> For clean Markdown of any page, append .md to the page URL.
> For a complete documentation index, see https://developers.meshapi.ai/docs/introduction/llms.txt.
> For full documentation content, see https://developers.meshapi.ai/docs/introduction/llms-full.txt.

# Pricing Details

> Understand how pricing and billing works for MeshAPI models.

# Detailed Pricing

MeshAPI provides a simplified token-based pricing structure to ensure you only pay for exactly what you consume.

## How Token Pricing Works

Like many foundational model APIs, usage is calculated per token. We display pricing based on blocks of **1,000 tokens**.

There are two primary components to pricing:

* **Prompt Pricing (`prompt_usd_per_1k`):** The cost per 1,000 tokens of context sent *to* the model.
* **Completion Pricing (`completion_usd_per_1k`):** The cost per 1,000 tokens generated *by* the model.

Since different models require different computational resources, pricing varies heavily. Some lighter models are exceptionally cheap per token, while heavy reasoning models cost more.

## Free Tier vs. Paid Models

We sort models into two distinct buckets to make cost administration easy:

1. **Free Models:** These models are completely free to use (`is_free = true`) and cost \$0 for both prompt and completion. They are exceptional for testing your application routing, standardizing prompts, and light tasks.
2. **Paid Models:** These charge a variable rate. Paid models typically include advanced reasoning capabilities and larger context sizes.

## Pre-paid Balances

Before using Paid models, you must load funds onto your account balance. Your balance is debited micro-fractions of a cent per token processed. Once your balance reaches zero, paid API requests will return an HTTP 402 "Spend Limit Exceeded" response until you top up.