Synthesia Pricing (2026): What $19 Buys and Where It Stops

Synthesia's new $19 Starter price fixes the sticker shock, not the production ceiling: it buys the same 1,200 credits as the free plan and stops at 10 standard video minutes a month. Creator costs $89 for 30 minutes, so the first minute beyond Starter turns a $19 budget into $89 unless annual credits or a different tool fits the workflow better.

Synthesia pricing at a glance

Synthesia now has four plans: Basic at $0, Starter at $19 monthly, Creator at $89 monthly, and Enterprise at a custom quote. The lower annual rates are $14 a month for Starter and $59 a month for Creator, both billed for the full year.

These numbers were verified against Synthesia's live pricing page on 15 August 2026. That date matters because the current plan cards carry a "NEW LOWER PRICES" banner while an older FAQ lower on the same page still quotes superseded amounts.

Starter is the sensible default only when one person stays within 10 standard minutes. The subscription makes the output usable for business, but it does not buy more monthly credits than Basic. Creator earns its $70 monthly premium when the workflow needs 11 to 30 minutes, multiple avatars in one scene, interactive video, branded video pages, API access, or five Personal Avatars.

Enterprise is not merely the biggest minute bucket. It is where Synthesia puts multi-editor workspaces, SAML/SSO, Brand Kits, live collaboration, SCORM export, 80+ one-click translation languages, and unlimited standard video minutes. If two people need to build videos rather than review them, the public self-serve prices no longer answer the budget question.

What each Synthesia plan buys

The right tier is determined by finished minutes, active editors, and one must-have feature, in that order. Avatar counts look generous on every paid plan, but output capacity and workspace permissions are the limits that change the budget.

Basic: free evaluation, not a finished-video workflow

Synthesia Basic costs $0 and includes 1,200 monthly credits, which can produce up to 10 minutes of standard generated video. It also includes one editor, nine stock AI avatars, and up to 25 AI-generated video assets. No credit card is required.

The important boundary is output. Synthesia lists video downloads and removal of its logo among the features Starter adds on top of Basic. Basic therefore works for learning the editor, testing avatars and voices, drafting a script, and sharing an evaluation inside the platform. It is not the plan to build a downloadable, unbranded training library.

Who never needs to pay? A buyer comparing avatar styles, a designer validating whether a script works with synthetic presenters, or a subject-matter expert reviewing a proof in the editor can remain on Basic indefinitely while the work stays below 10 standard minutes per month and does not need a clean MP4 deliverable. Paying before those two requirements appear buys convenience, not proof.

Starter: the cheapest usable production tier

Synthesia Starter costs $19 month to month or $14 a month billed yearly. It keeps the same 1,200 monthly credits as Basic, but adds downloads, Synthesia-logo removal, AI Video Assistant, AI Dubbing, 125+ stock avatars, custom on-brand avatars, chat and email support, one editor, and three guests.

The blunt verdict is that Starter sells production readiness, not production volume. At full monthly use, the $19 subscription costs $1.90 per standard generated minute. If a light month produces only five minutes, the effective subscription cost doubles to $3.80 per used minute. The unused half disappears at renewal.

Starter fits a founder making four short product updates, an instructional designer shipping two five-minute modules, or a creative lead producing occasional avatar-led announcements. It stops fitting when an eleventh minute, a second hands-on editor, multiple avatars in one scene, interactive branching, or API generation becomes part of the brief.

Creator: a feature and capacity jump

Synthesia Creator costs $89 monthly or $59 a month billed yearly. It includes 3,600 monthly credits, up to 30 standard video minutes, 180+ stock avatars, five Personal Avatars, API access, multiple avatars per scene, interactive videos, branded video pages, priority support, one editor, and five guests.

Creator costs $2.97 per maximum standard minute on monthly billing. That is more, not less, than Starter's $1.90 maximum-minute rate. The $70 monthly jump buys 20 additional standard minutes and a different production toolkit. On capacity alone, each added minute between the two ceilings costs an incremental $3.50.

This tier is right for one content owner who regularly produces between 11 and 30 minutes, needs a two-presenter dialogue, generates through the API, or builds interactive training. It is a poor substitute for a team plan. Five guests can comment and review, but the plan still includes one editor.

Enterprise: the team and governance tier

Synthesia Enterprise uses custom pricing and is the first tier built for several active creators. It publishes unlimited standard video minutes, custom credits, custom editors and guests, 240+ stock avatars, unlimited Personal Avatars subject to reasonable consumption, SAML/SSO, live collaboration, Brand Kits, SCORM export, tailored onboarding, implementation services, and a dedicated customer success manager.

The word "unlimited" applies to standard video minutes. Other usage-based features draw from custom credits, so a useful quote must separate standard generation from dubbing, generated assets, personalization, and API work. Ask sales to price the actual production model rather than a generic seat count.

Enterprise is the right conversation when SCORM or SSO is mandatory, several teammates edit, procurement needs centralized controls, or self-serve output regularly exceeds 30 minutes. A single creator should not request an Enterprise quote merely to avoid planning credits.

Synthesia credits are the budget, not the headline minutes

One shared credit pool pays for standard video, dubbing, personalization, API generation, and generated visual assets. The published "10 minutes" and "30 minutes" are maximums only when every credit goes to standard generated video.

Standard video consumes two credits per second, or 120 credits per minute. AI Dubbing without lip sync also uses 120 credits per minute. Lip-synced dubbing costs 240 credits per minute, Bulk Personalization uses 90, and API usage uses 75. Listed generated-video assets range from 48 to 192 credits each, while listed AI images cost three or nine credits depending on the model.

That creates four materially different Starter outcomes from the same 1,200-credit balance:

• 10 minutes of standard generated video
• 10 minutes of dubbing without lip sync
• 5 minutes of lip-synced dubbing
• A mixed workload with fewer finished minutes because assets and localization share the balance

Creator scales the same system to 3,600 monthly credits. It can cover 30 standard minutes or 15 lip-synced dubbing minutes before any other credit-consuming work. The marketing number is therefore a ceiling, not a production forecast.

The craft move is to separate free iteration from paid generation. Drafting and previewing do not use credits. Deleting words, reordering existing words, changing punctuation, changing avatar framing, or changing voice tone also avoid extra consumption in Synthesia's published examples. Newly generated seconds, an added or replaced avatar, and some language or voice changes can consume more.

Credits also answer the overage question. Self-serve plans do not publish a pay-as-you-go overage rate. When the balance reaches zero, the choices are to upgrade or wait for renewal. That makes the eleventh monthly standard minute expensive: the subscription jumps from $19 Starter to $89 Creator, a 4.68 times increase, even if the brief needs only one more minute.

Monthly vs annual: the break-even is month 9 or month 8

Annual Starter becomes cheaper once you would otherwise pay for nine monthly cycles. Annual Creator crosses that line at eight monthly cycles. Before those points, monthly billing costs less and preserves the option to stop.

Starter costs $168 for the year at the current $14 effective monthly rate. Twelve monthly payments cost $228, so annual billing saves $60. At full use, annual Starter costs $1.40 per standard minute across 120 published minutes, compared with $1.90 on the monthly plan.

Creator costs $708 for the year at $59 a month billed annually. Twelve monthly payments cost $1,068, so the annual saving is $360. At full use, the annual plan costs $1.97 per standard minute across 360 published minutes, compared with $2.97 monthly.

Annual billing also changes the production rhythm. Starter carries a 14,500-credit annual balance and Creator 44,000, expressed as up to 120 and 360 standard minutes for the year. A training team can spend more than the monthly average during a launch and less later, provided the full-year pool survives the rest of the term.

That flexibility is useful for lumpy work. It is dangerous when annual volume is guessed from an unusually busy month. Credits do not roll beyond the billing period, and Synthesia purchases are generally non-cancelable and non-refundable. A promised discount is not a saving if a quarter of the annual allowance expires unused.

Hidden costs that change the plan

The largest hidden cost is not an overage fee. It is the forced tier change created by no self-serve overage lane, followed by expiring credits, one-editor workspaces, and add-ons that can exceed the subscription.

No rollover and no small top-up

Synthesia says unused credits reset at the next billing period and do not accumulate. If a monthly Starter account uses 600 of 1,200 credits, the remaining 600 do not make next month larger. If the account runs out early, it must upgrade or wait.

An upgrade takes effect immediately and carries a prorated charge. Unused credits from the old plan do not carry over; the balance resets to the new plan's full allocation, and the renewal date can shift. Upgrade near the end of a cycle only after checking the checkout date and prorated amount.

Guests are not extra editors

Starter includes one editor and three guests. Creator includes one editor and five guests. Those guest counts make review easier, but they do not turn a self-serve subscription into a production team workspace.

Shared Synthesia workspaces use Full, Free, and Restricted licenses. Full licenses are paid. A Free license can auto-upgrade to Full when its user creates or generates video, edits scenes, duplicates video, or creates and edits templates. Enterprise admins should set default licenses deliberately so a reviewer does not become a paid creator through an avoidable action.

API work uses the app's credit pool

Synthesia does not publish a separate pay-as-you-go self-serve API tariff. API access begins on Creator, consumes 75 credits per generated minute, and is capped at up to 360 API video minutes a year deducted from plan usage. Enterprise lists 360 API video minutes a year plus additional paid usage.

This split matters when an automation appears cheap beside the $89 Creator card. API generation does not create a second allowance. It draws from the same credits needed for editor-made video, so an automated localization or personalization job can reduce the app capacity available to the content owner.

A studio avatar can dominate the annual bill

Synthesia's Studio Express-1 Avatar costs $1,000 a year, is available only to annual-plan users, and can take up to 10 days to process. Add one to annual Starter and the first-year total becomes $1,168. Add one to annual Creator and it becomes $1,708.

That add-on makes sense when one recognizable spokesperson will appear across a large library. It does not make sense for a pilot still deciding whether an avatar format fits the brand. Use the included stock or Personal Avatar options to settle the format before commissioning studio production.

Cancellation does not restore the budget

Synthesia purchases are generally non-cancelable and non-refundable. The policy lists no general, student, nonprofit, or educational-institution discount. A forgotten renewal is still non-refundable even when the subscription was not used, apart from contract exceptions or review of a confirmed technical-access issue.

Starter and Creator can be canceled from account billing settings. Access continues through the paid period, then the account loses access to Synthesia and its videos. Export every required video before that date. Canceling prevents the next charge; it does not create a refund for the remaining term.

Synthesia vs HeyGen and Colossyan pricing

Synthesia is the cleaner choice for governed avatar-led training, but HeyGen is cheaper for several high-volume avatar workflows and Colossyan publishes a stronger small-team L&D package. Normalize by output type before comparing one "minute" with another.

HeyGen: cheaper volume with variable credit burn

HeyGen is an avatar and generative-video platform whose Creator plan costs $29 monthly or $24 a month paid annually. It includes 600 credits, videos up to 30 minutes, 1080p export, watermark removal, voice cloning, and monthly credit rollover for one extra cycle.

Those 600 credits buy very different amounts of Studio video. Avatar III uses three credits per minute, allowing a theoretical 200 minutes if the whole pool goes there. Avatar IV and V use 20 credits per minute, allowing 30. At full utilization, the same $29 subscription ranges from about $0.15 to $0.97 per potential Studio minute.

That flexibility is HeyGen's advantage and its budgeting wall. The chosen engine changes unit cost by more than six times. Synthesia's standard presenter-video allowance is easier to explain to procurement, while HeyGen's rollover is more forgiving when production varies from month to month. The detailed HeyGen pricing breakdown maps every credit tier.

Choose HeyGen when expressive avatar engines, localization, rollover, or high standard-avatar volume matter more than Synthesia's training governance. Choose Synthesia when predictable standard-minute capacity and an Enterprise path to SCORM, SSO, Brand Kits, and managed rollout matter more.

Colossyan: the sharper published L&D price

Colossyan is an AI training-video platform. Its free Starter plan publishes 20 NEO minutes a month, while Professional costs $59 a month billed yearly plus $30 a month for each additional member. Professional includes 30 NEO minutes, 10 NEO2 minutes, five streaming SCORM exports a month, up to three editors, 20 custom avatars, and five voices.

At full use, Professional costs $1.97 per published NEO minute or $1.48 if both the 30-minute NEO and 10-minute NEO2 pools are useful. Colossyan does not roll unused monthly minutes, but annual subscribers receive the year's minutes together. Its Enterprise plan uses custom pricing and adds unlimited NEO minutes, custom NEO2 capacity, unlimited SCORM, custom editors, SSO/SAML, and dedicated support.

Choose Colossyan Professional when a small learning team needs a published multi-editor price and five SCORM exports without entering Enterprise procurement. Choose Synthesia when its avatar library, workflow, or governed Enterprise environment justifies a quote. Both list a $1,000 yearly studio-avatar add-on, so that cost does not break the tie.

The broader HeyGen vs Synthesia comparison covers the product decision beyond price. Teams considering non-avatar formats can use the AI video generator shortlist before committing to this category.

The same 12-minute brief before and after budget planning

A four-module onboarding brief at three minutes per module needs 12 standard generated minutes. Monthly Starter cannot ship it. The extra two minutes trigger Creator, turning the subscription into $89 and producing an effective $7.42 cost per used minute for that brief.

The better plan depends on whether 12 minutes is a recurring month or a launch spike. If the business expects similar output every month, Creator is honest capacity. If the rest of the year stays light and total annual demand remains below 120 standard minutes, annual Starter can absorb the 12-minute launch from its yearly pool for $168 total.

The first version of the budget fails because it prices four deliverables but ignores shared credits and billing cadence. The corrected version prices 1,440 standard-video credits for the 12 minutes, checks every extra asset and lip-synced dub, assigns one editor, then chooses a billing period that contains the workload.

1. 1

   Lock the runtime in draft

   Write the four scripts to a measured 12-minute target. Preview pacing, pronunciation, avatar framing, and scene order before generation because draft work does not consume credits.

2. 2

   Price every credit-consuming layer

   Start with 1,440 credits for 12 standard minutes. Add lip-synced dubbing at 240 credits per minute and any generated assets at their published model rate. Do not count all allowances as separate buckets.

3. 3

   Choose capacity, not the cheapest card

   Use Creator for a recurring 12-minute month. Use annual Starter only when total yearly standard output, including revisions and localization, remains within 120 minutes and one editor is enough.

4. 4

   Generate once, then patch

   Approve the full draft, generate the deliverables, and correct only changed seconds. Download the final videos into the business asset library rather than leaving the only usable copy inside a subscription account.

The Monday move

Do not open checkout with a plan name. Open the last 90 days of finished video and write down four numbers: standard generated minutes, lip-synced dubbing minutes, generated-asset credits, and active editors. Then mark whether the next quarter requires API access, multiple avatars per scene, interactivity, SCORM, or SSO.

Pick Basic when the work is still an evaluation. Pick monthly Starter when one editor needs downloadable, unbranded output below 10 standard minutes and the paid lifespan is uncertain. Pick annual Starter after nine expected paid months when yearly output fits inside 120 standard minutes. Pick monthly Creator for recurring 11-to-30-minute months or a Creator-only feature, and switch to annual after eight expected paid months. Ask for Enterprise pricing when a second editor, SCORM, SSO, or sustained output above self-serve capacity enters the brief.

That is the Monday move: budget the production behavior first, then buy the smallest plan that contains it. The new $19 price lowers the approval threshold. It does not remove the need to count minutes, credits, and editors.

Synthesia pricing FAQ

How much does Synthesia cost per month?

Synthesia Basic costs $0. Starter costs $19 on monthly billing, Creator costs $89, and Enterprise uses custom pricing. Annual rates are $14 a month for Starter and $59 a month for Creator, billed yearly at $168 and $708.

Is Synthesia free?

Yes. Basic includes 1,200 credits a month, up to 10 standard video minutes, one editor, nine stock avatars, and up to 25 AI-generated video assets. Starter is the first production tier because it adds downloads and removal of the Synthesia logo.

Does Synthesia offer a student discount?

No. Synthesia's current billing policy says it does not offer general discounts, student discounts, or separate nonprofit and educational-institution pricing. Students can use Basic for evaluation, but there is no standing paid student rate.

Can I get a refund from Synthesia?

Generally, no. Synthesia says purchases are non-cancelable and non-refundable except where a contract says otherwise. A confirmed technical-access problem may be reviewed, and an Enterprise Order Form can carry different terms.

Do Synthesia credits roll over?

No. Unused credits reset at the next billing period and do not accumulate. Unused old-plan credits also disappear when an upgrade resets the account to the new allocation.

How much is Synthesia Enterprise?

Synthesia does not publish a fixed Enterprise price. Request a quote that separates editors, unlimited standard video, custom credits, dubbing, API usage, implementation services, and any Studio Express-1 Avatars.

What is better, Synthesia or HeyGen?

Synthesia is the clearer choice for governed training, predictable standard-minute allowances, and an Enterprise path to SCORM and SSO. HeyGen is often cheaper for higher avatar-video volume, and its monthly credits roll into one extra cycle, but credit burn changes sharply by engine.

How did Synthesia pricing change in 2026?

Synthesia's live plan cards now show Starter at $19 monthly or $14 a month billed yearly and Creator at $89 monthly or $59 a month billed yearly. The page's older FAQ still quotes $29 and $264 for Starter plus $89 and $804 for Creator, so the current plan cards are the values to use.

Get the AI business workflow audit checklist to map video minutes, credit-consuming steps, and editor roles before committing to an annual plan.