How much do AI coding agents cost per developer?
At API list prices, a developer who runs a coding agent every working day costs $71 a month on Claude Sonnet 5.5 when their days are typical and $579 when every day is busy. With one busy developer in five, a team of 20 costs $3,447 a month on Sonnet 5.5 and twice that on Opus 5.5.
Cost per developer per month
We priced every coding-agent request on the Standard Compute gateway from September 13 to October 12, 2026 at each model's list price. The median active day had 94 requests and 8.5M tokens. A busy day, the 90th percentile, had 491 requests and 86.7M tokens. Cache reads were 87% of input, which keeps a day far cheaper than its token count suggests.
Busy here means the 90th-percentile day repeated every working day, an upper bound for planning: our 297 developer-days come from 75 developers, so no single developer's month is measured. This page plans a team rollout; for one person choosing a plan, see what AI coding agents cost per month.
| Developer | Per day, Sonnet 5.5 | Month, Sonnet 5.5 | Month, Opus 5.5 | Month, GPT-6 Luna |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Typical (median day) | $3.53 | $71 | $141 | $5 |
| Busy (90th percentile, every day) | $28.97 | $579 | $1,159 | $48 |
| Team average, 1 busy in 5 | $8.62 | $172 | $345 | $13 |
Month = 20 working days. Agents in the sample: OpenCode, Kilo, Roo and others; Claude Code and Codex were not in it. List prices per million tokens on October 13, 2026: Sonnet 5.5 $2 input, $0.10 cache read, $10 output; Opus 5.5 $4, $0.20, $20 (claude.com/pricing).
Monthly cost by team size
The busy developers carry the bill. In a team of 20, the four busy ones account for $2,318 of the $3,447 on Sonnet 5.5, two thirds of the total. Opus 5.5 doubles every figure, and an efficient model such as GPT-6 Luna costs a fraction of either.
| Team | Typical + busy | Sonnet 5.5 | Opus 5.5 | GPT-6 Luna |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 developers | 4 + 1 | $862 | $1,724 | $66 |
| 10 developers | 8 + 2 | $1,724 | $3,447 | $132 |
| 20 developers | 16 + 4 | $3,447 | $6,894 | $264 |
| 50 developers | 40 + 10 | $8,618 | $17,236 | $660 |
API at list prices, 20 working days, every developer on one model all month. The one-in-five busy mix is a planning assumption: count your own heavy agent users and adjust.
A team of 20, priced each way
Seat plans cost least while every developer fits inside their limits, and a busy agent user often does not. Budgets per key cost about the same as the API for this mix; what they add is a known ceiling per developer, with any agent and model.
| Option | Per developer | Team of 20 | Limit |
|---|---|---|---|
| API, Sonnet 5.5 | $172 avg. | $3,447 | None. The total moves with usage |
| API, Opus 5.5 | $345 avg. | $6,894 | None. The total moves with usage |
| Claude Team, Premium seats | $125/mo ($100 yearly) | $2,500 | 5-hour and weekly limits per member, Claude models only |
| ChatGPT Business | $25/mo ($20 yearly) | $500 | Codex at Plus-level 5-hour limits; weekly limits may apply |
| Cursor Teams | $30/mo and up | $600 and up | Claude and GPT usage billed on top at API list prices |
| Standard Compute, 16 Standard + 4 Pro Plus | $171 avg. | $3,420 | A fixed budget per key ($95 on Standard, $549 on Pro Plus) that stops at the cap, with no overage |
Seat prices from claude.com/pricing, developers.openai.com/codex/pricing and cursor.com/pricing, checked October 13, 2026. Cursor's teams docs still list $40 and $120 seats. A seat plan's price holds only while each member's work fits its limits.
How budgets per developer work in Standard Compute
- Each developer you invite as a Member or Admin gets their own API key. Every key has its own plan, from Starter at $19 to Fleet at $4,999 a month, and at its monthly budget it stops with HTTP 402 while other keys keep working.
- Pay as you go suits a developer you can't predict yet: usage plus 15% from a prepaid company balance, with a monthly limit per key. Application keys carry their own plan for CI jobs or shared agents.
- Admins see usage and logs for any key, and Billing shows spend this period by company, person or key. Each key's plan bills monthly through Stripe on one company account.
- Compliance limits where requests may run (Europe, United States or anywhere) for the company or one key, and the Audit log records who invited whom, changed a plan or viewed a key.
Rollout plan: pilot, measure, roll out
- Pilot with three developers for two weeks: your heaviest agent user and two typical ones, each on their own key and the agent they already use (Claude Code, Codex CLI, OpenCode or Cline).
- Measure spend per active day for each key on the Usage page. Near $3.50 a day on a Sonnet-class model is typical for coding agents, and near $29 is busy.
- Size each developer from their spend per active day times working days. Standard ($89 price, $95 budget) fits a typical $71 month, Pro ($249 price, $269 budget) a heavier one, and Pro Plus ($499 price, $549 budget) about 19 busy Sonnet 5.5 days. Someone busy every day needs Pay as you go with a monthly limit, or an efficient model for routine work.
- Create the company from Business → Create a company in the dashboard, set its Compliance rule before inviting anyone, then roll out in batches of five to ten.
- Review Billing each month and move developers between plans, so a key that keeps hitting its budget gets a bigger plan before it blocks a sprint.
The catch
A budget sized on the team average will stop your heaviest users mid-task, because a key at its cap returns HTTP 402 until renewal or an upgrade. Our day costs come from agents such as OpenCode, Kilo and Roo, Claude Code and Codex may differ, and the one-in-five mix is our assumption. Run the pilot before you buy for everyone.
Where Standard Compute fits
Teams that need each developer's AI spend fixed before the month starts, across Claude Code, Codex CLI, OpenCode and Cline. Creating the company is free, and billing starts when the first key's plan is active.
FAQ
How much does Claude Code cost for a team of 20?
Claude Team Premium seats cost $125 a month each ($100 billed yearly), so $2,500 for 20, with 5-hour and weekly limits per member. On the API, measure a pilot first: our day costs come from other coding agents, and Claude Code was not in the sample.
How do I budget AI coding agents for a team?
Budget per developer, not per team. Pilot with three developers for two weeks, measure their spend per active day, then give each developer a key with a monthly budget that matches their use. Typical developers and heavy agent users differ by about eight times.
Why does one developer cost eight times another?
Busy days run more and longer agent sessions. Our median coding-agent day had 94 requests and 8.5M tokens; the 90th percentile day had 491 requests and 86.7M tokens. Context grows with every step of a session, so cost rises faster than the request count.
Are per-seat plans cheaper than paying for the API?
Usually, while each member's work fits the plan's limits. ChatGPT Business is $25 a seat a month and Claude Team Premium $125. A heavy agent user who hits the 5-hour or weekly limit has to wait, move to a bigger seat, or pay for extra usage.
What happens when a developer reaches their budget on Standard Compute?
Their key returns HTTP 402 until the plan renews or an admin upgrades it, and everyone else keeps working. There are no overage charges on plans. A key on Pay as you go keeps running from the prepaid company balance until it reaches its monthly limit.
Can developers on one company account use different coding agents?
Yes. Every developer has their own key. Claude Code connects through the Anthropic Messages API by setting ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL, and Codex CLI, OpenCode, Cline and other agents use the OpenAI-compatible endpoint at api.stdcmpt.com/v1.