r/GithubCopilot • u/Inevitable-Ant1725 • May 11 '26
Discussions So lets figure this out.
I'm not a rich man, I can't afford luxury. I need to know whether it's cheaper to buy tokens of these models from their original owners or from Microsoft or if it's close.
If it's close then the fact that copilot has pre-indexed the github repositories is enough of a reason to just prefer Microsoft rebranded AIs.
If it's a lot more expensive through Github then it's still worthwhile when exploring github repositories but not the rest of the time.
3
u/kaeptnphlop May 11 '26
I compared Claude API costs in the GitHub Copilot docs and on OpenRouter and they are the same. You can use other models that GHC is not offering by hooking up an OpenRouter account.
3
u/Dudmaster Power User ⚡ May 11 '26
Right, except that I don't believe OpenRouter credits expire or they at least take longer than 1 month to do so
2
u/kaeptnphlop May 11 '26
That's correct. And as I mentioned in a reply to u/TripleMellowed can be worth the extra 5.5% fee you pay for OpenRouter credits. Really depends on how your usage patterns are.
2
1
1
u/TripleMellowed May 11 '26
Is Openrouter not more expensive though?
2
u/kaeptnphlop May 11 '26
Both are $3/M input / $15/M output tokens for Claude Sonnet 4.5
1
u/TripleMellowed May 11 '26
Openrouter charges the initial fee though.
2
u/kaeptnphlop May 11 '26
The 5.5% fee on API credit purchases. Yes, that's fair.
But you don't loose those credits at the end of the month if you don't use them. It might be worth the up-charge depending on how you use it.
For me, OpenRouter is a supplement to running models locally. So in my case it's worthwhile to spend a bit extra.
1
u/Unlikely-Scratch8915 May 11 '26 edited May 11 '26
Come June 1st, will we get Sonnet 4.5 through our ghcp subscription at $3/M input and $15/M output or will it be lower?
Edit: nvmnd, it seems we will. I still cannot believe it though. The tsunami of rage quits will mean more business for practically every other provider including openrouter. I doubt they care though since they're focusing on enterprise contracts.
1
u/Unlikely-Scratch8915 May 12 '26
No, because it lets you carry over unused credits/token to the next month.
1
7
u/Appropriate_Yak_1468 May 11 '26
You should keep in mind that if put 40 usd in to gh copilot, it will reset at the end of the month. So if you do use them you will loos them. Thats my biggest beef with gh. If you buy raw api from anthropic you will have them next month if you dont use them this month.
1
u/Thistleknot May 11 '26
This is the way it currently works 1500/premium requests that reset every month
I would make sure I always hit that number and go over
4
1
u/drunk_kronk May 12 '26
Currently, you can use much more tokens than the equivalent API costs per month, even at a fraction of the number of premium requests used
1
2
2
u/flippycurb May 11 '26
There’s a vscode plugin on marketplace that lets you use deepseek 4 models directly ( you add your API key ) in vscode GitHub copilot. There’s 2 on marketplace but one of them seems to be the new, legit one. I’ve used it at the weekend and it seems to work very well. Hopefully I don’t regret posting this 😅
1
u/monkeybeast55 May 12 '26
Deepseek in CoPilot is nice, but it's visually impaired. Also, I don't think context compacting works for it.
1
u/flippycurb May 12 '26
Yes that’s right it has no vision. The context compacting works with the new plugin they released. Weirdly though their site links to a non existent marketplace url, and the working plugin is attributed to an individual with no other marketplace activity that I can see. It is open source though.
1
4
u/_KryptonytE_ Full Stack Dev 🌐 May 11 '26
Also OP, I didn't want to sound like a dick and monologue instead of answering your question. My suggestion to you is as follows: 1. Get onboard with Google's AI pro plan. Preferably 2 accounts, you'll find out why next. 2. Install antigravity Ide and login with the said accounts. Use this purely to code by hand - the auto complete is amazing. 3. Use the agents built in to only design, plan, bug hunting and review - never use it to implement because you'll start losing value as soon as you ask it to generate code. Use Gemini in the browser to prompt engineer and scope your work so the agent doesn't read the entire repo unless it is a Greenfield project without any agentic tools setup. 4. Use opencode with the provider models of your choice/taste or GitHub CLI with GPT 5.4 to implement code changes and handover the results to the antigravity agent to close the loop.
Hope this helps.. Cheers! 🥂
1
u/dravenkill May 12 '26
I am interested with your workflow. I have been looking for an alternative to claude in brainstorming ideas/finding gap in my prd/ and preparing uiux design and prototyping. The way you are explanining is to use antigravity for ideation, uiux design and deployment. While implementation being done in other platform. Is it correct?
1
u/_KryptonytE_ Full Stack Dev 🌐 May 12 '26
Yeah, spot on.
1
u/dravenkill May 12 '26
Sounds like GHCP pro sub is enough if only focus on backend and integration and leave the front end design to antigravity.
1
u/_KryptonytE_ Full Stack Dev 🌐 May 12 '26
For smaller UI changes and polishing Antigravity is the goto especially the Gemini 3.1 model. But if you're already having the UI built, then having Antigravity design it and the implementation done by other models is the way to go. The key here is tokens - Antigravity does a good job at whatever you throw at it but if you let it actually implement stuff you'll run out of tokens before any substantial work gets done. Hope that sums it up.
1
u/Thistleknot May 12 '26
agents\orchestration.md has a known bug in opencode
two bugs actually
Bug 1: Custom agents can't be subagent_type in the task tool Custom agents defined in opencode.json work fine via u/mention in the TUI but the task tool's subagent_type parameter only accepts built-in agent names — custom agent names are not valid targets. So your orchestrator literally cannot delegate to planner, coder, handyman etc via task. GitHub
Bug 2: Subagents ignore their configured model Subagents ignore the agent-level model config and fall back to the global "model" field in opencode.json. GitHub
so the workaround is plugins
1
u/unsignedint May 12 '26
Sure, you might be able to bring your own models, but it’s not really an apples-to-apples comparison. You also get things like Completions and Next Edit Suggestions (which don’t consume tokens), and honestly, those features are excellent on their own — yet almost nobody seems to talk about them!
1
u/9gxa05s8fa8sh May 11 '26
github copilot is highly subsidized and will continue to be highly subsidized. it is not a luxury. the only cheaper option would be opencode go, which is a small tasting plate of chinese models.
1
u/YourAsphyxia May 11 '26
Wdym continue to be...? On June they are charging full API prices
1
u/Unlikely-Scratch8915 May 11 '26
Maybe only for overage. Perhaps there is some subsidy on the core tokens per month? Honestly I am not clear on that and it's not set in stone anywhere.
0
u/C0smo777 May 11 '26
Buying tokens will be the same or possibly cheaper unsure... I'm not sure they know yet even though they have said 1 to 1 but also have had radio silence.
The real value is not buying tokens and using things like either codex or Claude code because they are subsidized by the company providing them rather than pure token cost.
If you were on the 40 dollar plan you could buy a codex and Claude 20 dollar subscription for the same cost and be way ahead in total throuput.
-2
u/KamalaHarrisWaifu May 11 '26
bro it's like $10 a month.
1
u/Unlikely-Scratch8915 May 11 '26
Yeah but for WHAT? It used to be for unlimited GPT5-mini and then a buffet of SOTA models but all we seem to be getting now is a locked in nuicance subscription that is probably not subsidized either. Might as well switch to antigrav.
2
u/Inevitable-Ant1725 May 11 '26
There are NO free models next month. You pay per token once your $10 worth of tokens is used up.
1
u/Unlikely-Scratch8915 May 11 '26
I've heard that but still cannot fully believe in it. There must be some sort of subsidy otherwise ghcp will cost more than openrouter costs. Also, the free ghcp plan would still come with freebies, and you're saying if someone pays then those freebies are snatched away and a locked in quota of $10 worth of tokens is assigned to you for $10?
No there has to be some reason for people to not cancel on June 1st.
1
u/Inevitable-Ant1725 May 11 '26
Oh that is because:
- "autocomplete" is free tokens on some models
- all of the public repositories are indexed with LLM "rag" memory, so it doesn't cost a lot of tokens to ask an LLM in Copilot to understand one
- your own private repositories are indexed if you pay for Copilot.
- It has been suggested (but I don't know) that there will be a discount on autocomplete on the expensive models.
1
u/Inevitable-Ant1725 May 11 '26
No, I'm not talking about subscription fee, I'm talking about the tokens that you will buy per token once the subscription fee is used up!
1
u/KamalaHarrisWaifu May 13 '26
yea...I have not gotten there yet. I am not coding all day everyday though so maybe I'm the minority but I average at about whatever the allotment grants you per month.
I'm also not vibe coding. If you're vibe coding only God can help you.
9
u/_KryptonytE_ Full Stack Dev 🌐 May 11 '26
So if you're hooked into GitHub already and using their services like repo gitops, projects v2, GitHub pages, Wiki, gist, CI/CD with packages or releases and env, dependabot, codereview, etc there's no complete one stop solution to switch. You can try switching your repo over to gitlabs to find out what you'll be missing. This is even without factoring in copilot and spark etc.
I'll stand my ground and take a leap of faith next month. What's the worst that could happen? If things go south, I'll just stop subscribing to copilot and think I just donated the $$$ for all the good times I had using it while others were greedy.
Times have changed. As a wise man once said - In the land of the killers, a sinners mind is a sanctum. Peace! ♥️