Mintlify (Developer documentation)
Created by: Han Wang and Hahnbee Lee

Mintlify prices on editor seats and reserves the most valuable feature (AI search) for higher tiers. The free-OSS tier feeds the customer-roster flywheel.

TL;DR: Mintlify's pricing is per-editor with a free tier for open-source projects and graduated paid tiers for teams. The most valuable forward-looking feature (AI-powered search and Q&A) is reserved for higher tiers, creating an upgrade trigger as customer expectations evolve. The lesson for indie founders: gate the future-state feature, not the table-stakes one — buyers upgrade for capability they do not yet have, not for what they take for granted.

What they sell: A documentation-as-code platform that turns Markdown plus components into a polished docs site with search, analytics, and AI-assisted answers.
Who it's for: Developer-tool SaaS, API companies, and platforms that want documentation that looks intentional rather than templated.
Pricing model: Per-editor seat tiered subscription with free OSS tier
Payment frequency: Monthly or annual with annual discount
Free trial behavior: Free OSS tier IS the trial for open-source projects. Paid tiers can be trialed via direct conversation; standard self-serve evaluation is mostly via the OSS tier or a sandbox.
Number of tiers: 4

Anchor pattern: Growth tier as anchor
The Growth tier at approximately $550/mo anchors the page for serious dev-tool companies, making Pro at approximately $150/mo read as the reasonable starting tier. The free OSS tier is the entry; Enterprise sits ready for procurement. Anchoring is conventional; the unusual move is the AI-feature gating that makes upgrading a forward-looking decision rather than a feature-gap fix.

Upgrade trigger: AI feature gating and brand removal
Two upgrade triggers work together: brand removal (the OSS free tier carries Mintlify branding; Pro removes it) for buyers ready to publish to a marketing-grade audience, and AI feature gating (search, chat, advanced AI) for buyers whose users expect LLM-powered docs. The AI trigger is forward-looking — buyers upgrade for capability that becomes table-stakes over the next year, not for a feature they already need.

What's working:
Free OSS tier seeds visible-customer presence across the dev-tool category — every Mintlify-built docs site advertises the platform.|Brand removal as Pro trigger aligns with the moment a buyer is ready to publish without third-party branding.|AI feature gating creates a forward-looking upgrade trigger — buyers upgrade for capability that becomes expected, not for missing basics.|Per-editor pricing on Pro and Growth captures revenue from teams as they scale.|Visible customer roster on the marketing surface (Anthropic, Cursor, Resend) borrows authority from category-recognizable companies.

What to adapt:
Gate the forward-looking feature, not the table-stakes one. Buyers upgrade for what they do not yet have but will soon need.|Use a free tier with branding to seed visible-customer presence; remove branding at the trigger where the buyer's willingness to pay structurally spikes.|Per-editor pricing works when each editor produces value the team consumes; combine with visible customer roster for compounding authority.

What to avoid:
Do not gate features your buyer already considers table-stakes; the gating reads as nickel-and-diming and lowers trust.|Do not free OSS without the bandwidth to support OSS users; bad OSS support poisons the customer-roster flywheel.|Do not adopt per-editor pricing if seats do not get clear individual value.

Brunson lens:
Stack: Tiered stack with progressive AI features per rung; Growth tier is the visual anchor.
Value ladder: Four-rung ladder (Free OSS → Pro → Growth → Enterprise) with AI as forward-state continuity feature.
Decoy/anchor: Growth as anchor; Pro as the visible starting tier; Free OSS as visible-customer flywheel seed.
Payment mechanics: Per-editor monthly or annual with annual discount; no usage metering on docs traffic.

Pricing last verified: 2026-05-17