LLM Token Cost Calculator
Free LLM token cost calculator. Compare API pricing per 1M tokens for OpenAI, Claude and Gemini, and find the break-even vs self-hosting on your own GPU.
What is a LLM Token Cost Calculator?
Every LLM API bills by the token — the small text chunks a model reads and writes, roughly three-quarters of an English word each. Prices are quoted per million tokens, with input (your prompts and context) charged at a much lower rate than output (the model's replies). That split makes real bills hard to predict from a price list: at a typical 4:1 input-to-output ratio, a workload of 50 million tokens per month on GPT-5.4 Mini ($0.75 in / $4.50 out per 1M) works out to about $75 a month — while the same volume on a premium frontier model can cost more than $1,000.
This calculator answers the question price lists can't: at your volume, is the API still the cheap option, or would renting a GPU server and self-hosting an open-weights model save money? It converts a server's rental price, throughput and utilization into an effective cost per million tokens, compares that with the API's blended price at your input:output ratio, and shows the break-even volume — including a capacity check that flags when a single server physically cannot produce the tokens you need.
| Value | Meaning | Example | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Token | The unit LLMs bill by, ≈ ¾ of an English word | "hello world" ≈ 2–3 tokens | Estimating your volume |
| Input price | Dollars per 1M prompt and context tokens | $0.75 per 1M (GPT-5.4 Mini) | RAG and long-context work |
| Output price | Dollars per 1M generated tokens | $4.50 per 1M (GPT-5.4 Mini) | Generation-heavy workloads |
| Blended price | Average $/1M at your input:output ratio | $1.50 per 1M at 4:1 | Comparing models fairly |
| Throughput | Tokens/sec a self-hosted server produces | ≈1,500 tok/s (Llama 3.3 70B on an H100) | Sizing a self-host rig |
| Utilization | Share of the month the server does useful work | 60% | Honest self-host math |
| Break-even | Volume where self-hosting beats the API | ≈1.4B tokens/mo vs GPT-5.4 Mini | The rent-or-build decision |
How it works
Set your monthly token volume and the input : output ratio of your workload.
Choose an API model and a rental GPU server — current prices are filled in for you.
See both monthly bills, the effective price per 1M tokens, and the break-even volume.
Watch how it works
A quick tour of the tool.
Perfect for
Popular LLM Token Cost Calculator variants
Purpose-built calculators for the token-cost questions people look up most.
OpenAI vs self-hosting
GPT-5.6 pricing against a rented H100 — where is the break-even?
OpenAI API cost
Your monthly bill across the GPT-5.6 and GPT-5.4 tiers — from Nano to Sol.
Claude API cost
Anthropic pricing with the ~30% tokenizer correction built in.
Gemini API cost
Google's tiers from budget Flash-Lite to Gemini 3.1 Pro.
Tokens to words
Two-way converter: what 1K, 10K or 1M tokens mean in words and pages.
RAG cost
Price a retrieval pipeline: system prompt, context chunks and output per request.
Prompt caching savings
What the ~90% cached-input discount is worth on your repeated prompts.
AI API budget
From active users and requests per user to monthly spend and cost per user.
Frequently asked questions
Learn more
Short, practical guides.
How to estimate your monthly LLM token usage
Turn requests per day and words per prompt into a tokens-per-month number you can trust.
LLM pricing comparison
16 models side by side: input, output and blended cost per million tokens.
LLM self-hosting break-even guide
The formula and three worked examples for when your own GPU beats the API.
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