Pricing

What an iMessage API actually costs

Every published price we could verify, in one table, with the parts that are not on the pricing page: setup fees, what a line can safely send, and why nobody in this category charges per message.

$20

Cheapest published entry point, for a shared sender

$100–$200

Typical monthly cost of a dedicated number

What testing costs — four of five providers include a sandbox

Prices checked August 2026. Vendors change these without notice — follow the links and confirm before you commit.

The model

Why it is per line, not per message

Understanding this one thing tells you how to read every price on this page.

Apple sells no wholesale access to iMessage, so every provider here reaches it the only way available: by operating real Apple accounts and real Apple devices, and putting an HTTP API in front of them. Each phone number you rent has physical infrastructure behind it.

That single fact explains the whole commercial shape of the category. The line is the scarce resource, so the line is the unit of billing. A dedicated number costs more than a shared one because it occupies capacity nobody else uses. And nothing is unlimited, because a line that sends too much gets flagged — which is a delivery problem long before it is a billing one.

The practical consequence is unusual and mostly in your favour: a business sending 400 messages a month pays the same as one sending 4,000. Small senders get proportionally far more for their money than they do on metered SMS. The arithmetic in full.

The number that is not on any pricing page

A line has a safe daily sending ceiling — commonly cited around 100 new conversations a day, and lower while a number is warming up. If your volume needs more than that, you need another line, and the real price is your monthly volume divided by that ceiling. How to pace a line safely.

Cheapest is not free

“Free iMessage API” results are open-source projects that run on a Mac you own and send from your personal Apple ID. Genuinely free, genuinely useful for prototypes, and a poor idea for a business — the Apple ID at risk is a real person’s. What is actually out there.

Every provider

Published pricing, cheapest entry first

Providers we have reviewed in depth. Each tier is as the vendor publishes it.

LoopMessage

An omnichannel API covering iMessage, SMS, RCS and WhatsApp behind a single number — but no cold outbound.

Free sandboxFrom $59.99

Tier	Price	What it is
Sandbox	$0	Test the API before paying. Capped at 5 contacts.
Light	$59.99 /month, from	A dedicated sender for lower-volume conversation workloads.
Regular	$99.99 /month, from	The standard production tier.
Shared sender	$20 /month, from	A cheaper shared-number track restricted to AI assistant use cases, with a free tier below it.

Tiers as listed on loopmessage.com. Prices are quoted as 'from', and the dedicated tiers are metered on daily active contacts rather than messages — model your own contact concurrency before comparing against a flat per-line competitor.

Read the LoopMessage review

Miss Blue

A virtual iMessage line with a REST API and a shared team inbox on top of it.

Free sandboxFrom $78

Tier	Price	What it is
Free sandbox	$0	API testing before launch. No customer-facing number.
Shared number	$78 /month	Live conversations on shared infrastructure. Listed at $39/mo during their promotion.
Dedicated	$198 /month per number	Production line, unlimited usage. Listed at $99/mo during their promotion.
Enterprise	Custom	Multiple numbers, guaranteed terms, migration help.

List prices with promotional rates as shown on missblue.dev. Promotional pricing is described as locked in for accounts created during the sale — confirm the current terms directly before you commit.

Read the Miss Blue review Their pricing page

Sendblue

A REST API for sending and receiving real iMessages, with SMS and RCS fallback.

Free sandboxFrom $100

Tier	Price	What it is
Free sandbox	$0	Build against the API before you pay for a line.
AI Agent	$100 /month per dedicated line	A production line for an agent or a small outbound motion.
Enterprise	Custom	Multiple lines, outbound teams, and compliance requirements.

Tiers as listed on sendblue.com. Third-party comparison sites quote materially different figures for Sendblue, so treat their own pricing page as the only authority and confirm before you budget.

Read the Sendblue review Their pricing page

Tuco AI

A managed, CRM-native iMessage service that fires the moment a lead converts — sold with white-glove setup rather than as raw API access.

From $149

Tier	Price	What it is
Starter	$149 /month + $335 setup	The entry tier, including white-glove implementation.
Growth	On request	Higher volume. Pricing quoted after a demo.
Enterprise	Custom	Multi-line and agency deployments.

The only provider here with a one-time setup fee, and the only one without a free sandbox. That buys you implementation you would otherwise do yourself — worth it if you have no engineer, expensive if you do.

Read the Tuco AI review

Blooio

Messaging infrastructure across iMessage, RCS and SMS, sold on delivery reliability and instantly available pre-warmed numbers.

From Tiered

Tier	Price	What it is
Starter	Tiered	Entry commercial tier. See their comparison page for current rates.
Commercial	$195 /line, promotional	Promotional rate shown at 50% off for a six-line commitment at the time of writing.
Inbound	Custom	Purpose-built for reply-first AI agent workflows.
Enterprise	Custom	High volume with operational security controls.

Blooio's public pricing is presented as tiers with a promotional per-line rate rather than a simple list price, and the promotion shown was a six-line commitment. Get a written quote for your actual line count before comparing it against flat per-line competitors.

Read the Blooio review

Also in the market

Vendors we price but have not reviewed

We have not run a paid line with these, so they are not in the comparison above. Their published pricing is still worth knowing when you are benchmarking a quote.

Photon

$0 / $25 / $250 per line

Free and Pro tiers run on your own Mac and Apple ID. Dedicated lines start at the Business tier.

Our write-up Their pricing

Linq

Quote only

Free sandbox, then enterprise pricing through sales. Competitor pages cite figures around $250 per line plus a setup fee — treat that as a rival's estimate, not a quote.

Our write-up Their pricing

Worked examples

What it comes to in practice

Monthly cost for three realistic shapes of business. Using published list prices; volume discounts exist above a handful of lines.

Business	Volume	Lines	Sensible pick	Monthly
Single-location clinic sending reminders	~400/month	1	A shared sender, or one dedicated line	$20–$100
Three-van home services company	~1,500/month	1	One dedicated line	$100–$200
Agency running ten client accounts	Varies per client	10	One dedicated line per client	$1,000–$2,000

The agency row is the one that surprises people, and it is the reason per-line pricing has to be built into what you charge clients rather than absorbed. The GoHighLevel version of this problem.

The rest of the bill

Costs that are not on the pricing page

Setup and onboarding fees

Tuco AI publishes $335 alongside its monthly price. Enterprise vendors frequently charge four figures. Always ask before comparing monthly numbers.

Additional lines

Rarely the same as the first. Get the per-additional-line price in writing, especially if you are multi-location or an agency.

SMS and RCS fallback

Roughly half your contacts will not be on iMessage. Fallback may be included, metered, or absent — and absent means those messages simply fail.

Minimum terms

Monthly pricing does not always mean a monthly commitment. Ask about contract length and what happens if you stop.

The person answering replies

The largest real cost of this channel, and it never appears on a pricing page. Replies arrive, and someone has to answer them.

Losing the number

Most providers do not let you port a number out. Switching later means telling your customers you have a new number — a cost paid in confusion, not dollars.

Questions

Common pricing questions

How much does an iMessage API cost?

Published entry prices run from about $20 a month for a shared sender to about $250 a month for a dedicated enterprise line. A dedicated number from a mid-market provider is typically $100 to $200 a month. Most providers bill per phone line per month rather than per message, so volume within a line's safe sending limit does not change the bill.

Is there a free iMessage API?

There is no free commercial API with its own phone number. Four of the five providers we review offer a free sandbox for testing, and Photon has a free tier that runs on your own Mac and Apple ID. Open-source projects such as BlueBubbles are free but require a Mac you own and send from your personal Apple ID.

Why is iMessage API pricing per line instead of per message?

Because the phone line is the scarce resource. Providers reach iMessage by operating real Apple accounts and devices, so each number has physical infrastructure behind it. Once a line exists, an extra message costs the provider almost nothing — which is why the line, not the message, is what you are billed for.

What is the cheapest way to test an iMessage API?

A free sandbox, which costs nothing and takes under an hour. Sendblue, Miss Blue, LoopMessage and Blooio all offer one. If you need a real customer-facing number, LoopMessage's shared sender is the lowest published entry point at about $20 a month.

Are there setup fees?

Sometimes. Tuco AI publishes a $335 setup fee alongside its $149 monthly Starter tier, and enterprise vendors frequently charge a four-figure onboarding fee. Ask about setup, per-additional-line pricing and minimum contract length before comparing monthly figures.

Compare providers Every vendor in the category