I reduced my AI bill by 90% with 50 lines of code. Here's the trick.

#tutorial #webdev #ai #javascript

I reduced my AI bill by 90% with 50 lines of code. Here's the trick.

Last month I was paying $20/month for ChatGPT Plus. This month I'm paying $2/month for the same Claude API access.

The trick isn't a hack. It's just knowing where to look.

The 50-line wrapper

Here's the full code that routes my AI calls through a flat-rate proxy:

// ai-client.js — drop-in replacement for OpenAI SDK
const fetch = require('node-fetch');

const AI = {
  baseURL: 'https://simplylouie.com/api/v1',
  apiKey: process.env.LOUIE_API_KEY,

  async chat(messages, options = {}) {
    const res = await fetch(`${this.baseURL}/chat`, {
      method: 'POST',
      headers: {
        'Authorization': `Bearer ${this.apiKey}`,
        'Content-Type': 'application/json'
      },
      body: JSON.stringify({
        messages,
        model: options.model || 'claude-sonnet-4-5',
        max_tokens: options.maxTokens || 1024,
        stream: options.stream || false
      })
    });

    if (!res.ok) {
      const err = await res.json();
      throw new Error(`AI Error: ${err.message}`);
    }

    return res.json();
  },

  async complete(prompt, options = {}) {
    return this.chat(
      [{ role: 'user', content: prompt }],
      options
    );
  },

  // Streaming support
  async stream(messages, onChunk) {
    const res = await fetch(`${this.baseURL}/chat`, {
      method: 'POST',
      headers: {
        'Authorization': `Bearer ${this.apiKey}`,
        'Content-Type': 'application/json'
      },
      body: JSON.stringify({
        messages,
        model: 'claude-sonnet-4-5',
        stream: true
      })
    });

    const reader = res.body.getReader();
    const decoder = new TextDecoder();

    while (true) {
      const { done, value } = await reader.read();
      if (done) break;
      const chunk = decoder.decode(value);
      onChunk(chunk);
    }
  }
};

module.exports = AI;

How to use it

const AI = require('./ai-client');

// Simple completion
const result = await AI.complete('Explain async/await in 2 sentences');
console.log(result.content[0].text);

// Multi-turn conversation
const response = await AI.chat([
  { role: 'user', content: 'What is a closure in JavaScript?' },
  { role: 'assistant', content: 'A closure is...' },
  { role: 'user', content: 'Give me a practical example.' }
]);

// Streaming output
await AI.stream(
  [{ role: 'user', content: 'Write me a README for my project' }],
  (chunk) => process.stdout.write(chunk)
);

Why $2/month instead of $20/month?

SimplyLouie (https://simplylouie.com/developers) is a flat-rate Claude API proxy. You pay $2/month — not per token, not per call. For indie developers and side projects, this is the difference between:

$20/month ChatGPT Plus (web UI, limited API)
$20/month Claude Pro (web UI, no API)
$2/month SimplyLouie (full API access, unlimited calls)

For global developers, the math is even more dramatic:

Country	ChatGPT cost	SimplyLouie
Nigeria	N32,000/mo	N3,200/mo
India	₹1,600/mo	₹165/mo
Philippines	₱1,120/mo	₱112/mo
Kenya	KSh2,600/mo	KSh260/mo
Indonesia	Rp320,000/mo	Rp32,000/mo
Brazil	R$100/mo	R$10/mo
Mexico	MX$350/mo	MX$35/mo

The open source angle

Here's what nobody talks about: when companies like Anthropic or OpenAI build products on top of open research — transformer architectures, RLHF techniques pioneered by academics — and then charge $20/month to access them, they're doing exactly what Bambu Lab does with open source hardware.

They take the commons. They close it. They sell it back to you.

At SimplyLouie, 50% of every $2/month goes to animal rescue. The other 50% keeps the servers running. No VC funding needed. No $20/month tax on your side project.

Quick start

curl -X POST https://simplylouie.com/api/v1/chat \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "Hello!"}]}'