Most people underestimate their AI spend by half. Add up ChatGPT Plus, Claude Pro, a Copilot or Cursor seat, Perplexity and an image plan and you’re usually looking at $50 to $120 a month, or $600 to $1,400 a year — money that leaves your account in small, forgettable charges. The fastest way to see your real number is to list every plan you pay for and total it. The AI subscription cost calculator does that in your browser and splits the spend by category so the overlap jumps out.
Why AI subscriptions creep up on you
Each plan is cheap enough to feel like a rounding error. Twenty dollars here, ten there, none of it big enough to trigger a second thought. But they renew silently every month, and you rarely cancel the old one when you sign up for the new one. Six months later you’re paying for two assistants that do the same job, a coding tool you tried once, and an image generator you last opened in spring.
The charges also hide across different cards, app stores and team accounts, so no single statement shows the full picture. That’s the trap: the total is large, but no individual line ever looks worth the effort of cancelling.
Common AI subscription prices (approximate, mid-2026)
These are list monthly rates for individual tiers. They shift often and don’t include annual discounts, team seats or tax, so treat them as ballpark figures to build your own total from.
| Tool | Plan | Approx. monthly |
|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | Plus | $20 |
| ChatGPT | Pro | $200 |
| Claude | Pro | $20 |
| Claude | Max | $100–200 |
| Google Gemini | AI Pro | $20 |
| Perplexity | Pro | $20 |
| GitHub Copilot | Pro | $10 |
| GitHub Copilot | Pro+ | $39 |
| Cursor | Pro | $20 |
| Midjourney | Basic / Standard | $10 / $30 |
| Grok | SuperGrok | $30 |
Add it up, then look for overlap
Once you have the total, the useful question isn’t “is this a lot?” — it’s “what am I paying twice for?” Group your plans by what they actually do:
- General assistants — ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity. You rarely need more than one as a daily driver.
- Coding tools — Copilot, Cursor, Claude Code. These overlap more than people admit; pick the one that fits your volume.
- Image and video — Midjourney and similar. Easy to forget, easy to pause between projects.
Two general assistants is the most common duplication. So is a coding subscription you kept after switching editors. The category donut in the calculator makes these obvious at a glance — if one group dominates your spend but you use it lightly, that’s your first cut.
A worked example
Say you pay for ChatGPT Plus ($20), Claude Pro ($20), Cursor Pro ($20), Perplexity Pro ($20) and Midjourney Standard ($30). That’s $110 a month, $1,320 a year.
Now be honest about usage. You use Claude for daily chat and coding, open ChatGPT maybe twice a week, and haven’t touched Perplexity since you got Claude. Drop ChatGPT Plus and Perplexity and you’re at $70 a month — a $480 annual saving for no real loss. If your remaining assistant use is light, the metered API can cost a dollar or two a month instead of a flat $20, which the calculator flags with a link to compare.
Decide what to cut
Run three tests on every line:
- When did I last open it? If it’s been weeks, cancel — you can resubscribe in seconds if you miss it.
- Does another plan already do this? Overlapping assistants and coding tools are the fat to trim first.
- Would metered API use be cheaper? For light, occasional use, paying per token often beats a flat subscription.
If you’re weighing coding tools specifically, the AI coding cost calculator ranks Cursor, Copilot and Claude Code against raw API cost for your actual request volume. And if you’re eyeing a cheaper model to replace a pricey plan, how much you save switching AI models shows the math. Start with the AI subscription cost calculator to see your number, then cut from there.
