AnnounceKit and Beamer both charge for the changelog, not the board

Type either of these two names into a search box and you are almost certainly shopping for an announcement widget, not a request board. Both products are built that way: a changelog and release notes tool with a feedback board riding along as a smaller, later addition.

Beamer was read on its own pricing page on 15 September 2026. AnnounceKit's figures below were re-read on its own pricing page on 2 October 2026, after it replaced its plan ladder with modular, per-product pricing.

What does each one charge?

AnnounceKit's changelog is forty nine dollars a month billed yearly, Beamer's Starter is forty nine month to month, and neither figure buys a voting board on its own.

Read on AnnounceKit's own pricing page on 2026-10-02 and Beamer's on 2026-09-15.

AnnounceKit's Changelog product is forty nine dollars a month billed yearly, fifty nine month to month: publishing, a standalone changelog page, every widget type and a roadmap module. Feature Requests & Roadmap, the actual voting board, is now its own product at thirty nine dollars a month billed yearly, not a higher tier.

Beamer's forty nine dollars is Starter, a changelog plan with a five thousand monthly active user allowance. Feedback sits beside it as a separate add on, with its own free tier or a ninety nine dollar paid one.

AnnounceKit bills per product and says plainly, on its own pricing page, "Never per-seat." It does now meter monthly active users, with 10,000 included per workspace and twenty five dollars per extra five thousand past that. Beamer bills per monthly active user on the changelog side and leaves votes on the feedback side uncounted.

How much does AnnounceKit cost compared to Beamer?

It depends on how much traffic your product carries and whether the board needs to stay private, because AnnounceKit's price does not move with either one.

AnnounceKit's number now moves with MAUs too, though more slowly than Beamer's: the board itself stays thirty nine dollars flat, and only the overage above 10,000 monthly active users climbs, at twenty five dollars per extra five thousand, with no contact-required wall at any size.

Beamer does not publish a rate above fifty thousand monthly active users. Past that line its page reads by contact, with no printed figure, while AnnounceKit's overage formula keeps naming a price at every size.

Whether AnnounceKit's feature requests can be made private at all is not stated on the pages read on 2 October 2026. Only a private changelog page is named, under the Private & Authenticated add-on at forty nine dollars a month billed yearly, or fifty nine monthly.

If you would rather look at a board than read about billing, the demo is open without an account.

Which one should you choose?

They are built for different jobs wearing similar looking price lists, and the answer names something real about both.

AnnounceKit's own pricing page still states plainly that it charges no per seat fee, a commitment most metered tools in this category do not put in writing. It now meters monthly active users too, past 10,000 per workspace, so the price is flat only up to that line.

Beamer's free feedback add on is a fully working public board, not a locked demo. Public ideas, comments, a portal and a roadmap, with unlimited votes, for as long as the changelog plan under it stays free or paid.

Choose AnnounceKit when a flat per-product rate up to 10,000 MAU matters more to you than a smaller number today. Choose Beamer when your audience is small enough that its meter stays cheap and its free feedback tier covers what you need.

The demo board is open and it asks for no account.

Why choose AnnounceKit over Beamer, or Beamer over AnnounceKit?

Because one of them prices your project and the other prices your product's traffic, and those move at completely different speeds.

Choose AnnounceKit when you run one product with a growing audience and want the board's price to stay fixed up to 10,000 monthly active users, with a predictable twenty five dollar step per extra five thousand rather than a tier jump.

Choose Beamer when your audience is modest, because Starter at forty nine dollars with a free feedback tier is cheaper than AnnounceKit's changelog plus board together, and the changelog widget itself is a strong reason to prefer them at that size.

Is there a cheaper alternative to both?

Several, and which one wins depends on whether your risk is your product count or your traffic.

Against AnnounceKit's flat per product rate, a cheaper board only matters once you are certain the feature request module is what you are paying for. Against Beamer's monthly active user meter, the calculator works out the crossover at a size you choose.

The full field, with the unit each vendor bills on, is one page, and VoteFirst's own plan is $9/mo, with no meter of any kind.

What does each do with a vote from a big customer?

Read on each vendor's own pages on the date in the row above. Not published means nobody could read it on the pages opened that day, never that the capability is absent.

A dash means nobody could read it on the pages opened that day, never that the capability is absent.

Neither AnnounceKit's nor Beamer's pages, re-read on 2 October 2026 for AnnounceKit, mention vote weight, MRR or customer tier. Eight of the thirty two vendors in the vendor matrix describe some form of ordering or weighting votes by customer revenue in their own words, and neither of this pair is one of the eight.

Can I move from one to the other?

Neither vendor's own pages, read on the day, state an export capability for the feedback side one way or the other. That is worth checking directly before you commit to either.

Whoever cast each vote, the comment threads underneath it, the exact timestamps and every board link your customers have already bookmarked rarely make the trip in either direction, whatever the export turns out to hold.

Where VoteFirst fits, and where it does not

Both AnnounceKit and Beamer sell a net promoter score product beside the board, AnnounceKit as its own standalone NPS product at forty nine dollars a month billed yearly and Beamer as a ninety nine dollar add on with a free tier of its own. VoteFirst has no NPS feature and none planned.

Both also hand out more team members past their included headcount, AnnounceKit through its Unlimited Team & RBAC add-on at twenty nine dollars a month billed yearly across the workspace and Beamer on every paid changelog plan. VoteFirst's team members come only with the thirty nine dollar plan, and it charges nothing per seat.

Both carry single sign on, AnnounceKit with SSO & SAML as an add-on across every product at seventy nine dollars a month billed yearly. VoteFirst's own sign in is a token handed over from your own application on the thirty nine dollar plan, and it has no SAML at any price.

What is AnnounceKit, and what is Beamer?

Both are changelog and release announcement products first, with a feedback board sold in as a later addition rather than the reason either one exists.

AnnounceKit publishes what shipped to a hosted page, an in app widget and an email list, and sells the feature request board as its own standalone product rather than a module gated behind a higher plan.

Beamer publishes release notes through an in app widget metered by monthly active users, and sells its feedback board and its NPS survey as two separate add ons sitting on top of whichever changelog plan you hold.

Does either one have a free plan?

Beamer does. Its changelog reads free at a thousand monthly active users and one teammate, and its feedback add on carries its own separate free tier of public ideas, comments, a portal and a roadmap with unlimited votes.

AnnounceKit does not. Their pricing page, re-read on 2 October 2026, offers a fifteen day trial with no credit card, and the cheapest single product, the thirty nine dollar voting board, is the least you can keep.

Choosing AnnounceKit or Beamer

Both of these are widgets for telling people what shipped, and both treat the request board as the smaller, later half of the product. AnnounceKit's product price stays fixed up to 10,000 monthly active users, then climbs in twenty five dollar steps per extra five thousand. Beamer's changelog price climbs with that audience from the start, and its feedback board rides along as an add on either way.

If the board is the actual reason you are here, neither headline price is the one to compare. Feature Requests & Roadmap at thirty nine, or Starter plus Feedback Free at forty nine, are the numbers that answer that question.

14 days, a card at signup, then $9 or $39 a month.