T
Hndy Tools

AI API Cost Calculator

Estimate and compare monthly API costs across OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Meta — with caching factored in.

SaaS
Development
AI

Usage Details

About This Tool

AI API costs can spiral quickly as your product scales. This calculator estimates your monthly spend across the major AI providers — factoring in caching discounts — so you can budget accurately and choose the best provider for your use case.

If you need to generate keys for your chosen provider, use our API Key Generator. For cost modeling in other domains, try the CPC & CPM Calculator for ad spend estimation.

All calculations happen in your browser — no data is sent to any server.

How It Works

Daily Tokens = Tokens per Request × Requests per Day
Monthly Tokens = Daily Tokens × 30
Monthly Cost = (Monthly Tokens ÷ 1,000,000) × Price × (1 − Cache Rate ÷ 200)
Cached tokens cost 50% less: at 30% cache hit rate, total cost = base cost × 0.85

The comparison table uses averaged input/output prices for each provider. OpenAI GPT-4o ($2.50/$10.00), Anthropic Claude 3.5 Sonnet ($3.00/$15.00), Google Gemini 1.5 Pro ($1.25/$5.00), and Meta Llama 3 via Groq ($0.20/$0.75). Cache pricing is applied uniformly across all providers for a fair comparison.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

How do I estimate tokens per request?
Check your provider's usage dashboard or API logs. For reference: a typical Q&A exchange uses 500–2,000 tokens, document summarization 2,000–5,000, and large context tasks can exceed 10,000 tokens. Use the average across your real traffic for the most accurate estimate.
What cache hit rate is realistic?
20–40% is typical for applications with repeated or similar queries (chatbots, code assistants, support systems). Higher rates are achievable with semantic caching. Providers charge roughly 50% less for cached tokens since they skip the full computation — enter 0% if you don't use caching.
Why are the provider prices averaged?
Most providers charge different rates for input (prompt) and output (completion) tokens. We use the average of the two for a fair comparison. For a detailed breakdown, multiply your specific input/output split by each provider's respective rates.
How accurate are the cost comparisons?
The comparison gives a directionally accurate estimate based on published list prices. Actual costs may vary with volume discounts, fine-tuned model pricing, and batch processing. Always check current pricing on each provider's website before making a decision.

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