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About Z.ai
The Z.ai token price index is $0.82 per 1M tokens today, down 11.0% since yesterday, down 15.7% over the past week and up 21.7% over the past month. Over the past year it has ranged from $0.53 to $2.15. It is the usage-weighted average of the posted prices of Z.ai's 3 models, blending 3 input tokens with 1 output token; GLM 5.3 Flash has the largest share of usage, at 69.6%. It is calculated once a day, for each UTC day, shortly after the day ends.
Z.ai, formerly Zhipu AI, makes the GLM models. It was founded in Beijing in 2019 as a Tsinghua University spin-out, is led by chief executive Zhang Peng, and took the Z.ai name internationally in July 2025. It listed in Hong Kong on January 8, 2026 under stock code 2513 and trades there as Knowledge Atlas Technology, with a market value of HK$434.7 billion, or about $55.9 billion, on May 7, 2026. GLM flagship prices have stepped up twice since GLM-4.5's $0.60/$2.20: to $1/$3.20 with GLM-5 and to $1.40/$4.40 with GLM-5.1, where GLM-5.2 and GLM-5.3 have stayed. Its high-volume Flash model costs about a ninth of the flagship.
Models and list prices
| Model | Input | Output | 3:1 blend |
|---|
| GLM-5.3 | $1.40 | $4.40 | $2.15 |
| GLM-5.3-FlashX | $0.37 | $1.25 | $0.59 |
| GLM-5.3-Flash | $0.15 | $0.50 | $0.2375 |
| GLM-5 | $1.00 | $3.20 | $1.55 |
| GLM-4.5 to GLM-4.7 | $0.60 | $2.20 | $1.00 |
USD per 1M tokens on October 24, 2026, from Z.ai's pricing page. Cached input costs $0.26 on GLM-5.3 and $0.03 on GLM-5.3-Flash, and cache storage is "Limited-time Free"; the price list has no prompt-length tiers or off-peak rates. GLM-4.7-Flash is free. GLM-5.3 always reasons and has a 1M-token context window.
What this index measures
Each day's value averages the prices Z.ai posts for its own GLM models, weighted by each model's tokens in OpenRouter's daily rankings and blended at 3 input tokens to 1 output token. On October 23, 2026, GLM-5.3-Flash carried 69.6% of Z.ai's ranked tokens. The history starts on July 29, 2025, the first day a Z.ai model was among OpenRouter's 50 most-used; it prices each model at today's list price, because Z.ai's past prices are not in the dated price history the index uses, so it shows changes in which models were used rather than changes to a model's price.
Other hosts sell the open GLM weights at very different prices. On October 24, 2026, 48 endpoints listed GLM-5.3 on OpenRouter, from $0.079 to $2.80 per million input tokens, while Z.ai and most large hosts charged $1.40/$4.40. GLM-5.3's license requires model-as-a-service businesses with more than $10 billion in revenue to pass Z.ai's security review; GLM-5.3-Flash and earlier models use the MIT license. The index uses Z.ai's own price.
What moves Z.ai's index
- Flash versus flagship. GLM-5.3-Flash, released on August 26, 2026 at about a ninth of GLM-5.3's price, carried 68% of the tokens the index counted for Z.ai the next day. The index fell from $2.15 for most of August to between $0.53 and $0.98 since September.
- Pricier flagships. On Z.ai's price list, GLM-4.5 to 4.7 cost $0.60/$2.20, GLM-5 $1/$3.20 and GLM-5.1 to 5.3 $1.40/$4.40. As usage moved to each new flagship, the index rose from about $1.00 in 2025 to $2.15 by July 2026.
- Mix between GLM-5.3 and Flash. The flagship's blend is nine times Flash's, so small shifts in its share move the index: it ranged from $0.75 to $0.98 in October 2026 to the 23rd without any price change.
Price history
US government actions
Zhipu AI has been on the US Commerce Department's Entity List since January 16, 2025, so exports to it of items subject to US export rules need a license, reviewed with a "presumption of denial". The listing said it advances China's "military modernization through the development and integration of advanced artificial intelligence research". Amazon Bedrock and Google Cloud's Vertex AI both sell GLM models.
FAQ
How much does the GLM API cost per million tokens? GLM-5.3 costs $1.40 input and $4.40 output, and GLM-5.3-Flash $0.15 and $0.50, as in the table above.
Why did Z.ai's index fall in late August 2026? GLM-5.3-Flash, released on August 26 at about a ninth of the flagship's price, carried most of the tokens the index counts for Z.ai from the next day. The flagship's list price stayed at $1.40/$4.40.
How often is it updated? Once a day: each UTC day's value is calculated shortly after that day ends, from the day's OpenRouter volumes and the prices posted then. The site checks for new data every 2 to 3 hours.
Sources
Text reviewed Oct 24, 2026; the figures in it are as of that date. The figures at the top of this page update once a day. Not investment advice.
