Somewhere between $7,500 and $350,000 a year, which is not a useful answer until you know which of five things you are buying. Here is every published price we could verify, the costs that do not appear on the price list, and a way to budget that a managing partner can defend.
All figures are annual or year-one, in US dollars unless noted, from the source named in the last column. Where a vendor publishes no price, we say so rather than guess. Read What is an AI audit? first if the categories are unfamiliar.
| Option | What you get | Published or estimated cost | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| ISO/IEC 42001 certification | Accredited certificate for an AI management system; 3-year cycle with annual surveillance; 6–12 months | ~$73,000 year one, 30-person firm (gap $8K + consultant $25K + internal time $22K + audit $18K); ~$185,000 at 120 people; $353,000+ at 500+. Certification-body fees alone $20,000–$40,000 initial, $13,000–$20,000/yr surveillance | certbetter, Jun 2026 |
| SOC 2 | CPA attestation report on service-organization controls; not AI-specific | Type 1 audit $5,000–$25,000; Type 2 $7,000–$50,000+; $30,000–$150,000 all-in | Bright Defense, May 2026 |
| Enterprise AI governance platforms (Credo AI, Holistic AI, Trustible, FairNow) | Software: inventory, policy packs, risk workflows, evidence; no independent human review of your governance | No published pricing; "roughly $50,000/yr for a focused mid-market deployment to several hundred thousand" for enterprise | SecurePrivacy, Jun 2026; aicompliancevendors, Apr 2026 |
| Responsible AI Institute | Membership with badge pathways (RAISE Pathways); SMB tiers "in development" | Affiliate $10,000/yr; Advocate $25,000; Strategic $50,000 (recommended badge pathway); Custom $100,000+ | responsible.ai membership page, 2025–26 |
| BABL AI and similar algorithmic auditors | Technical and bias audits of specific systems; auditor training | Audit engagement pricing not published; auditor certificate program $2,999 | babl.ai, 2026 |
| Big 4 / mid-tier "AI assurance" or readiness engagement | Model validation, control testing, ISO 42001 readiness; attestation-style reports by licensed CPAs | No published pricing; engagements typically quoted in the $46,000–$138,000+ range (AboveBoard estimate compiled from engagement ranges, Sept 2026) | CPA Practice Advisor, Sept 2025; Deloitte UK; AboveBoard estimate |
| Compliance automation (Vanta, Drata, Secureframe) with ISO 42001 framework | Evidence-collection software; you still pay a separate auditor or certification body | Vanta median $20,000/yr, range $7,500–$57,221; 1–50 employees, single framework $12,000–$28,000; plus audit fees | Vendr, Feb 2026 |
| TrustArc (Responsible AI Certification and privacy products) | Certification with seal, aimed at data and ad-tech companies | No published certification price; median TrustArc contract ~$15,120/yr across products | consentstack, 2026 |
| AboveBoardAI | Governance audit for firms that use AI: 40-control assessment, evidence review by an independent reviewer, 0–100 score, year-stamped badge, public registry listing, board report, Academy training, annual renewal | $7,500 (1–49 people) · $18,000 (50–249) · $42,000 (250–999) · from $75,000 (1,000+); all-inclusive, no separate auditor | aboveboardai.com/pricing |
Prices change; we re-check sources quarterly. The Big 4 range is an estimate compiled from engagement ranges rather than a published rate card, and is labeled as such.
You get an accredited certificate that procurement teams worldwide recognize, and an AI management system with the documentation to match. You also get six to twelve months of work, a consultant in most cases, and annual surveillance audits. The $73,000 year-one figure for a 30-person company is dominated by consultant fees and internal time, not the audit itself (certbetter, Jun 2026). Approximately 350 organizations worldwide held the certificate by spring 2026 (Atoro, Jul 2026). It is the right answer for companies that build AI products and sell them to enterprises, which is why almost no professional-services firm has one.
A SOC 2 Type 2 report is what enterprise customers demand of a software vendor. It attests to security, availability, confidentiality and related controls over a period. AI shows up inside those criteria if your auditor asks, but SOC 2 does not test whether your firm has an AI policy, reviews AI output or trains its staff. If you are not a service organization whose customers demand SOC 2, spending $30,000 to $150,000 on one to answer AI questions is the wrong tool.
Credo AI, Holistic AI, Trustible and FairNow are built for governance teams inside large organizations with many AI systems to inventory and many policies to enforce. They are quote-only, described in the market as roughly $50,000 a year for a focused mid-market deployment (SecurePrivacy, Jun 2026), and one review calls them "heavy for smaller organizations" (aicompliancevendors, Apr 2026). What they do not include is an independent human verifying that your governance is real. A platform records what you tell it.
The Responsible AI Institute's badge pathway sits inside a $50,000-a-year Strategic membership; SMB tiers were "in development" as of its April 2025 announcement. It is a credible organization doing serious work on control frameworks. It is priced for enterprises.
Vanta, Drata and Secureframe now sell ISO 42001 frameworks alongside SOC 2. The software collects evidence continuously and the platform's partner auditors perform the audit, but the auditor is a separate engagement with a separate fee. Vanta's median contract is $20,000 a year (Vendr, Feb 2026); add the certification body's $20,000 to $40,000 for ISO 42001 or the SOC 2 audit fee. These platforms are excellent if you already run SOC 2 and want to add AI. They are not built for a 40-person law firm with no security team.
$7,500 a year for a firm of 1 to 49 people includes the full 40-control assessment, an evidence vault, remediation templates, review by an independent reviewer with sign-off by a certification officer who has no role in sales, your verified score and year-stamped badge, a public registry listing, a board-ready report and Academy Foundations training for every staff member. There is no separate auditor, no consultant and no surveillance fee; renewal is the same price. It is a private, voluntary standard mapped to NIST AI RMF and cross-walked to ISO 42001; it is not an ISO certification and does not pretend to be. Full tiers are on the pricing page.
Start with who is asking. If a client contract or an enterprise customer specifically requires ISO 42001 or SOC 2, that decides it, and you budget $30,000 to $150,000 plus internal time. If the questions come from a state regulator, a malpractice or E&O carrier, a client questionnaire or your own board, and your firm uses AI rather than builds it, a governance audit answers them. Budget the annual fee plus roughly the same again in staff time for year one, and less thereafter. For a 40-person firm that is $7,500 plus a few partner days, against $73,000 and six months for the ISO route.
Then decide what you want to be able to say. "We have a policy" is free and worth about what it costs. "We hold a verified AboveBoard Score of 81, reviewed in 2026, listed in the public registry" costs $7,500 and answers the next twenty questions before they are asked.
Between about $7,500 and $350,000 a year depending on what kind. A governance audit for a firm that uses AI, such as AboveBoardAI, is $7,500 to $75,000 a year by headcount with everything included. ISO/IEC 42001 certification runs about $73,000 all-in in year one for a 30-person company and $185,000 for 120 people (certbetter, Jun 2026). SOC 2 Type 2 programs run $30,000 to $150,000 all-in (Bright Defense, May 2026). Enterprise AI governance platforms start around $50,000 a year and are quote-only (SecurePrivacy, Jun 2026).
About $73,000 all-in in year one for a 30-employee AI-using company, made up of roughly $8,000 for a gap assessment, $25,000 for consultants, $22,000 of internal staff time and $18,000 for the certification audit; about $185,000 for a 120-person company and $353,000 or more above 500 people. Certification-body fees alone run $20,000 to $40,000 initially plus $13,000 to $20,000 a year in surveillance, and the process takes six to twelve months (certbetter, Jun 2026). See NIST AI RMF vs ISO 42001.
For a firm that is being asked about AI by clients, carriers, regulators or a board, yes, provided the certification verifies practices against a published standard and costs less than answering those questions ad hoc. The value is a single dated evidence file that replaces every questionnaire, renewal form and board question. Whether the right vehicle is ISO 42001, SOC 2 or a governance score depends on who is asking and what they will accept.
Staff time to gather evidence, remediation of the gaps the audit finds, annual surveillance or renewal, tooling to keep evidence current, and consultants where the standard is too technical for the firm to self-implement. In the ISO 42001 example, internal time and consultants are two-thirds of the year-one figure. Ask any provider what is included and what happens after year one.
Headcount and number of entities, the scope of the standard, whether a human reviewer or only software is involved, how ready your evidence is, whether remediation support and training are bundled, and whether the audit must be performed by an accredited certification body or a licensed CPA firm. Governance audits for firms that use AI sit at the low end because they verify documented practices rather than test models.