Perplexity Models API Cost Calculator & Comparison

Perplexity API pricing ranges from $1.00 to $3.00 per 1M input tokens. Output tokens cost more than input on every model. Prices are per 1 million tokens (1M ≈ 750,000 words). Use the calculator above to estimate your monthly spend at your actual workload.

Sonar is the lowest-priced Perplexity model with public pricing at $1.00/1M input tokens. It suits high-volume tasks where cost matters most — classification, extraction, summarization, and similar workloads that don't need frontier reasoning.

Sonar Pro Search is Perplexity's highest-tier model at $3.00/1M input. It delivers the most sophisticated reasoning, instruction-following, and nuance. For workloads that don't require frontier performance, a mid-tier model typically cuts inference costs substantially.

Sonar Deep Research, Sonar Reasoning Pro support deep reasoning mode, which improves performance on multi-step coding, debugging, and code review. For simpler autocomplete or snippet generation, a faster, cheaper model often delivers acceptable quality at a fraction of the cost.

Yes — Sonar Pro Search, Sonar Pro, Sonar Reasoning Pro, Sonar accept image input alongside text. You can pass screenshots, photos, charts, and documents for analysis. Vision adds no separate line-item on most Perplexity models — you're billed for the token equivalent of the image.

Yes — Perplexity supports prompt caching (discounts for repeated context) and batch processing (accept a delay, cut costs ~50%). These rates appear in the table above under "Cached /1M" and "Batch /1M." Caching pays off quickly if your prompts share a long system prompt or document prefix across many calls.

Perplexity has historically adjusted prices when launching new model generations, often cutting rates to stay competitive. Buzzi.ai snapshots pricing daily — you can subscribe to price-drop alerts on any Perplexity model using the "Alert me" button on its detail page.

Use the main comparison wizard to run the same calculator across Perplexity, Anthropic, Google, Meta, Mistral, and 20+ other providers. Set your exact workload and get a ranked cost chart in under a minute.

Sonar Deep Research, Sonar Reasoning Pro offer an extended thinking or reasoning mode. The model spends extra compute "thinking" before answering — slower and more expensive, but meaningfully better on complex, multi-step problems. Standard mode is faster and cheaper for routine tasks.