A 90,000-word novel is not 90,000 words of AI usage: drafting generates multiples of what you keep, and the model reads context on every call. Set your word count, drafting habits and timeline, and compare the true project cost of raw API access, Sudowrite tiers, and Novelcrafter with your own key.
90,000 finished words at 3x drafting is 270,000 generated words. At the ~1.33 tokens-per-word heuristic that is 359,100 output tokens, plus an assumed 718,200 input tokens of context read along the way.
Claude Opus 4.8 pay-as-you-go for the whole project. No subscription, but you bring your own interface.
Hobbyist at $8/mo for 3 months, plus the same Claude Opus 4.8 API usage. Novelcrafter plans include no AI credits; AI runs on your own key.
Subscription only, for 3 months. Sudowrite meters usage in credits (225,000 to 2,000,000 per month by tier), and publishes no fixed credits-per-word rate, so credits are not converted to words here.
| Model | Input $/1M | Output $/1M | Project cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Opus 4.8 Anthropic API | $5 | $25 | $12.57 |
| Claude Sonnet 5 Anthropic APIIntroductory pricing through August 31, 2026; $3 input and $15 output per million tokens from September 1, 2026. | $2 | $10 | $5.03 |
| Claude Haiku 4.5 Anthropic API | $1 | $5 | $2.51 |
| GPT-5.6 Sol OpenAI API | $5 | $30 | $14.36 |
| GPT-5.6 Terra OpenAI API | $2.5 | $15 | $7.18 |
| GPT-5.6 Luna OpenAI API | $1 | $6 | $2.87 |
Runs entirely in your browser. Nothing you enter is sent anywhere.
Every rate in this tool was read from the vendor's live pricing page on 2026-07-20and is stored with its source URL and verification date. Nothing is estimated from memory, and rows that could not be verified on the day were left out rather than guessed.
| Model | Input | Output | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Opus 4.8Anthropic API | $5 | $25 | pricing page |
| Claude Sonnet 5Anthropic APIIntroductory pricing through August 31, 2026; $3 input and $15 output per million tokens from September 1, 2026. | $2 | $10 | pricing page |
| Claude Haiku 4.5Anthropic API | $1 | $5 | pricing page |
| GPT-5.6 SolOpenAI API | $5 | $30 | pricing page |
| GPT-5.6 TerraOpenAI API | $2.5 | $15 | pricing page |
| GPT-5.6 LunaOpenAI API | $1 | $6 | pricing page |
Sudowrite plans (Hobby & Student $10/mo, Professional $22/mo, Max $44/mo) verified the same day atsudowrite.com/pricing; the page offers a yearly toggle advertising up to 50% off, so your invoice depends on the billing period. Novelcrafter plans (Scribe $4/mo, Hobbyist $8/mo, Artisan $14/mo, Specialist $20/mo) verified atnovelcrafter.com/pricing; no Novelcrafter plan includes AI credits, so AI usage bills to your own API key on top.
If an AI tool created actual text, images or translations in your book, KDP requires a disclosure, even after substantial edits. Walk your workflow through theKDP AI Disclosure Wizardbefore you hit publish, and check the AI stance of magazines and contests in theAI submission policies database.
This calculator uses roughly 1.33 tokens per English word, which is the published 1 token to about 0.75 words rule of thumb turned around. It is a heuristic: real tokenizers differ by model, and dialogue, names and non-English text all shift the ratio.
Because drafting with AI is not one clean pass. Rerolls, rejected passages, alternative versions and revision prompts all consume tokens, so the wordage you generate is a multiple of the wordage you keep. The slider makes that assumption explicit instead of hiding it; 1x means you keep every word, 5x means a heavy reroll habit.
APIs charge for what the model reads as well as what it writes. Every generation call resends your prompt, style notes, outline and often prior chapters as input tokens. The setting expresses that as a ratio of input to output tokens, and input is usually the cheaper of the two rates.
It depends on your volume and your tolerance for setup. Raw API is pure usage pricing with no interface. Novelcrafter charges a small subscription for the interface and runs AI on your own API key, so its total is subscription plus the same API bill. Sudowrite bundles interface and usage into a credit allowance per tier. Run your own numbers above; the answer flips as word count and project length change.
Every price was read from the vendor's live pricing page on 2026-07-20, and each row in the tool's data file carries that verification date and source URL. AI pricing moves quickly, so confirm on the vendor's page before committing to a plan.
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