Seat-based Plans

Clerk Billing Plans can use seat-based configuration to:

• Limit how many seats an Organization can have
• Charge Organizations based on the number of purchased seats
• Combine seat limits and per-seat pricing on the same Plan

This makes it possible to tailor Plans to Organizations based on size, or to offer pricing that scales with growth.

How seat-based Plans work

Seat limits and per-seat pricing can be used independently or together:

• Seat limits determine the maximum number of seats an Organization may have.
• Per-seat pricing determines how much an Organization is charged.

Creating a Plan with a seat limit

1. In the Clerk Dashboard, navigate to the New Organization Plan⁠ page.
2. Toggle on the Seat-based section, then choose how many seats the Plan allows:
   • To cap the number of seats, select Custom limit and enter the desired value.
   • To allow an unlimited number of seats, select Unlimited members.

Creating a Plan with per-seat pricing

1. Ensure the seat-based configuration described above is complete.
2. Toggle on the Per-seat fee section, then:
   • Enter the price per seat in the Cost per member seat monthly section.
   • To bundle free seats into the Plan, enter the desired value in the Included seats section.

SDK version requirements

To use seat-based billing, you need to be using one of the following Clerk SDK versions:

• @clerk/react v6.9.0 or higher
• @clerk/nextjs v7.5.1 or higher
• @clerk/expo v3.4.1 or higher
• @clerk/react-router v3.4.1 or higher
• @clerk/tanstack-react-start v1.4.1 or higher

Seat-based billing also requires @clerk/clerk-js v6.16.0 or higher and @clerk/ui v1.16.0 or higher. If you've pinned these dependencies, please update them before attempting to use seat-based Billing Plans.

How per-seat pricing works

When an Organization subscribes to a Plan with per-seat pricing, each provisioned seat contributes to the Subscription cost according to the parameters configured on the Plan. Plans may also include a recurring base fee and free seat tiers in addition to seat-based charges. For example, a Plan may include the first five seats for $10 a month and charge $5 a month for any additional seats.

Purchasing seats

When an Organization subscribes to a per-seat Plan, it purchases an initial quantity of seats during checkout:

• The number of purchased seats covers the current number of members in the Organization plus any pending invitations.
• If an Organization has no unused seats left and a new member is added, the admin will be prompted to purchase an additional seat.
• Additional seats are added to the existing Subscription and are prorated based on the amount of time that has passed in the current billing period.
• If the Plan also has a seat limit configured, Organizations cannot purchase more seats than the Plan's maximum allowed seat count.

When an Organization subscribes to a Plan with a seat limit but no per-seat fee, its seat limit will be set to the Plan's seat limit.

Recurring billing

At the beginning of each new billing period, the Subscription's seat quantity is automatically adjusted to match the number of members currently in the Organization before the renewal charge is calculated. This means that seats that were purchased but never occupied during the previous billing period will not automatically renew. Organizations can continue purchasing additional seats throughout the billing period as their membership grows.

This automatic seat adjustment will never reduce the Organization's seats below what it still needs. If the Plan has no per-seat fee, no seat adjustment is made. If the Plan includes free seats, the seat count will not be reduced below the number of included seats.

Managing seat limits

Organization invitations

Organizations can invite members up to their purchased seat count. Once all seats are occupied, additional invitations will be blocked until one of the following happens:

• Additional seats are purchased
• Existing members are removed from the Organization
• Pending invitations are revoked

Changing Plans

If an Organization wants to switch to a Plan with a seat limit and has more members than allowed by the Plan, it must remove members from the Organization before switching Plans.

If an Organization wants to switch from a seat-limited Plan to a Plan without seat limits and is currently over the default membership limit for Organizations, it must remove members before switching Plans.

Example pricing models

Per-seat pricing can be configured in a variety of ways depending on how you'd like to monetize Organization growth. Plans can include a recurring base fee, per-seat charges, included seats, seat limits, or any combination of these.