Credits for AI work
Placement: a judgment drawn from the evidence, open to correction (dispute it).
The model
- Definition
- The product charges via an abstracted usage unit (credits, compute units, request quotas) that scales with the amount of AI work or effort performed on a task, rather than via a flat per-seat license.
- In one line
- Users buy credits or compute units that are consumed by the amount of AI work a task takes, instead of paying per seat.
- What compounds
- Revenue scales with how much work the AI does, which grows as the AI can do more.
- Who accelerates
- Small teams and individuals get large amounts of work done without hiring. Opaque metering erodes trust fast.
- What it displaces
- Flat per-seat developer and productivity tools.
- Stops working when
- When the unit becomes unpredictable to the buyer (Cursor rolled back a metering change and refunded users in July 2025).
Evidence
Companies 3
Evidence items 3
Grades 2A 1B
Latest dated 2026-03-02
Counter-evidence 1
Evidence items 3
Grades 2A 1B
Latest dated 2026-03-02
Counter-evidence 1
The three labels
1. Flow through · loop gain about zero. The curve helps it, but the gain passes straight through to customers and rivals.
Selling abundance · money lands in volume of cheap intelligence.
Cost-curve loop · cheaper models, lower unit cost, more volume, more revenue.
Same rung and family
Named companies 3 companies · grade per item
| Company | Claim | Date | Gr | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cursor (Anysphere) US · scaleup · best B |
Cursor surpassed $2 billion in annualized revenue, per a Bloomberg source, having doubled its revenue run rate over the prior three months (up from $1B ARR in late November 2025 and $500M ARR in June 2025). | 2026-03-02 | B | TechCrunch |
| Cognition (Devin) US · scaleup · best A |
Devin's own documentation confirms Enterprise customers are billed in ACUs at a rate set per order form, without a public dollar rate | 2026 | A | Cognition (Devin Docs) |
| Lovable Sweden · scaleup · best A |
Lovable describes itself as building software "from the heart of Stockholm" | 2025-01-21 | A | Lovable |
Counter-evidence Reversals, failures and disputes
| Cursor's July 2025 shift from a flat request allowance to metered usage caused enough customer backlash (unexpected charges, cancellations) that the company rolled back limits and refunded affected users | 2025-07 | Wikipedia (sourced compilation) |
Sources 4
TechCrunch techcrunch.com · 2026-03-02
Cognition (Devin Docs) docs.devin.ai · 2026
Lovable lovable.dev · 2025-01-21
Wikipedia (sourced compilation) en.wikipedia.org · 2025-07
Cognition (Devin Docs) docs.devin.ai · 2026
Lovable lovable.dev · 2025-01-21
Wikipedia (sourced compilation) en.wikipedia.org · 2025-07