Price checkPer per million tokens
Free ModelsFreePay-as-you-goCustom
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OpenRouter costs Free to $75 per per million tokens as of April 2026, with 2 plans available including a free tier. Plan: Free Models (free). Pricing depends on your chosen tier, contract length, and negotiated discounts.

Use the interactive pricing calculator to estimate your exact cost based on team size and requirements.

  • Free tier: Yes

OpenRouter offers 2 pricing tiers: Free Models, Pay-as-you-go. The Pay-as-you-go plan is developers and teams wanting model flexibility without multiple provider accounts.

Compared to other llm api providers software, OpenRouter is positioned at the budget-friendly price point.

  • 3 documented hidden costs beyond list price
Last verified: | Sources: 1 pricing pages and reviews

How much does OpenRouter cost?

OpenRouter offers a free plan with 1 paid tiers from $Infinity to $75/per million tokens. Plans include Free Models (free), Pay-as-you-go (custom pricing).

OpenRouter Pricing Overview

OpenRouter has 2 pricing plans, including a free tier. Paid plans range from $0 to $75/per million tokens. The Free Models plan is free and is best for experimentation and development with free open-source models. The Pay-as-you-go plan requires contacting sales for a custom quote and is designed for developers and teams wanting model flexibility without multiple provider accounts.

There are at least 3 documented hidden costs beyond OpenRouter's list price, including implementation, training, and add-on fees.

This pricing was last verified in April 15, 2026 from 1 independent sources.

See OpenRouter Plans

OpenRouter is a unified LLM gateway that routes requests to the best available provider for each model. With a single API key, you access 300+ models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, Mistral, Cohere, and dozens of smaller providers. OpenRouter charges passthrough rates (provider cost + small markup) with transparent pricing at openrouter.ai/models. Popular models include GPT-4o, Claude Sonnet, Gemini Flash, Llama 3, and many free/community models. The platform is ideal for teams that want model flexibility without managing multiple provider accounts and keys.

All OpenRouter Plans & Pricing

Plan Monthly Annual Best For
Free Models rateLimit: 20 req/min on free modelsreliability: Best-effort availability Free Free Experimentation and development with free open-source models
Pay-as-you-go billing: Prepay credits, minimum $5 Custom Custom Developers and teams wanting model flexibility without multiple provider accounts
View all features by plan

Free Models

  • Community-hosted free models
  • Rate limited (20 requests/minute)
  • Llama 3.1 8B (free), Gemini Flash 1.5 (free), Mistral 7B (free)
  • No credit card required
  • Subject to availability

Pay-as-you-go

  • 300+ models across all providers
  • Single API key for all models
  • OpenAI-compatible endpoint
  • Automatic fallback routing
  • Provider-level rate limits respected
  • Real-time pricing at openrouter.ai/models
  • No markup on most popular models
See OpenRouter Plans

Usage-Based Rates

Per-unit pricing for OpenRouter API usage.

Pay-as-you-go

Model Unit Rate
GPT-4o 1M input tokens $2.5 OpenAI — passthrough
GPT-4o 1M output tokens $10 OpenAI — passthrough
GPT-4o mini 1M input tokens $0.15 OpenAI — passthrough
GPT-4o mini 1M output tokens $0.6 OpenAI — passthrough
Claude Sonnet 3.7 1M input tokens $3 Anthropic — passthrough
Claude Sonnet 3.7 1M output tokens $15 Anthropic — passthrough
Claude Haiku 3.5 1M input tokens $0.8 Anthropic — passthrough
Claude Haiku 3.5 1M output tokens $4 Anthropic — passthrough
Gemini 2.0 Flash 1M input tokens $0.1 Google — passthrough
Gemini 2.0 Flash 1M output tokens $0.4 Google — passthrough
Gemini Flash 1.5 1M input tokens $0.075 Google — passthrough
Gemini Flash 1.5 1M output tokens $0.3 Google — passthrough
Llama 3.3 70B (via Meta) 1M input tokens $0.12 Meta/community hosted — passthrough
Llama 3.3 70B (via Meta) 1M output tokens $0.3 Meta/community hosted — passthrough
Mistral Large 2 1M input tokens $2 Mistral — passthrough
Mistral Large 2 1M output tokens $6 Mistral — passthrough
DeepSeek-R1 1M input tokens $0.55 DeepSeek — passthrough
DeepSeek-R1 1M output tokens $2.19 DeepSeek — passthrough
  • Passthrough pricing — rates reflect provider costs, may have small markup
  • Prices change frequently as providers update rates
  • Verify current rates at openrouter.ai/models before building cost-sensitive applications
  • Some models have zero-cost free variants with rate limits

How OpenRouter Pricing Compares

Software Starting Price Top Price
OpenRouter Free $75/per million tokens
Groq Free $3/per million tokens
Together AI $0.03/per million tokens / hour $9.95/per million tokens / hour
Fireworks AI Free $9/per million tokens / hour
Google Gemini API Free $18/per million tokens
Mistral AI API $0.1/per million tokens $6/per million tokens

Browse all LLM API Providers pricing →

3 OpenRouter Hidden Costs Beyond the List Price

Beyond the listed price, OpenRouter has at least 3 documented hidden costs that can significantly increase total cost of ownership.

Watch for 3 hidden costs
  • Small per-request markup on some providers (typically $0.001-$0.01/request)
  • Minimum $5 credit purchase to use paid models
  • Rate limits vary by model and provider — OpenRouter inherits provider-level limits
Tip

Ask your OpenRouter sales rep about these costs upfront. Getting them in writing before signing can save you from surprise charges later.

Full hidden costs breakdown →

OpenRouter Pricing FAQ

01 How much does OpenRouter cost?

OpenRouter uses passthrough pricing — you pay the model provider's rate plus a small platform markup. GPT-4o costs $2.50/M input and $10/M output (same as OpenAI direct). Many community-hosted open-source models are free with rate limits. Paid models require a minimum $5 credit purchase.

02 Does OpenRouter have free models?

Yes. OpenRouter offers several free models including community-hosted Llama 3.1 8B, Gemini Flash 1.5, and Mistral 7B. Free models are rate-limited to 20 requests/minute and subject to availability.

03 Is OpenRouter cheaper than using providers directly?

For most popular models, OpenRouter charges approximately the same as provider list prices with a small markup. The value is API key consolidation and automatic routing, not price — you won't save money vs direct provider access, but you gain flexibility and model switching.

04 How many models does OpenRouter support?

OpenRouter supports 300+ models from providers including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, Mistral, Cohere, Perplexity, and community-hosted open-source models. The full model list with live pricing is at openrouter.ai/models.

05 What is OpenRouter's API compatibility?

OpenRouter is fully OpenAI-compatible. Set your base URL to https://openrouter.ai/api/v1 and use any OpenAI-compatible SDK. Model names use the format provider/model-name (e.g., openai/gpt-4o, anthropic/claude-3.5-sonnet).

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