How Software Is Priced in 2026: The Median Tool Costs $18, the Average Costs $178

Ask a founder what to charge and you will get an anecdote. We wanted the actual distribution, so we read the pricing pages of 5,194 software tools that publish at least two plans and measured how the market really prices itself. The headline number is deceptively simple: the median tool starts at $18 a month. The mean is $178. That ten-fold gap is the whole story of how software is priced in 2026.

The dataset

This report covers 5,194 tools on Toolradar that publish at least two pricing plans. For each we recorded whether it has a free tier, whether it offers a free trial, its starting paid price (the cheapest tier above zero), and how many tiers it lists. Starting prices are normalized to a monthly figure where possible and capped to plausible values. This is first-party structured analysis of public pricing pages, released under CC BY 4.0.

The $18 median and the $178 mean

The single most useful fact about software pricing is that the average is a lie. Here is where starting prices actually land.

Six tools in ten start under $25 a month. That is the real center of gravity of the software market: cheap enough to expense without asking, priced for a single user or a small team to self-serve. The mean of $178 exists only because the top 14%, the enterprise and infrastructure tools that start at hundreds or thousands a month, pull it upward. When someone quotes you an "average SaaS price," ask whether they mean the median a normal buyer actually pays or the mean a spreadsheet produced.

The free tier is alive and well

The recurring worry that free tiers are disappearing does not hold up. Across the tools we measured, 51% offer a free tier and 54% offer a free trial. The majority of software now lets you use it, or at least test it, before any money changes hands.

The logic is straightforward. In a market where the median tool starts at $18, the cost of acquiring a paying customer through sales is often higher than the price of the product itself. Self-serve, free-to-start funnels are how cheap software finds its buyers, so the free tier is not charity, it is the distribution model. Paywalling the front door only makes sense when a tool is expensive enough to justify a sales motion, which is exactly the top 14% that skips the free tier.

Three tiers, no more

Pricing-page design has converged. The distribution of tier counts is tight and unambiguous.

The good-better-best structure won. 43% of tools use exactly three plans, and adding 4-tier tools, more than two-thirds land at three or four. Three tiers is enough to anchor a middle option, offer a cheap entry, and reserve an enterprise ceiling, without the paralysis of a five-column comparison table. If you are choosing how many plans to publish, the market has already run the experiment.

What this means

• For buyers: the $18 median is your reference point, not the vendor's enterprise quote. If a tool in a normal category is asking far more than $25 to start, there should be a clear reason (heavy infrastructure, deep compliance, real services), otherwise it is priced above the market. And you can almost always try before you buy.
• For anyone pricing a product: three tiers, a starting price in the $10 to $25 band, and a free tier or trial is not playing it safe, it is matching where the market already is. Deviating upward without a strong story means competing against a median you are ignoring.
• For the "SaaS is getting expensive" narrative: at the entry level it is not. Most tools start cheap and let you try them free. The expense lives at the top, in the enterprise tier, which is a different market with different rules, and it is where the SSO tax and the biggest price hikes concentrate.

Methodology

Source: the published pricing tiers of 5,194 tools on Toolradar that list at least two plans. We recorded free-tier and free-trial availability, the cheapest paid tier price (normalized to monthly and capped to plausible values), and the number of tiers. Median and mean are computed over tools with a parseable paid starting price. This is descriptive analysis of public pricing data, released under CC BY 4.0. Reuse it with a link back to this page.

Frequently asked questions

What is the average price of software?

There is no single useful average. The median tool starts at $18 a month, but the mean is $178 because expensive enterprise tools skew it. For a normal buyer, the median is the honest number: most software starts under $25 a month.

Do most software tools have a free tier?

Yes, just. 51% of the tools we measured offer a free tier and 54% offer a free trial, so a slim majority let you use or test the product before paying. Free-to-start is now the default distribution model for affordable software, not a rarity.

How many pricing tiers should a SaaS have?

Three. 43% of tools use exactly three plans, and more than two-thirds use three or four. The good-better-best structure is the industry standard because it anchors a middle option without overwhelming the buyer.

Why is the gap between median and mean price so large?

Because software pricing is bimodal. Most tools are cheap self-serve products under $25 a month, while a smaller group of enterprise and infrastructure tools start at hundreds or thousands. The mean sits between two clusters and describes neither, which is why the median is the more honest figure.