Reading
AI subscriptions keep climbing. Here is what a seat still costs.
OpenAI now sells a $200-a-month tier and reports a billion-dollar ad run-rate. As the sticker prices rise, this is what the same tools cost on a shared plan, read today.
Prices last read 2026-09-02
The short version
The headline prices are going up. The shared prices, read today, have not moved with them.There is now a $200 ChatGPT Pro tier, and OpenAI's ad business just crossed a billion-dollar annualised run-rate — the industry is testing how much people will pay. A seat on a shared plan is a different number, and this page reads it from the seller every day rather than repeating last month's.Two pieces of news this week say the same thing from opposite ends. One: analysts at SemiAnalysis noted a $200 ChatGPT Pro subscription can represent thousands of dollars of API-equivalent usage if pushed hard — flat-rate plans quietly subsidise their heaviest users. Two: OpenAI's advertising revenue hit a billion-dollar run-rate. Both are a business working out what a user is worth.
For anyone paying the sticker price, that is a direction of travel worth watching. For anyone on a shared plan, the question is narrower: what does a seat actually cost right now?
What a seat costs today
| Services | Official | Shared | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | $20.00 | $5.00 | 75% |
| Perplexity AI | $16.67 | $4.09 | 75% |
| Poe | $19.99 | $10.99 | 45% |
| Grok | $30.00 | $15.00 | 50% |
Every price on this page was read on 2026-09-01.
These are read from the seller on the date shown, not carried over. A price that rose yesterday shows as risen; a price that has not moved shows as it is. That is the whole point of reading them daily rather than writing them down once.
See these shared plans on GamsGo. That link carries our partner code Sk52g, which is how a purchase is attributed to this site. Promotion code UPD3S.
A $200 ChatGPT Pro subscription could represent as much as $14,000 a month in equivalent API-priced usage if pushed to its limits.
SemiAnalysis, reported September 2026Why the two prices drift apart
A direct subscription is priced on what the service thinks a single account is worth — and as this week's news shows, that estimate is climbing. A shared seat is priced on how a plan is divided: how many people are on it, and how long the term runs. Those move for different reasons, so the gap between them tends to widen, not close, as the headline tier goes up.
A rising sticker price is not a reason to rush
News that a tier got more expensive does not make a shared seat a better deal than it was yesterday — the shared price is its own number. And a shared seat is not always the whole product. The seller writes its own notes on each product page; this site quotes them rather than summarising them. Read the one for the plan you are buying.
What to actually do with this
- Ignore the headline, read the rowThe $200 tier is a story about the top of the market. What matters to you is the shared price of the plan you use, which is in the table above and read today.
- Check the term before the priceThe lowest monthly figures are usually attached to the longest commitments. A rising market makes a long lock-in riskier, not safer, so weigh the term.
- Read the terms, which have not changedWhether sharing is permitted is set by each service's own terms, linked on its product page with the date checked. A price rise does not change what those say.
Questions people are asking this week
Why is ChatGPT getting a $200 plan?
It is a top tier aimed at the heaviest users, and analysts note that even at $200 it can be a bargain for someone pushing it to API-equivalent limits. For everyone else it is a signal that flat-rate AI pricing is being tested upward, which is a reason to know what a shared seat costs.
Does a shared plan get more expensive when the official price rises?
Not automatically. The shared price is set by how the plan is divided, not by the sticker price, so the two can move independently. This page reads the shared price daily so you are looking at today's number, not last month's.
Is the cheaper AI plan as good as the expensive one?
A shared seat is not always the full product — some plans exclude features that the direct subscription includes. The seller writes these exclusions itself and each product page carries the note in full.
Where do these prices come from?
Each one is read from the seller's own page when this site is built, and each row states the date it was read and the currency it was quoted in. Nothing is estimated, and where a price could not be read the row says so.
Read the news yourself
- CNBC — on OpenAI's advertising run-rate
- OpenAI Terms of Use — what ChatGPT permits
- Perplexity Terms of Service