Cost Comparison and ROI Across All Three Tools

Your finance team does not need a promise that an AI tool “pays for itself.” It needs the fixed subscription price, the rules for additional usage, and assumptions it can replace with observed data. This guide separates those three things.

What You’ll Walk Away With

Current public subscription prices for individuals and teams
The difference between included usage, paid credits, and API billing
A token-based Codex rate card instead of obsolete message estimates
Illustrative scenarios whose assumptions are visible and editable
A break-even formula that does not assume undocumented productivity gains

Verified Plan Prices

Individual Plans

Product	Plan	Public US Price	Coding Access and Billing Model
Cursor	Hobby	$0	Limited Agent and Tab usage
Cursor	Pro	$20/month	Includes $20 of third-party API usage plus first-party/bonus capacity
Cursor	Pro+	$60/month	Includes $70 of third-party API usage plus first-party/bonus capacity
Cursor	Ultra	$200/month	Includes $400 of third-party API usage plus first-party/bonus capacity
Claude	Pro	$20/month or $200/year	Claude Code included; plan usage is shared with Claude
Claude	Max 5x	$100/month	Five times Pro session capacity; Claude Code included
Claude	Max 20x	$200/month	Twenty times Pro session capacity; Claude Code included
ChatGPT	Plus	$20/month	Codex included; credits may extend usage after included limits
ChatGPT	Pro 5x	$100/month	Same Pro capabilities with five times Plus usage
ChatGPT	Pro 20x	$200/month	Highest individual Pro allowance; twenty times Plus usage

The “5x” and “20x” labels describe relative plan capacity, not a guaranteed number of Codex or Claude Code messages. Task size, model, context, effort, and execution surface all affect consumption.

Team and Enterprise Plans

Product	Plan / Seat	Monthly Billing	Annual Billing	Key Billing Controls
Cursor	Teams Standard	$40/user/month	$32/user/month	Central billing, analytics, spend alerts, admin controls
Cursor	Teams Premium	$120/user/month	$96/user/month	Five times Standard included usage; mixable with Standard seats
Cursor	Enterprise	Custom	Custom	Pooled usage, invoicing, SCIM, advanced controls
Claude	Team Standard	$25/member/month	$20/member/month	Central billing/admin, spend controls, Claude Code, usage credits
Claude	Team Premium	$125/member/month	$100/member/month	Higher per-member usage; mixable with Standard seats
Claude	Enterprise	Custom	Custom	Seat- or usage-based contract, analytics and enterprise controls
ChatGPT	Business standard seat	$25/user/month	$20/user/month	Workspace billing/admin; baseline Codex access and optional shared credits
ChatGPT	Enterprise	Custom	Custom	Contracted workspace, RBAC, spend controls and credit pool

Claude Team requires at least five members. ChatGPT Business standard-seat access requires at least two seats. Cursor and Claude usage allowances remain per member unless the applicable enterprise contract explicitly provides pooling.

How Usage Is Metered

Individual plans include a third-party API pool plus separate first-party/bonus capacity. Pro, Pro+, and Ultra publicly list $20, $70, and $400 of third-party API usage respectively, even though their subscription prices are $20, $60, and $200.

Model selection changes how quickly the pool is consumed. Auto dynamically routes requests; it is not a fixed low-cost model. When included usage is exhausted, Cursor can charge approved on-demand usage at published rates or the user can upgrade. Teams Standard and Premium use separate first-party and third-party pools, with live balances shown in the dashboard.

Current Codex Credit Rate Card

Credits per 1M tokens under the current token-based rate card:

Model	Input	Cached Input	Output
GPT-5.6 Sol	125	12.5	750
GPT-5.6 Terra	62.5	6.25	375
GPT-5.6 Luna	25	2.5	150

Actual task cost is the sum of the token categories used. Fast mode has separate rates. A small subset of older Enterprise workspaces may still use OpenAI’s legacy card; those customers should follow their workspace contract rather than this table.

Illustrative Individual Scenarios

Working Pattern	Cursor Candidate	Claude Candidate	ChatGPT/Codex Candidate	What to Validate
Occasional assistance	Pro — $20	Pro — $20	ChatGPT Plus — $20	Whether included usage covers the measured month
Daily agent work	Pro+ — $60	Max 5x — $100	ChatGPT Pro 5x — $100	Token/credit draw, context length, and frequency of parallel tasks
Sustained high usage	Ultra — $200	Max 20x — $200	ChatGPT Pro 20x — $200	Whether the higher allowance costs less than lower tier plus measured overage
Mixed-tool workflow	Add the actual named subscriptions	Add the actual named subscriptions	Add the actual named subscriptions	Whether duplicated capabilities justify every seat

An individual can combine tools, but the budget should be simple addition. For example, Cursor Pro plus Claude Pro plus ChatGPT Plus is $60/month before usage credits or on-demand charges. That is an arithmetic example, not a recommendation.

Illustrative Team Seat Math

For five named users, public seat fees are:

Workspace	Monthly Billing	Annual Billing Equivalent	Notes
Cursor Teams Standard	5 × $40 = $200/month	5 × $32 = $160/month	Additional usage may apply
Cursor Teams Premium	5 × $120 = $600/month	5 × $96 = $480/month	Standard and Premium seats can be mixed
Claude Team Standard	5 × $25 = $125/month	5 × $20 = $100/month	Five-member minimum; credits optional
Claude Team Premium	5 × $125 = $625/month	5 × $100 = $500/month	Standard and Premium seats can be mixed
ChatGPT Business	5 × $25 = $125/month	5 × $20 = $100/month	Baseline Codex access; workspace credits optional

For a mixed-seat plan, use:

monthly seat cost
= standard seats × standard monthly rate
+ premium seats × premium monthly rate
+ measured on-demand usage or purchased credits
+ separately billed API/automation usage

Do not estimate Enterprise cost from public seat prices. Ask each vendor for a quote that states platform fees, included usage, overage rates, support, security options, and billing terms.

ROI Without Invented Productivity Numbers

Break-Even Formula

hours required to break even
= total monthly tool cost / loaded developer cost per hour

Monthly Tool Cost	At $80/hour	At $120/hour	At $150/hour
$20	0.25 h	0.17 h	0.13 h
$60	0.75 h	0.50 h	0.40 h
$100	1.25 h	0.83 h	0.67 h
$200	2.50 h	1.67 h	1.33 h

This table only calculates the threshold. It does not claim the tool will save that much time.

Editable Illustration

Assume, solely for planning, a loaded rate of $120/hour, 220 working days, and a measured saving of 30 minutes per working day:

annual measured time saved = 0.5 × 220 = 110 hours
annual gross value = 110 × $120 = $13,200
annual tool cost at $100/month = $1,200
illustrative net value = $13,200 - $1,200 = $12,000

Replace the 30-minute assumption with evidence from your own pilot: cycle time, accepted code, review rework, escaped defects, or developer time studies. Do not present this illustration as measured ROI.

Total Cost of Ownership Checklist

Fixed subscription or seat fee
Usage credits, on-demand inference, and API-key spend
Separate automation, code-review, or compute charges
Time spent on onboarding, policy, rules, MCP, and integrations
Human review and security/compliance controls
Duplicate subscriptions across tools
Taxes, currency conversion, annual commitments, and contract minimums
Cost of blocked work measured from actual limit events

When This Analysis Stops Being Reliable

The vendor changes a price, allowance, model, promotion, or credit rate.
Your account has regional pricing or a negotiated agreement.
A workload moves from interactive subscription use to API or SDK automation.
A team assumes individual credentials can be shared.
An illustrative usage or productivity assumption is presented as observed data.

Official Sources

Cursor: pricing, usage model, and June 2026 Teams pricing
Anthropic: individual plans, Team plan, and usage credits
OpenAI: ChatGPT pricing, Codex plan access, Codex rate card, and Business billing

What’s Next

Cost Optimization Reduce measured spend without relying on message-count folklore

Feature Matrix Compare what each current plan actually provides

Pricing Calculator Apply the verified rates to your own assumptions