Per-channel pricing
A pricing model where cost scales with the number of social accounts connected — one Instagram profile is one channel, one Facebook Page is another, one LinkedIn Company Page is a third. Buffer and Later use this model.
What per-channel pricing means in practice
Per-channel pricing charges you for each social account you connect — one Instagram profile is one channel, your Facebook Page is another, your LinkedIn Company is a third. Buffer and Later are the clearest examples.
Buffer’s Essentials plan: $5/channel/mo. A single brand on Instagram + Facebook + LinkedIn + TikTok + X = 5 channels = $25/mo, regardless of how many people on your team log in.
This model is brutally cheap for small teams managing one or two brands, and brutally expensive for agencies managing 20 brands.
The opposite: per-user pricing
The alternative model — per-user (or per-seat) pricing — charges you for each person who needs to log in, not for each social account. Hootsuite Professional is $99/mo for 1 user. Sprout Social Standard is $249/seat/mo.
Per-user models are cheap for solos managing many brands. Per-channel models are cheap for teams with few brands.
The crossover calculation
| Situation | Per-channel (Buffer $5/ch) | Per-user (Hootsuite $99) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 user, 5 profiles | $25/mo | $99/mo → Buffer wins |
| 1 user, 20 profiles | $100/mo | $99/mo → Hootsuite wins |
| 3 users, 5 profiles | $25/mo (1 user) or $60/mo (Team) | $249/mo → Buffer wins |
| 3 users, 30 profiles | $180/mo (Team) | $249/mo → Buffer wins narrowly |
| 5 users, 30 profiles | $300/mo (Team) | $739/mo → Buffer wins |
| 1 user, 60 profiles | $300/mo | $99/mo → Hootsuite wins |
Most listicles call “Buffer cheap” and “Hootsuite expensive” without saying for whom. If you’re a 12-brand agency with 3 teammates, Buffer can be the expensive one.
Why the industry doesn’t explain this clearly
Vendor-owned comparison sites (Buffer’s blog comparing itself to Hootsuite, Hootsuite’s content comparing itself to Sprout) structurally cannot publish this analysis — it would reveal cases where their own product is the wrong choice.
Independent comparison sites could publish this but often don’t because the math requires knowing the user’s specific brand count and team size — information they don’t collect.
This site’s decision wizard (/tools/decision-wizard) takes your brand count and user count as inputs and outputs the actual cheapest tool for your shape.
How to calculate your cost under per-channel pricing
- Count every social profile you need to connect (each Instagram, each Facebook Page, each LinkedIn Company Page as separate)
- Multiply by the per-channel price
- Compare to the per-user cost at your team size
Example: 3 brands Ã- 4 platforms each = 12 channels Ã- $5/mo = $60/mo on Buffer Essentials vs $249/mo Hootsuite Team for 3 users. Buffer wins here.
Example: 15 brands Ã- 4 platforms = 60 channels Ã- $5/mo = $300/mo on Buffer Essentials vs $99/mo Hootsuite Professional for 1 user. Hootsuite wins here by $201/mo.
See also: post scheduling · content calendar · analytics dashboard