Buffer vs Metricool
Buffer Charges Per Channel, So Count Your Channels Before You Compare Prices
Metricool's Tier Name Doesn't Set the Price — Your Brand Count Does
The short answer
- Entry price
- Buffer does not publish a single starting price we can rank against Metricool's $20/month, so we do not rank them. A zero in our data means one of two opposite things — a genuine free tier, or a product that is not sold at a fixed monthly rate at all — so calling either one "cheapest" would be wrong.
- Our rating
- 4.2/5 against 4.3/5. That gap is inside our own margin, so treat these as rated level and decide on the specifics below rather than on the score.
Buffer
see siteThe free plan is 3 channels with 10 scheduled posts each, which refill. Paid is $5 per channel on Essentials and $10 per channel on Team — so the advertised $5 is the price of one account, and six accounts is $30.
What works
- ✓ Free plan connects 3 channels and is not a trial
- ✓ Free scheduled posts refill as they publish, so 10 per channel is a rolling limit not a lifetime one
- ✓ Team at $10/channel includes unlimited users — genuinely per-channel, not per-person
- ✓ Free tier still includes AI Assistant, Insights, 100 ideas and API access
What does not
- ✗ Pricing is per channel, so the $5 headline multiplies by every account you run
- ✗ Free plan allows 1 user account — no collaborators until you pay
- ✗ Essentials is single-user; team access means Team at double the per-channel rate
- ✗ The per-channel discount only starts above 10 channels, which most small businesses never reach
Metricool
from $20/monthStarter is $20/month for 5 brands or $36 for 10. Advanced is $53 for 15, $85 for 25, $159 for 50. The plan name only sets the feature band — the price inside it slides with how many brands you connect, which is why quoted 'Metricool costs $20' figures rarely match anyone's bill.
What works
- ✓ The free plan manages 1 brand permanently, with 5 competitor profiles tracked
- ✓ Starter at $20/month covers 5 brands — genuinely cheap per brand
- ✓ Competitor tracking jumps to 100 profiles on paid tiers
- ✓ The full brand-count price ladder is published, not quoted on request
What does not
- ✗ Every plan has multiple prices, so a single headline figure is misleading
- ✗ The free plan caps at 20 scheduled posts a month
- ✗ Free analytics history is 30 days, which is too short to see a trend
- ✗ Users included per plan are not stated anywhere on the pricing page
Who should pick which
Pick Buffer if this is the thing that matters most to you:
Free plan connects 3 channels and is not a trial.
What most often rules it out: Pricing is per channel, so the $5 headline multiplies by every account you run.
Pick Metricool if this is the thing that matters most to you:
The free plan manages 1 brand permanently, with 5 competitor profiles tracked.
What most often rules it out: Every plan has multiple prices, so a single headline figure is misleading.
Figures come from our review of each product, checked against the vendor's own pricing page. We do not convert currencies or rank prices quoted on different billing periods — where that applies it is said above, not quietly resolved.
A third option, and what it is not
Bonfire Terminal is an AI agent that runs as a desktop app on your own machine — no cloud, nothing you type leaves your computer. It does not do what Buffer or Metricool do, and we will not pretend it does. If either is doing its job for you, keep it.
What the $27 actually gets you→The way in is the AI Marketers Club — $27 one-time, including 21 days of access. Keeping it after that is a separate purchase; the vendor's FAQ states Bonfire Terminal starts at $5,000. We earn a commission at no extra cost to you, which is why both tools' drawbacks are printed in full above and the $5,000 is here rather than left for you to find later.