/vs/chatlio
spookat
vs chatlio.
Chatlio is a Slack-first live chat that opens a Slack channel for each visitor, priced per account in tiers by operators, conversations and widgets. Spookat is a chat widget that loads nothing until the click and lands every chat in Slack, Discord or our inbox and its phone app. Here's the honest version.
the short version.
- 01
$4.99 a site (early access) with the whole team and no cap on chats. Chatlio's Starter is $29 a month for 2 operators and 200 conversations.
- 02
Discord, and our own inbox and phone app, next to Slack on every paid plan. Chatlio's Discord is still in development.
- 03
Nothing loads before the click. Chatlio pulls about 69 kb gzipped and writes to localStorage on page load.
the scoreboard.
10 chat widgets, one test page, an empty Chrome cache every run. Measured 2026-09-27 – 2026-09-30. Every bar links to the raw data.
lower is better · raw data, measured 2026-09-27 – 2026-09-30
lower is better · raw data, measured 2026-09-27 – 2026-09-30
lower is better · raw data, measured 2026-09-27 – 2026-09-30
lower is better · raw data, measured 2026-09-27 – 2026-09-30
lower is better · raw data, measured 2026-09-27 – 2026-09-30
side by side.
| what | spookat | Chatlio |
|---|---|---|
| cheapest paid plan | $4.99 a site a month, $9.99 after early access | Starter, $29/month for 2 operators, 1 widget and 200 conversations. source for Chatlio, cheapest paid plan (opens in a new tab) |
| your team | Unlimited and free. We charge per site. | 2 operators on Starter, unlimited from Basic ($49/month). source for Chatlio, your team (opens in a new tab) |
| their AI | No bot of ours to sell you. No per-answer fees. | No AI of their own. source for Chatlio, their AI (opens in a new tab) |
| your own AI agent | Webhooks, a reply API and MCP on cool guy ($14.99 in early access). | Your own Slack bot can reply to visitors. source for Chatlio, your own AI agent (opens in a new tab) |
| remove their logo | On cool guy ($14.99 in early access). | White-label widget from Pro, $99/month. source for Chatlio, remove their logo (opens in a new tab) |
| answer from Slack | A thread per chat, reply in the thread. Every paid plan. | Native on every plan. Each visitor gets their own Slack channel. source for Chatlio, answer from Slack (opens in a new tab) |
| answer from Discord | A thread per chat, or a post in a forum channel. Reply in it. Every paid plan. | In development, not available yet. source for Chatlio, answer from Discord (opens in a new tab) |
| before anyone clicks | One launcher script under 4 kb gzipped. 0 requests to our API. | 5 requests and about 69 kb on page load, from 2 servers. measured for Chatlio, before anyone clicks (opens in a new tab) |
| cookies | None. | No cookie on page load in our test, but a visitor id in localStorage. Their docs say cookies keep visitor sessions unless you turn them off. source for Chatlio, cookies (opens in a new tab) |
| visitor IPs | Never stored. | Always collected, per their pricing FAQ. source for Chatlio, visitor IPs (opens in a new tab) |
| free plan | Yes, for now: freeloader, 5 chats a month, 3 days of history. Plus 14 days free, no card. | No. 30-day trial. source for Chatlio, free plan (opens in a new tab) |
Chatlio's side comes from their public pages, checked 2026-09-30. "measured" means we loaded their widget on a test page ourselves and counted what arrived before any click. Prices change: spot something outdated and we'll fix it.
where chatlio wins.
- Around since 2015, with slash commands in Slack for visitor info, email and going offline.
- Unlimited domains and full custom CSS on every plan.
- A 30-day free trial.
- Zapier and Segment integrations, and your own Slack bot can reply to visitors.
pick chatlio if
you only use Slack, want a long-running tool built for it, and don't mind a new Slack channel for every visitor.
pick spookat if
you want Slack or Discord threads or our inbox, and one price per site with no cap on chats.