Chatfuel SDK vs Tidio
Tidio is an account in their help desk, billed on three ladders: your team’s conversations, Lyro’s, and the visitors Flows reach. Chatfuel SDK is an inbox and an AI agent in an app you own, on one balance.
Side by side
| Feature | Tidio | Chatfuel SDK |
|---|---|---|
| What you get | ||
What it is | An account in their help desk, at their address | The application itself, handed over |
Source you can read and change | ||
Licence | “A limited, revocable, non-exclusive, non-sublicensable, and non-transferable right to use our Services” | MIT |
Where it runs | Their platform; no self-hosting or source-code option is published | Vercel, your own server or Docker |
What leaves with you | A chat transcript as CSV, one conversation at a time; an API for more on Plus and Premium | The app, its source, and the deployment you already control |
Transferring the account | “You will not transfer any of your rights or obligations under our Terms to anyone else without our prior written consent.” | It is your codebase; it sells with the business |
| Your brand, your customer | ||
Your name and logo on the chat widget | Hiding “Powered by Tidio” is a $20-a-month add-on on Growth; your own logo in its place is a Plus feature | A company name, an accent colour and a logo, set in your app |
The app your team signs in to | Tidio, at their address; a white-label of the panel is not published | Yours, on your domain, under your name and logo |
Selling it to your own clients | Their terms forbid reselling or charging for the service, “except if it’s done by the official resellers of Tidio Group” | Your own sign-up and your own price, with the accounts module |
What you keep on a sale | “Up to 25% revenue share for up to 3 years” as an agency partner, on a sale made under their name | The price you set, in full |
Running several clients | Multiproject, every project in one panel, is a Plus and Premium feature | Client bots in one workspace, on one balance |
| What it costs | ||
The plans | Free, Starter at $29, Growth from $59, Plus from $300 plus usage, Premium on request | Business at $20 for one bot; from $100 for an agency workspace |
Conversations a person answers | 50, 100, or 250 to 2,000 a month by plan; at the limit you can no longer reply until it resets or you move up | Not metered |
Conversations the AI answers | A second subscription: 50 for $39 up to 1,000 for $700 a month, then sales | Tokens off the plan’s balance: $2.75 per 1M tokens read, $16.50 per 1M written |
Scripted flows | A third subscription: 100 visitors reached free, 2,000 for $29 up to 100,000 for $299 a month | Part of the plan |
People answering the inbox | 10 seats on every self-serve plan, a custom number on Plus; no seat price | No seat charge |
Channels | Live chat, email, Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp, on every plan | Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook, TikTok and the web widget, on every plan |
What is metered | Billable conversations, Lyro conversations and visitors reached by Flows, each on its own ladder | AI tokens, and a cent a conversion event, from the plan’s balance |
| A month at your size | ||
100 answered by your team, 50 by the AI | Starter 100 at $29 + Lyro 50 at $39 = $68 | From $20: conversations are not metered, and the AI is billed by the tokens it reads and writes |
250 answered by your team, 200 by the AI | Growth 250 at $59 + Lyro 200 at $140 = $199 | From $20: conversations are not metered, and the AI is billed by the tokens it reads and writes |
600 answered by your team, 500 by the AI | Growth 600 at $129 + Lyro 500 at $350 = $479 | From $20: conversations are not metered, and the AI is billed by the tokens it reads and writes |
1,000 answered by your team, 1,000 by the AI | Growth 1,000 at $179 + Lyro 1,000 at $700 = $879 | From $20: conversations are not metered, and the AI is billed by the tokens it reads and writes |
3,000 answered by your team, 2,000 by the AI | Past the published ladders: Plus, from $300 a month plus usage, through sales | From $20: conversations are not metered, and the AI is billed by the tokens it reads and writes |
| The inbox | ||
One inbox across channels, with human takeover | ||
Assigning a conversation | To an operator by hand; automatic assignment from Growth | To a teammate, to the AI, or to nobody |
Saved replies | Macros, a library the team shares, from Growth | Your own, up to 50, inserted where the cursor is; not shared with the team |
A note on the contact | Visitor notes, from Growth | |
Views you filter and save | Custom views over conditions such as the channel | Your own, over assignee, sales stage, unread and search |
WhatsApp templates from the inbox | ||
Tickets and an email inbox | ||
A live visitors list | From Starter | |
A preview of what the visitor is typing | From Growth | |
A satisfaction survey | Automated, from Growth | |
Team and response analytics | First response time and missed chats on every plan; satisfaction and team performance from Growth | |
Departments to route by | Plus and Premium | |
Mobile and desktop apps | Android, iOS, Windows and Mac | A web app that fits a phone; no native app |
| The AI, and the app around it | ||
An AI that answers the chat | ||
Where the AI answers | Live chat, Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp and email | Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook, TikTok and the web widget |
What it learns from | Website URLs, up to 60 pages a scan; question-and-answer pairs; CSV or PDF files; Zendesk articles; store products | Files, links and the answers Copilot writes for you, plus FAQs and a product catalogue |
How much it is allowed to do | Guidance, Actions, and hand-off and escalation rules for the project | Per entry point: fifteen settings across seventeen sources |
Handing over to a person | To an agent, or into a ticket | Up to 20 rules, each with its own message and its own assignee |
A guaranteed resolution rate | 50%, on Premium only | |
Scripted flows on a canvas | Flows, with sales and FAQ templates to start from | |
A template library to start from | ||
Campaigns to people who already wrote in | Email campaigns, on a quota of their own | WhatsApp campaigns over approved templates |
A deals board, a bookings calendar and Instagram publishing in the same app | ||
Conversions reported to Meta | 14 names plus your own, on 7 triggers | |
Shopify orders inside the chat | Order history, cancellations and product recommendations, from Growth | |
| Building on it | ||
Platform API | OpenAPI and webhooks on Plus and Premium; a widget SDK on every plan | The Chatfuel API through your own proxy, on every plan |
Custom code | Widget SDK commands that “affect the front-end of the chat” | It is a React app; you write whatever you like |
Your own screen inside the app | A route in your own React tree | |
Putting it on a site | Paste a script, or install it on WordPress or Shopify; nothing to deploy | Deploy the app, then paste the widget’s snippet |
| Money and terms | ||
Published price | $0, $29, $59 to $349, and from $300 plus usage; two months free when billed annually | $20 for one bot, $100 to $2,050 for an agency |
A free tier | 50 billable conversations a month, 10 seats, and 50 Lyro conversations once | |
Trial | 7 days on every feature, no card; then the Free plan | A trial the wizard opens, and a promo code worth $100 of credits |
Refunds | “Tidio is not obligated to provide a refund for any reason”; an exception is at their discretion | The SDK costs nothing; only the workspace is billed |
Going over | No overage rate is published: you move up the ladder, or wait for the reset | Top the balance up, or move up a plan |
Support | Email on every plan; live chat from Plus; Slack on Premium | Discord, GitHub and email |
Where a conversation can start
Tidio starts on the website: a live chat widget, with email, Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp brought into the same inbox. Chatfuel SDK has five channels and seventeen entry points, each with its own rules for the AI. Here is every entry point on each side, including the ones only one side has.
| Entry point | Tidio | Chatfuel SDK |
|---|---|---|
| Website | The channel Tidio is built around. Their widget also carries video calls, and a chat page of its own that their support team switches on. | |
| Chat widget on your pages | ||
| A chat page at its own address | On a Customer Service plan, enabled by their support team | |
| Video calls from the widget | ||
| Tidio brings direct messages, story activity and comments into the inbox; a comment arrives as a ticket and the reply is published under the post. | ||
| Direct messages | ||
| Comments on a post | Arrive as tickets; the reply is published under the post | |
| Comments on an ad | ||
| Story replies | ||
| Story mentions | ||
| ig.me links | ||
| Click from an ad | ||
| On both sides a customer’s message opens a 24-hour window to reply in. Their WhatsApp article documents replying inside it. | ||
| Direct messages | ||
| Click from an ad | ||
| Click from a post | ||
| Messenger conversations and page comments, on both sides. | ||
| Direct messages | ||
| Comments on a post | Arrive as tickets | |
| m.me links | ||
| Click from an ad | ||
| TikTok | TikTok is not among the channels Tidio’s pricing page or help centre list. | |
| Direct messages | ||
| Comments on a post | ||
| Click from an ad | ||
| Email and tickets | A channel and a workflow Tidio has and we do not. | |
| An email inbox | ||
| Tickets | ||
When to choose which
Choose Tidio if
- You want a free tier. Theirs is 50 billable conversations a month and ten seats, no card; we do not have one.
- You want nothing to deploy: paste a script, or install it on WordPress or Shopify, and the widget is live the same hour.
- Email and tickets belong in the same inbox as the chat. We have Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook, TikTok and the web widget, and neither of those.
- Your store runs on Shopify and the agent should see the order, cancel it and recommend a product the day you install. Here that is a screen you code.
- You want the support desk ready on day one: a visitors list, a typing preview, departments, and mobile and desktop apps, with surveys and analytics already built.
Choose Chatfuel SDK if
- The product your team or your clients log into should be yours down to the source, not an account in theirs.
- Three ladders — people, Lyro and Flows — are not something you want between a busy month and your margin.
- The conversations start on Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook and TikTok as often as on the website, and the AI should answer on every one of them.
- You run bots for several clients and want them on one balance, at a price you set, with no revenue share and no reseller clause.
- The inbox, the contacts, the deals, the bookings and the knowledge base belong in one app, under MIT, with a coding agent that knows it.
Move the inbox over
One command scaffolds the app and writes only the modules you pick. What Lyro learned from — the FAQ, the files, the pages of your site — goes to Copilot, which writes the knowledge base from it. The widget is one snippet in place of theirs, and the inbox, the contacts and the hand-off rules are already in the app behind it.
- Run the wizard, pick the modules, give it your name and your logo.
- Hand Copilot the files and the links Lyro learned from, and approve what it writes into the knowledge base.
- Set the AI per entry point, and the rules for handing a conversation to a person: when, with what message, and to whom.
- Deploy it on your own domain, switch the widget on for your site, and paste its snippet where theirs was.
Questions
Tidio alternatives divide on one question: whether you rent an account in someone’s help desk, metered by conversations, seats or resolutions, or own the application your team signs in to. Intercom and LiveChat are the first kind: Intercom bills a seat plus $0.99 for every outcome of its AI, and LiveChat bills per person. Chatfuel SDK is the second kind, and this page is the case for it, with the rows where Tidio wins left in.
All comparisons