Kimi API Pricing Calculator & Complete Cost Guide
Calculate Kimi API costs for K2.6 (flagship), K2.5, and the legacy K2 family. OpenAI-compatible API with automatic caching and web search.
Pricing TLDR
- • $5 voucher when you reach $5 cumulative recharge
- • K2.6 (latest): $0.95/$4.00 per M tokens • K2.5: $0.60/$3.00 • Legacy K2 family: $0.60/$2.50 (EOL May 25, 2026)
- • Automatic caching: $0.10-$0.16/M tokens (~80-85% savings) • Web search: $0.005/call
Kimi API Cost Calculator - Monthly Pricing
Calculate by
Input Tokens
Output Tokens
API Calls / Month
Quick Examples:
Cost Optimization:
Kimi K2.6 (kimi-k2.6)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $0.95
Out: $4.00
Monthly Cost
Kimi K2.5 (kimi-k2.5)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $0.60
Out: $3.00
Monthly Cost
Kimi K2 Thinking (kimi-k2-thinking)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $0.60
Out: $2.50
Monthly Cost
Kimi K2 Thinking Turbo (kimi-k2-thinking-turbo)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $1.15
Out: $8.00
Monthly Cost
Moonshot V1 Vision (8K) (moonshot-v1-8k-vision-preview)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $0.20
Out: $2.00
Monthly Cost
Moonshot V1 (8K) (moonshot-v1-8k)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $0.20
Out: $2.00
Monthly Cost
Kimi K2 0905 (kimi-k2-0905-preview)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $0.60
Out: $2.50
Monthly Cost
Moonshot V1 Vision (32K) (moonshot-v1-32k-vision-preview)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $1.00
Out: $3.00
Monthly Cost
Moonshot V1 (32K) (moonshot-v1-32k)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $1.00
Out: $3.00
Monthly Cost
Kimi K2 Turbo (kimi-k2-turbo-preview)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $1.15
Out: $8.00
Monthly Cost
Moonshot V1 Vision (128K) (moonshot-v1-128k-vision-preview)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $2.00
Out: $5.00
Monthly Cost
Moonshot V1 (128K) (moonshot-v1-128k)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $2.00
Out: $5.00
Monthly Cost
Kimi K2 0711 (kimi-k2-0711-preview)
Context
Quality
Per 1M Tokens
In: $0.60
Out: $2.50
Monthly Cost
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About Kimi API
What is Kimi API?
Kimi API provides access to Moonshot AI's large language models. The current flagship is Kimi K2.6, a multimodal reasoning model with strong agent and coding performance. Kimi K2.5 remains available as a cheaper multimodal alternative, and the legacy K2 family (K2 0905, K2 Turbo, K2 Thinking, K2 0711) is scheduled for end-of-life on May 25, 2026. The API is fully compatible with OpenAI's SDK.
- Multimodal Reasoning: Kimi K2.6 supports text and visual input natively with thinking and non-thinking modes. Strong on agent tasks, coding, and visual understanding.
- OpenAI-Compatible API: Drop-in replacement for the OpenAI API. Use existing SDKs and tools with the api.moonshot.ai/v1 endpoint. Supports tool calls, JSON mode, and streaming.
- Automatic Context Caching: Cached input is billed at $0.10/M on K2.5, $0.15/M on the legacy K2 family, and $0.16/M on K2.6 — roughly 80-85% off cache-miss input rates. No configuration required.
When to Use Kimi API
Choose Kimi K2.6 for the best current quality on agent and coding workloads. Use K2.5 when you want lower per-token cost and don't need K2.6's improvements. Migrate any traffic still on the legacy K2 family before May 25, 2026.
Ideal for
- AI coding assistants and code generation
- Autonomous AI agents with tool use
- Complex multi-step reasoning
- Cost-effective alternative to GPT-5.5 and Claude Opus 4.7
- Applications requiring built-in web search integration
Not ideal for
- Applications requiring <100ms latency
- Use cases needing very long context (>262K tokens)
- Tasks requiring guaranteed deterministic outputs
Kimi API Pricing Breakdown
Getting Started
Recharge at least $1 to activate your account. When your cumulative recharge reaches $5, you receive a $5 voucher bonus - effectively doubling your first $5 investment.
- Sign up at platform.moonshot.ai
- Recharge minimum $1 to activate API access
- Receive $5 voucher at $5 cumulative recharge
- OpenAI-compatible: use existing SDKs immediately
Cost Optimization Features
Automatic Context Caching (~80-85% Savings)
Cached input is billed at $0.10/M on K2.5, $0.15/M on the legacy K2 family, and $0.16/M on K2.6 — versus cache-miss input rates of $0.60-$0.95/M. Caching is automatic with no configuration needed. View 'context caching' costs in your console.
Web Search Integration ($0.005/call)
Enable the $web_search tool for real-time information. Charged only when search is triggered. Search results count toward token usage in subsequent calls.
Multimodal Input
K2.5 and K2.6 accept both text and images natively, with thinking and non-thinking modes. Image tokens follow the same per-million-token rates as text.
Tiered Rate Limits
Rate limits scale with cumulative recharge: Tier 1 ($10) gets 50 concurrent requests and 200 RPM. Tier 5 ($3000) gets 1000 concurrent and 10,000 RPM.
Kimi API Monthly Cost Estimates
Light Use
$5-40/mo
• Personal projects
• <1K requests/day
• K2.5 with caching
Medium Use
$40-200/mo
• Small apps
• 1-5K requests/day
• K2.5 + K2.6 mix
Heavy Use
$200-800/mo
• Production apps
• 5-20K requests/day
• K2.6 with cache hits
Enterprise
$800+/mo
• Large scale
• 20K+ requests/day
• Contact sales for tier 5+
6 Kimi API Cost Optimization Tips
Leverage Automatic Caching
Kimi's automatic context caching drops input cost to $0.10-$0.16/M (roughly 80-85% off cache-miss rates). Design prompts with consistent system messages, retrieval context, and few-shot examples to maximize cache hits.
Choose K2.6 vs K2.5
Pick K2.6 ($0.95/$4.00) when you need the best Kimi quality for agent and coding workloads. Pick K2.5 ($0.60/$3.00) when cost matters more than the K2.6 quality bump and you mostly need multimodal text-and-image work.
Migrate Off the Legacy K2 Family
kimi-k2-0905-preview, kimi-k2-0711-preview, kimi-k2-turbo-preview, kimi-k2-thinking, and kimi-k2-thinking-turbo are scheduled for end-of-life on May 25, 2026. Move production traffic to K2.5 or K2.6 before that date to avoid breaking changes.
Optimize Web Search Usage
Web search costs $0.005 per call plus token costs for search results. Only enable $web_search when real-time information is needed. Search results add to input tokens in subsequent calls.
Scale Your Rate Limits
Recharge strategically to unlock higher tiers: $10 gets 50 concurrent/200 RPM, $100 gets 200 concurrent/5K RPM. Match your tier to actual throughput needs.
Monitor with CostGoat
Track Kimi API spending per model with CostGoat. Get alerts when cache hit rates drop, when K2 Turbo usage spikes, or when web search costs exceed thresholds.
Kimi Model Selection Guide
Use Case
Code Generation & Agents
Recommended Model
Kimi K2.6
Latest Flagship
Monthly Cost (Est.)
~$60-300
Why This Model?
Best Kimi quality for coding, agent loops, and tool use
Use Case
Cost-Optimized Multimodal
Recommended Model
Kimi K2.5
Multimodal + Thinking
Monthly Cost (Est.)
~$30-150
Why This Model?
Cheaper multimodal alternative when K2.6 quality isn't needed
Use Case
Image Understanding
Recommended Model
Kimi K2.6
Native Multimodal
Monthly Cost (Est.)
~$60-300
Why This Model?
Best vision quality in the Kimi lineup
Use Case
Simple Chatbot (cheapest)
Recommended Model
Moonshot V1 (8K)
Lowest Cost
Monthly Cost (Est.)
~$10-50
Why This Model?
Budget option for basic conversations
Use Case
Web-Augmented Tasks
Recommended Model
K2.6 + Web Search
Real-time Info
Monthly Cost (Est.)
~$70-350
Why This Model?
Current information for research tasks ($0.005/call)
Kimi API Rate Limits & Tiers
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Concurrency
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TPM
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Cumulative Recharge
Concurrency
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TPM
User Level
Cumulative Recharge
Concurrency
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TPM
User Level
Cumulative Recharge
Concurrency
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User Level
Cumulative Recharge
Concurrency
RPM
TPM
User Level
Cumulative Recharge
Concurrency
RPM
TPM
RPM: Requests Per Minute | TPM: Tokens Per Minute. Tier 0 has 1.5M tokens/day limit. Tier 1+ has unlimited daily tokens. Vouchers don't count toward cumulative recharge.
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Kimi API Pricing FAQ
Common questions about Kimi API costs, billing, and optimization
