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manus alternatives when you want a different ai bill

manus suits someone who wants a cloud agent with its own models and a credit allowance. dusk bot suits someone who wants a few ongoing bots that think with the ai they already sign in to, with ai usage billed by that provider. neither arrangement guarantees a cheaper completed task. as of 12 november 2026, manus is independent again after the meta deal was unwound; describing it as still meta-owned is out of date.12310

by the dusk bot team · checked · how we made this

pixel art: a indigo pixel bot, a yellow pixel bot and a coral pixel bot beside a tile saying Manus, a coin purse and a long receipt, on a lemon field in front of green terraced fields, one saying "follow the ai bill"

the short version

pick manus if

  • you want cloud tasks that produce research, websites, slides or media in one product
  • you prefer manus models and credits, or want to evaluate its pro bring-your-own-keys option

pick dusk bot if

  • you want persistent bots with different jobs, chats, memory and ai choices
  • you want to start personally on your own computer and pay your ai provider directly for usage

a task allowance or a team you keep

prices and ownership here are as of 12 november 2026. a manus credit is not a dusk unit, so the allowances do not establish a cost per finished job.

ManusDusk Bot
main shapegeneral-purpose cloud agent producing research, websites, slides, images and videodesktop app with named bots, each with a job and its own memory43
model choicemanus 2.0 lite on free; pro adds manus 2.0, 2.0 max and manus flex for your own keyspick an ai for each bot; sign in, add an api key or choose a local model135
entry pricefree: 300 credits per day and 2 automationsfree personal use on your computer; ai charges remain with your provider12
paid starting pointpro: $20 monthly, 4,000 monthly credits and 20 automationsdusk cloud plus: $20 monthly for the hosted computer, with ai usage separate162
larger monthly optionmax: $200 monthly, 40,000 credits, then pay as you godusk cloud pro: $50 monthly; includes a work license for one person16
recurring workautomations included by tier; scheduled summaries can arrive in telegramroutines made by asking; local runs need the app awake, cloud runs on time178
getting into chatweb with no install, desktop and phone apps, slack, and telegramdesktop app; pair a phone browser with your computer or cloud739

read the credit allowance before comparing totals

manus free gives 300 credits each day; pro lists 4,000 per month. those periods are different, and neither number tells you how many of your particular jobs will finish. pro also lists 20 simultaneous tasks, compared with 3 on free.1 that can matter if you want several separate deliverables underway.

dusk bot does not put ai usage on the dusk bill. your provider bills it on your plan with them.2 a free desktop app therefore does not mean free inference. compare the work you intend to repeat, the provider allowance you already have, and whether you need hosting. the agent cost guide follows those separate costs.

the ownership story needs the second half

manus announced a meta acquisition on 29 december 2025.4 a global times report says china's ndrc ordered the deal unwound in april 2026, and manus resumed independent operations on 1 september with its founding team leading.10

that is why an old comparison calling manus a meta product can mislead you. the same report describes data backup and possible data loss during the separation. check current notices before relying on an old account's history. ownership alone does not tell us which agent will handle your task better.

choose between a deliverable and an ongoing relationship

manus explicitly describes producing websites, slides and media, alongside research.4 if that package is what you need, keep it on the shortlist. dusk bot isn't built to match those specialised outputs.

dusk's other shape is a bot you keep: one job, several chat threads, shared memory across those threads, and the ability to change its ai without losing chats or files.5 ai teammates explains that approach; manus versus dusk bot keeps the direct comparison together. begin with one narrow recurring job and inspect its early runs before trusting it with more.

how we checked

we read manus's own pricing and product pages and compared them with dusk bot's docs on 12 november 2026. we make dusk bot and have not run identical research or creation tasks through both. no conversion from credits to finished tasks is available here. the current ownership account is a press report; the old acquisition announcement is retained only to explain the timeline.

questions

manus ai: how many free credits do i get?

as of 12 november 2026, its free plan lists 300 credits per day, manus 2.0 lite, 3 tasks at once and 2 automations. a credit count is not a promise of a fixed number of completed tasks.1

what are people switching to instead of manus?

if your reason is wanting different ai billing, dusk bot is one option: it works with the ai apps you already use. if your reason is finished slides or websites inside one cloud product, manus may still fit better. this is a fit comparison, not a survey of people leaving.234

is manus still owned by meta?

the current recorded report says it resumed independent operations on 1 september 2026 after the acquisition was ordered unwound. the december 2025 acquisition announcement is real but does not describe the position as of 12 november 2026.410

sources

  1. manus pricing, checked 12 november 2026
  2. dusk billing
  3. dusk getting started
  4. manus original meta announcement and product scope, checked 12 november 2026
  5. dusk bots
  6. dusk cloud plans
  7. manus telegram agents, checked 12 november 2026
  8. dusk routines
  9. dusk phone pairing
  10. global times: manus resumes independent operations, checked 12 november 2026

drafted with ai help from the dusk bot docs and the sources listed on this page, then checked against them. if something here is wrong or out of date, write to [email protected].