At 40 requests/user/day (totaling 60,000,000 queries/mo), running AI coding assistant on DeepSeek R1 (Reasoner) costs $481,680.00 / month ($9.634 / user / mo).
Total expected API invoice for 50,000 Active Users generating 60,000,000 queries.
Direct inference cost per MAU to model your SaaS pricing tiers and gross margins.
Savings generated by exploiting 60% cache hits on prompt context.
| Model | Provider | Monthly Spend (50,000 Active Users) | Cost / User / Mo | Annual Spend | Context Limit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DeepSeek R1 (Reasoner) (Current) | deepseek | $481,680.00 | $9.634 | $5,780,160.00 | 64,000 |
| GPT-5.6 Terra | openai | $2,102,400.00 | $42.048 | $25,228,800.00 | 1,050,000 |
| GPT-5.4 Workhorse | openai | $2,628,000.00 | $52.56 | $31,536,000.00 | 256,000 |
| o3-mini | openai | $1,082,400.00 | $21.648 | $12,988,800.00 | 200,000 |
| o4-mini | openai | $963,600.00 | $19.272 | $11,563,200.00 | 256,000 |
| o1-mini | openai | $1,082,400.00 | $21.648 | $12,988,800.00 | 128,000 |
At 40 queries per user/day with DeepSeek R1 (Reasoner), the estimated cost is $9.634 per monthly active user (MAU). Total monthly bill for 50,000 Active Users is $481,680.00.
Assuming a 60% cache hit rate on repeated system and context tokens, prompt caching saves $177,120.00 per month ($2,125,440.00/year) on DeepSeek R1 (Reasoner).
With a direct COGS of $9.634 per user/month on DeepSeek R1 (Reasoner), charging at least $48.168 per user/month ensures an 80%+ software gross margin.