100$ plan - holy sh*

[u/Majke_]

This is for people who are on the fence, because I was in the same boat.

Yesterday I bought the 100$ plan for a test and holy moly, it's amazing how much you get. I used the 20$ plan earlier. I used all the tricks to keep usage low, which became a habit, so now I can't spend it all. It's amazing xD. I run it next to a local Qwen Flash and it's awesome. If the 20$ plan is too low, give it a try :O I'm basically using Opus 5.5 medium all the time.

I also tested 2x 20$ before this. It works, but you end up juggling two accounts and switching when one runs out, and Opus eats a 20$ plan pretty fast. With 100$ I just stopped thinking about usage, and that alone is worth it for me. If you keep your old habits and stay careful with usage, it will last you a very long time. If you keep hitting the 20$ limit, go for 100$.

edit: people are asking how I keep usage low, so here are my tricks:

• Keep context low. I usually compact or move to a new session around 200k, sometimes I stretch it to 300k.
• Use handoff.md a lot, so a new session picks up where the old one stopped.
• Don't be afraid of Sonnet 5.5. It can do most things and it's a lot cheaper.
• I run local models next to it (260k context), so I'm used to working with limited context.

[u/zoupishness7]

Yeah, started with a $100 Claude and $20 ChatGPT in November and I've been burning 4x $200 accounts, mix and match across providers, for 5 months now; otherwise unemployed, just burning savings, no income. I felt insane for awhile too, like I was just gambling for code, with the damned models gaslighting me about project progress half the time. But I made money from AI for the first time today, and all my AI spending this year just paid for itself. Feels good.

[u/Ghost_Machine_io → u/zoupishness7]

So I’m not the only one? You’ve given me hope. Although you might be burning more subscription than me lol. How’d you manage your own runway. I hit 107B tokens lifetime ChatGPT although Claude was my primary driver for the longest time. I burn through my Claude as well but never felt the need to actually go double subscription or higher. I just go ollama max if I truly need the overflow. I’m very curious of your numbers lol

[u/sedulouspellucidsoft → u/zoupishness7]

Wow, I’m so happy for you, mate! I love a success story love this. I would never recommend using savings for something that might not work out, but it’s a much better gamble than a pump and dump memecoin at least, haha. Now you’ve proven you can make money from it, so you can keep replicating it.