Use an AI assistant for the desk work: inbox, calendar, follow-ups, content and reports. Hire a human virtual assistant only for work that needs a person present: errands, in-person tasks and sensitive relationships. Most founders who use Sabi keep no human assistant; a few keep a part-time human for exactly those jobs.
By Bruce van Zyl, co-founder of Sabi · Updated October 29, 2026
A human executive assistant at this level runs $7K to $12K a month in the US; a full-time US EA runs $84K to $144K a year plus benefits and management. A virtual assistant works 8 hours, takes vacation and eventually quits, costs that never show on the invoice.
Sabi Pro is $195 a month, month to month, with no contract, no exit fees and no per-seat surprises. You start free with a grant of credits and no credit card, and decide whether to hire her when they run out.
Sabi Pro costs $195 a month against the $7K to $12K a month a human executive assistant at this level runs in the US.
A VA covers one 8-hour shift and is gone on weekends and vacation. An AI assistant answers the moment you text and keeps working while you sleep.
For paying customers, Sabi's Night Shift indexes new emails by project overnight and drafts a Monday brief for your review; each morning a Morning Check-in arrives by text, and reminders and scheduled emails fire on their own.
In Sabi's experience most founders save 15 to 25 hours a week within the first month, and for some customers Sabi has absorbed the admin of 3 to 5 team members.
Far less, and the training does not walk out the door. A VA learns your tone over months of corrections; when they leave, the next one starts from zero.
Sabi learns from what you have already written. Ask her to "learn my brand voice" and she picks up your tone and your common scenarios, then drafts emails and posts in that voice.
Sabi remembers your business, your clients and your priorities between conversations, so the training a founder gives her is never lost to turnover.
On repeatable work, yes. A follow-up cadence runs the same way every day, and nothing is forgotten because someone was out sick.
Consistency also means control: you can review and adjust Sabi's access at any time without a support ticket.
Sabi logs every tool she runs, and an approval rule written in code stops her from emailing or texting anyone until you approve each one.
When the work needs a person in the room. A human assistant still wins on relationships and judgment face to face, on errands, and on the sensitive client relationship you would never hand to software.
Three honest limits on the AI side: Sabi serves one user today with team seats on the roadmap, approval rules do not yet cover Slack or Discord messages, and she writes words, not images.
Sabi fits best with a founder or owner who runs the business by text; a 50-person ops team is not the fit, and that is where a human still earns the seat.
Free starter credits, no credit card, and your first week of desk work handed off by text.
For most founders who use Sabi, yes: they do not keep a human assistant. A few keep a part-time human for in-person errands or sensitive relationships.
No. Sabi answers when you text, works overnight through Night Shift for paying customers, and sends a Morning Check-in briefing every day. Reminders and scheduled tasks run without you.
Sabi Pro is month to month with no contract and no exit fees. Disconnect any integration from inside Sabi. Delete your account and it is removed from production right away.
No. Email and calendar connect through OAuth, so Sabi never sees your password, and any API keys or app passwords are encrypted in a vault.
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