$20/Month: The Price Ceiling Every AI Company Copied

9 days ago

AI subscriptions like ChatGPT Plus, Claude Pro, Perplexity Pro, and Google AI Pro share a $20 monthly price, originating from OpenAI's February 2023 launch to subsidize free-tier costs.
Competitors adopted $20 through price anchoring rather than independent cost analysis, extending to smaller tools and higher tiers like $100-$200 for power users.
Despite identical pricing, each $20 subscription offers different usage limits, features, and model access, varying significantly across providers.
The price reflects a psychological ceiling—$20 is the maximum typical users tolerate before cancelling, with $19.99 used to undercut this anchor.
Future pricing may depend on compute costs; while models are becoming cheaper, subscriptions rarely cut prices voluntarily, so competition may shift to higher tiers.

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