Find your cheapest viable AI setup
Estimate your real monthly AI spend and immediately see lower-cost alternatives.
Recommendations are based on use case, usage level, and cost sensitivity.
Use this if…
- • You're paying for GPT-4o, Claude, or a subscription and want a cheaper equivalent.
- • You need a fast estimate before choosing between API and subscription plans.
- • You want one clear next step after seeing your projected monthly spend.
Start with a common usage scenario
Pick a preset to prefill the calculator.
500K tokens · ~375,000 words
200K tokens · ~150,000 words
GPT-4o: $3.25/month at 500K in / 200K out
Recommended: Cohere: North Mini Code (free) (Cohere) — < $0.01/month at your usage. Best fit: API.
- Cohere: North Mini Code (free) — Cohere — api — < $0.01/month
- Claude Pro — Anthropic — subscription — $20.00/month
- GPT-4o (your selection) — OpenAI — api — $3.25/month
- Google: Gemma 4 26B A4B (free) — Google — api — < $0.01/month
At 500K input + 200K output tokens/month, paying per-token on Cohere: North Mini Code (free) (< $0.01/mo) is cheaper than the cheapest flat subscription, Claude Pro ($20.00/mo).
Best fit: API
Estimated Monthly Cost
$3.25
Input: $1.25 · Output: $2.00
GPT-4o
OpenAI
Best fit: API
Recommended: Cohere: North Mini Code (free) (Cohere) — < $0.01/month at your usage. Best fit: API.
At 500K input + 200K output tokens/month, paying per-token on Cohere: North Mini Code (free) (< $0.01/mo) is cheaper than the cheapest flat subscription, Claude Pro ($20.00/mo).
- Cohere: North Mini Code (free) — Cohere (api) — < $0.01/month
- Claude Pro — Anthropic (subscription) — $20.00/month
- GPT-4o (your selection) — OpenAI (api) — $3.25/month
- Google: Gemma 4 26B A4B (free) — Google (api) — < $0.01/month
You are overpaying by $3.25/month.
Switch to Cohere: North Mini Code (free) — save $3.25/month
100% lower than GPT-4o at this usage (< $0.01 vs $3.25 per month).
Consider routing to Cohere: North Mini Code (free) to save 100% — significant quality reduction — best for simple tasks.
How are costs calculated?
API costs are calculated as: (input tokens / 1000 × input cost per 1K) + (output tokens / 1000 × output cost per 1K). Subscription costs are flat monthly fees regardless of usage.
1 token ≈ 0.75 words ≈ 4 characters of English text. Learn more about tokens →
Often 10× cheaper than GPT-4o for the same output
Most content and coding tasks cost under $1/month with DeepSeek V3 via API.
Try DeepSeek V3 →