Pendo Pricing 2026: MAU Quotes, Free Cap, No Public Rates
Vorec Team · 2026-11-06 · About 8 min read
Pendo pricing is quoted, not published. The pricing page at pendo.io/pricing, read on 5 November 2026, lists three paid plans, Base, Core and Ultimate, and every one of them says "Request pricing" with a "Custom MAU volume"; there is no monthly or annual rate and no billing toggle. The two numbers the page states about cost and access are the cap on the free-forever version, 500 monthly active users, and the length of the full-platform trial, 30 days. Everything else that decides your bill, the MAU count and the modules you pick, comes from a sales conversation.
Verified: rendered page, 5 November 2026, about 11:24 to 11:28 UTC, two consecutive rendered-text reads after opening the trial FAQ matched exactly. Captures are saved. If you have seen a dollar-per-month figure for Pendo elsewhere, it did not come from this page as read on that date, and we are not going to repeat one. Vorec, which publishes this page, comes up at the end.
The plans on the page
| Pendo Free | Base | Core | Ultimate | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Subscription price shown | Free forever | Request pricing | Request pricing | Request pricing |
| Monthly active users | Up to 500 | Custom | Custom | Custom |
| Analytics | Included | Included | Included | Included |
| In-app guides | Included | Included | Included | Included |
| Session replays | Not listed | Add-on | Included | Included |
| Product discovery | Not listed | Add-on | Add-on | Included |
| Sentiment (NPS, surveys) | Included, Pendo-branded | Add-on | Add-on | Included |
| Journey orchestration | Not listed | Add-on | Add-on | Included |
| Data management and access | Included | Included | Included | Included |
| Support | Not listed | Included | Included | Included |
The comparison legend says a check mark means included in the bundle and a dollar sign means available for purchase as an add-on. The dollar sign is not a price; the page never attaches an amount to any add-on. Rows marked "Not listed" above are blank for that column on the page, which is a reading of the layout, not a statement that the capability is unavailable.
The plan cards describe the audiences this way: Base is for teams ready to scale with analytics and in-app guidance; Core adds Session Replay for teams who want to see the full user journey; Ultimate, marked most popular, adds Sentiment surveys, Orchestrate, Listen and Data Sync for enterprises coordinating adoption across systems.
What sets the price
The FAQ "How does Pendo pricing work?" gives the formula without the numbers: the price combines the number of monthly active users you track and the functionality in your plan. More MAUs raise the total while lowering the cost per MAU. Three other FAQ answers close off the usual guesses:
- A monthly active user is a unique visitor who was active in your app over the last 30 calendar days.
- Applications and sessions don't change the price. You can track several apps at no extra cost per app; only MAUs and modules count.
- Discounts are built in. The page says volume and bundle discounts are already in the pricing and that a representative can tailor further options. No percentage is stated.
The "Our pricing philosophy" section promises all-in access to a module once bought, savings as you scale, and no "bait and switch" low starting price. Those are claims about how the quote behaves over time, and the only way to test them is to get the quote.
Free, trial, and Novus are three different things
The page is easy to misread here, because three things on it are free in some sense.
- Pendo Free is a free-forever version: product analytics, in-app guides, Pendo-branded roadmaps and Pendo-branded NPS surveys, with unlimited web and mobile app keys, for up to 500 MAUs. Above 500 MAUs on Free you can't create new guides, NPS surveys or segments until you upgrade.
- The 30-day free trial opens the entire platform, analytics, guides, feedback, journey orchestration and more, and the FAQ directs you to sales to start one.
- Novus is a separate product in free open beta, "Free (no credit card required)" with "No MAU limit during beta". Its card lists continuous product monitoring, proactive recommendations in Slack, AI-generated pull requests to keep instrumentation current, and auto-instrumentation via GitHub. Its beta terms say nothing about Pendo Free or the paid bundles.
For paid plans the overage rule is softer than Free's: the FAQ says exceeding your MAU limit won't interrupt functionality, and your account representative will contact you to find out whether the growth needs a contract adjustment or is a configuration issue.
What you can and can't calculate
Because the paid rate isn't public, the arithmetic you can do from this page is limited to what you bring to it:
- Your annual cost is whatever sales quotes for your MAU band and modules. The page states no billing interval and no annual discount, so don't assume either.
- Pendo Free's cost is zero until you pass 500 MAUs, at which point you can't create new guides, NPS surveys or segments until you upgrade.
What you can't derive: a per-MAU rate (none is shown), an add-on price (the dollar sign carries no amount), a seat price (the page never mentions seats), or a comparison with vendors that do publish rates, except to note that Pendo asks you to talk to sales first.
Which plan do the gates point to?
Reading the comparison as a buyer, the bundles sort by three modules:
- Session replay is the Base-to-Core step. It's an add-on on Base and included from Core up.
- Product discovery and journey orchestration are add-ons on both Base and Core and included only on Ultimate.
- Sentiment surveys are Pendo-branded on Free, add-ons on Base and Core, and included on Ultimate.
So a team that wants analytics and guides pays for Base, a team that also wants to watch sessions is a Core team, and a team that wants surveys, discovery and orchestration without add-on line items is being steered to Ultimate. The page also lists two AI products sold alongside any plan, Predict (custom prediction volume, request a demo) and Agent Analytics (custom prompt volume with a free prompt allowance), again without amounts.
Where Vorec fits
Pendo's job is to measure how people use your product and to guide them inside it. The guides still need something to show, and Vorec is for making that: it records your screen with its own macOS recorder, and an AI agent can drive it for you through the Claude Code plugin, capturing locally for you to review before anything is uploaded. It then drafts narration matched to the workflow it captured and generates the voiceover, so nothing is spoken into a microphone. In the editor you can add smooth cursor motion, cursor-follow zoom and click-based auto-zoom, and freeze-sync can hold a frame to give an explanation time to finish. The same capture can also produce a written step-by-step guide, with annotatable screenshots, and narration regenerates in supported languages on eligible plans, without re-recording. You can upload an existing recording instead if you already have one.
Teams that need product analytics, session replay or in-app orchestration should evaluate Pendo for those workflows; teams that mainly need the walkthrough videos and written guides that go into an onboarding flow or help centre can produce them with Vorec and host them wherever their users already look.
Vorec's prices are public: a free trial, no credit card required (current allowances on the pricing page), then $9, $24 or $59 a month ($86, $230 or $566 a year). Read live from our plan catalogue on 6 November 2026.
Related reading
For other vendors in the onboarding and demo space with captured pricing, see Trainual pricing, Supademo pricing, Storylane pricing and Arcade pricing. For how pricing pages in this category behave in general, see the video tool pricing study. For the videos themselves, see customer onboarding videos.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Pendo cost per month?
The pricing page does not say. As read on 5 November 2026, Base, Core and Ultimate all show "Request pricing" and a custom MAU volume, and the FAQ explains that the price combines your tracked MAUs with the functionality you choose. The only way to get a monthly figure is to ask sales for a quote.
Is Pendo free?
Pendo Free is free forever for up to 500 monthly active users and includes product analytics, in-app guides, Pendo-branded roadmaps and Pendo-branded NPS surveys. Past 500 MAUs on Free you can't create new guides, NPS surveys or segments until you upgrade to a paid plan.
What is a monthly active user in Pendo pricing?
A unique visitor who engaged with your app at least once in the last 30 calendar days. The number of applications you track and the number of sessions a user has do not affect the price; MAUs and modules do.
Does Pendo offer a free trial?
Yes, a 30-day trial of the entire platform, which the FAQ says to start by talking to sales. Existing customers can also ask for trial access to additional modules. Novus, the separate AI-native product in open beta, is free to try without a card and has no MAU limit during the beta.
What is the difference between Base, Core and Ultimate?
Base includes product analytics and in-app guides. Core adds Session Replay. Ultimate adds Sentiment surveys, Orchestrate, Listen and Data Sync, and includes as standard the modules that are add-ons on the lower two bundles, such as product discovery and journey orchestration.
Does Pendo charge per seat?
The pricing page, as read on 5 November 2026, never mentions seats; it describes MAUs and functionality as the two inputs. Ask sales whether seats appear anywhere in your contract before assuming they don't.
Want the recording to narrate itself? Record with Vorec, or upload one you already have, and get a narrated tutorial plus a written guide. Start your free trial, no credit card required (current allowances on the pricing page).