Most Affordable AI Models

Find the cheapest and most cost-effective AI models for your applications, including free options.

All ModelsRoleplayCodingMath & LogicLong ContextCheapestOpen SourceDaily Use
Nvidia

Nemotron 3.5 Lightning

NVIDIA

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.10 in / $0.20 out
/M Tokens
DeepSeek

DeepSeek V4 Flash 0731

DeepSeek

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.14 in / $0.28 out
/M Tokens
HuggingFace

Laguna S 2.1

Poolside

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.10 in / $0.20 out
/M Tokens
ByteDance

Doubao Seed Character

ByteDance

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.12 in / $0.30 out
/M Tokens
jetbrainsJE

Mellum 2 12B A2.5B Instruct

JetBrains

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.05 in / $0.10 out
/M Tokens
Tencent

Hy3

Tencent

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.10 in / $0.60 out
/M Tokens
Cohere

North Mini Code 1.0

Cohere

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.20 in / $0.80 out
/M Tokens
Stepfun

Step 3.7 Flash

StepFun

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.20 in / $1.15 out
/M Tokens
Stepfun

Step 3.7 Flash (Free)

StepFun

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
savramSA

Sarvam 105B

Sarvam

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.05 in / $0.18 out
/M Tokens
savramSA

Sarvam 30B

Sarvam

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.03 in / $0.11 out
/M Tokens
ibm provider icon

Granite 4.1 8B

IBM

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.04 in / $0.09 out
/M Tokens
HuggingFace

Laguna XS.2 (Free)

Poolside

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
DeepSeek

DeepSeek V4 Flash

DeepSeek

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.12 in / $0.25 out
/M Tokens
xiaomi provider icon

MiMo V2.5

Xiaomi

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.14 in / $0.28 out
/M Tokens
AlibabaCloud

Qwen3.6 Flash

Qwen

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.18 in / $1.04 out
/M Tokens
Google

Gemma 4 26B A4B

Google

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.11 in / $0.36 out
/M Tokens
Google

Gemma 4 31B

Google

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.11 in / $0.33 out
/M Tokens
Google

Gemma 4 31B (Free)

Google

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
OpenAI

GPT 5.4 Nano

OpenAI

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
Flex
5% off
$0.19 in / $1.19 out
/M Tokens
AlibabaCloud

Qwen 3.5 35B A3B

Qwen

Vision
Reasoning
LLM
$0.18 in / $0.46 out
/M Tokens
AlibabaCloud

Qwen 3.5 Flash

Qwen

Vision
Reasoning
LLM
$0.09 in / $0.37 out
/M Tokens
Stepfun

Step 3.5 Flash

StepFun

LLM
$0.10 in / $0.30 out
/M Tokens
thedrummer provider icon

Cydonia 24B v4.3

The Drummer

LLM
$0.09 in / $0.12 out
/M Tokens
Zhipu

GLM 4.7

Z.AI

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.15 in / $0.80 out
/M Tokens
Nvidia

Nemotron 3 Nano 30B A3B

NVIDIA

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.10 in / $0.15 out
/M Tokens
Nvidia

Nemotron 3 Nano 30B A3B (Free)

NVIDIA

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
Mistral

Devstral 2 2512

Mistral

Function Call
LLM
$0.15 in / $0.60 out
/M Tokens
Grok

Grok 4.1 Fast

xAI

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.19 in / $0.48 out
/M Tokens
Nvidia

Nemotron Nano 12B 2 VL

NVIDIA

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.02 in / $0.06 out
/M Tokens
Grok

Grok 4 Fast

xAI

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
$0.19 in / $0.48 out
/M Tokens
Zhipu

Qwen3 235B A22B Instruct 2507

Alibaba

Function Call
LLM
$0.18 in / $0.70 out
/M Tokens
Zhipu

Qwen3 235B A22B Thinking 2507

Alibaba

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.18 in / $0.70 out
/M Tokens
Nvidia

Nemotron Nano 9B V2

NVIDIA

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.02 in / $0.04 out
/M Tokens
Nvidia

Nemotron Nano 9B V2 (Free)

NVIDIA

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
Grok

Grok Code Fast 1

xAI

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.19 in / $1.43 out
/M Tokens
DeepSeek

DeepSeek V3.1

DeepSeek

Function Call
LLM
$0.18 in / $0.64 out
/M Tokens
OpenAI

GPT OSS 120B

OpenAI

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
5% off
$0.04 in / $0.30 out
/M Tokens
OpenAI

GPT OSS 120B (Free)

OpenAI

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
5% off
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
OpenAI

GPT OSS 20B

OpenAI

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
5% off
$0.15 in / $0.60 out
/M Tokens
Zhipu

GLM 4.5 Air

Z.AI

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.10 in / $0.10 out
/M Tokens
OpenAI

GPT-5 Mini

OpenAI

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
FlexPriority
5% off
$0.13 in / $1.00 out
/M Tokens
OpenAI

GPT-5-Nano

OpenAI

Vision
Function Call
Reasoning
Flex
5% off
$0.05 in / $0.20 out
/M Tokens
Google

Gemma 3n 2B

Google

Function Call
LLM
5% off
$0.03 in / $0.02 out
/M Tokens
Google

Gemma 3n 4B

Google

Function Call
LLM
5% off
$0.05 in / $0.04 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 4 Maverick

Meta

Vision
Function Call
LLM
$0.11 in / $0.44 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 4 Scout

Meta

Vision
Function Call
LLM
$0.10 in / $0.23 out
/M Tokens
Google

Gemma 3 4B

Google

Function Call
LLM
5% off
$0.01 in / $0.03 out
/M Tokens
Google

Gemma 3 12B

Google

Function Call
LLM
5% off
$0.03 in / $0.10 out
/M Tokens
Google

Gemma 3 27B

Google

Vision
Function Call
LLM
5% off
$0.04 in / $0.15 out
/M Tokens
aion-labs provider icon

Aion 1.0 Mini

AionLabs

Function Call
Reasoning
LLM
$0.20 in / $0.28 out
/M Tokens
aion-labs provider icon

Aion-RP 1.0 8B

AionLabs

Function Call
LLM
$0.20 in / $0.28 out
/M Tokens
Mistral

Mistral Small 3

Mistral

LLM
$0.14 in / $0.28 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 3.3 70B Instruct

Meta

Function Call
LLM
$0.13 in / $0.39 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 3.3 70B Instruct (Free)

Meta

LLM
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
Cohere

Command R7B (12-2024)

Cohere

Function Call
LLM
$0.04 in / $0.13 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 3.2 1B Instruct

Meta

LLM
$0.15 in / $0.07 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 3.2 1B Instruct (Free)

Meta

LLM
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 3.2 3B Instruct

Meta

LLM
$0.02 in / $0.05 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 3.2 3B Instruct (Free)

Meta

LLM
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
Cohere

Command R (08-2024)

Cohere

Function Call
LLM
$0.15 in / $0.60 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Meta

LLM
$0.09 in / $0.09 out
/M Tokens
Meta

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct (Free)

Meta

LLM
$0.00 in / $0.00 out
/M Tokens
Mistral

Mistral Nemo Instruct

Mistral

LLM
$0.02 in / $0.04 out
/M Tokens
OpenAI

GPT-4o-mini

OpenAI

Vision
Function Call
LLM
5% off
$0.15 in / $0.60 out
/M Tokens

Cheapest AI Models & Free LLMs 2026

High-performance models at the lowest prices — including completely free options.

Build affordably with the best budget and free AI models. This section highlights all models under $0.20 per million input tokens, plus 100% free open-weights options.

Frequently Asked Questions

Are there truly free AI models on Routeway?

Yes. Several strong open-weights models are completely free to use (marked with the Gift icon), ideal for testing, personal projects, and low-volume automation.

What are the cheapest high-quality AI models?

DeepSeek V4-Flash, Qwen3.7-Plus, and certain Llama 4 variants currently offer the best price-to-performance ratio, delivering strong results at a fraction of frontier model costs.

Do cheaper models sacrifice quality?

Not always. Many budget models excel at specific tasks like fast summarization, coding assistance, and data processing while remaining highly capable for everyday use.