AI & LLM

Embedding API Cost Calculator

Estimate what it costs to embed your corpus across OpenAI, Cohere, and Voyage. Adjust token volume and re-embed frequency — the estimate updates live.

Total tokens across your corpus for one embedding pass.
Estimated monthly cost $0.00 OpenAI text-embedding-3-large
Cost per run$0.00
Runs / month0

How this estimate is built

Embedding providers bill per 1,000 input tokens with no separate output rate, since the API returns a fixed-size vector rather than generated text. This calculator multiplies your tokens-per-run by the provider's per-1K rate to get a cost per run, then multiplies by how many times per month you re-embed.

It doesn't account for batch API discounts, provider free tiers, or volume-tier pricing that kicks in above certain monthly thresholds. Treat this as a directional ceiling for planning, not an exact invoice.

Frequently asked questions

How is embedding API cost calculated?

Cost = (tokens embedded ÷ 1,000 × per-1K rate) × times re-embedded per month. Most providers bill per 1,000 input tokens with no output cost.

Why would I re-embed the same corpus multiple times a month?

Teams re-embed when source documents change, when switching to a higher-quality model, or when rebuilding an index after a schema change.

Do smaller embedding models save meaningful money?

Yes. Small models cost roughly 6x less per token than large models, and for many retrieval tasks the quality gap is small enough to be worth testing.

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