Cognito Forms pricing starts at zero and the first paid plan costs 19 US dollars a month billed annually, or 24 dollars billed monthly. The free Individual plan gives one user and 100 entries a month, and forms and payments are unlimited on every plan. Those headline numbers are stable. What is not stable right now is the rest of the ladder: when the pricing page was checked on October 8, 2026, it served two different plan layouts, and which one a visitor sees changes what Team costs and how many users Pro includes.
That matters if the decision is being made from a screenshot someone else took, or from a review article written before September. The sections below lay out both layouts, the meters that sit behind every plan, and the billing rules that decide what a year actually costs.
Two versions of the pricing page are live
The pricing page at cognitoforms.com/pricing is built so that the plan cards can be swapped. On October 8, 2026, the version that loaded in a normal desktop browser showed five plans. The plain HTML of the same page also carried the older four-plan layout, and the page code names the five-plan version "September 2026 Business Plan Experiment", with a start date of September 4, 2026. In other words, Cognito Forms is testing a new plan structure, and different visitors can be shown different prices.
Here is the four-plan layout, which most third-party pricing articles still describe.
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed annually (per month) | Entries per month | Users included | Guests included | Storage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Individual | Free | Free | 100 | 1 | None | 100 MB |
| Pro | 24 USD | 19 USD | 2,000 | 2 | None | 1 GB |
| Team | 49 USD | 39 USD | 10,000 | 5 | 5 | 10 GB |
| Enterprise | 174 USD | 129 USD | Unlimited | 20 | 20 | 100 GB |
And here is the five-plan experiment, as rendered in the browser on the same day.
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed annually (per month) | Entries per month | Users included | Guests included |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Individual | Free | Free | 100 | 1 | None |
| Pro | 24 USD | 19 USD | 2,000 | 1 | None |
| Team | 62 USD | 49 USD | 10,000 | 5 | None listed |
| Business | 129 USD | 99 USD | 25,000 | 10 | 5 |
| Enterprise | 199 USD | 149 USD | Unlimited | 20 | 20 |
Three differences stand out. Pro includes one user instead of two. Team goes up by 10 dollars a month on annual billing and no longer lists guests. A new Business plan sits between Team and Enterprise, and it picks up folder permissions, one year of audit log history and 50,000 API requests a month, features that were split between Team and Enterprise before.
The practical advice is simple. Open the pricing page yourself on the day of purchase, note which layout appears, and work from that one. If a colleague's numbers differ from yours, the experiment is the likely reason, not a mistake on either side.
The meters behind every plan
Price per month is the least informative number on the page. Each plan is really a bundle of four meters, and the one that runs out first decides the plan.
Entries per month
An entry is a submitted form. The allowance resets monthly, so it tracks demand, not effort. The month a hiring round opens, a registration launches or a campaign lands is the month the count spikes. Planning from an average month underestimates the need. Planning from the busiest month of the last year is closer to reality.
On the free plan, 100 entries a month covers a quiet contact form. A single event registration can pass it in a week. Pro's 2,000 is generous for most small teams, and Team's 10,000 is high enough that, in practice, the user count tends to decide the plan before volume does. Unlimited entries appear only on Enterprise, together with HIPAA compliance and single sign on.
Users
Users build and manage forms. Paid plans let you add users for 5 dollars per user per month, according to the plan cards. The free Individual plan cannot add users at all. That add-on price changes the arithmetic between plans more than most people expect, and it is covered in the worked examples below.
Guests
Guests are people outside the organization who need to collaborate on entries without a full seat. The card text describes them as a way to "securely collaborate with people outside your organization". Included guests are counted monthly. Beyond the included number, guest access is sold in tiers: up to 50 guests for 25 dollars a month, up to 100 for 50 dollars, up to 250 for 100 dollars, up to 500 for 150 dollars, up to 1,000 for 200 dollars and up to 2,500 for 250 dollars. Each tier price covers all guests up to that limit, and after 2,500 each additional 1,000 guests adds 100 dollars.
Storage
Uploaded files count against storage. The four-plan layout lists 100 MB on Individual, 1 GB on Pro, 10 GB on Team and 100 GB on Enterprise. For Enterprise, going over 100 GB automatically adds 50 GB for 25 dollars a month from the next invoice, and the page states that this is based on actual use, so nothing is charged if the extra space is not consumed. Any form that collects documents, photos or signed PDFs should be sized against the storage figure, not only the entry count.
What each step up actually buys
Read the ladder as jumps between plans rather than as a list of prices.
Individual to Pro buys the finishing features for forms that go to the public: electronic signatures, save and resume, and removal of the Cognito Forms branding. Save and resume is the one that changes outcomes. Long applications, grant forms and anything that asks for documents get abandoned when the respondent cannot come back later, and that loss never shows up in the entry count.
Pro to Team buys workflow. The Team card lists workflow and approvals and data lookups, and in the four-plan layout also a client portal and five guests. This is where a form tool stops being only a collection point and starts routing entries to people. If the real problem is that nobody knows who is handling which submission, the answer starts at Team, not Pro.
Team to Business exists only in the five-plan experiment. It buys 25,000 entries, ten users, five guests, folder permissions, a one year audit log and 50,000 API requests a month. For a team that has outgrown five users but has no compliance requirement, this plan removes the need to jump straight to Enterprise.
Business or Team to Enterprise buys security and control: HIPAA compliance, single sign on, unlimited entries, twenty users and twenty guests, and in the experiment layout custom document templates. These are features requested by IT or compliance staff. If none of them appears in the requirements, Enterprise is rarely the right answer, whatever the volume.
Billing rules that move the real cost
The FAQ at the bottom of the pricing page contains rules that matter as much as the plan cards.
Annual billing is cheaper by a fixed margin. In the four-plan layout, the annual prices are 19, 39 and 129 dollars a month against monthly prices of 24, 49 and 174. The page headline says prepaying saves up to 20 percent. Annual plans also come with a usage wallet: extra usage during the term, such as guests, storage or API calls, is drawn from it.
Upgrades are immediate, downgrades wait. An upgrade takes effect at once and the difference is prorated over the rest of the billing period. On a monthly plan, a downgrade takes effect at the next billing date. On an annual plan, a downgrade can be scheduled for renewal. Because upgrading is quick and cheap to do mid-period, the low-risk move is to start on the smaller plan and upgrade when a meter actually bites.
Trials end by dropping to free, not by charging. A paid plan can be trialed for 14 days with no credit card. When the trial ends, the organization moves to the free Individual plan unless billing details were entered. That is reassuring on cost, but a live form then falls back to 100 entries a month and one user. To end a trial early, the steps on the page are: select the organization name at the top left of the sidebar, choose Settings, choose Plan & Billing in the left navigation, then click End Trial at the top right.
Each organization is billed separately. One login can create any number of organizations, but each is its own billing entity and needs its own plan for paid features. An agency running forms for several clients, or a company where two departments want separate spaces, should price that as several subscriptions.
Nonprofit discounts exist on request. Discounted rates apply at any plan level for organizations that are tax exempt under section 501(c)(3), excluding educational and governmental bodies. The route is to contact support.
Working out what a year costs
Three short examples show how the meters interact. All figures use the annual prices from the four-plan layout and the published 5 dollar add-on user price.
A team of three builders with 1,200 entries a month. Pro includes two users, so the third is an add-on: 19 plus 5 is 24 dollars a month, or 288 dollars a year. Team at 39 dollars a month is 468 dollars a year. Unless workflow and approvals are needed, Pro with one extra user is the cheaper fit. In the five-plan layout Pro includes only one user, so the same team pays 19 plus 10, which is 29 dollars a month, or 348 dollars a year.
A team of five that routes every application to an external reviewer panel of 30 people. Team includes five users and five guests in the four-plan layout. Thirty guests fall in the "up to 50" tier at 25 dollars a month. The total is 39 plus 25, or 64 dollars a month, which is 768 dollars a year.
A team of eight with no compliance requirement. On the four-plan layout, Team with three add-on users is 39 plus 15, or 54 dollars a month. On the five-plan layout, Team at 49 plus 15 is 64 dollars a month, while Business at 99 includes ten users and adds audit history. The decision then depends on whether the audit log and folder permissions are worth 35 dollars a month.
None of these examples touches the entry allowance, which is common. For most small teams the people count sets the bill, and entries only matter in the busiest month.
When the meter itself is the question
Stepping back, Cognito Forms charges on several axes at once: entries, users, guests, storage and API calls. That design is reasonable for teams whose volume is predictable. It becomes harder to plan when submissions arrive in bursts, or when the work that takes time is not collecting the entry but handling it afterwards: assigning an owner, tracking a status, replying to the person who submitted.
Some form tools take a different approach and price only on the number of people using them, with forms and responses unlimited on every plan. In that model a busy month costs nothing extra and adding a colleague is the only thing with a price. Neither model is better in general. The test is which number in your organization moves the most from month to month. If it is submissions, a per-person price is easier to budget. If it is people, a per-entry price may be cheaper.
It is worth comparing what happens after a response arrives, not only what the form builder can do. A page that lists response handling features such as owners, stages and replies is a quick way to see the difference, and a pricing page built around head count can be checked directly against the examples above.
What to change first
Open the Cognito Forms pricing page today and note which layout it shows. Then count your busiest month of entries and the number of people who genuinely need to build forms, and run both through the examples above. If the real cost of your current process is in replying to and tracking each submission rather than in collecting it, try a tool such as Halict on a copy of one live form before committing to an annual plan.
Q1. How much does Cognito Forms cost per month?
The Individual plan is free. As checked on October 8, 2026, Pro costs 24 US dollars billed monthly or 19 dollars a month billed annually. Higher plans depend on which pricing layout the page shows: Team is 39 or 49 dollars a month on annual billing, and Enterprise is 129 or 149 dollars. Sales tax may apply in some jurisdictions.
Q2. Why do two people see different Cognito Forms prices?
The pricing page currently runs two layouts. The page code labels the five-plan version "September 2026 Business Plan Experiment", which adds a Business plan and changes Team and Enterprise prices. Visitors can be shown either layout, so compare screenshots taken on the same day before assuming an error.
Q3. Can more users be added to a Cognito Forms plan without upgrading?
Yes, on the paid plans. The plan cards list additional users at 5 dollars per user per month. The free Individual plan cannot add users. For a small team that only needs one or two extra seats, adding users to Pro is often cheaper than moving to Team.
Q4. What happens when a Cognito Forms free trial ends?
The organization moves automatically to the free Individual plan unless billing details were provided, so nothing is charged. The organization then sits under the free plan's limits of one user and 100 entries a month, and the features listed only on paid plans, such as save and resume and electronic signatures, are no longer part of the plan.
Q5. Does Cognito Forms offer a nonprofit discount?
Yes, in many cases. Discounted rates are offered at any plan level for organizations tax exempt under section 501(c)(3), excluding educational and governmental organizations. The discount is not applied automatically. You apply by contacting the support team.