Manus Pricing (2026): Plans, Credits & Real Costs
Manus sells access in credits, not tasks. The sticker price is easy: $20, $40 or $200 a month. What that buys is the hard part, because a single task can cost 200 credits or 9,000.
The short verdict: Manus is priced fairly for people who hand it a few big one-off jobs a month (a research report, a deck, a website) and watch what each one costs. The catch is that nobody, Manus included, can tell you a task’s cost before it runs, unused plan credits vanish every month, and loops or failed attempts still bill. If what you actually need is ongoing help with email, scheduling and follow-ups, Carly is built for that job and starts at $35/month.
All prices below were pulled from Manus’s live plan data and help center on September 28, 2026, in USD before tax.
Manus pricing at a glance
| Manus (as of Sep 28, 2026) | |
|---|---|
| Free plan | $0: 300 daily credits, usable on Manus 1.6 Lite only, capped at 1,500 a month from daily credits |
| Pro plans (monthly) | $20 for 4,000 credits, $40 for 8,000, $200 for 40,000; higher tiers up to $20,000 |
| Pro plans (annual) | $200/year, $400/year, $2,000/year (the “Save 17%” toggle) |
| Free trial | 7 days on the $40 tier |
| Team | From $20 per seat/month, 2-seat minimum, credits pooled across the team |
| Extra credits | Add-on packs at $20 per 2,000 credits, half the value of plan credits |
| Rollover | None for monthly plan credits |
| Biggest cost risk | Tasks that loop, fail or need fixes still consume credits |
How Manus credits work
Manus’s help center says credits pay for three things: LLM tokens, virtual machines and third-party APIs, and that a task’s cost “is determined by its complexity and duration.” Credits are only consumed while a task is actively running. Finished tasks, stored files and deployed outputs don’t draw credits.
Manus publishes three reference tasks on its credits explainer:
| Task | Duration | Credits used | Cost at plan rate (200 credits/$1) |
|---|---|---|---|
| NBA scoring-efficiency chart (data analysis) | 15 min | 200 | about $1.00 |
| Wedding invitation webpage, built and deployed | 25 min | 360 | about $1.80 |
| Location-based sky-events web app | 80 min | 900 | about $4.50 |
Those are clean runs picked by the vendor. Real tasks with revisions run higher. Three rules shape the bill more than the sticker price:
- No estimate up front. Manus’s own help article says the system “does not possess the capability to autonomously judge or regulate the consumption of credits,” and that any cost prediction the agent gives you should be treated as a hallucination.
- No rollover. Monthly credits reset on your renewal date, on monthly and annual plans alike. Daily credits reset at 00:00 UTC.
- Refunds only for bugs. The credit refund policy covers platform errors and tool misuse. It excludes unclear instructions, “subjective dissatisfaction,” third-party site failures, and hitting task limits. An AI agent reviews the refund request first.
Credits drain in a fixed order: event credits, then daily, then monthly, then add-on, then free credits. Paid users still get the 300 daily credits, but those only run on Manus 1.6 Lite, the cheaper, faster mode.
Every Manus plan, monthly vs annual
| Plan | Monthly price | Annual price | Credits per month | What it adds |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | n/a | 300/day (Lite only, max 1,500/month) | Chat mode, 1.6 Lite agent, 2 scheduled tasks |
| Pro $20 | $20 | $200/year (about $16.67/mo) | 4,000 | Manus 1.6 and 1.6 Max, 20 concurrent and 20 scheduled tasks |
| Pro $40 | $40 | $400/year (about $33.33/mo) | 8,000 | Same features; 7-day free trial |
| Pro $60 to $100 | $60, $80, $100 | $600, $800, $1,000/year | 12,000, 16,000, 20,000 | Same features, more credits |
| Pro $200 | $200 | $2,000/year (about $166.67/mo) | 40,000 | Same features, more credits |
| Pro $300 and up | $300 to $20,000 | 10x the monthly price | 63,000 up to 5,000,000 | Slightly better rate (e.g. 230,000 credits for $1,000) |
| Team | $20 per seat | $200 per seat/year | 4,000 per seat, pooled | Admin access control, usage analytics, shared slide templates, data-training opt-out, SSO |
Up to $200, every tier buys exactly 200 credits per dollar, and the feature list barely changes between them. Moving up mostly buys volume. Manus’s plan data also lists SSO and SCIM as separate Team add-ons at $150/month each.
Costs outside the plan
- Add-on credits cost twice as much. Packs run $20 for 2,000 credits up to $1,000 for 100,000, which is 100 credits per dollar against 200 on a plan. Manus’s help center says add-ons are for users already on the highest tier of monthly credits, and they go inactive if your subscription lapses. One App Store reviewer in September described the squeeze: “The only way to get more 5000 is buying 60.000.”
- Website hosting is billed separately. Credits pay to build a site. Running it draws a usage balance with a free monthly allowance of $10 cloud, $1 AI and $1 API. Manus’s own estimates put a marketing site with lead capture at “Subscription + $24” a month and an e-commerce site at “Subscription + $248.” Sites on a custom domain go offline if your subscription ends.
- Cloud Computer. A persistent server for bots and databases is $30 or $50 a month, and its files are deleted if you stop paying.
- Taxes. Listed prices exclude VAT and GST.
What happens when credits run out
You can’t start a new task at zero. A task already running can push your balance slightly negative, which clears at your next refresh. From there your options are waiting for the reset, upgrading mid-cycle (Manus prorates the credit difference), or buying add-ons if you qualify.
Canceling ends access to plan credits immediately. The cancellation article says leftover monthly credits “are reset to 0 once the subscription cycle ends.” One r/ManusOfficial user learned this the hard way: after canceling a 40,000-credit plan, “those remaining credits disappeared.”
Watch the trial too. An r/AI_Agents user was charged on day two of the $40 trial. Support later explained that the trial “automatically ends and converts to a paid subscription if you hit a 500-credit limit,” then refunded the $40.
Did pricing change after the Meta deal?
List prices didn’t move. Meta announced the Manus acquisition on December 29, 2025, China blocked it in April 2026, and Manus resumed independent operations on September 1. The $20/$40/$200 ladder shown in March 2026 is the same one live today.
What did change was temporary. Manus paused charges for affected users during the August 11 to 23 data-backup window and promised “welcome back bonuses” after restoration. A free-access campaign let everyone run Manus 1.6 and 1.6 Lite without spending credits, within a daily allowance, until August 28.
Since then, several users say the same money buys less work. A September r/ManusOfficial post reads: “I got a monthly plan worth 4K credits and just giving out two prompts to add features and fix error issues killed all my credits.” Another user who “would previously run several high complexity projects and rarely hit my limit” says they hit it in four days after the switchover. Manus hasn’t published a change to its credit rates, so treat these as reports, not a confirmed price increase.
What users say about the cost
Where people feel it’s worth it
- “Not gonna lie Manus is expensive, but I look at it like buying time.” (App Store review, August 2026, Manus on the App Store)
- “Yes I have spent thousands of dollars on tokens to build out the platform, but it hasn’t let me down so far.” (r/ManusOfficial, September 2026)
- “1.6 Lite can do things that Max can do. It’s really how you prompt.” (r/ManusOfficial, September 2026)
Where the bill surprises people
- “I burned through 97,000 credits in a single week.” (App Store review, September 2026)
- “I’m over 9000 credits in with no business card, and it’s asking me to add more.” (App Store review, July 2026)
- “When that new month started they take your 70k credits that are left and you will start with 20.” (App Store review, July 2026, after downgrading from 80,000 to 20,000 credits)
Our read: happy users scope tasks tightly, use Lite for simple work, and treat Manus as a project budget. Angry users hit loops, fixes that bill again, or credits that expired unused.
Real-cost examples
These use Manus’s own reference tasks (200 credits for a 15-minute analysis, 360 for a simple site, 900 for an 80-minute app) as baselines.
Emily, solo consultant. Each month she runs 8 research briefs (about 1,600 credits), 4 client decks (about 1,440) and one small web tool (about 900). That’s 3,940 credits on paper, right at the $20 plan’s 4,000. One loop or a round of fixes pushes her over, so the realistic plan is $40/month ($400/year annual). The 300 daily Lite credits help with quick lookups but don’t cover Max-mode work.
Josh’s 5-person agency. Team starts at $20 per seat: $100/month for 20,000 pooled credits, or $1,000/year annual. Five people doing Emily’s workload need about 20,000 credits before any retries, so the realistic setup is $40 per seat, $200/month. Add SSO and it’s $350/month. If they publish client sites on Manus, hosting bills separately on top.
Is Manus worth the price?
Worth it if you need a finished artifact (a researched report, a deck, a working prototype) a few times a month and your time is expensive. $1 to $5 in credits for a clean run is cheap next to a freelancer.
Not worth it if your work is steady and repetitive. Every run is metered, estimates don’t exist, and a bad month can cost multiples of the sticker price. The complaints above aren’t about the $20 sticker. They’re about bills nobody could predict.
Manus vs Carly on cost
| Manus | Carly | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Monthly credit pool, every run metered | Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/month |
| Cost of a repeat task | Credits every time it runs | Workflows without an AI step run free |
| Built for | One-off projects: research, slides, sites | Ongoing admin: inbox, calendar, follow-ups |
| Where it lives | Manus web, desktop and mobile apps | Your email (CC or forward), text message, and the web |
Manus charges for compute on big one-off tasks. Carly is an AI executive assistant inside Gmail or Outlook and your calendar: CC it on a thread and it finds times and sends the invite, triages and drafts replies, and runs triggered workflows when a new email, calendar event or form arrives. It connects to thousands of apps, including HubSpot, Slack, Notion and Salesforce (integrations).
If most of your Manus credits go to “summarize my inbox” or “follow up with these leads,” that recurring work fits an assistant better than a metered agent. Try Carly, or book a call if your team needs SSO or a custom setup.
Who should pay for Manus
Good fit:
- Consultants, founders and marketers who need a few big deliverables a month
- Builders prototyping sites who accept hosting as a separate bill
Look elsewhere:
- You need recurring inbox, calendar or CRM work done every day
- You need a predictable monthly bill
For other options, see our Manus alternatives and the full Manus AI review.
FAQ
How much does Manus cost per month? As of September 28, 2026: Free, then Pro at $20 (4,000 credits), $40 (8,000) or $200 (40,000) per month, with higher tiers up to $20,000. Annual billing is $200, $400 or $2,000 a year. Team starts at $20 per seat per month with a two-seat minimum.
How many credits does a Manus task use? Manus’s examples range from 200 credits for a 15-minute analysis to 900 for an 80-minute app build. Complex or looping tasks can run into the thousands, and Manus can’t estimate the cost before a task starts.
Do Manus credits roll over? Monthly plan credits don’t. They reset on your renewal date, and they’re gone at the end of the cycle if you cancel. Add-on credits carry over only while you keep a paid subscription.
Is there a free version of Manus? Yes. The free plan gives 300 credits a day for Manus 1.6 Lite, capped at 1,500 a month from daily credits. The $40 tier also has a 7-day free trial, which one user reports ends early once you use 500 credits.
Is Manus cheaper than an AI assistant for email and scheduling? For recurring admin, usually not, since every run bills credits. Carly handles email, scheduling and follow-ups inside Gmail or Outlook, with free Zapier-style workflows and AI agents from $35/month. Teams can also set up dedicated Email Agents.
Related: Carly vs Manus · Manus vs ChatGPT Agent · Manus vs Genspark
Ready to automate your busywork?
Carly schedules, researches, and briefs you—so you can focus on what matters.
See what people say
"Before Carly, I relied on a Calendly link, but the whole process felt impersonal and not very professional. Carly changed that by handling all the back-and-forth, so I'm no longer stuck in endless email threads trying to line up schedules.
Now Carly reaches out to candidates, shares my real-time availability, lets them pick a slot, then sends a Zoom link and drops it straight into my calendar. She sends reminders to both of us before each call, which has significantly reduced no-shows and last-minute confusion.
On top of scheduling, Carly acts like a full executive assistant, sending me my schedule the night before so I can prepare for each call. It reminds me of the old x.ai assistant, but Carly is noticeably smarter, faster, and better suited to my healthcare recruitment business."
