Back to Blog
Billing 6 min read Jan 5, 2025

Optimizing Your API Costs

Tips and strategies to minimize costs while maximizing value.

Understanding Your Costs

Before optimizing, understand what you're being charged for:

Per-Usage Costs

  • • Call minutes
  • • Chat messages
  • • AI summaries
  • • Recording storage
  • • Transcription

Platform Costs

  • • Monthly subscription
  • • Platform fee (Managed mode)
  • • Overage charges

Cost Optimization Strategies

1. Choose the Right Payment Mode

Self-Managed mode has lower per-unit costs but requires you to handle payments. For high-volume applications, the savings can be significant.

Example: At 10,000 call minutes/month, Self-Managed saves ~$170/month compared to Fully Managed.

2. Choose the Right Plan

Higher plans have lower overage rates and more included minutes. If you're consistently hitting overages, upgrade to save money.

PlanIncluded MinutesOverage Rate
Free100$0.028/min
Starter ($49/mo)2,000$0.025/min
Growth ($149/mo)10,000$0.022/min
EnterpriseUnlimitedCustom

3. Optimize AI Summary Usage

AI summaries cost $0.075-$0.095 each. Consider:

  • Only generate summaries for calls over a certain length
  • Let users opt-in to summaries instead of auto-generating
  • Cache summaries to avoid re-generation

4. Smart Recording Settings

Recording and transcription can add up quickly:

  • Only enable recording when needed
  • Set retention policies to auto-delete old recordings
  • Use audio-only for calls where video isn't needed (smaller file sizes)

5. Monitor Usage Patterns

Use the Usage Dashboard to identify:

  • Peak usage times
  • Highest-cost features
  • Underutilized plan minutes
  • Users with unusual usage patterns

Cost Optimization Checklist

  • Review payment mode (Self-Managed vs Fully Managed)
  • Upgrade plan if hitting consistent overages
  • Implement smart AI summary triggers
  • Set recording retention policies
  • Monitor usage dashboard weekly
  • Set up balance alerts to prevent surprise charges
Need Enterprise Pricing?

For high-volume applications, contact sales for custom pricing and volume discounts.