Pricing and Rate Limits

Pricing Details

Pricing for Multimodal Reasoning Models

Model	Billing unit	Input (cache miss)	Input (cache hit)	Output
`step-5-preview`	1M tokens	$1.00	$0.05	$2.70
`step-3.7-flash`	1M tokens	$0.20	$0.04	$1.15

For step-5-preview, the cache-miss input price includes writing new content to the cache. Output tokens include both the model’s reasoning process and final answer. See Prompt caching for details.

Pricing for Reasoning Models

Model	Billing unit	Input (cache miss)	Input (cache hit)	Output
`step-3.5-flash`	1M tokens	$0.10	$0.02	$0.30
`step-3.5-flash-2603`	1M tokens	$0.10	$0.02	$0.30

Pricing for Vision Models

Model	Billing unit	Input (cache miss)	Input (cache hit)	Output
`step-1o-turbo-vision`	1M tokens	$0.36	$0.07	$1.15

Image input is counted and billed as tokens, just like text input. By default, each image uses 169 input tokens; with detail enabled, the token count is calculated from the image size.

Pricing for Speech Models

Billed by token

Model	Billing unit	Input (cache miss)	Input (cache hit)	Output	Current status
`stepaudio-3-realtime-preview`	—	—	—	—	Free (limited time)
`stepaudio-3-chat-preview`	—	—	—	—	Free (limited time)
`stepaudio-2.5-realtime`	1M tokens	$1.50	$0.30	$10.00	Usage-based
`stepaudio-2.5-chat`	1M tokens	$1.50	$0.30	$3.50	Usage-based
`step-1o-audio`	1M tokens	$3.57	$0.71	$8.57	Usage-based
`step-audio-2`	1M tokens	$1.43	$0.29	$10.00	Usage-based
`step-audio-r1.5`	1M tokens	$1.43	$0.29	$15.00	Usage-based

Billed by characters or audio duration

Text-to-speech

Model	Model type	Unit price
`stepaudio-3-tts`	Text-to-speech model	$0.36 / 10,000 characters
`stepaudio-2.5-tts`	Context-aware text-to-speech model	$0.85 / 10,000 characters
`step-tts-2`	Next-generation text-to-speech model	$0.40 / 10,000 characters
`step-tts-mini`	Text-to-speech model	$0.13 / 10,000 characters
`stepaudio-3-tts` / `stepaudio-2.5-tts` / `step-tts-2` / `step-tts-mini`	Voice cloning model	$1.50 / voice; trial calls are charged only for synthesis, and a successful production clone is charged immediately

Audio generation and music generation

Model	Model type	Unit price
`stepaudio-3-gen-preview`	Unified audio generation model	Free (limited time)
`stepaudio-3-music-preview`	Music generation model	Free (limited time)

Speech recognition

Model	Model type	Unit price
`stepaudio-3-asr-max`	Speech recognition model	$0.40 / hour
`stepaudio-2.5-asr`	Speech recognition model	$0.022 / hour
`stepaudio-2.5-asr-stream`	Streaming speech recognition model	$0.18 / hour
`stepaudio-2-asr-pro`	Speech recognition model	$0.29 / hour
`step-asr`	Speech recognition model	$0.13 / hour
`step-asr-1.1`	Speech recognition model	$0.31 / hour
`step-asr-1.1-stream`	Streaming speech recognition model	$0.37 / hour

For character-based billing, one Chinese character counts as one character, two English letters count as one character, and two punctuation marks count as one character.

Pricing for Image Generation and Editing

step-2x-large and step-image-edit-2 will be retired on October 10, 2026. The text-to-image, image-to-image, and image editing APIs will stop serving requests on that date. See the image model retirement notice.

Model	Billing unit (per image)
`step-2x-large`	$0.02
`step-image-edit-2`	$0.003

Image generation is billed by the number of images generated. The default is one image per request. step-2x-large has not been free since June 12, 2026 and is billed at $0.02 per image.

Pricing for Value-Added Capabilities

Capability	Billing unit
Internet search	$0.006 / call
Image search	$0.02 / call
File storage	$0.08 / GB / day

Value-added capabilities are billed by actual usage.

Tiered Rate Limits

Pay-as-you-go calls to the standard Open Platform API are rate limited by tier according to the cumulative top-up amount on your account. Only cash top-ups count toward that amount; vouchers do not. Step Plan usage is governed by the monthly Credit allowance of your subscribed tier rather than by cumulative top-up. When resources reach capacity, we may temporarily adjust the limits for each tier.

Individual Accounts

Individual accounts must complete identity verification first. Tiers are assigned by cumulative top-up amount:

User tier	Cumulative top-up amount	Concurrency	RPM	TPM
V0	Under $15	5	100	500,000
V1	$15 to$ 69	20	400	2,000,000
V2	$70 to$ 299	30	600	3,000,000
V3	$300 to$ 1,499	40	800	4,000,000
V4	$1,500 and above	130	2,600	13,000,000

Enterprise Accounts

For the rate limit tiers available to verified enterprise accounts, contact your sales representative. Prepaid funds added to an Open Platform account count toward the cumulative top-up amount and are eligible for invoicing through the Open Platform. Postpaid billing is not tied to the cumulative top-up amount and is not invoiced through the Open Platform.

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Pricing Details

Pricing for Multimodal Reasoning Models

Pricing for Reasoning Models

Pricing for Vision Models

Pricing for Speech Models

Billed by token

Billed by characters or audio duration

Text-to-speech

Audio generation and music generation

Speech recognition

Pricing for Image Generation and Editing

Pricing for Value-Added Capabilities

Tiered Rate Limits

Individual Accounts

Enterprise Accounts

​Pricing Details

​Pricing for Multimodal Reasoning Models

​Pricing for Reasoning Models

​Pricing for Vision Models

​Pricing for Speech Models

​Billed by token

​Billed by characters or audio duration

Text-to-speech

Audio generation and music generation

Speech recognition

​Pricing for Image Generation and Editing

​Pricing for Value-Added Capabilities

​Tiered Rate Limits

​Individual Accounts

​Enterprise Accounts

Pricing Details

Pricing for Multimodal Reasoning Models

Pricing for Reasoning Models

Pricing for Vision Models

Pricing for Speech Models

Billed by token

Billed by characters or audio duration

Pricing for Image Generation and Editing

Pricing for Value-Added Capabilities

Tiered Rate Limits

Individual Accounts

Enterprise Accounts