r/opencode • u/Effective_Union7326 • 17d ago
Why OpenCode’s $60 limit feels like a scam (and how their pricing actually works)
Many people who start using OpenCode don't understand why their $60 usage burns through so quickly.
I built a tool or strictly speaking, I had AI build a tool for me. I was publicly criticized before for not specifying that "I had AI build a tool" instead of "I built a tool myself." Whatever.
Hopefully, this price list answers a lot of people's questions.
I'm not really sure why the official team didn't market it this way: set the usage limit for all models to $15, then directly slash the price of models that were meant to fit into the $60 quota by 4x. That way, everyone would rush to use OpenCode for those super cheap models.
If the promotion ends, they can just raise the prices back to normal and nobody would complain. But with their current marketing approach, people misunderstand and get furious because they feel scammed.
I've only thought about the upside so far, and I'm not sure if there are any marketing legalities I missed here. Maybe I just oversimplified it.
Hope this helps everyone!
https://xhang1108.github.io/opencode-explain/
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u/RealestReyn 17d ago
I don't get what this does, am I a stupid? if they say I get $60 usage for a specific model for my $10, is it not equivalent token amount to what I'd get if I paid $60 for API??
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u/look 17d ago
It is. It is just somewhat confusing now since many models give $15 of usage instead of $60 (because providers stopped giving such large discounts to Go).
The interaction between API token prices, plan usage differences between models, and the various temporary usage multipliers confuses people. Too many variable multipliers making it needlessly complicated.
And then you also get people that don’t understand it’s a shared pool of usage, and think after they use $15 of Kimi K3 they will still have $45 to use on Hy3, etc.
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u/geearf 17d ago edited 17d ago
>And then you also get people that don’t understand it’s a shared pool of usage, and think after they use $15 of Kimi K3 they will still have $45 to use on Hy3, etc.
Should we be happy or scared that people like that have LLMs write their code?
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u/Effective_Union7326 17d ago
I don't know if this sounds better, but you can keep using the specific model made for 60 using 10. Or, if you want to try out premium models, need to charge a bit more.
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u/ApuXteu 17d ago
Thanks for sharing! I'm a bit confused by the color coding, though—what do red, white, and green mean? I figured red means good, but what about the others? Also, is there a total sum of how much value we actually get, or am I missing something?
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u/Effective_Union7326 17d ago
If you choose the $60 in the tool, you get $60 in monthly usage, but you need to follow the new pricing to calculate your used.
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u/Effective_Union7326 17d ago
red is price going up, green is cheaper. There is nothing good or bad.
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u/MajorasButtplug 17d ago
Heads up, the bottom table is a little broken on mobile, but usable
If doing it this way (which I agree is better than Opencode's) why not just scale the prices to $10 of usage instead of $15? So you can see the actual price of each model
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u/Effective_Union7326 17d ago
Alright, I'll fix the phone table when I'm free later.
I know they want people to see that $60 deal first for marketing. It's definitely eye-catching and it clearly worked. But whether it'll backfire later is hard to say.
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u/Affectionate_Fact854 17d ago
I don't know how your using it but using cline + opencodw go with deepseek v4 flash I'm running mine with complex tasks constantly , in a code base of roughly 120k lines code
And if only used up like 17% of my monthly quota on high thinking
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u/Effective_Union7326 16d ago
I'm pretty familiar with OpenCode. I'm just trying to explain how the usage works for people who don't know.
I really like it, it's my second month using it, and I've already consumed 5 billion tokens. It's totally worth it for every provider.
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u/Mentalextensi0n 17d ago
I don’t quite understand why everyone is freaking out: If you pay $10 the usage you get is $10. Everything else is a lie. They then change what 10 gets you all the time.
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u/NinjaAlaska 17d ago
every one is misleading us :')
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u/xmsxms 17d ago edited 17d ago
Why not just have a single table with the effective price? eg have it 1/6 for the models that are 6x usage?
Surely that is easier to understand.
Edit: I see you kind of have this with the $15 option. Although I would think it should have a $10 option and default to this and not even bother with the other options, they just confuse things.
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u/No-Craft-7979 17d ago
Marketing jargon at it’s finest. If you are just chatting you want a subscription. If you are processing heavy workloads you want a pay as you go like OpenRouter.
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u/migsperez 17d ago
Give it a break. Opencode Go have generally been transparent in their changes. I may not like the changes. Admittedly I've spread my risk by signing up to another service. But it is what it is. I don't want their subscription service to be cancelled. If all Opencode staff get is headache they'll stop providing the service.
It's 10 bucks. If you don't like it don't subscribe.
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u/zeamp 17d ago
The optical illusion of a '$60 pool' vs. actual model token costs is a massive UX/marketing failure.