Pay As You Go vs Monthly Plans: Which Is Cheaper for AI Video?
Monthly plans buy the cheaper credit; pay as you go costs less if you create in bursts. The live rupee and dollar prices, what each render actually costs, and how to pick between them.
If you generate AI video every month, a monthly plan is cheaper per credit. If you generate in bursts — a campaign here, a client project there — pay as you go costs less in absolute terms, because you only pay in the months you actually create something. The gap per credit is about 10%, so the honest question is not price. It is regularity.
Arcframe now sells both, in rupees and in dollars, and this post is the arithmetic behind choosing one. Every number below is the live price at the time of writing.
What one credit costs on each route
A credit is the single unit everything is billed in: video by the second, images and 3D models per generation, speech per 1,000 characters.
| How you buy | Price | Credits | Per credit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pay as you go | ₹199 | 40 | ₹4.97 |
| Pay as you go | ₹561 | 120 | ₹4.67 |
| Pay as you go | ₹1,399 | 300 | ₹4.66 |
| Pay as you go | ₹3,199 | 700 | ₹4.57 |
| Starter, monthly | ₹849 | 200 / month | ₹4.25 |
| Pro, monthly | ₹2,449 | 600 / month | ₹4.08 |
| Studio, monthly | ₹7,749 | 2,000 / month | ₹3.87 |
Rupee prices include 18% GST. Outside India the same ladder is priced in dollars:
| How you buy | Price | Credits | Per credit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pay as you go | $5 | 120 | $0.042 |
| Pay as you go | $12.50 | 300 | $0.042 |
| Pay as you go | $29 | 700 | $0.041 |
| Starter, monthly | $7.50 | 200 / month | $0.038 |
| Pro, monthly | $22 | 600 / month | $0.037 |
| Studio, monthly | $72 | 2,000 / month | $0.036 |
Annual billing is cheaper again: Starter is $79 a year, Pro $234 and Studio $775, which works out at roughly $0.032 a credit — the cheapest credit sold anywhere on the platform.
You can also type your own amount rather than picking a pack, anywhere from ₹199 to ₹25,000 or from $5 to $300. The credits are worked out server-side on the same volume curve as the packs, so a custom amount is never a worse deal than the pack below it.
What that money actually makes
Per-credit pricing means nothing until you know what a render costs. Every video model has a minimum clip length, so each one has a floor price. These are the cheapest possible renders on each:
| Model | Rate | Shortest clip | Credits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wan 2.5 | 2 / second | 5 seconds | 10 |
| Seedance 1.5 | 4 / second | 2 seconds | 8 |
| Gemini Omni Flash | 4 / second | 3 seconds | 12 |
| Kling 2.5 | 3 / second | 5 seconds | 15 |
| Gemini Omni Flash 1.1 | 5 / second | 3 seconds | 15 |
| Veo 3.1 Fast | 7 / second | 4 seconds | 28 |
| Sora 2 | 8 / second | 4 seconds | 32 |
| Seedance 2.0 | 13 / second | 4 seconds | 52 |
| Veo 3.1 | 17 / second | 4 seconds | 68 |
| Seedance 2.5, 720p | 20 / second | 4 seconds | 80 |
| Seedance 2.5, 1080p | 45 / second | 4 seconds | 180 |
Images and 3D are far cheaper: Flux Schnell is 1 credit an image, Flux Dev and Nano Banana Lite are 2, Imagen 4 and Ideogram v3 are 3, and a Hunyuan 3D Rapid mesh is 4. A music or sound-effect track on Stable Audio 2.5 is 9.
So the smallest pay-as-you-go purchase, ₹199 for 40 credits, is four five-second Wan 2.5 clips, or forty Flux Schnell images, or ten 3D models. The $5 pack, at 120 credits, is twelve five-second Wan clips, or eight three-second Gemini Omni Flash 1.1 clips in 1080p, or sixty Flux Dev images.
Every model runs on every plan
This is the part that changed most recently, and it is worth being explicit about: there is no per-plan model gating any more. Veo, Sora, Seedance and Kling are not locked behind a tier. The only thing that decides whether you can run a model is whether your balance covers the render.
That means the table above doubles as the access rule. A brand-new account gets 20 credits at signup, which reaches Wan 2.5, Seedance 1.5 and Gemini Omni Flash. For a four-second Seedance 2.5 clip at 720p you need 80 credits, so you would top up first. Nobody has to buy a plan to unlock a model; they buy credits to afford a render.
Which route fits you
- Pay as you go suits occasional and project-based work. No subscription, no renewal date, and nothing to cancel. If you make videos in two months out of six, you pay in two.
- Starter at 200 credits a month is the break-even point. If you are reliably spending ₹561 or more on credits most months, the plan gives you more credits for less.
- Pro and Studio are for steady production. They carry the cheapest credits, unused credits roll forward up to 3 and 6 months respectively, and both include voice cloning and commercial-use rights.
- Annual billing is the cheapest credit available if you already know this is a tool you use every month.
Three details worth knowing before you buy
- Free credits are a one-time grant. Every new account gets 20 credits at signup. There is no monthly free refill, so plan around the grant rather than waiting for it to return.
- Rollover differs by plan. Starter resets to 200 credits each cycle and does not roll over. Pro rolls over up to three months of credits, Studio up to six. Pay as you go has no cycle at all, so nothing resets.
- If you are on a plan and also top up, the credits share one balance, and your plan’s renewal rule applies to that balance as a whole. On Starter in particular, buy a pack when you are about to use it rather than months in advance.
Where to buy
Both routes live on the same page. Pay-as-you-go packs and the custom amount are on the pricing page and in Settings under Billing, alongside the monthly and annual plans. Prices are shown in rupees or dollars based on where you are, and the price you see is the price you are charged.