Buffer

Buffer pricing details

• Free plan available
• 14-day paid trial
• paid plans from $5/channel/mo (annual)
• essentials $6/channel/mo · Team $12/channel/mo (monthly)
• essentials $5/channel/mo · Team $10-12/channel/mo (annual)

Buffer bills by channel, not by user. Free $0 forever: 3 channels, 10 scheduled posts per channel, 1 user. Essentials $6/channel/mo monthly ($5 annual, 14-day trial). Team $12/channel/mo monthly ($10 annual) adds analytics and integrations. Each additional channel adds to the bill; there is no per-user charge, so it scales better for many-brand accounts than seat-based rivals.

In our index: Free plan available; paid from $5/channel/mo ($6 monthly, Essentials), Team $10-12/channel/mo; per-channel, not per-seat

How Buffer scores across our 6 index dimensions

• Functionality: 4/5 (research only)
• Usability: 4/5 (research only)
• Stability: 4/5 (research only)
• Collaboration: 3/5 (research only)
• Localization: 3/5 (research only)
• Value: 4/5 (research only)

Score rationale: Per-channel, not per-seat, pricing is the differentiator: 3-channel free tier is a real standing plan, and Essentials at $5/channel/mo annual is the cheapest paid entry in this cluster. UI is clean and fast (ease 4/5). Collaboration (approvers, shared feeds) is thinner than Hootsuite's team workflows (3/5). English-only UI (3/5). No hands-on testing this round; figures from the official pricing page.

What Buffer does well

• Free plan is a standing plan (3 channels, 1 user), not a trial
• Per-channel, not per-seat, pricing — the cheapest paid entry in the cluster ($5/channel/mo annual)
• Covers Instagram, X, Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, YouTube and Threads from one feed
• Clean, fast UI (ease 4/5) with 14-day paid trial

Where Buffer falls short

• Collaboration (approvers, shared feeds) is lighter than Hootsuite's team workflows
• No built-in deep analytics suite the way Metricool ships — scheduling is the strength, not measurement
• No X-removal surprises, but feature depth trails an enterprise platform

How Buffer compares to other Social Media Scheduling tools

Our index tracks 5 Social Media Scheduling tools. Buffer sits at 4.0/5, with essentials $5/channel/mo · team $10-12/channel/mo (annual). Here are the 4 closest alternatives we hold pricing and scoring evidence for.

• Metricool — 4.2/5 · Free plan · $20/mo (annual)
  Metricool is an all-in-one social planner plus analytics platform: schedule across networks, run a content calendar and get built-in analytics and competitor tracking. It bills by brand and has a genuinely useful free tier.
• Hootsuite — 4.1/5 · 14-day free trial (no credit card) · $99/user/mo (annual, Standard)
  Hootsuite is the established enterprise social management platform: publish, monitor and route a shared inbox across networks, with Wisdom AI and Talkwalker listening. It bills per user and has no free plan.
• Publer — 4.0/5 · Free plan · $5/account/mo (annual)
  Publer is a low-cost social planner that bills per account on a flat workspace with unlimited scheduling. Its free tier covers 3 social accounts, and its paid entry is among the cheapest in the cluster when a small team needs many accounts without the per-seat math.
• Later — 3.8/5 · 14-day trial (credit card required, auto-charge at expiry) · $18.75/mo (annual)
  Later is a social-first scheduler built around a visual Instagram-first grid. It has no free plan — only a 14-day trial that requires a credit card and auto-charges — and bills by 'Social Set' (a bundle of profiles and posts) rather than per user.