Every AI provider wants a monthly subscription. For a product whose traffic is spiky, that's the wrong shape.
The mismatch
Subscriptions assume predictable monthly usage. AI products rarely have it: a launch spike, a batch backfill, a quiet week between releases. With a subscription you either over-provision (paying for unused capacity) or hit limits mid-spike and get throttled at the worst possible moment.
What prepaid changes
A prepaid wallet bills exactly what you consume. Three practical consequences:
No unused capacity. You top up based on observed burn rate, not a forecast. Quiet months cost less automatically.
No surprise throttling. Your limit is your balance, not a rate plan tier. If you need a burst, you top up.
Cleaner unit economics. Spend ÷ tokens gives a true marginal cost, which makes pricing your own product far easier.
The operational side
Prepaid needs two guardrails: a low-balance alert (so you don't hard-stop in production) and a spend cap per environment (so a runaway loop can't drain the wallet). Both are standard in a wallet-based system and missing from most subscription tiers.
Comparing options
When you compare [OI] API pricing across gateways, check whether pricing is prepaid or subscription, and whether a wallet can cover multiple modalities. One balance for text, image, voice and video is meaningfully simpler than four billing relationships.
Our rate card and wallet model are documented on one page: compare [OI] API pricing.
If your traffic is spiky, the subscription you're paying for is probably subsidising someone else's steady usage.
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