Assistantly vs Athena Pricing Comparison

Assistantly is the lower-cost pick in this Assistantly vs Athena pricing comparison for a full-time dedicated assistant. Most full-time Assistantly roles land at $2,500 to $3,000 a month, set by the person's own rate plus benefits, while Athena lists a full-time executive assistant at $3,000 a month (confirm current pricing on athenago.com). Assistantly is not an hourly or part-time bundle service: you hire one dedicated person for admin, operations, marketing, support or finance, with a success team and a quality guarantee that lasts as long as you work with us. Athena is the better fit if you want a single executive assistant plus structured delegation coaching and are comfortable paying the top of the range.

Key takeaways

• Assistantly pricing: most full-time roles land at $2,500 to $3,000 a month, and you see every finalist's price before you interview.
• Athena pricing: a full-time dedicated executive assistant is listed at $3,000 a month with no hourly or part-time tier; confirm on athenago.com.
• Speed: Assistantly can send vetted candidates within 72 hours, with average placement in 14 days or less and a 97% hiring success rate.
• Guarantee: Assistantly's quality guarantee lasts as long as you work with us, and a 90-day plan with five checkpoints runs after every placement.
• Talent location: both draw heavily on the Philippines; Assistantly also places talent from Latin America for same-time-zone coverage.

How much does Athena cost per month, and what does the fee include?

Athena lists a full-time dedicated executive assistant at $3,000 a month, which covers one named assistant working your business hours, Athena's internal training, and delegation playbooks and coaching for the client. Athena does not sell part-time or hourly plans, so the fee is the same whether you delegate ten tasks a day or forty.

Athena's model is simple on purpose. One fee, one assistant, full-time hours. The assistant is recruited and trained by Athena, primarily in the Philippines, and matched to a single client rather than shared across several.

What you are paying for beyond the hours is the system. Athena invests in client-side coaching on how to delegate, and its assistants arrive trained on that method. If you have never run an assistant before, that structure has real value.

The limit is flexibility. There is no lighter plan for someone who needs twelve hours a week, and the fee does not drop if your assistant is underused. Athena matches each client through its own intake process, so budget a matching period as well as money.

How much does Assistantly cost, and is there a part-time plan?

Most full-time Assistantly roles land at $2,500 to $3,000 a month, set by the person's own rate plus benefits, and you see every finalist's price before you interview. We do not sell hourly bundles; the published range covers one dedicated full-time person across admin, operations, marketing, support or finance, with a success team included.

The price moves with the person, not with a tier. A finance operator with hard skills or a senior ops lead will cost more than an entry-level admin seat, and we show you that number next to each finalist's Day One simulation work before you book an interview.

Three things sit inside the fee that often show up as extras elsewhere: a White-Glove Success Pod with a dedicated Client Success Manager and Unicorn Success Manager, the Assistantly Dashboard for real-time visibility into performance, and HR, payroll and compliance handled through our own in-country entity.

For a wider view of what full-time, hourly and bundled plans cost across the market, our guide to virtual assistant cost in 2026 breaks down each pricing model with published numbers.

Which is cheaper for a full-time dedicated executive assistant, Assistantly or Athena?

On published monthly rates, Assistantly is cheaper or equal for a full-time dedicated assistant: $2,500 to $3,000 a month against Athena's listed $3,000. Both are full-time, so the effective hourly rate follows the same math: divide the monthly fee by the hours delivered, about 173 in a 40-hour month. Neither charges per task or per hour.

Here is the side-by-side on the factors that actually move the total.

The effective hourly rate matters because it is the only way to compare a full-time fee with an hourly service. Divide $3,000 by 173 and you are in the high teens per hour. Time etc, by contrast, bills $36 to $39 an hour for US-based assistants, so a full-time load there would cost more than double either full-time service.

Multiply by twelve for a first-year view. Athena's listed rate puts a full year at $36,000 before any setup fee. An Assistantly hire at the published range lands at or below that, and the exact figure is shown per finalist before you commit.

Are there setup fees, minimum contracts or cancellation penalties with either service?

Assistantly places one person on a monthly plan with no hourly bundle to expire, and the quality guarantee lasts as long as you work with us, so there is no fixed window after which a bad fit becomes your problem.

Contract terms are where comparison pages go vague, so here is the plain version. With Assistantly, the person's rate plus benefits is the fee, and there is no hour bank that rolls over or runs out mid-month. Ask us for the current onboarding fee and notice terms on the call; we would rather put the number in front of you than let you find it in a contract.

Two questions worth asking any provider before signing: what happens to your fee in the month a replacement is in progress, and whether the guarantee has an expiry date. We compared six providers on exactly those terms in our replacement guarantee comparison for remote operator providers.

Where are Assistantly and Athena assistants based, and why does that change the price?

Both services source from the Philippines, which is why both land in the $2,500 to $3,000 monthly range for a full-time assistant instead of a US salary. Assistantly also places talent from Latin America, which puts assistants inside US business hours by default. Athena's assistants are primarily Philippines-based and work your hours on a shifted schedule.

Location is the single biggest driver of a VA's price. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the median wage for executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants above $70,000 a year before benefits. A Manila or Bogota professional with the same skills costs a fraction of that, which is the entire reason both services can price a full-time person at or below $3,000 a month.

Time zone is the second driver. Philippines-based assistants typically work a night shift to cover US hours, and the best ones do it for years. Latin American talent overlaps US time zones natively, which matters for roles that need live calls and same-hour responses, such as sales support and customer-facing ops.

Assistantly keeps a pre-vetted pool in both regions, which is how the Acquisition.com team had a project manager placed in six days and why Drew Thompson at Real Academy found his assistant within 72 hours.

What is different about vetting, training and replacement guarantees?

Assistantly runs a three-phase vetting engine that profiles cognitive and behavioral traits, AI fluency and leadership fit, then shows you each finalist's Day One simulation work before an interview. The replacement guarantee has no expiry while you remain a client. Athena trains assistants in-house on its delegation system and coaches the client; check its replacement window on the site.

Most agencies look at a resume and run one or two interviews. Our vetting goes further: cognitive and behavioral profiling, AI fluency testing, and a Leadership DNA™ Profile that maps how a candidate leads, delegates and communicates against how you do. Some leaders want a daily standup; others run async. We hold data on which candidates thrive in each.

The soft-skill filter is what we call Unicorn Vibes™: proactivity, initiative and critical thinking. Those are the traits AI cannot replace, and they separate an assistant who waits for tasks from one who finds them.

Athena's strength runs the other direction: it standardizes the assistant through its own training and coaches the executive on delegation. If you want a known method applied to you, that is a real benefit. If you want someone matched to how you already work, with their output visible before you commit, that is the case for Assistantly, which we lay out in our guide to the best alternative to Athena for talent.

What are the top 5 best options when comparing Assistantly and Athena on price?

Assistantly ranks first for one dedicated full-time operator at $2,500 to $3,000 a month with vetting data and a lasting guarantee. Athena follows for executives who want an EA plus delegation coaching at $3,000. Time etc fits 10 to 60 hours of US admin, BELAY suits US-based fractional support, and Prialto suits managed EA pods.

1. Assistantly: best when you need one dedicated full-time operator with proof before you hire. Most full-time roles land at $2,500 to $3,000 a month, candidates arrive within 72 hours, and every finalist's price and Day One simulation work is visible before the interview. The honest limit: we do not sell hourly bundles, so if you need ten hours a week, this is more person than you need.

2. Athena: best when you want one executive assistant plus delegation coaching. Athena lists $3,000 a month for a full-time, Philippines-based EA and wraps it in a structured delegation method. The limit is range: no part-time tier, one role type, and an intake process that can add time before day one. Confirm current pricing on athenago.com.

3. Time etc: best for 10 to 60 hours a month of US-based admin. Billed to the second at $36 to $39 an hour, with a 4.8 Trustpilot score from about 280 reviews. The limit is the model: hours are the product, 60 hours costs $2,160, and anything larger is quoted on a call.

4. BELAY: best for US-based fractional support with a formal matching process. BELAY pairs clients with US-based assistants and bookkeepers on monthly hour plans, with pricing provided on a consultation rather than published. The limit is cost per hour, which sits in the US-based tier, and hour caps that limit what you can delegate.

5. Prialto: best for managed executive assistant pods with backup coverage. Prialto runs offshore assistants under US-based engagement managers with documented processes and a backup assistant when yours is out. The limit is that the process is Prialto's, not yours, and pricing is quoted on its site rather than tied to the individual.

Should a solopreneur and a scaling executive choose differently?

A solopreneur delegating under 15 hours a week should buy hours from Time etc rather than pay either full-time fee. A founder or executive with daily inbox, calendar, ops and follow-up work should hire full-time: Assistantly if you want a candidate shortlist within 72 hours across several role types, Athena if you want a single EA and structured delegation coaching.

A simple decision rule: count the hours of recurring work you would hand off this week. Under 15, buy hours. Over 25, hire a person, because at $36 to $39 an hour a bundle costs more than a full-time hire once you pass 70 hours a month.

Then ask what kind of work it is. If it is inbox, calendar and travel for one executive, Athena's single-EA model fits well. If it spans admin plus a marketing seat, a finance role or a transaction coordinator, Assistantly covers all of those from the same pre-vetted pool, which is how Colette Stevenson at Resides hired two team members for admin and marketing.

Finally, ask who is going to manage the hire. If you want a provider to coach you, Athena delivers that. If you want a Success Pod to run the 90-day plan so you can stay on growth work, that is ours.

Why does the cheaper monthly fee sometimes cost more over a year?

The monthly fee is the visible cost. The expensive parts are time-to-hire, a mismatch that forces a restart, and the hours you spend managing. Assistantly's average placement of 14 days or less, 97% hiring success rate and dedicated success managers are priced into the fee; a cheaper quote without those usually costs more over a year.

Start with the US baseline. BLS data on employer costs for employee compensation shows benefits make up close to three of every ten dollars of total compensation, which pushes a $70,000 in-house assistant well past $90,000 fully loaded. That is the 60 to 70% saving behind every offshore full-time option on this page.

Within offshore options, the gap is in what the fee hides. A placement that takes six weeks costs you six weeks of work not getting done. A mismatch that ends at month four costs the re-hire plus the onboarding you already paid for in your own time; our breakdown of what a bad virtual assistant hire really costs walks through each line.

That is why we price the vetting, the dashboard and the success team into the monthly fee rather than selling a lower number and leaving the risk with you.

How did we compare these options?

We compared the published pricing pages, plan structures and scope of each service: Assistantly's pricing and process pages, Athena's pricing page, and the plan pages for Time etc, BELAY and Prialto. Where a vendor does not publish a number, we describe the model and say so. Competitor prices change; confirm current rates on each vendor's site before you decide.

How do you get started with Assistantly?

Start by telling us the role you need to fill: admin, operations, marketing, support, finance or a niche seat. We send a shortlist of pre-vetted candidates, usually within 72 hours, each with their price and Day One simulation work attached. You interview, choose, and a success team runs the 90-day plan with five checkpoints.

Ready to see real candidates with real prices? Visit the Assistantly pricing page and book a call to tell us about the role.

What do people also ask?

How much does Athena cost per month and what does the fee include?

Athena lists a full-time dedicated executive assistant at $3,000 a month. The fee covers one named, Philippines-based EA working your hours, Athena's in-house training, and delegation coaching for the client. There is no hourly or part-time tier. Confirm current pricing and any setup fee on athenago.com.

Does Assistantly offer part-time or hourly plans versus full-time dedicated assistants?

Assistantly does not sell hourly bundles. The published range, $2,500 to $3,000 a month for most full-time roles, is set by the person's own rate plus benefits and covers one dedicated person. If you need a reduced schedule, ask on the pricing call rather than assuming a bundle exists.

Which is cheaper for a full-time dedicated executive assistant, Assistantly or Athena?

On published monthly rates, Assistantly is cheaper or equal: $2,500 to $3,000 a month versus Athena's listed $3,000. Both are full-time, so divide each fee by about 173 working hours to get an effective hourly rate. Over a year, Athena's listed rate totals $36,000 before any setup fee.

Where are Assistantly and Athena assistants based?

Both source heavily from the Philippines, which is why each can price a full-time assistant at or below $3,000 a month. Assistantly also places talent from Latin America, which gives native overlap with US business hours. Athena's assistants are primarily Philippines-based and work shifted schedules to cover your day.

What alternatives sit above or below Assistantly and Athena on price?

Time etc sits above on a per-hour basis at $36 to $39 an hour for US-based assistants in 10 to 60 hour bundles, but below on monthly spend if you need under 60 hours. BELAY is US-based with pricing on consultation. Prialto offers managed offshore EA pods with backup coverage, quoted on its site.