Airtable vs monday.com Pricing: The Bucket Is the Comparison

Airtable vs monday.com pricing is usually compared as $20 against $12 — and that comparison misses the seat buckets that lift monday's bill for a 6-editor team from $72 to $120, exactly tying Airtable. Run your team through our free Airtable vs monday.com Cost Calculator: on 10 editors at Team vs Standard, annual billing, Airtable costs $2,400 in year 1 and monday.com costs $1,440 — but a 6-editor team ties at $120 vs $120, and a 10-editor team at Business vs Pro pays $450 against $190.

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Why Plan Prices Lie

Airtable Team lists at $20 an editor; monday Standard at $12 a seat. A plan-price comparison reports an $8 gap and stops there. But $20 buys an exact editor seat and $12 buys a bucket: monday bills paid plans in buckets (a 3-seat minimum, then multiples of 5), so a 6-person team bills 10 seats and pays $120, not $72. The bucket line on monday's side ($48 at 6 editors) is six times the plan-price gap — and it is invisible in every $20-vs-$12 headline.

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Airtable's Pricing, Line by Line

Airtable on annual billing, November 2026: Free $0 for up to 5 editors, Team $20 per editor a month, Business $45 per editor a month. Airtable bills editors exactly: 5 editors cost $100 on Team, 6 cost $120, 10 cost $200, and Business scales the same way at $45 (10 editors cost $450). Monthly equivalents ($24/$54) are noted only. Airtable's strength is bases, views and automations that teams adopt as their database of record; its weakness is the rate itself — $20 is the most expensive seat in this comparison before any bucket is counted.

monday.com's Pricing, Line by Line

monday.com on annual billing, November 2026: Free $0 (fits 2 seats), Basic $9, Standard $12, Pro $19 per seat a month. Paid plans bill seat buckets: 1–3 people bill 3 seats, 4–5 bill 5, 6–10 bill 10, 11–15 bill 15, 16–20 bill 20, and so on. monday's strength is boards, dashboards and automations that teams adopt as their system of record; its weakness is that the bucket charges for seats nobody occupies — a team of 11 pays for 15, a team of 16 pays for 20.

The Seat-Bucket Table

The table every buyer should check before signing: 1–3 people → 3 billed seats; 4–5 → 5; 6–10 → 10; 11–15 → 15; 16–20 → 20; 21–25 → 25. At Standard's $12, those buckets cost $36, $60, $120, $180, $240 and $300 a month — while Airtable Team at the same headcounts costs $20–$60, $80–$100, $120–$200, $220–$300, $320–$400 and $420–$500. The bucket penalty is zero exactly on a boundary (3, 5, 10, 15, 20 seats) and largest just past one (6, 11, 16, 21 seats). Time your hiring against the table: one hire from 10 to 11 adds 5 billed monday seats, not 1.

The 6-Editor Tie, and the Top-Tier Flip

At 6 editors, Team vs Standard ties at $120 vs $120 — Airtable's exact billing meets monday's 10-seat bucket, and neither vendor wins on price. The tie is fragile: at 7 editors Airtable moves to $140 while monday stays at $120, and at 11 editors Airtable moves to $220 while monday jumps to $180. At the top tier the story reverses outright: Business at $45 an editor costs $450 for 10 editors against Pro's $190, a $260 monthly gap in monday's favour. The everyday comparison favours monday; the tie is a curiosity at exactly 6; the top tier is a rout.

Hidden Costs Beyond the Subscription

Neither column includes implementation help, advanced admin or SSO tiers, or enterprise quotes — those sit on higher tiers or separate quotes. Both vendors run promos, so the annual-billing rates here are list prices, not your negotiated quote. Re-check the bucket table at every hire: the most expensive monday mistake is budgeting headcount instead of billed seats, and the most expensive Airtable mistake is budgeting Team rates for a team that needs Business features.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Airtable or monday.com cheaper? monday.com, at the defaults: 10 editors, Team vs Standard are $200 against $120 a month, $2,400 against $1,440 in year 1. How do monday seat buckets work? Paid plans bill a 3-seat minimum, then multiples of 5 — 6 people bill 10 seats, 11 bill 15. Why does a 6-editor team tie? Because 6 × $20 = $120 meets the 10-seat bucket × $12 = $120 — exact billing crossing bucket billing at one headcount. Is Airtable Free usable? For up to 5 editors, yes; at 6 it stops fitting and the path is Team at $120. When is Airtable worth the premium? When the team already runs on its bases and views — buy Airtable for the database workflow, monday for the seat price.