Oct 23, 2026

7 Best Nextiva Alternatives in 2026 (With Real Pricing)

Nextiva’s headline price is $15 a user. That number is the annual rate on a paid 12-month term, Core caps texting at 100 messages per user a month, and its AI employee, XBert, bills for every conversation it handles.

The quick answer: The best Nextiva alternative for a small team that wants callers answered and booked is Carly. It rings your team first, answers when nobody picks up, books the caller on the right person’s real calendar, texts from your business number and calls new web leads back within a minute. There’s no 12-month term, and setup is one prompt in ChatGPT or Claude. For a straight seat swap, Quo and Dialpad also start at $15 a user billed annually.

US prices from each vendor’s own pricing page, checked October 23, 2026.

Nextiva alternatives compared

Tool	Starts at	AI that answers calls	Texting	Commitment
Carly	Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/mo	Answers, books, texts back, calls new leads	Two-way, plus missed-call text back	None
Nextiva (for reference)	$15/user annual, $23 monthly	XBert: $1.50 a conversation, or $99 for 100	100/user on Core, 500 on Engage	Annual price needs a 12-month term
Quo	$15/user annual, $19 monthly	Sona: 10 calls free, then $25 for 40	Shared threads	Monthly or annual
RingCentral RingEX	$20/user annual, $30 monthly	AIR add-on from $39	25/user on Core	Auto-renews
Dialpad	$15/user annual	AI Agents on a credit pool	Included	Annual for the $15 price
Ooma Office	$19.95/user	AI Answering Service from $14.99; AI Receptionist by quote	250 on Pro, none on Essentials	No contract
JustCall	$29/user annual	AI Voice Agent, per minute	500 segments/license on Team	2-license minimum
Vonage	$19.99/line monthly	AI virtual assistant add-on	Included	1-year term for the promo price

Why teams leave Nextiva

The $15 is an annual-term price. Nextiva’s fine print says annual small-business pricing applies to customers “signing a paid 12-month or longer minimum term agreement.” Month to month, Core is $23 and Engage jumps from $25 to $50.
Texting runs out. Core includes 100 texts per user a month and Engage 500. Only Scale, at $75 a user, is unlimited.
XBert is metered. Every plan lists XBert at $1.50 a conversation. Packages start at $99 a month for 100. A busy month costs more, not less.
Basics are add-ons on Core. A toll-free number and live chat are both add-ons on the entry plan.
It answers, then waits. Calling a lead back the minute they fill in your web form isn’t part of the phone plan.

A five-person team on monthly Engage pays $250 a month in seats. If XBert takes 300 conversations at $1.50, add $450.

1. Carly: best Nextiva alternative for small teams

Carly answers your business line the way you tell it to, every time. You describe the rules in plain English, and it follows them exactly.

One prompt to go live. Paste Carly’s setup prompt into ChatGPT or Claude and grab a number in the chat. Or keep your Nextiva number for now and forward the calls you miss.
Team first, AI second. In business hours Carly rings your people and picks up only when nobody does. After hours it answers straight away.
Books on real calendars, Google or Outlook, round robin across your team, and texts the confirmation.
Speed to lead. A web form fill gets a call within about a minute, then a text and an email if they miss it (how it works).
Two-way texting from your business number and a text back on every missed call.
Phone menus and ring groups with up to nine options, in English or Spanish.
Every call logged to Carly’s CRM, HubSpot, Salesforce or Dynamics 365, with summaries in one team inbox.
Steer it from your AI chat. Ask ChatGPT or Claude to call a customer, text a list or change how Carly answers (see how).

Pricing: Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/month. No term to sign. Get started.

2. Quo

The phone app formerly called OpenPhone: a number per user, shared threads for calls and texts, and Sona answering when you can’t. See Quo alternatives.

Pricing: Starter $15, Business $23, Scale $35 per user billed annually ($19, $33, $47 monthly). Sona takes 10 calls free, then $25 a month for 40. Extra numbers are $5 each. Watch out for: Sona answers questions and takes messages. Phone menus and CRM sync start on Business.

3. RingCentral RingEX

The closest like-for-like swap if you use Nextiva for video and chat as well as calls. See RingCentral vs Nextiva.

Pricing: Core $20, Advanced $25 per user billed annually ($30, $35 monthly). The AIR AI Receptionist starts at $39 a month. Watch out for: Core includes 25 texts per user a month, and the shared texting inbox is a $25 booster.

4. Dialpad

AI transcripts and call summaries built into the phone system. See Dialpad alternatives.

Pricing: Standard $15, Pro $25 per user billed annually. AI Agents use a pool of credits bought separately. Watch out for: the AI Agents that answer customers run on a separate pool of credits.

5. Ooma Office

No contract, a friendly support team and desk-phone friendly. See Ooma alternatives.

Pricing: Essentials $19.95, Pro $24.95, Pro Plus $29.95 per user. The AI Answering Service starts at $14.99 a month for 40 minutes. Watch out for: Essentials has no texting, and the AI Receptionist that books appointments is priced by sales.

6. JustCall

A calling platform for sales and support teams with CRM integrations from the entry plan. See JustCall alternatives.

Pricing: Team $29, Pro $49, Pro Plus $89 per user billed annually, two licenses minimum. The AI Voice Agent is billed per minute. Watch out for: monthly billing costs up to 29% more than the annual rate.

7. Vonage Business Communications

A long-running phone system with video meetings and desk-phone support. See Vonage alternatives.

Pricing: Mobile $19.99, Premium $29.99, Advanced $39.99 per line monthly, 30% less on a 12-month promotion. Watch out for: Vonage for Businesses rates 2.1 out of 5 on Trustpilot, with reviewers describing outages, hard cancellations and auto-renewals.

Which Nextiva alternative fits

Callers need an answer and a booking, every time: Carly. Compare it with the best AI receptionists.
You want the same seat price without the term: Quo, monthly.
You use Nextiva for video and team chat too: RingCentral RingEX.
You run an outbound sales floor: JustCall, or see Aircall alternatives.

To try Carly, paste this into ChatGPT or Claude:

Carly business setup prompt

Paste this into ChatGPT, Claude or any AI. It walks you through the rest.

Help me connect Carly Teams so I can work with my organization's business texts, phone calls, voicemail and voice/text agents from this chat. I'll add it to you myself: tell me exactly what to click for the app you are, one step at a time, and wait for me to confirm before moving on. If a step doesn't match what I see, ask me what's on my screen. If you can do the setup yourself (Claude Code, Codex, Muse, Grok Bot), go ahead, and ask me for any key in your secure credential prompt, never in the chat. Don't tell me it's connected until list_phone_lines works, and if I have several teams, ask which to use. Before sending a text or making a call, confirm the team, recipient and message or task with me. The steps are below.

# Connect Carly Teams to an AI app

> Carly Teams works a team's business phone lines through the team's AI agents: business texts, phone calls, voicemail, the voice and text agents, and the team's CRM.

MCP server: https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp (streamable HTTP, OAuth)

## Setup

Carly Teams isn't in any plugin or connector directory yet, so it's added as a custom connection by URL.

1. Add Carly Teams:
- ChatGPT: open https://chatgpt.com/plugins, click Add, and choose Create MCP App (not Create plugin or Upload plugin archive). If Create MCP App isn't on the menu, turn on Developer mode first in Settings > Security and login. Name it "Carly Teams" with the description "Work with my team's business texts, calls, voicemail and voice/text agents," paste https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp as the server URL, choose OAuth, create it, and sign in. Then in the message box open the + menu, choose Developer mode, and pick Carly Teams. No plugin needs to be built, packaged or uploaded.
- Claude (claude.ai, Claude Desktop, or Cowork): Customize > Connectors > Add custom connector, name it Carly Teams, paste https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp, and sign in.
- Claude Code: `claude mcp add --transport http --scope user carly-teams https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp`, then /mcp, pick carly-teams, and authenticate.
- Codex: `codex mcp add carly-teams --url https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp`, then `codex mcp login carly-teams`.
- Cursor: add {"mcpServers": {"carly-teams": {"url": "https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp"}}} to ~/.cursor/mcp.json, then sign in to carly-teams from Customize.
- Muse: a custom connector to https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp with a Carly API key as its bearer token. The key comes from carlyassistant.com/integrations (Advanced > API Keys > Create a new key, with Owner set to the team and all scopes selected) and goes in Muse's connector settings, not in a chat message.
- Grok: grok.com/connectors > New Connector > Custom, paste https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp, and sign in.
- Grok Bot: a custom remote MCP server named carly-teams at https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp. Approve it and sign in.
- Perplexity: Plugins in the sidebar (or Customize > Connectors), then Add custom > Connector > Add MCP connector. Choose Remote, name it Carly Teams, paste https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp, pick OAuth, check the box and click Add, then click the Carly Teams card to sign in.
- Anything else: a remote MCP server (streamable HTTP) named carly-teams at https://carlyassistant.com/team/mcp. It signs in with OAuth.
Sign in with the Carly account that belongs to the organization.

2. Once it's added, the Carly Teams tools show up in the chat, including list_phone_lines. If they don't, turn Carly Teams on for the chat or start a new chat.

3. To check it worked, call list_phone_lines: it returns the teams and phone lines the account can reach. A team with no phone line yet can get one with find_numbers (optionally by area code) and get_number, which may return a checkout link to finish.

4. Something to try first: "Review our missed calls and voicemail and help me reply to customers." Carly Teams also reads and answers business texts, has the team's agent make calls, and edits the voice and text agents. Texts and calls go out at once from the agent's number and can't be taken back. Team permissions apply.

## Email, calendars and workflows

Email, calendars, files, booking pages and workflows are the regular Carly connector, added separately. It's listed in ChatGPT's plugin directory (https://chatgpt.com/plugins/plugin_asdk_app_6a67a26316b88191860222f918d4ec54) and Claude's connector directory (https://claude.ai/directory/carly), and connects anywhere else at https://carlyassistant.com/mcp/. Its setup is https://carlyassistant.com/mcp.txt.

Get started, or watch the 2-minute video.

FAQ

What is the best alternative to Nextiva?

Carly for small teams that need calls answered, booked and followed up without a 12-month term. RingCentral if you want a full phone, video and chat suite from one vendor.

Does Nextiva require a contract?

Nextiva’s annual pricing applies to customers signing a paid 12-month or longer minimum term. Monthly pricing is higher: Core is $23 a user and Engage $50.

How much does Nextiva’s XBert cost?

Nextiva lists XBert at $1.50 per conversation on its plans, with packages from $99 a month for 100 conversations. More in Nextiva AI receptionist.

Is there a cheaper alternative to Nextiva?

Quo and Dialpad match Nextiva’s $15 annual seat price, and Quo is $19 month to month against Nextiva Core’s $23. Carly works alongside any of them on the calls your team misses.

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."

Gus Ibrahim, Founder & Director, IHR