How OpenRouter prices
Captured October 26, 2026 at 1440px wide.
OpenRouter plans and prices
| Plan | Price | Billing |
|---|---|---|
| Free | Free | |
| StandardHighlighted | 5.5% | Pay-as-you-go |
| Business | 8% | Pay-as-you-go |
| Enterprise | Fee discounts available |
As printed on the page captured October 26, 2026.
How does OpenRouter pricing work?
The value metric is a percentage of inference spend. Model costs pass through from 80+ providers across 500+ models, and OpenRouter earns its platform fee on top, which keeps its own value, routing, spend controls and admin, apart from the cost of the models themselves. Bring-your-own-key usage has its own allowance: Standard and Business include '$25,000 of list price inference / month with no fees, 5% fee after', and Enterprise reads 'Custom'. Free carries '25+ free models', '4 free providers' and '50 requests/day'.
The motion is self-serve through Business and sales-led at Enterprise. The subhead names the audience for each column, 'Plans for indie hackers, AI native startups, growing teams, and enterprises', and the hero pairs 'Get started' with 'Talk to sales'. Each column carries its own CTA, 'Get started for free', 'Get started', 'Upgrade to Business' and 'Contact sales'. Below the table, twenty-five FAQs are grouped into Billing and Pricing, Usage and Rate Limits, Routing and Latency, Privacy and Security, Models and Features, Reliability and Uptime, and Support, and a 'Ready to get started?' band closes the page.
Under the hood, the fee is the lever and the plan sets what it buys. Business at 8% adds Advanced notifications, EU and US in-region routing, Workload Identity Federation (authentication for cloud workloads through their own identity provider), a workspace limit of 1,000 and a signed DPA on request, and the FAQ 'What does the Business plan fee apply to?' points to a fee basis set by plan. Enterprise turns three levers into contract terms: 'Fee discounts available', a 'Custom' BYOK allowance, and Private Endpoints as an 'Add on', which opens a priced add-on layer on top of the enterprise deal. Rate limits are 'Passthrough from the provider(s)' on the paid plans, so capacity follows the upstream provider. The BYOK allowance is a smart piece of design: a team that brings its own provider keys routes its first $25,000 a month free, which makes OpenRouter the default routing layer before the fee applies. Pass-through cost plus a visible platform fee is a model any marketplace or aggregator could borrow.
What does OpenRouter's pricing page do well?
- Platform fees is the first row of the table, so the number that differs between plans is the first thing read
- Each column carries its own CTA, 'Get started for free', 'Get started', 'Upgrade to Business' and 'Contact sales', so every plan has a next step named for it
- BYOK limits are stated in dollars on the self-serve plans, '$25,000 of list price inference / month with no fees, 5% fee after', with Enterprise set as 'Custom'
- New rows such as Advanced notifications, Workload Identity Federation and Private Endpoints each carry a 'Learn more' link into the docs
- Billing and Pricing FAQs ask 'Do you mark up provider pricing?' and whether fallback attempts are billed, the questions a router buyer brings
What does OpenRouter's pricing page reveal about its pricing strategy?
- A percentage platform fee on pass-through inference separates OpenRouter's value from the cost of the models it routes
- A free BYOK allowance up to $25,000 a month makes the router the default layer for teams that already hold provider keys
- The step from 5.5% to 8% buys in-region routing, Workload Identity Federation, Advanced notifications, 1,000 workspaces and a signed DPA, so the fee carries the compliance and operations scope
- Enterprise pairs 'Fee discounts available' with a 'Custom' BYOK allowance, which makes both the fee and the free BYOK volume terms negotiated at scale
- Private Endpoints marked 'Add on' points to priced options layered on top of the Enterprise contract
Learn with Orb
- ProductPrice modeling A percentage platform fee on pass-through inference, with BYOK usage free up to $25,000 a month, is hybrid logic Orb's price modeling represents and adjusts without re-engineering billing.
- GuideAn expert's guide to enterprise pricing for SaaS Enterprise offers fee discounts, which makes the platform fee the term shaped in each deal; Orb's guide covers what to weigh when prices are set deal by deal.
- ProductSpend controls Spend controls sit alongside routing and admin in the value the platform fee carries; Orb's spend controls cover the alerts and dashboards that keep usage visible for customers.
Questions about OpenRouter pricing
How much does OpenRouter cost?
OpenRouter's pricing starts at 5.5% platform fee. The page shows 4 plans, including a free plan, with the top plan priced through sales.
What pricing model does OpenRouter use?
OpenRouter prices by usage, combined with transaction fees. Buyers can sign up on their own or go through the sales team. Its plans are aimed mainly at developers.
Does OpenRouter have a free plan?
Yes, OpenRouter has a free plan. Paid plans start at 5.5% platform fee.
Does OpenRouter offer an annual discount?
OpenRouter's pricing page shows a single billing period. The listed prices start at 5.5% platform fee. Terms for the plans priced through sales are set with the sales team.
How is OpenRouter's pricing page laid out?
The page shows 4 plans, highlights Standard, and includes a comparison table and an FAQ. The breakdown above marks 14 points on it: 5 things it does well and 9 insights into the pricing.
How does OpenRouter charge for bring-your-own-key (BYOK) usage?
On the Standard and Business plans, OpenRouter's BYOK allowance is "$25,000 of list price inference / month with no fees, 5% fee after". Teams that bring their own provider keys can route their first $25,000 of list price inference each month with no platform fee. On Enterprise, the BYOK limit is set as "Custom".
What are OpenRouter's rate limits on each plan?
The Free plan allows "50 requests/day". On Standard and Business, rate limits are "Passthrough from the provider(s)", so capacity follows the upstream model provider. Enterprise lists "Higher allowances available".
What does the OpenRouter Enterprise plan include?
OpenRouter Enterprise offers "Fee discounts available" on the platform fee, along with SSO/SAML, Contractual SLAs, Managed Policy Enforcement and a dedicated support team. It also includes invoicing options, a custom workspace limit, a custom BYOK allowance and DPA "Customizations available". Private Endpoints are available as an "Add on".
From the page as captured October 26, 2026. Current prices are on openrouter.ai
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