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GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

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Re: GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

#201

Post by torben-friis »

skeeter2020 wrote: post #106
my002 wrote: post #4

The era of subsidised inference is truly ending. The new model multipliers ( https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/reference/copilot-billing... ) seem like a huge leap, though. From 1x to 6x for new-ish GPT and Sonnet models. 27x for Opus... Seems like folks would be better off with OpenRouter instead.

"This change aligns Copilot pricing with actual usage and is an important step toward a sustainable, reliable Copilot business and experience for all users." I see statements like this as strong indicators that the sales people are wrapping up their work and the accountants are taking over. The land rush is switching to an operational efficiency play.

The sooner the better. Let's take a look at the long term, enshittified, viable product before we get too dependent on the trial version.

Re: GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

#202

Post by bluescrn »

giwook wrote: post #71
my002 wrote: post #4

The era of subsidised inference is truly ending. The new model multipliers ( https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/reference/copilot-billing... ) seem like a huge leap, though. From 1x to 6x for new-ish GPT and Sonnet models. 27x for Opus... Seems like folks would be better off with OpenRouter instead.

Lots of us have noticed that usage limits for Claude have been nerfed in recent weeks/months. If anything, these new multipliers are more transparent than anything OpenAI or Anthropic have communicated regarding actual costs and give us a more realistic understanding of what it's costing these providers. The fact that we were able to get such a substantial amount of usage for $20/$100/$200 a month was never meant to…

Did anyone really expect AI to be cheap?

If/when it gets to the point where it can replace a skilled worker, the service can be sold for close to the same price as that skilled labour. But the AI can run 24/7, reliably, and scale up/down at a moments notice.

There's not going to be much competition to drive prices down, the barriers to entry are already huge. There'll likely to be one clear winner, becoming a near-monopoly, or maybe we'll get a duopoly at best.

Re: GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

#204

Post by slopinthebag »

dist-epoch wrote: post #70
ReptileMan wrote: post #38

I really don't understand why OpenAI, Anthropic and Microsoft are in competition to see which one of the three will elevate deepseek the most.

DeepSeek will do the same thing. Z/Mimo already raised their prices multiple times since the promotional prices at the start of the year.

DeepSeek is actually more expensive than expected ATM due to compute shortage, but they said it would come down in price.

Re: GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

#206

Post by boothby »

AntiUSAbah wrote: post #173
BearOso wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you paid attention to the power requirements and amount of hardware being put into data centers, you should have realized that it cost them an order of magnitude more than you were being charged. To rework your analogy: they hooked you, now they're gonna see if they can reel you in.

They can only reel you in if its worth it. I still can code. And while i do not spend 200$ privat, in my startup we discussed this and our current mental model is, that instead of hiring someone new, we prefer to have more money for tokens. This is easier for us and has a bigger benefit. The cost of a new / first employee is very high, a 200$ subscription is not. Upgrading that to lets say 400 or 800$ is still alot e…

I'm looking at education -- teachers and students, not terribly tech savvy, are being mandated to use these tools. And then comes the rug-pull. It was worth it, but now it's outside of their budget. Poorer schools / students can't stay at the cutting edge; richer schools / students can.

Re: GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

#207

Post by Ronsenshi »

boc wrote: post #96
sefrost wrote: post #25

I was curious why a company would still use the VS Code + Copilot sidebar method for coding, rather than something like Claude Code. Turns out there’s a GitHub Copilot CLI! I thought I was pretty familiar with available options, but no one in my circles ever mentions this product. It doesn’t seem to have much mindshare. Has anyone used it? What’s your experience? https://github.com/features/copilot/cli

I'm just so confused why people aren't just using ghostty/kitty/terminal.app and claude code. Compared to the other approaches I've tried, it's by far the most effective way to get performance from opus 4.6/4.7

I don't know about others, but I use Copilot more often than other apps because of its tight integration with the VS Code itself where I still spend most of my time working on other things while letting AI do some task that I decided to delegate to it.

Re: GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

#208

Post by pojzon »

hakunin wrote: post #157

Everybody who says it's a 5-9-27x seems to not be aware of the obvious loophole. More like 50x increase. You were able to use over $500 worth of Opus on a $10/mo Github plan easily, no hacks. You could just prompt "plan this out for me, don't stop until fully planned, don't ask any questions", and you would get ~$5 worth of planning in one 3x request. At 100 requests/mo, each easily reaching $5, that's easy $500 wort…

I did many 1h+ sessions of agent asking questions, delegating to subagents - all for 1 premium request.

I would say its a x1000 increase in price for agentic workflows.

Re: GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

#209

Post by stego-tech »

It begins.

"It" being the end of subsidization of tokens and plans (expected) but while lock-in to foundational models and cloud services is still lacking. Guess investors want their ROI sooner than later, given how big of a wrench the AI boom has thrown into global economics.

Re: GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing

#210

Post by asdfasgasdgasdg »

everfrustrated wrote: post #193
theanonymousone wrote: post #162

Something is hilariously off here: Why should I pay $10 and be forced to use it by the end of the month, while I can pay $10 and have it last as long as I want? Their "API pricing" is exactly the same as that of providers: https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/reference/copilot-billing...

I'm thinking the same. Downgrade to Pro and use OpenRouter (same price) for overage. Seems a massive loss for Microsoft. Presumably there's a further rugpull to come.

> Presumably there's a further rugpull to come.

How would that be? They are already charging as much as the underlying providers. They can hardly expect to have any customers if they are charging more.

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