Unlimited DMs, metered intelligence
Zorcha gives away the messages and charges for the AI behind them. inDM charges for the messages and doesn't sell AI credits at all. Which is cheaper depends on what your DMs are doing.
Zorcha runs the third distinct billing model in this category, and it is a genuinely interesting one: DMs are unlimited on every tier, including free. What gets metered is AI credits.
If your automations are simple — someone comments a keyword, they get a link — that model is very attractive. Unlimited sending at $0 is hard to beat, and their free tier includes it, bounded only by 15,000 AI credits and three automations.
If your automations lean on AI to compose or personalise replies, the credit meter becomes the real bill, and it is the harder of the two models to forecast. A message allowance is a number you can count. Credit consumption per AI reply depends on the length and complexity of what the model is doing, which is not something you can work out in advance from a pricing page.
inDM does not sell AI credits. We meter messages sent: 1,000 free a month, then $9.99 for 10,000 or $19.99 for 30,000. The bill is one number, and you can predict it from your own sending.
So this comparison is less about price and more about what your DMs are for. Unlimited simple sends favour Zorcha. Predictable cost and a full free product favour us.
Why creators switch
One meter you can forecast
Zorcha's bill moves with AI credit consumption, which varies per reply. inDM's moves with messages sent, which you can count from last month's numbers. If you have ever been surprised by a credit balance, that difference is the whole pitch.
Unlimited automations on the free plan
Zorcha's free tier caps you at 3 automations. inDM's free plan has unlimited automations and unlimited keywords, plus every automation type, the follow gate, analytics and the unified inbox — at 1,000 messages a month.
No AI upsell in the middle of the product
inDM does not sell AI credits, so nothing in the product is throttled by a balance you have to top up. The automations you build run on the plan you're already on.
Feature by feature
| Feature | inDM | Zorcha |
|---|---|---|
| Comment-to-DMSomeone comments a keyword on a post or reel; they get your link in a DM, instantly. | Yes | Yes |
| Story repliesA reply to your story triggers an automatic DM back. | Yes | Yes |
| Keyword DMsA DM containing a keyword gets an instant, useful answer. | Yes | Yes |
| Follow gateAsk for a follow before the link is delivered — every link grows your following. | Yes | Partial Verify current gate behaviour on their site |
| Email captureCollect an email address inside the DM thread, attached to the contact. | Yes | Partial Verify current capture behaviour on their site |
| Live DM previewSee the exact DM — bubbles, buttons, link card — before anything goes live. | Yes Always on screen while you build | Partial Verify current builder on their site |
| Built on your real contentAutomations attach to actual posts, reels, and stories — not an abstract flowchart. | Yes The spine of the product | Partial Verify on their site |
| Unified inboxEvery conversation your automations create, in one view. | Yes | Partial Verify current inbox scope on their site |
| ContactsEvery engaged person becomes a tracked contact — leads, hot leads, customers, superfans — exportable anytime. | Yes Light by design, not a sales CRM | Yes AI credits drive the bill, not contacts |
| AnalyticsTrigger rate, DM click-through, keyword performance, best hours to post. | Yes | Yes |
| Predictable pricingYou can say what next month costs before the month happens. | Yes One plan, two sizes; no overage below 30,000 DMs | Partial DMs are unlimited, but AI credit consumption per reply is the variable |
| Free foreverA free plan that renews every month, not a trial that runs out. | Yes 1,000 DMs a month, no card — or unmetered with the badge on | Yes 15K AI credits and 3 automations, with unlimited DMs |
Feature support as of August 2026. Something changed? Tell us and we'll fix it.
The pricing math
Free forever: $0, no card, 1,000 messages a month, with every automation type, unlimited automations and keywords, the follow gate, full analytics and the unified inbox. Then Growth at $9.99 a month for 10,000 DMs, or $19.99 for 30,000 with $1 per extra 1,000 above. No AI credit system — nothing in the product is gated on a balance. No account cap. The Powered by inDM badge is opt-in per automation and makes that automation's messages free. inDM bills in USD — $9.99 a month wherever you are.
Metered on AI credits with unlimited DMs on every tier, checked 2026-08-14 and confirmed as month-to-month rates. Free $0 / ₹0: 15,000 AI credits, 3 automations, unlimited DMs. Pro $14.99 / ₹1,199: 150,000 credits, unlimited automations, unlimited DMs. Ultimate $39.99 / ₹2,999: 1.5M credits. Business $109.99 / ₹8,999: 7.5M credits. Zorcha publishes a separate India pricing page in INR, one of three tools in this set that does. No connected-account limits are stated on their pricing page.
These two bills are not comparable by division, because only one of them counts messages. The honest framing: if your automations are simple keyword-to-link sends, Zorcha is unlimited at $0 and inDM is $9.99 once you pass 1,000 messages a month — they are cheaper, clearly, and the only thing you give up is the 3-automation cap on their free tier. If your automations use AI to compose replies, the comparison inverts: their credit consumption is the variable you cannot forecast from a pricing page, while our bill stays a flat function of messages sent. Compare on what your DMs actually do rather than on the headline numbers. Figures as of 2026-08-14 for Zorcha and 2026-08-12 for inDM.
Their pricing, from the source: Zorcha's pricing page (checked August 2026).
Where Zorcha is genuinely strong
Where Zorcha is the better pick, plainly:
- Unlimited DMs, including free. Every tier sends without a message cap. If you push high volume through simple automations, Zorcha's free plan does something our $19.99 plan does not, and it does it at no cost.
- AI-composed replies as a first-class feature. They are built around it and priced for it. inDM does not sell AI credits and does not position itself as an AI reply tool, so if you want the model writing your DMs, they are the ones building for that.
- Rupee pricing on the page. Their India pricing page quotes INR (₹0 / ₹1,199 / ₹2,999 / ₹8,999), so an Indian buyer sees their own currency. inDM bills in USD.
What is Zorcha?
Zorcha is an Instagram DM automation tool built around AI-assisted replies. It runs the familiar mechanics — comment triggers, story replies, keyword DMs — but its commercial model is unusual for this category: sending is unlimited on every plan, and what you buy is AI credits.
That makes it the third distinct meter in this comparison set. ManyChat counts monthly active contacts. LinkDM and inDM count messages. GRO.co counts followers. Zorcha counts AI credit consumption and lets the messages run free.
What the credit model means in practice
Their published plans, checked 2026-08-14 (and confirmed as genuine month-to-month rates — the page has a Monthly/Quarterly/Yearly switch, but it defaults to Monthly rather than to the discounted view some competitors default to):
- Free — $0 / ₹0. 15,000 AI credits, 3 automations, unlimited DMs.
- Pro — $14.99 / ₹1,199. 150,000 credits, unlimited automations, unlimited DMs.
- Ultimate — $39.99 / ₹2,999. 1.5M credits.
- Business — $109.99 / ₹8,999. 7.5M credits.
The attractive part is obvious: unlimited DMs at $0. For a creator running simple keyword-to-link automations at high volume, that is a genuinely strong offer, and our free plan's 1,000 messages does not compete with it on raw sending.
The part that needs thinking about is the credit meter. A message allowance is a unit you can count — you know how many DMs you sent last month, so you know which plan you need. Credit consumption per AI reply depends on how long the reply is and how much context the model is working with, which is not something a pricing page can tell you in advance. It is the least forecastable of the meters in this set, and that cuts both ways: it can be cheaper than you expected, or it can run out mid-month.
There is also a cap most summaries skip: the free tier allows three automations. Unlimited DMs, but through at most three of them.
How inDM is shaped
One meter: messages sent. No credits, no follower bands, no contact tiers, no account caps.
Free forever is 1,000 messages a month with the entire product — every automation type, unlimited automations and unlimited keywords, the follow gate, full analytics, the unified inbox and contacts, no card. Growth is $9.99 for 10,000 or $19.99 for 30,000, with $1 per extra 1,000 above and no overage on the entry plan.
We do not sell AI credits. There is no balance in the product that can run out and no feature that stops working when it does. That is a deliberate narrowing rather than a gap we are filling — it means the bill is a flat function of one number you already know.
One adjustment when comparing volume: a link delivery here spends two messages, the invite and then the link after the tap. Follow-gate prompts are never billed at all, because asking someone to follow you is not a delivery.
Which should you choose?
Choose Zorcha if your automations are high-volume and simple, if unlimited sending at $0 is the thing that decides it, or if you specifically want AI composing your replies and are comfortable managing a credit balance.
Choose inDM if you want a bill you can predict from your own sending, if you want more than three automations on a free plan, or if you would rather not have an AI meter sitting between you and your DMs at all.
There is a version of this where the honest answer is "use their free tier" — if you send 30,000 simple DMs a month through three automations, Zorcha's free plan beats our $19.99 one and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise.
Both tools run on Instagram's official API and sit under the same per-account DM limits Meta enforces. Neither can send faster than the other, whatever the plan says.
Already using it?
Switch from Zorcha — what carries over, what doesn't, and what the move actually costs.
Questions, answered plainly
Are Zorcha's DMs really unlimited?
On their own pricing, yes — every tier including the free one lists unlimited DMs, and what gets metered is AI credits instead. The practical ceiling is Instagram's own, roughly 750 private replies per hour per account, which applies to every tool on the official Meta API including inDM.
Which is cheaper, Zorcha or inDM?
For simple high-volume sending, Zorcha — their free tier is unlimited DMs at $0, capped at 3 automations. For AI-composed replies, it depends on credit consumption, which is the least predictable meter in this category. inDM is $9.99 for 10,000 messages with no credit system at all, so the bill is a flat function of what you sent.
Does inDM have AI credits?
No. inDM does not sell AI credits and nothing in the product is gated on a balance. That is deliberate — it means your bill is one number you can forecast from last month's sending rather than two.
Does Zorcha publish India pricing?
Yes — they run a separate India pricing page in INR (₹0 / ₹1,199 / ₹2,999 / ₹8,999), one of three tools in this set that publishes an India price alongside ReplyRush and SuperProfile. The implied rate is close to market, so it is currency display rather than a deep regional discount.
Can I switch from ManyChat or another tool?
Yes. Disconnect isn't even required first — connect your Instagram to inDM, rebuild your key automations (most creators have three or four that matter), preview, and set them live. Conversation history doesn't transfer between tools — no tool can import another's — so export your contacts from the old tool for your records. The switch guides walk through the order of operations.
Is Instagram DM automation allowed?
Yes — when it runs through Meta's official Instagram API on a professional account, and only messages people whose own action invited it, like commenting a keyword or replying to a story. That's exactly how inDM works. What breaks the rules is different: unofficial apps that ask for your password, scraping, purchased engagement, and cold outreach to people who never engaged.