AI Token Cost Calculator — LLM API Pricing per Request & Month

Estimate what your AI app will cost: enter input/output tokens and requests to see per-call and monthly spend. Prices are editable to match any model. ✓ Editable rates

🤖

AI Token Cost

LLM API spend

$
$
🤖
Enter tokens to estimate your AI cost

How the AI Token Cost Calculator Works

  1. Pick a model tier or enter your own per-million-token prices.
  2. Enter input & output tokens per request and your monthly volume.
  3. See the cost per request, per 1,000 calls, and per month.

Estimating LLM API Costs

Large language models charge by the token (~¾ of a word), with separate prices for input (your prompt) and output (the model's reply) — usually quoted per million tokens. Output is typically 3–5× more expensive than input, so long replies dominate cost. The formula: cost = (input tokens ÷ 1M × input price) + (output tokens ÷ 1M × output price), times your request volume.

Because prices change often and vary by provider, this calculator keeps the rates editable — drop in the exact numbers from your provider's pricing page. To cut spend: trim prompts, cap output length, cache repeated context, and use a smaller model for simple tasks. Estimate only.

AI Token Cost FAQ

A token is a chunk of text — roughly ¾ of a word, or about 4 characters. "Hello world" is about 2–3 tokens. Models bill by tokens in and tokens out.
Generating text is more compute-intensive than reading it, so providers charge more per output token — often 3–5× the input price. Limiting reply length is a fast way to cut costs.
Shorten prompts, cap max output tokens, cache or reuse context, batch requests, and route simple tasks to a cheaper/smaller model. Even small per-request savings multiply at scale.

Related Calculators

✔ Reviewed by the True Value Calc editorial team🗓 Last updated June 2026📚 Sources: Peer-reviewed formulas & official U.S. government data