Conversational AI is reshaping how businesses communicate, automate, and grow.
Kore.ai is a major player in the conversational ai space, but there are many ai alternatives available that can meet a variety of enterprise automation needs.
In the past few years, we’ve seen more and more companies turn to AI-powered voice agents to handle everything from inbound support calls to proactive sales outreach.
Kore.ai has become one of the most recognized platforms in enterprise conversational AI, yet in practice, many teams are now outgrowing the traditional “bot platform” model.
In this article I’ll walk you through some of the best Kore.ai alternatives for voice AI, platforms built to help teams launch faster, integrate deeper, and deliver more natural, human-sounding conversations at scale, and help you choose the right conversational ai platform for your needs.
Kore.ai is an enterprise-grade conversational AI platform that lets businesses design, build, and deploy intelligent chatbots and voice assistants. Key features include a visual bot builder, omnichannel support, detailed analytics, and pre-built integrations across popular channels.
Its strength lies in omnichannel reach, Kore.ai assistants can operate on web, mobile, messaging, and telephony, creating a seamless experience for end users. The platform also offers advanced AI capabilities such as natural language processing and integration with enterprise systems, along with detailed analytics and reporting to help teams measure performance and uncover insights from every interaction.
In terms of pricing, Kore.ai bills per 15-minute conversation session for chatbots and uses per-seat pricing for contact center deployments, with seamless integration to enterprise contact center systems.
Plans start around $50/month for Essential and $150/month for Advanced, but in practice, most enterprise implementations land closer to $300K per year.
Despite its strengths, Kore.ai has several limitations that may lead businesses to seek alternatives:
Platform usability, especially a user friendly interface, determines how quickly teams can design, test, and deploy voice agents to production, empowering business users to work efficiently. Evaluate whether the platform offers no-code or low-code interfaces that empower business users, or if it requires dedicated engineering teams for every modification.
Conversational AI pricing models range from transparent pay-as-you-go structures to opaque enterprise contracts requiring extensive negotiation.
Retell AI ($0.07-$0.08/minute) and Synthflow ($0.08/minute) publish clear per-minute rates enabling accurate cost forecasting. In contrast, enterprise platforms may start at $150,000-$300,000 annually with additional fees for usage, integrations, and support. For some platforms, the number and complexity of call flows can also impact the cost structure, as more intricate call flows may require higher pricing tiers or custom quotes.
Regulated industries must evaluate deployment options (cloud, hybrid, on-premises), data residency controls, and compliance certifications. Healthcare organizations require HIPAA compliance, financial services need PCI DSS, and European operations must satisfy GDPR mandates.
Assess whether the platform supports required communication channels including phone systems, web chat, mobile apps, WhatsApp, SMS, voice channels, and emerging channels. Support for voice channels is a key aspect of omnichannel communication, enabling real-time, low-latency interactions and seamless integration with chat platforms. Additionally, compatibility with a wide range of telephony providers ensures greater flexibility, especially for organizations with specific compliance or data residency needs. Platforms offering broad telephony integration provide greater flexibility than those centered on single providers.
Voice AI platforms must handle growth in call volumes, concurrent conversations, and geographic expansion without performance degradation. Evaluate latency metrics, platforms achieving sub-500ms response times (like Retell AI, Vapi, Synthflow) deliver more natural conversational experiences than higher-latency alternatives.
Organizations planning international expansion should confirm multilingual support and low-latency infrastructure in target regions.
Comprehensive analytics enable teams to measure performance, identify improvement opportunities, and demonstrate ROI. Essential metrics include call completion rates, containment rates (percentage resolved without human escalation), average handling time, customer satisfaction scores, and conversation outcomes.
Many of these platforms offer virtual assistants, ai powered chatbots, and intelligent agents to enable advanced automation, customer engagement, and seamless integration across industries.
Retell AI is a cutting-edge conversational AI platform that specializes in automating enterprise phone calls with AI voice agents. It is designed to provide a natural conversational experience, with a focus on low latency and high-quality voice interactions.
Retell AI offers a transparent, usage-based pricing model, which can be more cost-effective than Kore.ai's tiered pricing for businesses with fluctuating call volumes.
Costs are broken down by component: the conversational voice engine is priced per minute, ranging from $0.07 to $0.08 depending on the chosen voice (e.g., ElevenLabs or OpenAI). Added to this is the cost of the language model (LLM), which is also per minute and can range from $0.006 (for models like GPT-4o mini) to $0.06 (for Claude 3.5).
G2 Rating: 4.8/5 (612 reviews)
Review: "Retell AI has completely transformed the way we manage automated calls, with impressive voice quality and understanding".
Enterprises that require a high-quality, real-time voice AI solution for customer support, sales, or other voice-centric applications.
Sierra AI deploys advanced AI agents for customer service that are uniquely trained to align with a company's specific brand identity.
These agents can reason, predict, and take action not just based on a knowledge base, but also by adhering to the company’s tone, values, and policies for a highly personalized interaction.
Sierra’s pricing begins at approximately $150,000 annually, making it a more cost-effective alternative for sophisticated AI.
Final pricing is customized based on agent complexity and expected interaction volume. This structure provides a lower total cost of ownership compared to Kore.ai while delivering powerful, brand-aligned automation.
G2 Rating: 4.3/5 (12 reviews)
Review: "User friendly, fast and many supported languages. Very complex setup process and more bugs then competitors".
Customer-centric brands where a consistent voice and adherence to company policy are critical, especially in telecommunications and financial services managing diverse customer segments.
Parloa is a generative AI platform built for scaling customer support in enterprise environments, with a primary focus on robust governance and compliance.
It provides a comprehensive toolset to manage AI behavior and meet stringent regulatory standards in sensitive industries.
Parloa uses a custom pricing model based on conversation volume and the specific compliance and governance features required.
The enterprise-tier structure reflects its deep investment in certifications and regulatory tools, positioning it as a premium choice for organizations where compliance is a non-negotiable, mission-critical requirement.
G2 Rating: 4/5 (1 review)
Financial services, healthcare, and insurance companies operating under strict regulatory frameworks that demand comprehensive audit trails, data security, and verifiable compliance certifications.
PolyAI delivers highly advanced voice assistants engineered to handle complex, human-like conversations.
The platform excels where customers interrupt, change topics, or make mistakes, managing multi-turn dialogues and context switches that challenge simpler conversational AI systems.
The platform utilizes a custom enterprise pricing model that is based on projected call volume and the degree of conversational complexity required.
The cost reflects its specialized, voice-first capabilities and its ability to automate interactions that other systems cannot. Detailed pricing information is available through a direct consultation with their sales team.
G2 Rating: 5/5 (11 reviews)
Review: "There are many options for AI currently in the market. PolyAI impressed us by providing a product that could be launched in a short amount of time without risking quality".
Industries like travel, hospitality, and telecom where customer interactions involve frequent context switches, complex inquiries, and non-linear conversations that demand a high degree of contextual understanding.
Cognigy is an enterprise-grade customer service platform specializing in voice support for contact centers.
Its low-code editor allows teams to design, launch, and manage complex conversation flows across multiple channels and languages from a single interface, automating tasks like order tracking, appointment scheduling, and KYC verification.
Pricing is provided through custom quotes tailored to deployment scale and specific business requirements.
While enterprise-grade, its pricing is typically positioned competitively below Kore.ai's common entry point of over $300,000. The models are usage-based, aligning costs directly with conversation volume and the mix of channels used, offering a scalable investment for large contact centers.
G2 Rating: 4.6/5 (13 reviews)
Review: "Overall I loved it but I must mention that it does not support an extensive workflow".
Enterprise contact centers in highly regulated industries (finance, healthcare) that require on-premises deployment, comprehensive governance features, and broad telephony integration beyond a single vendor.
Synthflow is a scalable voice AI with a no-code visual workflow builder, real-time personalization, and deep CRM integrations. Supports HIPAA compliance, inbound routing, and multi-tenant management for agencies. Designed for production-grade voice automation.
Starter plan starts at $29/month for 5,000 minutes and 1 agent. Growth at $99/month includes 20,000 minutes and unlimited agents. Scale plan at $249/month supports 60,000 minutes. Custom enterprise pricing available.
G2 Rating: 4.5/5 (815 reviews)
Review: "What I like best about Synthflow is that it doesn’t bury you in technical complexity. You don’t need to be a coder or spend weeks wiring together APIs just to get a usable AI voice agent".
Marketing teams and enterprises needing robust inbound support automation with compliance needs and deep integrations.
Bland emphasizes hyper-realistic voice experiences with strong security and data governance. It supports high-volume inbound and outbound calling, SMS, and omnichannel workflows. Bland markets itself as capable of scaling up to one million concurrent calls, making it attractive to enterprises that demand resiliency.
No public pricing. Bland generally positions itself at the enterprise tier, with costs reflecting its scale and customization focus.
Product Hunt Rating: 3/5 (10 reviews)
Large enterprises with strict requirements for privacy, governance, and brand voice customization at scale.
Ada.cx powers AI agents that automate customer service across chat, voice, and email, helping support teams handle complex requests at scale.
Unlike traditional bots that rely on rigid scripts, Ada’s platform was built “AI-first”, meaning its agents can understand intent, trigger workflows, and even escalate to humans when needed, all while maintaining a consistent brand tone.
G2 Rating: 4.6/5 (155 reviews)
Review: “Ada helped our small support team contain the most easy-to-resolve customer inquiries, freeing-up more time for agents to go through our backlog.”
Ada uses a performance-based pricing model, where companies pay based on successful resolutions or interaction volume rather than flat usage fees. Exact pricing depends on the number of monthly conversations, integrations, and deployment channels, but most enterprise plans start in the low six figures annually.
Brands that prioritize customer experience at scale, especially e-commerce, fintech, and telecom companies, where multilingual support and fast automation setup are key.
Decagon.ai offers a unified AI engine that auto-resolves customer issues across chat, voice, email, SMS, and custom channels in any language.
Their approach centers on Agent Operating Procedures (AOPs): natural-language instructions that compile into logic, allowing teams to tweak behavior without heavy coding.
Decagon frames pricing around value. Their two main tiers are:
Because Decagon is aimed at enterprise clients with large volumes, their base pricing is custom. In one public review, estimated ranges span $95,000 to $590,900+ per year, depending on complexity, volume, and integrations.
G2 Rating: 4.9/5 (18 reviews)
Review: "The biggest upside of using Decagon isn't simply the assumption of repetitive day-to-day tasks that would normally be done manually, but that Decagon allows us to evaluate data on a much deeper level."
Organizations that demand high customization, transparency, and outcome-driven automation, especially in sectors like fintech, telecom, or SaaS with large support loads.
ElevenLabs is best known for its world-class text-to-speech and voice cloning tech, and more recently it’s expanded into conversational AI agents. Their platform can take user input (voice or text), ground it in your data, and produce natural spoken replies.
It’s not yet a full-blown telephony agent system, but it bridges content and voice interaction nicely, especially for brands already working in audio, narration, or voice experiences.
ElevenLabs uses a credit system. You get a bundle of credits (usable for TTS, agents, etc.), and if you exceed them, you buy more.
Example tiers (as of now):
Because it’s usage-based, your total cost will depend heavily on how many agent minutes you use, how much audio you generate, and how premium the voices are.
If your product or brand already has a voice or audio focus (podcasts, narration, gaming, or voice apps) and you want to layer in conversational agents, ElevenLabs is a powerful pick. It’s especially strong when you care deeply about sound quality, expressiveness, and voice branding. But if your priority is full telephony integration, call switching, deep voice workflows, or super predictable pricing, Vapi (or others) might still lead in those domains.
Google Cloud Dialogflow is a comprehensive development suite for building conversational interfaces for websites, mobile applications, and IoT devices. It is a powerful and flexible platform that is well-suited for a wide range of use cases.
Google Cloud Dialogflow's pricing structure is pay-as-you-go and varies significantly between its two versions: ES and CX.
For Dialogflow CX, the more advanced, enterprise-oriented edition, pricing is based on the number of requests (text, voice, or sessions). For example, text requests cost $0.007 per request.
For voice, the cost is $0.001 per second of audio, which includes both Speech-to-Text and Text-to-Speech. While this offers flexibility, costs can accumulate quickly in high-volume use cases.
It's crucial to account for the separate voice service charges, which are not included in the base request fee and can double or triple the total cost of a call. Google offers new customers a $600 credit to trial the platform.
G2 Rating: 4.4/5 (134 reviews)
Review: "Customer support can sometimes be slow or less responsive. In addition, while extensive, some documentation can be difficult to navigate."
Businesses that are already invested in the Google Cloud ecosystem or that require a highly scalable and flexible conversational AI platform.
Amazon Lex is a service for building conversational interfaces into any application using voice and text. It is based on the same technology that powers Amazon Alexa, and it offers a range of features for building and deploying chatbots and voice assistants.
Billing is based on the number of requests processed by the bot.
For voice interactions, the cost is $0.004 per request.
For text requests, the price is $0.00075 per request.
Under its free tier, Amazon Lex allows for up to 10,000 text requests and 5,000 speech requests per month, free for the first year. This model is very cost-effective for applications with low-to-moderate interaction volumes.
However, for large-scale voice operations, it's important to accurately calculate the total number of conversational "turns" to forecast monthly costs precisely.
G2 Rating: 4.2/5 (37 reviews)
Review: "Lex is easy to configure. Training and configuring the chatbot is simple and easy."
Businesses that are already using AWS or that require a cost-effective and scalable conversational AI solution.
Retell AI stands out as a top choice among Kore.ai alternatives due to its focus on voice, its low latency, and its flexible API.
The platform is designed to provide a seamless and natural conversational experience, and it is highly customizable to meet the specific needs of your business. With its transparent pricing and commitment to quality, Retell AI is a compelling option for any enterprise that is looking to automate its phone calls with AI voice agents.
Ready to experience the future of voice AI? Explore Retell AI's solutions and see how our platform can transform your customer interactions. Schedule a demo today and discover the power of real-time, human-like conversations.
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