Notion pricing explained: which plan a small team actually needs
For a small team, the short answer on Notion team pricing is this: the Free plan stops being practical as soon as two or more people share a workspace and start adding content, so most teams end up choosing between Plus and Business. On Notion's own pricing page, checked on October 8, 2026, Plus costs $10 per member per month billed yearly ($12 billed monthly) and Business costs $20 per member per month billed yearly ($24 billed monthly). Enterprise is quoted by the sales team. Plus covers what most teams of three to fifteen people need for shared docs and project databases. Business is worth it only if the team will actually use Notion AI every day, needs SAML single sign-on, or needs private teamspaces. The rest of this article walks through what each plan unlocks, how seats are counted, where the bill quietly grows, and how to work out the yearly cost for a team that is about to grow.
What each Notion plan costs in October 2026
All prices below come from the official Notion pricing page, read on October 8, 2026, in US dollars. Prices are per member per month. Notion also offers yearly billing, which the page describes as saving up to 20 percent.
| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed yearly | Who it is aimed at |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | $0 | Individuals organizing personal projects |
| Plus | $12 | $10 | Small teams and professionals working together |
| Business | $24 | $20 | Growing businesses that want AI and tighter access control |
| Enterprise | Contact sales | Contact sales | Organizations that need audit logs, SCIM, and advanced controls |
A few things are easy to miss on that page:
- The prices are per member, not per workspace. A five-person team on Plus pays for five seats.
- Guests do not pay. Notion states that guests are free of charge, but they can only open the individual pages they are invited to. They cannot browse the team's teamspaces.
- In Japan the page lists prices in yen with consumption tax added where it applies, so a team billed in another currency should check the currency selector before comparing numbers.
Notion also offers the Plus plan free to students and educators with an eligible school email address, but that version is limited to one member, so it does not help a team.
Where the Free plan runs out for a team
The Free plan looks generous, and for one person it is. The limits that matter for a team are specific, and Notion lists them on the same page.
| Limit | Free | Plus | Business | Enterprise |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pages and blocks | Unlimited for one person, limited for 2+ members | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| File uploads | Up to 5 MB per file | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Page history | 7 days | 30 days | 90 days | Unlimited |
| External guests | 10 | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
The block limit is the one that bites. A block is any single piece of content: a paragraph, a to-do item, an image, an embedded file. When a Free workspace with several members reaches its block allowance, Notion says existing content can still be read, edited, and organized, but no new blocks can be added. For a team that writes meeting notes and updates tasks every day, that point arrives quickly, and it usually arrives in the middle of a project.
The 5 MB file limit is the second wall. Design files, slide decks, and screen recordings regularly exceed it. Paid plans lift the cap to unlimited uploads, with Notion noting a per-file maximum of about 5 GB.
Page history matters more than it seems. Seven days of history means a page that was accidentally overwritten last month cannot be rolled back. Plus extends that to 30 days, Business to 90.
In practice, a team of two or more that uses Notion as a shared workspace should plan on Plus from the start rather than treating Free as a long-term option.
Plus or Business: the decision that actually matters
Most of the real decision sits between these two plans. The price gap is $10 per member per month on yearly billing, which doubles the bill.
What Plus adds
Plus includes everything in Free, plus unlimited collaborative blocks, unlimited file uploads, custom forms without Notion branding, custom sites, unlimited charts, and basic connections to tools like Slack and Google Drive. Notion AI on Plus is listed as a limited trial, not as full access.
For a small team that uses Notion for docs, wikis, and a project database, Plus covers almost everything.
What Business adds
Business adds the features Notion groups under its AI workspace, along with controls that larger teams ask for:
- Notion Agent, described as completing multi-step tasks using context from Notion, connected apps, and the web
- AI Meeting Notes, which transcribes meetings and writes a summary without a bot joining the call
- Enterprise Search across connected apps such as Slack and GitHub (marked as beta)
- SAML single sign-on and domain verification
- Private teamspaces that cannot be seen by anyone who has not been added
- Granular database permissions, so a collaborator can see only the rows assigned to them
- Premium connections to tools like GitHub and Asana
- 90 days of page history instead of 30
A simple way to decide
Ask three questions:
- Will at least half the team use Notion AI or AI Meeting Notes every week? If not, the AI features alone do not justify doubling the seat price.
- Does the company require single sign-on for every tool? If yes, Business is the lowest plan that includes SAML SSO.
- Does the team keep sensitive pages, such as hiring or compensation plans, that some members must never see? Private teamspaces are on Business.
If all three answers are no, Plus is the right plan. If one is yes, price out Business for only the period it is needed and revisit it at renewal.
How seats are counted and where the bill grows
Notion's billing rules are written out in the FAQ on its pricing page, and they explain most surprise invoices.
- Every member is a paid seat. A member is anyone who joins the workspace as a member rather than as a guest. Adding a member mid-cycle triggers a prorated charge for the rest of the billing period.
- Removed seats are not refunded mid-cycle. When a member is removed, the seat stays open for someone else until the end of the period. Notion does not credit it back.
- Seats resync at renewal. At the start of each billing period, the seat count is reset to match the number of members currently in the workspace.
- The whole workspace is upgraded. There is no way to put only some members on Plus.
- Custom Agents cost extra. Notion lists Custom Agents as free to try, then $10 per 1,000 Notion credits.
- Custom domains for Notion Sites cost extra. $8 per month per domain on yearly billing, or $10 per month on monthly billing.
The refund policy is short. Notion says it will refund the full amount if a team downgrades within three days of signing up for monthly billing, or within 30 days of signing up for annual billing. If members were added by accident, the prorated charge can be refunded if the request comes within three days of the invoice date.
Downgrades take effect at the end of the billing cycle. Upgrades are charged immediately, reduced by the share of the cycle already used.
What a small team will actually pay in a year
The per-seat price is easy to read. The yearly total is what lands in the budget, so it is worth working out before choosing.
| Team size | Plus, yearly billing | Plus, monthly billing | Business, yearly billing | Business, monthly billing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 members | $600 | $720 | $1,200 | $1,440 |
| 10 members | $1,200 | $1,440 | $2,400 | $2,880 |
| 15 members | $1,800 | $2,160 | $3,600 | $4,320 |
These figures are list prices before tax. They do not include Custom Agents credits or Sites domains.
Two habits keep the number honest:
- Price the team one year from now, not today. A team of eight that expects to hire four people should budget for twelve seats, because each new member adds a prorated charge the day they join.
- Convert people who only read into guests where possible. Clients and contractors who only need a few pages can be invited as guests at no charge. On Plus and above there is no guest cap.
When Notion is the right fit, and when it is not
Notion is strong when the team's work is mostly writing. Specs, meeting notes, onboarding guides, and a wiki that grows over time all fit its page and database model well. Teams that enjoy designing their own database, views, and templates get a lot out of it, and the public Sites feature lets the same workspace publish pages to the web.
The friction shows up when Notion is asked to be the team's project management tool first and its document tool second. Task tracking in Notion is something the team builds: a database, properties for status and assignee, a board view, a timeline view, and the rules for keeping them current. That flexibility is the point of the product, but it also means someone has to design and maintain the setup. When that person leaves, the system often drifts.
Signs that the team needs a dedicated project management tool alongside or instead of Notion:
- The status column in the task database is updated in a weekly meeting rather than when the work changes.
- Discussions about tasks happen in a separate chat tool and never make it back to the task.
- The timeline view exists but nobody drags the bars when dates slip.
- Most of the team never writes documents and opens Notion only to check their tasks.
If two or more of these are true, paying for a Business seat for every member is hard to justify, because most of those members are not using the features that make Business different.
Comparing Notion with a project management tool
A kanban board tool built for project work approaches pricing differently. Instead of gating features by plan, some tools give every feature on the free plan and charge only when the team or the number of boards grows. One example is free for up to 5 people and 10 boards with every board type included, including kanban, Gantt, calendar, list, and resource boards, plus built-in chat channels. Its Standard plan is $5 per user per month, or $4 billed annually, excluding tax, and view-only guests are not counted. The details are on the pricing page.
The trade-off is that this kind of tool is not a document workspace. If the team's main need is a wiki, a set of specs, and meeting notes that link to each other, Notion remains the better fit. A side-by-side look at where each tool is stronger, including the cases where staying with Notion is the better choice, is on the Notion comparison page. The full list of board types and what a card can hold is on the features page.
For many small teams the practical answer is a split: Notion Plus for documents, and a lighter tool for day-to-day task tracking, so that only the people who write documents need a paid Notion seat.
What to change first
Count how many members actually write in Notion each week, then price Plus for that number on yearly billing and invite everyone else as guests. If the team's daily friction is task tracking rather than documents, try a dedicated board tool such as Pinateca on one project for two weeks before upgrading to Business.
Q1. How much does Notion cost for a team of 5?
On the official pricing page checked on October 8, 2026, Plus costs $10 per member per month on yearly billing, so a team of five pays $600 a year before tax. On monthly billing the price is $12 per member, which comes to $720 a year. Business doubles those figures to $1,200 and $1,440.
Q2. Can a small team use the Notion Free plan long term?
Not comfortably. Notion states that a Free workspace with two or more members can add only a limited number of blocks before upgrading. Files are capped at 5 MB each, page history is 7 days, and the workspace can have 10 external guests. Most teams that work in Notion daily reach one of these limits within a few months.
Q3. Do guests count as paid seats in Notion?
No. Notion's pricing FAQ says guests are free of charge. The catch is that guests can only open the specific pages they are invited to and cannot browse teamspaces. Anyone who needs to see the whole team workspace has to be a member, and every member is billed as a paid seat.
Q4. Is Notion AI included in the Plus plan?
Plus includes a limited trial of Notion AI, not full access. Notion Agent and AI Meeting Notes are listed as Business plan features. Custom Agents are free to try and then charged at $10 per 1,000 Notion credits. Teams that want AI for every member should compare the cost of Business against how many people will actually use it.
Q5. Can a team get a refund after upgrading Notion?
Notion says it gives a full refund if the team downgrades within three days of starting monthly billing, or within 30 days of starting annual billing. Charges for members added by mistake can be refunded if the team asks within three days of the invoice date and has already removed those members.