Cursor's New Plans Drop Included Claude, GPT and Gemini Usage: Third-Party Models Now Bill at API List Price, From $30 a Month
- What happened
- On 12 October xAI's X Subscription became how new customers buy Cursor; on the new tiers, third-party models in Cursor bill at API list price via top-ups, from the $30 Premium tier up.
- Why it matters
- Claude, GPT and Gemini usage in Cursor is not included in any new plan, the $8 Plus tier is Grok-only, and the shared pool is unsized and resets weekly.
- What to do
- If you rely on third-party models in Cursor, price a month of that usage at API list rates before you switch or sign up, and set a monthly usage limit.
Our verdict
Cursor stays conditional, and the condition just got sharper. On the new X Subscription tiers, Claude, GPT and Gemini in Cursor are no longer part of any plan allowance: they bill at API list price through top-ups, and only from the $30 Premium tier up. If those models are why you use Cursor, price your token use before you buy. If you are on a current Cursor plan, do not switch until you have done that math, because the legacy plans are the only ones with an included pool for third-party models.
Grok Bot also stays conditional: it now draws from the shared plan pool, but no published page lets you put a number on what a bot costs to run.
What happened
On 12 October xAI announced The X Subscription, one plan family across Grok, Cursor and X. Cursor's pricing page now shows the same table:
| Plan | Price | Included usage | Third-party models in Cursor |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | Limited | Not listed |
| Plus | $8/month | Base | No: "Only Grok models are available on this plan" |
| Premium | $30/month | 4x Plus | At API list price, via top-ups |
| Super | $100/month | 15x Plus | At API list price, via top-ups |
| Ultra | $200/month | 50x Plus | At API list price, via top-ups |
xAI describes Premium as "The benefits of SuperGrok, Cursor Pro, and X Premium+, previously $90/month combined". Team users get Premium, Super and Ultra "at the same per-seat prices as individual plans", which, per Cursor's docs ("at the same price"), means $30, $100 or $200 a seat.
The third-party rule is spelled out on both sides. Cursor's pricing page: "Premium and above include generous usage of Grok models but do not include an allowance for third-party models." xAI's post: "Usage is billed separately at API list prices, through top-ups."
The old plans have not disappeared for everyone. Cursor's docs now say "Hobby, Start, Pro, Pro+, Ultra, and Teams Standard and Premium seats continue for existing customers", with "two monthly usage pools, Cursor Models and Other Models". Our August breakdown of those plans covers how they worked.
Why it matters
Third-party models got more expensive to reach. The cheapest new plan that can call Claude, GPT or Gemini in Cursor is $30 a month plus every third-party token at list price. On the legacy plans, an Other Models pool came included in the plan price. xAI's headline promise, "at least twice as much coding usage with our models as the comparable Cursor plan", applies to Grok models, not to the models many Cursor users pick.
The included pool is weekly and unsized. Cursor's pricing page says "Your allowance refreshes weekly", where the legacy pools reset monthly. Each tier is sized only relative to Plus (4x, 15x, 50x), and neither Cursor page we read states the Plus pool in tokens or dollars. You cannot turn "4x Plus" into a number of agent runs from the published pages.
Grok Bot now shares that pool. On 11 August, at Grok Bot's launch, xAI said Grok Bot "comes with its own usage, separate from your Grok and Cursor plans". Cursor's docs now say the pool "is shared across everything on your subscription: Agent in the editor, CLI, Cloud Agents, Grok Bot, and the Grok apps", and the pricing page lists Grok Bot from Premium up, not on Free or Plus. That is a plan price, not a per-task rate, so the running cost of a bot still cannot be modelled.
What changes for you
- Current Cursor subscribers: xAI says "Nothing changes for existing SuperGrok, Cursor, or X Premium subscribers. You can keep your current plan, price, and features or move to The X Subscription." The switch option appears in your billing settings when it reaches your account, with a prorated refund for the old plan.
- New sign-ups: Plus at $8 is Grok-only. Third-party models start at Premium ($30), billed per token on top.
- Spend control: new plans use prepaid top-ups with an optional Auto Top-up, and a monthly additional usage limit caps paid usage. Cursor's pricing page says you "can set spending caps to manage costs".
What we have not checked
We have not run any of the new tiers. No Anysphere-authored post was fetched; the cursor.com pricing and docs pages are the Cursor-side sources. Our Cursor directory entry still lists the old tiers and will be refreshed separately.
What to do
- 1 If you use Claude, GPT or Gemini in Cursor on Pro, Pro+ or Ultra, stay on your current plan until you have priced a typical month of that usage at API list rates.
- 2 If you are signing up now, skip Plus ($8) unless Grok models are enough: third-party models start at Premium ($30), billed per token on top.
- 3 Set a monthly additional usage limit, and decide on Auto Top-up, before your team runs agent mode on third-party models under the new plans.
- 4 If you run Grok Bot on a new plan, track how much of the weekly pool it consumes, since it now shares the allowance with your coding usage.
Affected tools & models
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