Amazon Connect pricing – Amazon Connect is AWS’s cloud-based, pay-as-you-go contact center platform, and its pricing model has evolved significantly in 2026 with the introduction of Amazon Connect Customer — a new, AI-bundled pricing tier that replaces the old “AI Unlimited” branding. If you’re evaluating Amazon Connect for your contact center, budgeting for a migration, or simply trying to understand what a bill will actually look like, this guide breaks down every cost component: voice, chat, email, SMS, telephony, outbound campaigns, tasks, cases, Voice ID, and every AI feature bundled into the platform.
We’ll also show you how to use a free Amazon Connect pricing calculator to model your exact monthly cost in minutes, instead of manually multiplying rate cards.
What Is Amazon Connect Contact Center?
Amazon Connect is a cloud contact center service built by AWS that lets businesses run omnichannel customer service operations — voice, chat, email, SMS, WhatsApp, and Apple Messages for Business — from a single platform, without provisioning any hardware or signing long-term licensing contracts.
Unlike legacy contact center platforms (Genesys, Cisco, Avaya, Five9, NICE CXone) that charge a per-agent seat license regardless of usage, Amazon Connect uses consumption-based pricing: you pay for the voice minutes, messages, and emails your contact center actually processes. There are no seat fees, no minimum commitments, and no long-term contracts.
In 2026, AWS restructured its pricing around a new product line called Amazon Connect Customer, which combines agentic AI capabilities (Amazon Q in Connect, Contact Lens conversational analytics, Amazon Lex self-service, and more) with human agent workflows under a single, simplified per-channel rate.
How Amazon Connect Pricing Works
Amazon Connect pricing is built around a few consistent principles:
- Pay-as-you-go: You’re billed only for the voice minutes, chat/SMS messages, and emails you actually send or receive — no upfront fees.
- No seat licensing: Agent headcount does not directly determine your bill (aside from optional per-agent add-ons like Forecasting & Scheduling in Customer Basic mode).
- Region-consistent service rates: Core channel pricing (voice, chat, email) is the same across AWS regions worldwide.
- Region-variable telephony rates: Phone number and per-minute carrier charges vary by country, since these reflect the cost of connecting to the global telephone network.
- Two pricing tracks: Amazon Connect currently offers two ways to buy the platform — Connect Customer Pricing (bundled, AI-inclusive) and Connect Customer Basic (unbundled, à la carte).
Understanding which track applies to your account — and which one is more cost-effective for your usage pattern — is the single biggest lever in controlling your Amazon Connect bill.
Amazon Connect Customer Pricing (New Bundled AI Model)
Amazon Connect Customer (Previously known as Unlimited AI) is AWS’s current flagship pricing tier. It bundles agentic AI capabilities directly into the channel rate, so there’s no separate charge for enabling Contact Lens analytics, Amazon Q real-time assist, or self-service bots.
Connect Customer Base Rates
| Communication Channel | Price |
|---|---|
| Voice | $0.038 per minute (plus standard telephony charges) |
| Chat | $0.010 per message sent or received |
| $0.080 per email sent or received | |
| SMS & 3rd-party messaging (WhatsApp, Apple Messages for Business) | $0.014 per message sent or received |
What’s Included at No Extra Charge
Because Connect Customer bundles AI into the base rate, the following capabilities carry zero incremental cost once you’re paying the channel rate above:
- Agentic self-service and pre-built AI agents
- AI agent designer
- Real-time agent assist (Amazon Q in Connect)
- AI-powered manager assist
- Predictive insights & conversational analytics (Contact Lens)
- Post-contact summaries (generative AI)
- Forecasting & agent scheduling
- Performance evaluations for human and AI agents
- Automated coaching feedback
- Custom metrics in dashboards and APIs
- Screen recording
- Unified observability, testing, and simulation
- Unified customer data
- Amazon Lex requests originating from your Connect instance
- Amazon Nova Sonic and Polly generative text-to-speech
- Access to third-party STT/TTS model configuration (the provider’s own usage fee is still separate)
This bundling is the core value proposition: instead of stacking Contact Lens ($0.015/min), Amazon Q ($0.008/min), and self-service ($0.008/min) charges on top of a base voice rate, you pay one blended $0.038/min rate that includes all of it.
Amazon Connect Customer Basic Pricing (Legacy À La Carte Model)
Some organizations — particularly those that only need basic routing without AI features — remain on Customer Basic, the unbundled predecessor pricing model. Customer Basic offers lower base channel rates, but every AI capability (self-service, agent assist, analytics, forecasting, evaluations) is billed as a separate add-on.
Customer Basic Channel Rates
| Channel | Base Channel Usage |
|---|---|
| Voice | $0.018 per minute |
| Chat | $0.004 per message |
| Messaging (SMS/WhatsApp/Apple) | $0.010 per message |
| $0.050 per email |
Customer Basic À La Carte Add-Ons
| Feature | Voice | Chat | Messaging | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Conversational analytics & post-contact summaries | $0.015/min (Tier 1) | $0.0015/msg | $0.0015/msg | — |
| End-customer self-service (+ Lex fees) | $0.0080/min | $0.0015/msg | $0.0015/msg | — |
| Real-time agent assistance | $0.0080/min | $0.0015/msg | $0.0015/msg | $0.020/inbound email |
| Screen recording | $0.0060/min | — | — | — |
| Forecasting & agent scheduling | $27/agent/month | |||
| Performance evaluations | $12/agent/month |
Customer Basic also lacks several capabilities entirely, including conversational analytics for email, customer first callbacks, estimated wait time, flow designer analytics, AI-powered case summarization, and Amazon Nova Sonic.
Important: Because AI features are billed per-use in Customer Basic, a heavily-AI-enabled deployment often ends up more expensive than simply moving to Connect Customer Pricing’s blended rate. This is exactly the kind of comparison our calculator (covered below) is built to run for you.
Also Check – RingCentral Contact Center Pricing, RingCX Complete Guide to Features, Omnichannel Capabilities & Pricing (2026)
Channel-by-Channel Pricing Breakdown
Voice Pricing
Voice is billed on two layers:
- Service charge — $0.038/min (Connect Customer) or $0.018/min (Customer Basic), billed per second with a 10-second minimum.
- Communication/telephony charge — the actual PSTN, in-app, or video connection cost (see the telephony section below).
Additional voice-related rates:
| Item | Price |
|---|---|
| In-app / web calling audio | $0.010/min |
| Video connection | $0.015/min/participant |
| Screen sharing | $0.015/min |
| External voice connector (3rd-party PBX integration for analytics) | $100/connector/day + $0.032/min (Connect Customer) or $0.012/min (Customer Basic) |
Chat Pricing
Chat is billed per message sent or received, including the initial message that opens the conversation. Connect Customer charges $0.010/message; Customer Basic charges $0.004/message. Step-by-step guided chat experiences (interactive forms/menus inside chat) carry an additional guide-message charge.
Email Pricing
Email is billed per email sent or received, including automated acknowledgment emails triggered by a flow. Connect Customer: $0.080/email. Customer Basic: $0.050/email. A small separate Amazon SES delivery fee (typically a fraction of a cent per email) also applies.
SMS, WhatsApp & Apple Messages for Business
Messaging channels share a unified per-message rate ($0.014/msg Connect Customer, $0.010/msg Customer Basic) for the Amazon Connect service charge. On top of this, message delivery is billed separately through Amazon End User Messaging — for example, a US 10DLC number typically costs roughly $0.0088 per outbound message and $0.0075 per inbound message, while WhatsApp delivery runs about $0.005 per message. These delivery fees vary by country, carrier, and number type.
Telephony & Global Phone Number Charges
Telephony is the part of Amazon Connect pricing that varies most by geography. AWS charges for phone numbers on a per-day basis, plus per-minute inbound/outbound carrier rates.
| Number Type | Example Rate (US) |
|---|---|
| Direct Inward Dial (DID) | $0.030/day + $0.0022/min inbound + $0.0048/min outbound |
| Toll-Free Number (TFN) | $0.060/day + $0.0050/min inbound |
| Shared Trunking (70+ countries via telco partners) | $0.0022/min inbound & national outbound |
| UIFN (Universal International Freephone) | Per-day rate, minimum 5-country enablement |
Amazon Connect also supports Shared Trunking, a model where a telecom partner carrier provides numbers directly (billed by the carrier) while AWS charges only for the trunking usage — useful for countries like India, Brazil, Indonesia, UAE, and dozens of others where direct AWS telephony coverage is limited.
International telephony rates differ significantly by country and destination type (landline vs. mobile vs. high-cost destinations), so businesses running multi-country deployments should model each region’s telephony separately rather than assuming US rates apply globally.
Add-On Features: Tasks, Cases, Customer Profiles, Outbound Campaigns & Voice ID
Tasks
Amazon Connect Tasks lets agents or automated flows create trackable work items (e.g., “follow up with customer in 3 days”). Priced at $0.070/task (Connect Customer) or $0.040/task (Customer Basic), whether created via API, flow action, or a connector to an external CRM like Salesforce.
Cases
Amazon Connect Cases bills $0.12 per case created, whether from the agent workspace, the API, or a flow action. AI-powered case summarization is included at no extra charge under Connect Customer Pricing.
Customer Profiles
Customer Profiles pricing is based on daily utilization, not storage:
- Profiles containing only Amazon Connect–generated data are free to search, merge, or read.
- Profiles enriched with imported data (CRM records, order history, custom attributes) cost $0.005 per profile per day utilized.
- Profiles with more than 100 data objects incur an additional $0.005 per 100-object block, per day utilized.
- Daily utilization charges are capped at 30% of total stored profiles per day.
Outbound Campaigns
Outbound Campaigns (predictive/progressive dialing, guided campaign builder, or visual journey builder) are billed with two components:
- $0.005 per outbound attempt, across every channel, covering orchestration, templates, and reporting.
- $0.045 per connected voice minute — this replaces the standard voice rate for campaign calls, it does not stack on top of it.
- SMS, WhatsApp, and email sent via campaigns are billed through their respective channel/delivery pricing.
Voice ID (End of Support: May 20, 2026)
Amazon Connect Voice ID — used for caller authentication and fraud detection — is billed at $0.025 per transaction (enrollment, verification, or fraud check). AWS has announced Voice ID will reach end-of-support on May 20, 2026, and new customer access is no longer available. Existing customers should review AWS’s migration documentation before this date.
Screen Recording
Billed at $0.006 per recorded minute, counted only while an agent is actively connected or completing after-contact work (not during IVR/queue time).
Forecasting, Scheduling & Performance Evaluations
Under Connect Customer Pricing, both are bundled into the channel rate at no extra cost. Under Customer Basic, they’re billed at $27/agent/month (forecasting & scheduling) and $12/agent/month (performance evaluations), applied only to agents who receive a schedule or an evaluation that month.
Real-World Amazon Connect Pricing Examples
To make these rates concrete, here’s how they play out for a few common contact center sizes (using Connect Customer Pricing, US region):
| Deployment | Monthly Usage | Estimated Monthly Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Small startup (10 agents) | 5,000 voice min, 8,000 chat msgs, 2 phone numbers | ~$272/month |
| Mid-size company (50 agents) | 50,000 voice min, 30,000 chat msgs, 10,000 campaign min, 5 numbers | ~$2,805/month |
| Enterprise (200 agents) | 300,000 voice min, 200,000 chat/messaging, 50,000 campaign min, 20 numbers | ~$16,770/month |
| Chat-only center (30 agents) | 80,000 chat msgs, 20,000 SMS, no voice | ~$1,080/month |
These figures exclude taxes, telecom surcharges, and third-party delivery/model fees (Polly, Lex standalone usage, Bedrock, SMS carrier delivery), which are billed separately. Actual costs will vary based on average handle time, agent utilization, region mix, and which optional features you enable.
Also Check – Cisco Webex Contact Center: Complete Guide to Features, Pricing & Value in 2026
AWS Free Tier for Amazon Connect
New AWS accounts can trial Amazon Connect at no cost through the AWS Free Tier, which includes, during the first 12 months:
- 1,000 Customer Profiles per month
- 500 chat messages per month for conversational analytics
- 100,000 voice minutes per month for conversational analytics (first 2 months upon first use)
- 30 days of performance evaluations upon first activation
- 90 days of forecasting, capacity planning, and scheduling upon first activation
These trial windows are tied to your AWS Payer Account ID, so they apply once per organization rather than per Connect instance.
Connect Customer Pricing vs. Customer Basic: Which Should You Choose?
| Factor | Connect Customer Pricing | Customer Basic |
|---|---|---|
| Voice rate | $0.038/min (all-inclusive) | $0.018/min (+ AI add-ons) |
| Chat rate | $0.010/msg (all-inclusive) | $0.004/msg (+ AI add-ons) |
| Best for | Contact centers using 2+ AI features (self-service, analytics, agent assist) | Basic routing with minimal or no AI usage |
| AI features | Bundled at no extra cost | Billed individually per feature |
| Forecasting & evaluations | Included free | $27/agent + $12/agent per month |
| Predictability | Simple, single blended rate | Requires tracking multiple line items |
As a rule of thumb: if your deployment uses Contact Lens analytics and Amazon Q real-time assist together, the combined à la carte cost in Customer Basic (roughly $0.023/min in add-ons alone) already approaches the $0.020/min premium that Connect Customer Pricing charges over the Customer Basic base rate — making the bundled tier the more economical choice for AI-forward deployments.
Calculate Your Exact Cost: Free Amazon Connect Pricing Calculator
Manually multiplying rate cards across voice, chat, SMS, email, telephony, campaigns, tasks, cases, and Voice ID gets complicated fast — especially if you’re comparing Connect Customer Pricing against Customer Basic, or trying to build a business case that includes Lambda, S3, and CloudWatch costs alongside your Connect bill.
To make this easier, we built the Amazon Connect Calculator — a free, browser-based estimator that covers the entire Amazon Connect cost stack in one place.
What the Calculator Covers
- Region-aware inputs across US, EU, Asia Pacific, Canada, and Africa
- Toggle between Connect Customer Pricing and Customer Basic modes, with a side-by-side comparison table so you can see which tier is cheaper for your actual usage
- Voice & telephony: inbound/outbound minutes, phone numbers, web/video calling, screen sharing
- Chat, SMS, WhatsApp, Apple Messages, and Email volume inputs
- Outbound Campaigns, including the $0.045/min campaign rate and $0.005/attempt processing fee
- Contact Lens, Amazon Q, forecasting, and performance evaluation add-ons for Customer Basic mode
- Tasks, Cases, and Customer Profiles, including the imported-data vs. free-tier profile logic
- Voice ID transaction costs, with a built-in notice about its May 2026 end-of-support date
- External voice connector costs for 3rd-party PBX integrations (Cisco, Avaya, Genesys)
- A full AWS infrastructure section for Lambda, S3, CloudWatch, Bedrock AgentCore, and Bedrock Knowledge Bases — so you can estimate the total cost of ownership, not just the Connect invoice
- A Migration ROI calculator comparing Amazon Connect against legacy per-seat CCaaS platforms like Genesys Cloud, Cisco UCCE, Avaya, Five9, and NICE CXone
- Pre-built scenarios (Small Startup, Mid-size, Enterprise, Chat-only, Outbound Campaign, Healthcare) to get a working estimate in seconds
- CSV export and print/PDF output for sharing estimates with finance or procurement teams
How to Use It
- Open the Amazon Connect Calculator.
- Select your AWS region and pricing mode (Connect Customer Pricing or Customer Basic).
- Load a pre-configured scenario close to your deployment size, or enter your own voice minutes, chat/SMS/email volume, phone numbers, and agent count. (Or put the details according to your contact center size)
- Review the cost composition breakdown and the Connect Customer vs. Customer Basic comparison table.
- Export your estimate as CSV or PDF for internal budgeting and vendor comparisons.
This tool is especially useful for solutions architects and CX leaders preparing an AWS cost justification, since it separates what’s billed directly by Amazon Connect from what’s billed separately by Lambda, S3, CloudWatch, Polly, Lex, and Bedrock — a distinction that’s easy to miss when reading the raw AWS pricing pages.
7 Ways to Reduce Your Amazon Connect Bill
- Pick the right pricing mode. Run both Connect Customer Pricing and Customer Basic through the calculator above using your real usage numbers — the cheaper mode depends entirely on how many AI features you actually use.
- Deflect voice to digital channels. A 5-minute voice call costs roughly the same as 19 chat messages — shifting suitable interactions to chat or self-service bots can meaningfully cut per-contact cost.
- Lean on self-service. Amazon Lex-powered self-service can resolve 20–40% of contacts before they ever reach a human agent, and it’s included at no extra charge under Connect Customer Pricing.
- Release unused phone numbers. Every claimed DID or toll-free number bills a daily fee whether or not it receives calls.
- Manage external voice connectors carefully. These bill $100/day even when idle — consolidate to the minimum number of connectors your architecture actually needs.
- Right-size Customer Profiles usage. Only profiles enriched with imported/merged data incur daily utilization charges — profiles built purely from Connect-native contact history are free.
- Negotiate telephony rates for high volume. Outbound and inbound per-minute carrier charges vary by country and volume tier; high-volume deployments may be able to negotiate better rates or use Shared Trunking in supported countries.
Also Check – Genesys Cloud CX Contact Center: Complete Guide to Features, Plans & Pricing (2026)
Frequently Asked Questions
Does Amazon Connect charge a monthly or annual license fee? No. Amazon Connect has no license fees, no seat charges, and no minimum commitments. You pay only for the voice minutes, messages, emails, tasks, and other resources you actually consume.
What is the difference between Amazon Connect Customer and Customer Basic? Connect Customer bundles all AI features (Contact Lens analytics, Amazon Q agent assist, self-service, forecasting, evaluations) into a single per-channel rate. Customer Basic offers lower base channel rates but bills every AI feature separately as an add-on.
Does Amazon Connect pricing change by AWS region? Core service charges (voice, chat, email rates) are the same worldwide. Only telephony charges — phone number day rates and per-minute carrier costs — vary by country.
Is Amazon Lex billed separately from Amazon Connect? Under Connect Customer Pricing, Lex requests originating from your Connect instance are included. Under Customer Basic, Lex is billed separately at standard Lex rates in addition to the self-service add-on charge.
Is Amazon Connect Voice ID still available? Voice ID reaches end-of-support on May 20, 2026, and new customer access is no longer available. Existing customers continue to be billed $0.025/transaction until they migrate.
How much does a 100-agent Amazon Connect contact center cost? There’s no per-agent license fee — cost depends entirely on usage. For example, 200,000 inbound minutes/month on Connect Customer Pricing in the US would run roughly $7,600 in voice service charges alone, before telephony and any digital channel usage. Use the pricing calculator to model your specific agent count and volume.
What costs are NOT included in the Amazon Connect bill? Amazon Polly (standalone usage), Amazon Lex (in Customer Basic mode), AWS Lambda, S3 storage, CloudWatch logs, Bedrock AgentCore Gateway, Bedrock Knowledge Bases, and SMS/WhatsApp carrier delivery fees are all billed separately by their respective AWS services.
Final Thoughts
Amazon Connect’s 2026 pricing structure — split between the AI-bundled Connect Customer Pricing tier and the unbundled Customer Basic tier — gives contact centers real flexibility, but it also means the “right” way to buy the platform depends entirely on how many AI features you plan to use. Rather than manually reconciling voice, chat, email, telephony, campaign, and infrastructure rate cards, use the free Connect Pricing Calculator to model your exact deployment, compare both pricing modes side by side, and generate a shareable cost estimate for your team.
This article is based on Amazon Connect’s official AWS pricing pages as of July 2026. Amazon Connect pricing is subject to change — always verify current rates at aws.amazon.com/products/connect/customer/pricing before making purchasing decisions.
