Alibaba Cloud Model Studio:Savings plans

Model Studio offers savings plans and resource plans to help you reduce model costs.

Plan selection

Use this guide to select the right plan.

• AI General-purpose Savings Plan (Recommended): Commit to a monthly spending amount in exchange for tiered discounts of up to 47%. This plan applies to most models and offers maximum flexibility, making it the best choice for most use cases.
• Savings plans for other models: Purchase a fixed amount upfront to offset call fees for specific model families. This option applies only to select model families (such as the speech model family) and typically offers smaller discounts than the AI General-purpose Savings Plan.

The following table compares the three plan types to help you choose the right one:

Dimension	Savings plan	Resource plan	Token Plan
Billing model	Commit to a monthly spend for tiered discounts	One-time purchase of a fixed token amount	One-time purchase of a credit balance
Model coverage	Covers most models provided by Alibaba Cloud	Applies to a single, specific model	Applies to only some models
Best for	Long-term, stable usage	Low usage volume or usage concentrated on a specific model	Team collaboration

Recommendation: If you have long-term, stable usage, choose a savings plan. If your usage is low or concentrated on a specific model, choose a resource plan. If you need to support team collaboration, choose a Token Plan.

Model Studio bills on a pay-as-you-go basis by default and does not provide tokens in advance for free. If you want to lock in a discounted rate or reduce costs ahead of time, you can purchase a resource plan, which takes effect immediately and deducts a specific token amount, or a savings plan, which lets you commit to a monthly spend in exchange for a discount.

To maximize cost-effectiveness, start with the AI General-purpose Savings Plan.

AI general-purpose savings plan

Key benefits

The AI General-purpose Savings Plan offers discounts on pay-as-you-go model calls. Commit to a monthly spend for a set term (3, 6, 12, or 24 months) to receive tiered discounts while keeping pay-as-you-go flexibility.

• Comprehensive coverage: A single purchase covers most models .
• Significant cost optimization: Higher spending commitments and longer terms unlock discounts of up to 47%.
• Simple management: The plan takes effect immediately or at a scheduled time after purchase. Discounts apply automatically without manual activation or binding. Auto-renewal is available.

Usage

Effective time: You can choose when the plan takes effect: "Immediately after ordering" or "Specified time (by hour)".

Calling methods: Model Studio console playground, API calls, and integration with third-party tools (such as Cursor and Cline, using pay-as-you-go API credentials).

Commitment cycle: The plan operates on a rolling monthly cycle starting from the effective date. Each cycle runs from the effective date to the same date one month later — this is not a calendar-month reset on the 1st of each month. The quota refreshes to its full amount on the day after the purchase date each month. Note the following rules:

• Monthly allocation: The total quota is distributed evenly across months and is not granted as a lump sum. For example, a 3-month Savings Plan with a USD 1,000 monthly commitment provides a new USD 1,000 quota each month, not a total of USD 3,000 upfront.
• No rollover: Any unused quota at the end of a monthly cycle expires automatically and cannot carry over to the next cycle.
• Billing cutoff and settlement delay: Quota deductions are based on the actual billing time, not the time the request was submitted. Billing typically lags 2 to 10 minutes behind request submission, and console data also refreshes with a delay. If your quota shows as available when you submit a request, but the savings plan has expired or the quota is exhausted by the time billing occurs, you will be charged at pay-as-you-go rates. We recommend that you set a high spending alert to monitor your costs and avoid unexpected overage charges caused by this billing delay.

Coverage:

• Covered usage: Fees for model calls (input and output tokens), model-native tool calling (such as function call and web extractor), context cache, and batch inference.

• Deductions from the AI General-purpose Savings Plan are independent of the region where your server is located. As long as your server is located in mainland China and you call the Model Studio API using the China (Beijing) base URL, the call is eligible for deduction from the savings plan, regardless of the region of your ECS instance or any cross-region calling setup.

• Not covered: Fees for model fine-tuning and model deployment. Web search plugin fees are billed independently and are not covered by the savings plan. Third-party tools can integrate with Model Studio, but any web search fees they generate are not covered by the savings plan.

  Qoder (China) currently supports usage only through Credits and is not eligible for deduction from the AI General-purpose Savings Plan. Model Studio API call fees remain covered by the savings plan.

Deduction logic:

• Deduction order: free quota> other model-specific Savings Plans > AI General-purpose Savings Plan > pay-as-you-go.
• Multiple Savings Plans of the same type: The plan expiring first is applied first. If the expiration dates are the same, the plan purchased first is applied first.
• Excess usage: If all matching Savings Plans expire or are exhausted, any remaining usage is billed at pay-as-you-go rates.
• Priority when a new subscription plan and a legacy resource plan coexist: If you have both a new subscription-based plan (such as an exclusive-seat subscription) and a legacy resource plan (a legacy booster resource plan), the quota from the new subscription plan is deducted first. Only after that quota is exhausted does deduction proceed to the resource plan. This is a scenario-specific refinement of the general deduction order described above (free quota > resource plan > other model-specific Savings Plans > AI General-purpose Savings Plan > pay-as-you-go).

View bills: See How to query Savings Plan bills.

Purchase guide

Purchase	Purchase an AI General-purpose Savings Plan
Regions	Singapore, US (Virginia), China (Beijing), Germany (Frankfurt), Japan (Tokyo) and Hong Kong (China)
Eligible services	Discounts vary by tier. Category A: Qwen (excluding qwen3.6-max-preview), Qwen-open-source, text embedding, multimodal embedding, reranking, domain-specific models, and model-native tool calling (such as function calling and web extractor) Category B: Image generation, speech synthesis, speech recognition and translation, and video generation and editing Category C: qwen3.6-max-preview, DeepSeek, Kimi, GLM, MiniMax, and HappyHorse Savings Plans do not apply to models provided directly by third parties. To check whether a model has an Alibaba Cloud-provided version, refer to the actual listing in the Model Marketplace in the console.
Monthly spend commitment	The amount you commit to spend each month on pay-as-you-go model services. Start at USD 150 in increments of USD 5. No upper limit.
Commitment cycle	You can choose a commitment cycle of 3, 6, 12, or 24 months.
Offering type	All upfront: Pay the full amount for the entire commitment cycle at once to receive the maximum discount. No upfront: No payment is required at purchase. You will be billed for your monthly spend commitment. To use the No upfront option, contact your account manager to be added to the allowlist.
Discounts	See Discount information.
Activation time	You can activate the plan immediately after purchase or schedule it to start at a specific hour.

Discount

Discounts vary by model, commitment tier, term, and payment method.

For example, when paid all upfront, a 12-month Savings Plan with a monthly spend commitment of USD 10,000 provides a 24% discount on calls to the Category A Qwen text generation model. A model call that costs USD 1 uses only USD 0.76 of your commitment.

The commitment ranges in the following tables are inclusive of the lower bound and exclusive of the upper bound. For example, 1,000 - 5,000 means an amount greater than or equal to 1,000 and less than 5,000.

Payment option	Monthly commitment range (USD)	Category A				Category B				Category C
		3 months	6 months	12 months	24 months	3 months	6 months	12 months	24 months	Entire cycle
All upfront	150 - 700	12% off	14% off	16% off	18% off	17% off	20% off	23% off	26% off	No discount
	700 - 1,500	14% off	16% off	18% off	20% off	20% off	23% off	26% off	29% off	No discount
	1,500 - 4,500	16% off	18% off	20% off	22% off	23% off	26% off	29% off	32% off	No discount
	4,500 - 7,000	18% off	20% off	22% off	24% off	26% off	29% off	32% off	35% off	No discount
	7,000 - 15,000	20% off	22% off	24% off	26% off	29% off	32% off	35% off	38% off	No discount
	15,000 - 45,000	22% off	24% off	26% off	28% off	32% off	35% off	38% off	41% off	No discount
	45,000 - 150,000	24% off	26% off	28% off	30% off	35% off	38% off	41% off	44% off	No discount
	≥150,000	26% off	28% off	30% off	32% off	38% off	41% off	44% off	47% off	No discount
No upfront Contact your account manager to enable this option.	150 - 700	10% off	12% off	14% off	16% off	15% off	18% off	21% off	24% off	No discount
	700 - 1,500	12% off	14% off	16% off	18% off	18% off	21% off	24% off	27% off	No discount
	1,500 - 4,500	14% off	16% off	18% off	20% off	21% off	24% off	27% off	30% off	No discount
	4,500 - 7,000	16% off	18% off	20% off	22% off	24% off	27% off	30% off	33% off	No discount
	7,000 - 15,000	18% off	20% off	22% off	24% off	27% off	30% off	33% off	36% off	No discount
	15,000 - 45,000	20% off	22% off	24% off	26% off	30% off	33% off	36% off	39% off	No discount
	45,000 - 150,000	22% off	24% off	26% off	28% off	33% off	36% off	39% off	42% off	No discount
	≥150,000	24% off	26% off	28% off	30% off	36% off	39% off	42% off	45% off	No discount

Lifecycle management

You can manage your savings plans on the Savings Plan Overview page.

When a savings plan (including the Entry-Level AI General Savings Plan) expires, it automatically becomes invalid. You do not need to manually release, cancel, or locate any instance, and no additional fees are incurred. If you no longer plan to use Model Studio, we recommend that you delete the associated API key to avoid unexpected pay-as-you-go charges.

The Entry-Level AI General Savings Plan is available only to new customers. Once it expires, it cannot be renewed. If you purchase this plan again, you cannot receive the first-purchase promotional price.

Entry-Level AI General Savings Plans with a monthly commitment below USD 150 (exclusive) do not support deducting kimi-k3 model usage. Plans with a monthly commitment of USD 150 or above support kimi-k3 deduction.

Savings plan renewal

Sign in to the Expenses and Costs console. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Billing > My Subscriptions to view and manage the subscription status, effective date, and auto-renewal settings of your savings plan.

Query discounts

For the AI General-purpose Savings Plan, discounts vary by model, tier, commitment period, and payment method. Go to the Savings Plan Price Discount Details page and filter by the following criteria:

• Applicable Commodity: Select the corresponding product name from the table below.
• Billing Item: Select the corresponding billed item from the table below.
• Savings plan type: Select AI General-purpose Savings Plan/Model Studio AI General-purpose Savings Plan
• Subscription duration and payment method: Select the corresponding options to view the pay-as-you-go discount.

Applicable Commodity	Billing Item
Model Studio foundation model inference	Text: Super-region Text Usage Image: Image generation count and multi-specification image generation count Video: Video generation duration Voice: CosyVoice speech synthesis character count, speech recognition duration, and voice clone and voice design model count Vector: Multimodal vector model usage and text vector model usage Batch: Batch model usage, BatchChat model usage, and BatchChat token usage Tool call: Usage by call count and the corresponding regional usage for each billed item. When querying discounts on call fees in Singapore, select a non-regional billed item. When querying discounts in other regions, select the corresponding regional billed item.
Model Studio foundation model - Industry-specific model	Text generation token usage
Model Studio foundation model - Vector model	Multimodal vector model usage
Model Studio foundation model - Qwen-Audio model	Speech synthesis character count and speech recognition duration
Model Studio foundation model - Model Studio audio model	Speech synthesis character count and speech recognition duration

Query bills

Go to the Expenses and Costs console. In the left-side navigation pane, choose Bills > Bill Details. Set Product to Alibaba Cloud Model Studio and Product Name to AI General-purpose Savings Plan. By default, bill details for the current month are displayed. See Query bills of savings plans.

Balance alerts and expiration reminders

Savings plans do not support a custom balance-alert threshold. By default, the system sends a reminder when your remaining quota falls to 20%, and this threshold cannot be changed. To set your own spending threshold, go to Fee Center > Available Quota Alerts in the Alibaba Cloud console. The system also sends three SMS reminders before your savings plan expires; no further reminders are sent after expiration.

Other model savings plans

Savings plans for other models

Compared to the AI General-purpose Savings Plan, these savings plans are better suited for lower usage volumes or workloads concentrated on a specific model family.

Usage notes

Effective date: Takes effect immediately after purchase.

Validity period: The validity period depends on the purchased plan. After a plan expires, any unused credit is forfeited and non-refundable.

Deduction scope: This plan covers fees for model calls (input and output tokens). It does not cover fees for tool calls, context cache, batch inference, model fine-tuning, or model deployment.

Deduction logic:

• Deduction order: Free quota> Savings plans for other models > AI General-purpose Savings Plan > pay-as-you-go.
• Multiple plans of the same type: The plan that expires first is applied first. If multiple plans share the same expiration date, the one purchased first is applied first.
• Excess usage: If all applicable savings plans expire or their quotas are exhausted, any excess usage is automatically billed at pay-as-you-go rates.

View bills: See How to query savings plan bills.

Supported savings plans

Large language models

Purchase method	Purchase a savings plan for large language model inference
Tiers	Available tiers: USD 10, USD 50, USD 100, USD 500, USD 1,000, USD 5,000, and USD 50,000.
Discount	The tiers do not include a discount. Deductions are based on the model call price.
Validity period	The USD 10, USD 50, and USD 100 tiers are valid for 3 months. The USD 500, USD 1,000, USD 5,000, and USD 50,000 tiers are valid for 6 months.
Applicable regions	China (Beijing), Singapore, US (Virginia), Hong Kong (China), and Germany (Frankfurt)
Applicable models	This plan covers token-based text generation models on Model Studio. Applicable models: General large language models: Commercial editions: Qwen-Max, Qwen-Plus, Qwen-Flash, Qwen-Turbo, Qwen-7B-Chat, and Qwen-Long Open source editions: Qwen-72B-Chat, Qwen-14B-Chat, Qwen-7B-Chat, Qwen-1.8B-Chat-Int4, Qwen-VL-Chat, CodeQwen1.5-7B-Chat, and Qwen-1.8B-Chat Third-party models: DeepSeek, GLM, Kimi, and MiniMax Multimodal models: Commercial editions: Qwen-VL-Max, Qwen-VL-Max-Realtime, Qwen-Audio-Chat, Qwen-VL-Plus, and Qwen-OCR Open source editions: Qwen-VL, Qwen-VL-V1.1, Qwen-VL-Chat, and Qwen-Audio-Chat Domain-specific models: CodeQwen, Qwen-Translate, Qwen-Data-Mining, and Qwen-Deep-Research Embedding and reranking models are not covered by this plan. To deduct fees for these models, see AI General-purpose Savings Plan.

FAQ

Savings plan not applying

A savings plan applies to your usage costs only when specific conditions are met. Common reasons include:

1. Model mismatch: The model you are calling is not covered by the savings plan. For example, you purchased an LLM Savings Plan but are calling a Wan model, or an embedding or reranking model.
2. Free quota not exhausted: The system applies benefits in the order of free quota > savings plan. A savings plan applies only to charges incurred after your free quota is exhausted.

Does the LLM Savings Plan cover embedding and reranking models?

No. The LLM inference savings plan covers only text generation models. Embedding and reranking models are not covered. If your workload involves both LLMs and embedding or reranking models (for example, RAG), consider the AI General-purpose Savings Plan.

Do third-party direct-supply models qualify for AI General-purpose Savings Plans?

For Category C models, only models provided directly by Alibaba Cloud are eligible for savings plan deductions. Third-party direct-supply models are not eligible. You can view the complete list of Alibaba Cloud-provided models in the Model Studio Model Marketplace, where you can identify eligible models by the "Alibaba Cloud-provided" or "Third-party direct-supply" badge on each model card.

Does a savings plan provide a dedicated API operation?

A savings plan does not provide a dedicated API operation. It is a billing benefit rather than a callable service, so you do not need to call an operation to activate it or query its status. Call Model Studio models the way you normally do — through the console playground, API calls, or third-party tool integration — and the system automatically deducts the fees from your savings plan quota when your bill is settled. No additional configuration or dedicated API call is required.