in several add-ons for teams running sales, onboarding, and support in one place.
For context on the alternative path, ProGeen, a construction company in Albania, priced up Salesforce first and found the cost hard to justify for a small team; a Google search for something budget-friendly led to Bigin, and a two-week trial settled it. That pattern repeats across our customers. The bigger platforms aren't overpriced for what they do; they're priced for companies that need it all.
The costs that sit outside the per-user price
This is where month-three surprises come from, so look here before you compare sticker prices. A few capabilities run outside the base per-user fee. Telephony and WhatsApp messaging work on usage credits or come as add-ons, which we call toppings, and about a third of our reps say add-ons or higher tiers costing more than expected is a common objection they field.
None of this is hidden; it's metered, which is different, and it rewards one specific question: what's bundled in my plan, and what's usage-based. Ask it of us, and ask it of anyone else you evaluate. Dawid Roux, who runs V4 Creative, a digital media design agency in South Africa, put the trap well: the market's options are either too expensive with complex features a small business doesn't need, or priced low with nominal features. Both failure modes cost you; the cheap plan that can't do the job just bills you in frustration instead.
Two more things to check while you're here. Know the free plan's limits, one user and 500 records in our case, so the upgrade moment doesn't ambush you. And ask what happens to your data if you downgrade or stop paying; with Bigin, the trial runs 15 days with no card required, nothing charges automatically after, and your account drops to the free plan rather than vanishing.
The annual commitment is the real sticking point
Here's the finding that reshaped how we think about pricing conversations. When price stalls a deal, the top objection our reps hear isn't the amount; 15 of 20 say it's the annual commitment. People aren't afraid of $7 a month. They're afraid of signing a year-long commitment to a tool their team hasn't yet lived with.
That fear is reasonable, and there are two honest ways through it. You can pay monthly at a slightly higher rate, $9 instead of $7 for Express, until you're sure, then switch to annual for the discount. Or commit annually, knowing there's a money-back window, 30 days on monthly billing, and 45 on annual, with a full refund and a downgrade to the free plan if it isn't working. Either way, the commitment question resolves the same way: run a real trial with the people who'll use it daily before you sign anything. The most expensive CRM is the one your team quietly stops opening, which is why adoption is worth understanding before budget even comes up.
What should come included
The sticker comparison misses what surrounds the license, and that's often where the real money hides. Email connects out of the box on our paid plans. Migration help is built in: single-click imports from Pipedrive, HubSpot, Insightly, and Zoho CRM, CSV imports for everything else, and our support team assists if you need it; the full switching process is more approachable than most buyers expect. Onboarding help often comes included too, though it can depend on the plan, so confirm what yours covers rather than assume, with us or any vendor.
That's the checklist that makes quotes comparable: license, add-ons, onboarding, migration, and the exit terms. Two tools with the same per-user price can end up hundreds of dollars apart once they are on the table.
Does AI add to the cost?
Buyers are starting to ask this, and with us, the answer is mostly no. Zia, Bigin's built-in AI, comes with the product rather than as a separate subscription. It drafts and proofreads emails, adjusts tone, and summarizes email threads, WhatsApp conversations, notes, and entire deal records so you can catch up in seconds. Three prebuilt agents are rolling out in early access, too: Reply Assistant answers routine inquiries that arrive by email, Cross-sell Genie flags upsell and cross-sell opportunities, and Churn Analyzer turns lost deals into patterns you can act on.
Two cost notes to keep in mind before you compare us with anyone. Call transcription runs as an add-on or usage-based feature, so it belongs on your bundled-versus-metered list. And on mobile, the writing and summary features run on your device through Apple Intelligence, Galaxy AI, or Gemini Nano, which matters if data privacy is part of your AI questions.
Work out your exact subscription cost
Per-user pricing only gets you so far; your actual cost depends on the number of seats, the plan you pick, and whether you bill monthly or annually. Our subscription calculator does the math for you: choose your team size, plan, and billing cycle, and it shows the exact figure, with annual billing saving roughly 35% compared to paying month-to-month. There's no signup wall in front of it, and the result is easy to screenshot for whoever approves the spend. Local taxes come on top, and the figure covers Bigin only, not other Zoho tools.
Then check what the spend earns back
Cost is half the question; the other half is what the tool returns. Our ROI calculator takes your current numbers, the hours spent on manual updates, your deal volume and close rates, and projects the hours you'd save in a year, the extra deals you could close, and the revenue that follows. We built it for the objection we hear from spreadsheet users, that spreadsheets are free, so the comparison starts from your figures rather than ours. Treat the output as a guardrail rather than a guarantee; it's a projection, and your real result depends on how consistently the team uses the thing.
The cost questions we hear most
How much does a CRM cost per month?
For a small business, between free and roughly $20 per user per month. Bigin runs $7 to $18 per user per month, billed annually, with a free plan for one user.
Do I have to pay for a year upfront?
No. Monthly billing exists at a slightly higher per-user rate, and annual billing carries a 45-day money-back window with us. Committing annually is cheaper; just do it after your team has used the tool, not before.
What are the hidden costs to watch for?
They're metered rather than hidden: telephony, WhatsApp messaging credits, add-ons, and the record or user limits that trigger an upgrade. One question surfaces it all: what's bundled and what's usage-based.
Is a free CRM enough?
For a solo operator with a few hundred contacts, often yes. Ours covers one user and 500 records. If you're choosing between a free CRM and the spreadsheet you already own, that comparison has its own answer.
Before you compare a single price, write down the three things your current setup keeps dropping, then price the tier that fixes them, not the entry tier on the website. That's the number that matters. You can see exactly where each Bigin plan lands on our pricing page, and this piece is part of our bigger guide to the questions to ask before buying a CRM.
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