The Subscription-Based OpenAI Codex is Super Cheap

After hitting the $20 monthly limit for ChatGPT Plus, I started experimenting with Codex using my API keys. It turns out it's incredibly expensive. After using it for about one day, I racked up $99 in charges.

You can see the analytics breakdown in these links:

• Perplexity analysis
• Gemini analysis
• Grok analysis

A big missing piece is that OpenAI search still costs extra money. I'm using Azure OpenAI keys, which don't provide web search functionalities, so that's an additional cost consideration.

The TLDR: Stick with Subscriptions for Early Stage

For early stage vibe coding, purchase a subscription. If you have one ChatGPT Plus subscription at $20, use that. When you hit the limit, purchase another one. That's totally fine, at least for this month.

The math is simple: even buying multiple $20 subscriptions is cheaper than burning through API credits at the rate I experienced.

Claude Code: A Frustrating Experience

Claude Code has been dishonest and disgusting. Their "cost saving" turns out to be bugs, and these bugs haven't been any of their top priorities for three weeks now. I wasted three weeks of my app development time dealing with random bugs caused by Claude Code.

For more perspective on this topic, check out Peter's blog post about AI subscriptions.

The bottom line: when you're in the early stages of development, subscription models offer predictable costs and fewer headaches than pay-per-use APIs that can surprise you with massive bills.