There's also the pressure on the provider side: The big AI companies have poured hundreds of billions of dollars into data centers, chips, and model training. Those investments have to pay off, at a scale that flat rates simply can't support.
This issue of the Frontier Radar maps out the emerging token economy along these lines. How is billing shifting from subscription to usage? How is the token itself becoming a segmented product? And why is token usage still a poor measure of AI value?
Why providers are walking away from flat rates
The most visible change is the overhaul of pricing models in response to growing usage. Starting June 1, 2026, GitHub Copilot is gradually moving to a usage-based model with "GitHub AI Credits." The credits are tied to actual token usage and the API prices of each model. They kick in wherever Copilot does more than just suggest code, mainly in chat, CLI, and agent features. Standard completions stay free of these rules in paid plans.
GitHub's reasoning nails the problem: a short chat question used to be treated about the same as an autonomous coding session running for hours. That can't last.
