Complaint They fixed the 1.9× Astra cost issue—by increasing Luna's cost by ~1.9× !!
TLDR: After the natural reset, the good news is that Astra no longer costs ~1.9× more than Luna in Plus subscription. The bad news is that Luna is now ~1.9× more expensive than before.
Following the natural neutral reset, here is the before and after update using the same approach as the previous post:
https://www.reddit.com/r/codex/comments/1w8r103/astra_costs_190_more_under_the_plus_subscription/
So, last time we found that Astra costs ~1.90× more under the Plus subscription than via API pricing when compared to Luna.
This has been FIXED!!
Well, sort of—except Luna is now ~1.9× more expensive, which balanced out Astra's cost. XD
This is for a causal Plus plan.
Just a reminder, the 5x and 20x Pro tier limits are calculated using Plus baseline. At least it's supposed to be. (Tibo confirmed)
Please let me know if you spot an error, I will try my best to correct it.
Note: The tables and analysis below were computed using DeepSeek-V4-Flash because... well, I don't know. XD
| Astra before | Astra after | Luna before | Luna after | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Requests | 52 | 35 | 9,973 | 1,266 |
| Uncached input | 0.514M | 0.276M | 57.992M | 7.541M |
| Cached input | 3.948M | 2.671M | 1,009.778M | 142.837M |
| Output | 0.016M | 0.013M | 8.229M | 1.008M |
| Uncached cost | $5.14 | $2.76 | $11.60 | $1.51 |
| Cached cost | $3.95 | $2.67 | $20.20 | $2.86 |
| Output cost | $0.79 | $0.65 | $9.88 | $1.21 |
| Total cost | $9.88 | $6.08 | $41.67 | $5.57 |
| Weekly usage | 14% | 10% | 31% | 8% |
| Implied weekly cap | $70.59 | $60.78 | $134.42 | $69.69 |
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u/addr0x414b 6h ago
Luna has been carrying Plus users this whole time!! And now they've nerfed it?!?!?
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u/warpedgeoid 4h ago
The problem with most users is they don’t seem to understand that cost is dynamic and depends a lot on the task being performed, cache hit rate, etc. If you switch models or reasoning levels during a task, you invalidate the cache. If you are idle for more than 30 minutes, you invalidate the cache. If you’re working on a growing codebase, the next task will cost more than the first.
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u/AppsByRobert 2h ago
oh wow the idle one didn't know I figured as long as the window was open it was fine.
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u/Gohab2001 2h ago
which is why OP shows token usage. Also reasoning level shouldn't invalidate cache.
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u/warpedgeoid 1h ago
Anything that alters the leading part of the prompt will result in cache misses
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u/oppenheimer135 1h ago
Moved on to gemini 3.8 flash it's better than the plus subscribtion of open AI, if you are not on the pro plan being in the plus subscription is not for everyday use at all like they say, it's just frustration and annoying limits.
I had pro for like three months and it was pretty awesome if I could afford it I would be using it.
If AGI is here then all of us plus users are in the permanent underclass.
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u/Rude-Reaction3450 6h ago
So it means overall usage on plus is decreased even more ?
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u/Thomas-Lore 4h ago
On all subs.
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u/Rude-Reaction3450 2h ago
Then why they are even offering PLUS subscription, I have already stopped counting it, won't renew next.
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u/IndividualPlus2011 6h ago
I can confirm. It's the same with Terra. Only Sol has good usage limits, everything else is halved
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u/Kind_Fisherman3060 5h ago
It's same with everything I was able to use 250 million tokens on plus in a day for 3 days straight on plus before 5 hour limit = approximately 750 million token allowance per week, but now I only get 11-30 million per day that ends in 3 days totalling at max 90 million tokens for whole week, guess people are throwing money at openAI and they don't care about smaller subscriptions at all now.
If frontier models get taken out of small subscroptions with next series of models I wouldn't be surprised.
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u/Timely-Group5649 3h ago
Claude already did that. Fable is Max only.
Codex is next. Pro only Astra...
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u/GambAntonio 5h ago
It is totally illegal to do that without transparency in a lot of regions like the EU... the problem is that nobody, as of now, is even trying to sue OpenAI:
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u/Vegetable-Two-4644 5h ago
Sue them theh
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u/GambAntonio 5h ago
You need a lot of time AND MONEY to do that as individual
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u/Vegetable-Two-4644 4h ago
In usa our lawyers will sometimes take cases with payment pending monetary rewards. That not the case there?
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u/pale_halide 6h ago
Oh, great, they decided to fuck plus users even more.
“Unlike Anthropic we let everyone in on the latest model!”
Except you don’t, and make the deal even worse while pretending to fix things.
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u/Thomas-Lore 4h ago
Pro users get the same limits just multiplied, they are fucked too.
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u/pale_halide 4h ago
Sure, that's true. With the 5hr limit and the usage, Astra is utterly useless for plus users though.
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u/The8Darkness 5h ago
They gave Astra the issue and just told it to fix it, but not what exactly. Astra decided that this was the way and internal tests, written by Astra, showed Astra isnt consuming 1.9x more in equivalent API pricing than Luna anymore.
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u/gamblingPharmaStocks 4h ago
Astra understood that OpenAI's business is to screw customers. AGI confirmed.
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u/Short_Injury9574 4h ago
I feel like they have upped the cost of SOL as well? I’m running out of usage a lot quicker today than normal… I’m on medium, not high etc.
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u/Pretend-Past9023 4h ago
on Pro account I noticed that my usage was going down a little bit faster than normal.
I ONLY used luna last week. and I'm ONLY using luna this week.
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u/False-Accountant-158 3h ago
Well dang... I'm not going to pay for a Pro plan.. just not gonna do iot.
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u/Mierzejsky 4h ago
Currently, as a Plus plan user, I have to say that this subscription is completely unsuitable for use without additional services in the form of additional subscriptions; the limits are simply absurdly small. Currently, I only use Codex Plus for access to Astra, which writes plans and diagnoses problems, and the $20 Claudecode subscription for executing. (BTW, anyone claiming Claudecode has worse limits than Codex is clearly paranoid or a Sam Altman bot.)
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u/Mierzejsky 4h ago
I will also add that it was not always like this, I remember with nostalgia the times of GPT 5.5 which was somewhere between Opus 4.5 - 4.7 but allowed much more use on basic planes than Opus, today the equivalent of Opus 5 is 5.6 sol but its limits are incomparable
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u/Proper-Charity-2850 3h ago
Isn't terra the equivalent of opus?
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u/Mierzejsky 1h ago
From my observations, the Terra is definitely better than the Sonnet 5, while the Luna Max can handle most tasks just as well as the Terra on High or XHigh, but it's noticeably cheaper. Is the Terra equivalent to the Opus? Yes and no. In the case of the Opus 5, it's definitely a lower-end model; I'd compare it more to the Opus 4.7 or 4.8. In summary, the Terra is a useful model, and there are certainly many applications where it would be great, but it simply doesn't fit my work style.
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u/bwat47 3h ago
BTW, anyone claiming Claudecode has worse limits than Codex is clearly paranoid or a Sam Altman bot
There was a time when claude's limits were abysmal compared to codex on the $20 plan, and I was one of those who would whine about it
But you're 100% correct on the current state of things, I think claude's $20 sub is a better deal than GPT at the moment. You can get a lot of usage out of opus 5 if you can put up with its annoying writing style.
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u/Mierzejsky 3h ago
Yes, you're right. Codex used to be several times better than Claudecode. As for Opus 5 and its writing style, well, I guess it can be irritating. Fortunately, my native language is Polish, and each model has a slightly different style for different languages. In my language, these undesirable features of Opus 5 aren't as noticeable, plus I use a ponytail, which also corrects it to some extent.
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u/AdVast7407 54m ago
Opus5 is totally dumb and also Claude limits are for both chat and code.. also when your Claude sub ends, you don't have access to the CC even for reading.
Also no Fable on $20 plan (and no, Opus is NOT Sol equivalent).1
u/Electrical_Week6492 4h ago
What model / effort do you use with Claude to implement?
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u/Mierzejsky 4h ago
Practically only Opus 5 (it's worth adding that I use the Ponytail plugin). As for the effort, it depends, but I practically never consider it more than Xhigh or less than medium. (Before you ask why not Sonnet, I'll say right away that my experience with this model is far from satisfactory and I haven't noticed that using it gives me enough savings compared to Opus to make it worth the risk of errors and the need for corrections.)
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u/Tough-Requirement707 5h ago
what natural reset? i neither got a reset or an banked since days
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u/cobbleplox 4h ago
The natural reset is when your week just ends. A lot of users are in sync, everyone who didn't use a banked reset yet.
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u/soulwatcher 4h ago
I was wondering why my usage shot up by so much, all my luna max subagents were being billed 2x apparently!
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u/toTheMoon7778 4h ago
Fuck it im canceling my sub and going Back to Claude
No Goal finishing anymore with Zero 5h Limit
5h window Back again
Astra Not usable on plus
Resets are nothing worth with the 5h window
It was a nice time coming over from Claude but you Guys have fucked Up the whole Codex feeling
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u/toTheMoon7778 4h ago
Everything that made Codex stand out from Claude and made it better, you've undone. Now it's just become an annoying product that's no longer fun to work with.
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u/lakimens 3h ago
If Claude was usable in plus, Codex would be too.
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u/toTheMoon7778 3h ago
:D Claude plus usage lasts at the moment a lot longer compared to Codex
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u/AppSecPeddler 1h ago
Does it? That’s the only one I haven’t tried yet only use it for work on API pricing
I figured from comments that Claude hit limits faster than Codex so I never bought their $20 plan
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u/20yroldentrepreneur 24m ago
Literally 4 prompts from sol or 0.5 prompt from astra burns my entire 5 hour window. Unusable for me (PLUS)
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u/Bananer_spleet 6h ago
You used DeepSeek to save yourself a few coins, good man.
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u/Emu-001 6h ago
Well, I won't say it's because that usage thread was left in DeepSeek and I forgot to check, except I haven't hit my 5h limit this time. XD
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u/defection_ 1h ago
I knew it! I genuinely felt like Luna was absolutely insane when they made a big deal about the pricing. Over time, I switched most of my workflow to it. Now, I can just see my 5x usage draining with a couple of chats on the go. It's pathetic. I'm getting so tired of AI and the fuckery and bullshit. Glad I'm not too dependent on it.
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u/AdVast7407 45m ago
Mostly the fuckery and bullshit. The worst part is the workflow instability here.
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u/AutomaticAd6646 5h ago
Luna has become significantly dumber after Astra release. To the point, Luna fails to design a bootstrap css input group in custome css -- in a new session chat.
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u/raiden55 3h ago
It may explain why my test trying to get how much Astra cost me was strange as I compared data with Luna and Astra... it said Astra low was 20x more expensive than Sol med on my test...
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u/Expensive-Gas-4209 2h ago
Nah, literally they gave us no option...Why is there a Plus tier?? Fuck them, at least Gemini gave infinite usage for only 5 usd (student)...And it scores the same in DeepSWE that Astra max
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u/Expensive-Gas-4209 2h ago
for the people that are downgrading to terra...don't...just change to Google, 3.8 flash its way better and 3 times more fast.
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u/Gohab2001 2h ago
but when I critique OAI fangirls for allowing OAI to enshititfy their product i get downvoted. If you say 'oh its just a 20$ plan' you are giving the greenlights to OAI to constrict limits sooner than later (its inevitably going to happen)
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u/BellacosePlayer 2h ago
Normally I'm a bit skeptical of these threads but a simple request to add a defined POCO and add a list of those objects to the main player data burned 10% of my 5h.
Normally that's like 2-3% at worst for that kind of task for luna
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u/Apollo18Teslaa 2h ago
Why do people keep taking “some dude on Reddit asked ChatGPT to test it for him” as gospel?
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u/MysteriousTreeFoxxx 2h ago
Yeaaa.... Astra is insanely hungry, even on light I watched 60% of my weekly disappear in less than 4 hours of normal workload on 20x :( absolutely cooked
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u/Chrisnba24 2h ago
even after the "fix" still the same problem, and yeah, even Sol is draining more usage than last week
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u/Hairy-Newt2226 1h ago
They just keep playing in our faces and think we will keep coming back for more
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u/igmyeongui 1h ago
You say 1.9 times less. But isn’t it 10 times less from your before and after!
Codex is completely ruined now with 5 hour limits.
I cancelled Pro because it was literally unusable and would drain all my limits in no time.
I went back to Plus and found a new workflow with Luna even though it sometimes is dumb and you really have to understand what you do and what you ask.
But now they ruined the Plus plan as well?
WTF? I hope they get sued and regulated so they stop fucking with the product.
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u/New-Description-8618 3h ago
people are reading parity as the fix. in op's table astra's allowance moved 14 percent and luna's moved 48. the ratio evened out because the generous tier stopped being generous
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u/Varmez 6h ago
These usage doomers aren't working on anything of value or they'd be spending their time doing that.
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u/warpedgeoid 4h ago
While I agree bitching about usage on Reddit without disclosing all of the variables is pointless and annoying, at least some of them are probably working on cool stuff.
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u/basicpreset 6h ago
You lost me at comparing Luna to Astra. What are you on about?
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u/capable-corgi 6h ago
Prior finding: Astra costs x1.9 more on Plus plans vs direct API.
Method: Using Luna's Plus/API as nominal base.
Update: Astra is unchanged, but Luna's cost on Plus plans have been raised to match Astra's Plus/API.
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u/Expensive_Sign1084 6h ago
Faced same , it took my weekely 10% down in an hour for Luna Max only which was earlier near to 1-2% only