# Free tier, trial and Pay As You Go

A workspace you sign up for yourself has three states:

- **Free tier:** everything in Karmaflow.ai that does not use AI, plus one chat agent, within the free tier's limits. It is yours to keep, paying or not.
- **Free trial:** a credit for AI and other paid usage, for your first 30 days.
- **Pay As You Go:** you add a card, AI unlocks everywhere, and usage above the free tier is billed each month.

This page explains what each one includes, and how to move between them.

Workspaces set up with Karmaflow under a contract don't have these states. Their plan is set by Karmaflow, and nothing on this page applies to them.

## What you'll need

- **`billing:read`** to see the plan, the free tier's counts and the agents. Tenant admins and the seeded **Billing Admin** role have it.
- **`billing:manage`** to add a card, turn Pay As You Go on or off, set its monthly maximum, and unlock agents.

## Where to find it

**Your user menu** (the avatar, top right) → **Billing & Spend Limits** → the **Plan** tab.

The Plan tab appears only on a self-serve workspace. The **Limits** tab beside it has a **Free tier** card with every free-tier count against its limit.

## The three states

| | Free tier | Free trial | Pay As You Go |
|---|---|---|---|
| Features without AI (CRM, pipeline, helpdesk, calendar and booking, documents and e-signature, inventory, websites, group inboxes) | Yes, within the limits below | Yes | Yes |
| AI (drafts, summaries, insights, the AI in the site builder, Needs-you suggestions, and so on) | Shown locked | Yes | Yes |
| Agents | One chat agent, with limits | Every agent | The included chat agent, plus every agent you unlock |
| Tenant Brain, document agents | Off | Off | Yes |
| Graph database (Data Analyst) | Not shown | Not shown | Yes |
| What you pay | Nothing | Nothing: the trial credit pays | Usage above the free tier, plus each unlocked agent |

**AI shown locked** means the AI controls stay where they are, with a short note of what they do and an **Unlock with Pay As You Go** link. Nothing disappears.

## The free tier's limits

These are the free tier's figures when this page was written. Karmaflow can change them, and your **Limits** tab always shows the ones that apply to you.

| Limit | Free tier |
|---|---|
| Users | 10 |
| Contacts | 5,000 |
| Emails sent by people (CRM and helpdesk) | 1,000 a month, at most 100 a day; no bulk sends to a list |
| Documents sent for signature | 25 a month |
| Booking pages | 1 per person |
| Paid bookings | 5 a month |
| Storage | 2 GB |
| Conversations with the included chat agent | 15 a month |

**At a limit,** the action is refused with a message naming the limit, the count, and how to go past it.

**A few things are never refused,** so no customer is lost:
- contacts created from incoming chats, texts, calls and forms;
- a chat that is already open;
- replies your customers send.

Booking reminders by email are free. Reminders by text are part of Pay As You Go.

## The included chat agent

Every self-serve workspace keeps one chat agent on the free tier. It is your first chat agent, unless you choose another (see below). It runs with limits:

- **Three tools:** save contact details, search its knowledge, and remember. There is no web search.
- **Instructions:** up to 7,000 characters, including your own prompt components.
- **Knowledge:** up to 3 files and 25 MB in total.
- **Conversations:** 15 a month.
  - Admins are told at 10 and again at 15.
  - At 15, without Pay As You Go, the chat widget stops showing on your website until next month.
  - With Pay As You Go on, each conversation past 15 is billed.

The limits are checked when the agent is saved, so they apply in the agent form and over MCP alike. A save that goes past one is refused with the count. The agent's form shows a notice above its **Tools** card: **Included agent — running limited**, with each limit listed.

Any other chat agent shows **This agent does not run on the free tier**. Its widget doesn't show and chats with it are refused. The notice offers two ways out:

- **Make this the included agent:** it takes over the included agent's place and limits.
- **Unlock it with Pay As You Go.**

Unlocking the included agent removes its limits.

## The free trial

A new self-serve workspace starts with a free trial: **$500 of usage for 30 days**, at the same prices Pay As You Go charges. There is no limit per service; one credit covers everything.

- **During the trial,** everything is unlocked except the Tenant Brain, document agents and the graph database. The Plan tab shows how much credit is left and when the trial ends.
- **The trial ends** when the 30 days are up or the credit is spent, whichever comes first. The workspace then stays on the free tier: AI locks, and the free tier's limits apply.
- **Nothing is deleted.** Agents you built during the trial are kept. Beyond the included chat agent, they don't run until you unlock them.
- **Your admins are told when the trial ends.** The notice says what AI did for you during it.

## What AI would do here

While AI is locked, Home and the Plan tab show a **What AI would do here** card built from your own workspace:

- **Lines worked out from your data,** with no AI used. For example, how many people have waited over four hours for a reply this week, or how many tickets waited hours for a first answer.
- **Once a week, one real example:** the reply AI would draft for a message waiting on you. It is marked **Written by AI** and is never sent.
- **After the trial,** what AI did during it.

## Turn on Pay As You Go

1. Open **Billing & Spend Limits** from your user menu, then the **Plan** tab.
2. In the **Card** card, click **Add a card**. You go to Stripe's page to enter it, then come back to the Plan tab.
3. In the **Pay As You Go** card, type a **Monthly maximum (usage)** in dollars.
4. Click **Turn on Pay As You Go**.

The card now reads **On**. AI unlocks across the workspace within a minute.

Usage above the free tier is billed on your monthly invoice, charged to the card. Usage stops when it reaches the monthly maximum, until next month or until you raise it. To change the maximum, type a new figure and click **Save maximum**. Agent fees are billed beside the maximum, not counted toward it.

The monthly maximum is the same figure as the account-wide limit on the **Limits** tab. See [Spend Limits](/help/workspace-administration/spend-limits).

## Unlock an agent

Pay As You Go must be on.

1. On the **Plan** tab, find the agent in the **Agents** card. Every agent is listed, of every type.
2. Click **Unlock · $150/month**.

The row shows **Unlocked since** and today's date.

- **Billing:** an unlocked agent is billed for the days it is unlocked, on the monthly invoice.
- **What changes:** the included chat agent loses its limits, and any other agent can go live and run.
- **To stop:** click **Lock**. From then on the agent is no longer billed, and it goes back to the free tier's rules: it stops running, or runs limited if it is the included chat agent.

## Turn Pay As You Go off

Click **Turn off** in the **Pay As You Go** card.

- The workspace goes back to the free tier: AI locks, and every unlock ends.
- Your settings and agents are kept, ready for when you turn it back on.
- Usage you have already run this month is still billed at month end.

Karmaflow.ai also turns Pay As You Go off for you in two cases:

- the card on file is removed, and there is no other card;
- a monthly payment fails after Stripe's last retry. A first failed attempt doesn't count.

Either way, your admins get a **Pay As You Go was turned off** notice saying why. Add a card and turn it back on to restore everything.

## Troubleshooting

**There is no Plan tab on my billing page.**
Your workspace's plan is set by Karmaflow, not self-serve, so the Plan tab doesn't apply. If you expected it, contact Karmaflow.

**Turn on Pay As You Go is greyed out.**
There is no card on file yet. Click **Add a card** first. If the card was just added, wait a moment and reload: Stripe confirms it a few seconds after you come back.

**Unlock is greyed out on every agent.**
Pay As You Go is off. Turn it on first; an unlocked agent is billed each month.

**An action was refused with "The free tier includes …".**
You've reached one of the free tier's limits. The message says which one and your current count. Pay As You Go lifts it, or bills usage above it.

**Our chat widget disappeared from the website.**
The included chat agent has used this month's 15 free conversations, and Pay As You Go is off. It comes back on the 1st, or as soon as Pay As You Go is on.

## Related

- [Spend Limits](/help/workspace-administration/spend-limits): the monthly maximum, and per-service limits.
- [Creating a Chat Agent](/help/chat-agents/creating-agents): building the included agent.
- [Modules](/help/workspace-administration/modules): switching product areas on and off.

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