AI API Pricing Comparison 2026: Every Major Provider, All Numbers
Pricing for AI APIs is a mess. Every provider uses different tiers, different billing models, and different names for similar capabilities. This article puts every major model's pricing side by side so you can stop guessing and start optimizing.
Full Price Table (USD per 1M Tokens)
Sorted by total cost for a typical 1:1 input/output ratio. All prices are current as of July 2026 from AIWave's live pricing data.
Ultra-Cheap ($0.005–$0.04/1M)
| Model | Input | Output | Context | Vendor |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| GLM 4.7 Flash | $0.03 | $0.03 | 128K | Zhipu AI |
| ERNIE 3.5/4.0 Turbo/Speed/Lite/Char (8 models) | $0.03 | $0.03 | 8K | Baidu |
| ERNIE 4.0 8K | $0.005 | $0.005 | 8K | Baidu |
| ERNIE 4.0 Turbo 128K | $0.018 | $0.018 | 128K | Baidu |
| DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 14B/32B | $0.015 | $0.031 | 128K | DeepSeek |
| GLM 4.5 Air | $0.031 | $0.031 | 8K | Zhipu AI |
Budget Tier ($0.01-0.05/1M)
| Model | Input | Output | Context | Vendor |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Qwen3 8B | $0.05 | $0.40 | 128K | Alibaba |
| GLM 4.7 FlashX | $0.06 | $0.06 | 128K | Zhipu AI |
| ERNIE Speed Pro 128K | $0.063 | $0.126 | 128K | Baidu |
| Qwen3 Coder 480B | $0.12 | $0.36 | 128K | Alibaba |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | $0.14 | $0.28 | 1M | DeepSeek |
| DeepSeek V3 / V3.2 | $0.15 | $0.308 | 64K | DeepSeek |
| GLM 4.5 | $0.15 | $0.15 | 128K | Zhipu AI |
| DeepSeek Chat | $0.164 | $0.329 | 128K | DeepSeek |
| Qwen3 32B | $0.20 | $0.60 | 128K | Alibaba |
Mid-Range ($0.05-0.15/1M)
| Model | Input | Output | Context | Vendor |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DeepSeek V4 Pro | $0.42 | $0.84 | 1M | DeepSeek |
| GLM 4.6 | $0.452 | $0.452 | 128K | Zhipu AI |
| MiniMax M2.5 | $0.50 | $2.00 | 1M | MiniMax |
| GLM 4.7 | $0.60 | $2.19 | 128K | Zhipu AI |
| DeepSeek R1 | $0.605 | $2.42 | 64K | DeepSeek |
Higher-End ($0.15-0.90/1M)
| Model | Input | Output | Context | Vendor |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| GLM 5 | $1.00 | $3.19 | 128K | Zhipu AI |
| GLM 5 Turbo | $1.20 | $4.00 | 128K | Zhipu AI |
| GLM 5.1 | $1.40 | $4.40 | 128K | Zhipu AI |
| Kimi K2.7 Code | $1.09 | $4.60 | 128K | Moonshot |
| Qwen3.5 397B | $1.50 | $6.00 | 128K | Alibaba |
| ERNIE 5.0 / 5.1 | $2.055 | $2.055 | 8K | Baidu |
| Kimi K2.7 Code HighSpeed | $2.19 | $9.20 | 128K | Moonshot |
Western Providers (for comparison)
| Model | Input (est.) | Output (est.) | Context | Vendor |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude 3.5 Haiku | $0.80 | $4.00 | 200K | Anthropic |
| Claude 3.5 Sonnet | $3.00 | $15.00 | 200K | Anthropic |
| GPT-4o | $2.50 | $10.00 | 128K | OpenAI |
| GPT-4o Mini | $0.15 | $0.60 | 128K | OpenAI |
| Gemini 1.5 Flash | $0.075 | $0.30 | 1M | |
| Gemini 1.5 Pro | $1.25 | $5.00 | 2M |
Cost Calculation Formula
To estimate your monthly spend:
Monthly Cost = (Monthly Input Tokens / 1,000,000) 脳 Input Price
+ (Monthly Output Tokens / 1,000,000) 脳 Output Price
Practical example: Processing 10M input tokens and 20M output tokens per month:
| Model | Monthly Cost |
|---|---|
| GLM 4.7 Flash | $0.90 |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | $7.00 |
| DeepSeek V4 Pro | $21.00 |
| GPT-4o | $225.00 |
| Claude 3.5 Sonnet | $330.00 |
That's not a typo. DeepSeek V4 Pro delivers comparable (or better) benchmark scores to GPT-4o at 10.7x lower cost.
The Chinese Model Advantage
Chinese AI providers consistently undercut Western pricing by 5-50x while maintaining competitive quality:
- DeepSeek V4 Pro ($0.42 input) vs GPT-4o ($2.50 input) 鈥?same ballpark benchmark performance, but DeepSeek is 6x cheaper on input tokens alone.
- GLM 4.7 Flash is extremely affordable at $0.03/1M with 128K context 鈥?no Western provider offers anything close.
- ERNIE models at $0.005/1M tokens are cheaper than any Western option by orders of magnitude.
This isn't about compromising quality. DeepSeek V4 Pro scores 92.1 on HumanEval (vs GPT-4o's 90.2) and 90.2 on MATH (vs 76.6). You're paying less for equal or better performance.
Smart Model Selection Strategy
-
Always start cheap. Use
glm-4.7-flashor ERNIE affordable models for prototyping. Minimal cost, immediate feedback. -
Match model to task complexity. Don't use a $0.42/1M model for simple text classification. Use
ernie-4.0-turbo-128kat $0.018/1M instead. - Use output pricing to guide model choice. If your workload is output-heavy (code generation, long responses), models with low output ratios like GLM 4.5 ($0.15/$0.15) save significantly.
- Budget for context size. DeepSeek V4 Flash and V4 Pro offer 1M context windows 鈥?a feature that costs $1.25/1M input on Gemini 1.5 Pro.
Token Cost Quick Reference
For a 1K token prompt producing 500 tokens of output:
| Model | Cost per Call |
|---|---|
| GLM 4.7 Flash | $0.000045 |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash | $0.00000028 |
| DeepSeek V4 Pro | $0.00000084 |
| GPT-4o | $0.007500 |
At 10,000 calls/day, that's $0.45 vs $0.38 vs $1.16 vs $75.00. Scale makes the difference obvious.
See the live pricing page for the most current rates across all 60+ models. Sign up to start testing with your $5 free credit. Join Discord to discuss cost optimization strategies with other developers.
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