ChatGPT Pro and Business now include up to $500 a month in OpenAI API credits

On October 28, 2026, OpenAI said eligible ChatGPT Pro and Business subscribers can claim up to $500 a month in free API credits. The credits pay for your own apps on the OpenAI API Platform, separate from what you use inside ChatGPT. You claim them once by linking an API organization you own.

How much you get

ChatGPT plan	Monthly API credits
Pro, $100 tier	$100
Pro, $200 tier	$200
Pro, $500 tier	$500
Business, Standard seat	$20 per paid seat
Business, Premium seat	$100 per paid seat
Business total	Pooled, capped at $500 per workspace
Plus, Go, Free, Enterprise	None

Business workspaces that pay a year upfront get the whole year’s grant at once, with a shared cap of $6,000 per annual cycle.

At OpenAI’s listed rates for GPT-6.1 Terra ($1 per million input tokens and $5 per million output tokens), $100 covers 20 million output tokens. You can estimate other models with our token cost calculator.

What the credits cover

According to OpenAI’s docs, the credits work on the Responses, Agents (including OpenAI-hosted sandbox charges), Decisions, GPT-Live and Realtime, and Images APIs, plus built-in tools such as web search, file search and Code Interpreter. They don’t cover Codex used through API keys, and they don’t raise ChatGPT or signed-in Codex usage limits.

The rules

• Your paid Pro or Business subscription must be at least seven days old. Free trials and complimentary subscriptions don’t qualify.
• You must own both the subscription (or workspace) and the receiving API organization, and both accounts must use the same email address.
• Credits expire at the end of each billing cycle and don’t roll over. The first grant is prorated.
• Free credits are spent before purchased ones. When they run out, requests fail with an HTTP 429 credit_balance_exhausted error unless you add paid credits or turn on Auto Recharge.
• Changing the receiving organization requires contacting support.

OpenAI’s page does not give an end date for the program or say whether it varies by region.

What to do

If you pay for ChatGPT Pro or Business and also buy OpenAI API credits, link your API organization from ChatGPT billing settings or from Billing on the API Platform. If you use none of the API, nothing changes for you. Compare models and prices on our AI models page.