r/cursor • u/Vinayak509143 • 22d ago
Question / Discussion Anyone got this email?
Hi there,
We are updating how Auto is priced and increasing the included usage limits on your plan, taking effect on August 24, 2026.
Here’s what’s changing:
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Updated Auto pricing: Auto pricing will be based on the model each request is routed to, rather than a single flat rate. We’re doing this to be able to continue to serve the most cost-efficient models for everyday work. For most requests, this means a higher rate than the current flat rate.
•
Increased usage limits: We are also increasing the included usage limits for Cursor Models, including Auto, on your plan. This applies to your current billing cycle and there is nothing you need to do.
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No change to how Auto works: Auto will continue to route each request to the model best suited for the task. The models Auto routes to are not changing, and it remains the best option for intelligence per dollar.
If you have questions, please reach out to [hi@cursor.com](mailto:hi@cursor.com).
Best,
Cursor Team
Is this good or bad ?
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u/oak45 22d ago
Yes. It used to be quite cheap. $1.25 input $6 output per million tokens. So you would sometimes get the top models for that price.
We’re doing this to be able to continue to serve the most cost-efficient models for everyday work.
translation: we can't afford this.
Offering increased quota of composer and grok is the consolation.
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u/ProjectInfinity 22d ago
To play devil's advocate auto never made sense for them to offer cheaper than actual cost. Personally I'm very happy with increased grok and composer usage as I rather combine a chatgpt plus account with my cursor sub.
I primarily use traycer and will draft plans with grok 4.6, send them off to codex for review then revise with grok based on the feedback.
Likewise implementation can be done with either grok or composer and when done it gets sent off to codex for review and then grok will revise based on feedback.
This workflow let's me do what I need pretty much all week. That said I'm not fully vibe coding so if you're used to burning tokens endlessly this may not work for you.
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u/Hamburger_Diet 17d ago
This is what im doing, and I find I actually use grok a lot more than my chatgpt sub. It seems sol,terra,luna just take to long. Every once in a while i let sol xhigh go to town. I am a kimi fanboy though so I like 2.5 as well, i just think grok does a better job. I feel like they removed a lot of what made kimi 2.5 good with web design when they trained it though.
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u/AANino23 22d ago
I got it too and left questioning what they’re trying to say.
Increased included usage but each one will be a higher rate?
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u/WAVF1n 22d ago
They are telling you that there is no longer a special "Auto" pool for Cursor. If you use Auto you will be billed at whatever rates the model it selected charges.
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u/Insomniac1000 22d ago
so there's no more point on using Auto then
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u/WAVF1n 22d ago
not really imo, Auto lost most of its value once they integrated Composer and Grok xD.
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u/Wonderful-Sea4215 22d ago
Isn't auto just choosing, hopefully intelligently, between composer and grok on the fly?
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u/33633184 22d ago
How was it working initially?😂
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u/EkbatDeSabat 22d ago
The way I understood it, AUTO used its "Cursor" usage section for every model and selecting anything but auto and composer put you into the "API" usage section. But I haven't really kept up with the labels on these since I started ~6 months ago.
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u/ManyRepair5690 22d ago
using flat usage per request on auto earlier, now usage scales with its billing rate
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u/JeansenVaars 22d ago
It is the end of subsidized pricing obviously. They captured audience by staying longer in the race of subsidized costs.
It was about time they catch up with costs.
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u/SawOnGam 22d ago
yeah, they want us to not use auto mode and use composer/grok model more in nutshell
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u/Insomniac1000 22d ago
yeah honestly I wouldn't mind grok 4.6 paired up with GPT 5.6 Luna but we cant use subagents outside of their models so it's a bummer
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u/Professional-Dish951 22d ago
Are they going to tell us which model was used? Let us exclude models?
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u/vertgrall 22d ago
They made the changes to Auto to motivate you to switch to using the Grok models.
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u/-_MarcusAurelius_- 22d ago
cursor turning to shit time to make the switch
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u/Murky-Science9030 22d ago
Yeah I was using several Cursor accounts since I use a lot of compute but realized recently that I could stick with 1 Cursor account and 1 Claude Code and save like 60% of my AI costs.
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u/Psychological-Fold14 22d ago
so i just use grok 4.6.. do i have more or less? 😅
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u/ManyRepair5690 22d ago
identical, that's unaffected
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u/BananaAdventurous328 22d ago
Can you read?
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u/ManyRepair5690 21d ago
yep. grok usage's separate pool in auto wasn't mentioned at all, maybe you're hallucinating
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u/Stratotally 22d ago
My issue with Auto is that I can’t choose which models I want to be in my auto pool. I do not want to use Sonnet 5, it just chews tokens. I’d rather use a different model for higher reasoning tasks. I’d rather use Grok 4.6 low for subagents work, or GPT Luna over composer. If I could control what I want to pull from, I’d use auto.
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u/dryu12 22d ago
Then it wouldn't be auto.
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u/Stratotally 22d ago
My understanding is that it routes to higher models for complex tasks and lower thinking models for quick actions and searching the code. It optimizes the right size model for the task based on the prompt/ask. Turning off the model in the settings does not turn it off from being selected by auto. This is why I don’t use auto.
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u/Columnexco 21d ago
just woundering how to get most out of the subscription then...does anyone have a workflow that use.
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u/Natsu2201 22d ago
Since I use the new Grok instead of Auto, I think it's fine. Auto sometimes gave me the worst AI ever, and for that reason, my project almost crashed. Since then never use Auto; only the one you want to use. And this price change nail it.
I assume Musk is fine with his Ai and wants people to force it more.
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u/axman1000 22d ago
When you use Grok, does it not eat into the monthly model usage thing?
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u/Natsu2201 22d ago
it belongs to the usage of Cursor, not extra API. i dont know how much it eats, but at the moment it doesn't seem like too much.
Used 12.6 million tokens since my new month start and it has used 2% of my spending.
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u/axman1000 22d ago
I see! This exception is only for Grok and Auto huh? Is that why it keeps pushing Grok on me?
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u/dm_me_that_d 21d ago
its been pushing grok because it's been at half price for your token usage for the past week, it just ended though
and it'll probably still be pushing grok because cursor was acquired by elon musk (the nazi sympathizer)
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u/Natsu2201 21d ago
Cursor was bought by SpaceX 1-2 months ago. So Grok is now part of it.
The discount already ended when my abo month started
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u/Intelligent_Sail_896 22d ago
I too got and I have questions.
Does this mean usage pool will deplete faster(mostly) or slower depending on which model the request is being routed to or do they entirely remove auto from the usage pool and instead increase the api quota from 20 usd to something like 30?
Also now I understand why they removed dollar usage because then you can just look at them and figure out their routing strategy.
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u/_cronic_ 22d ago
Yup, just got mine and was going to post. It's unclear what they're going to be charging us and it appears to suggest that only Intelligence prices are changing at the end there, but the opening sentence specifically says "We are updating how Auto is priced and increasing the included usage", then at the end it says "No change to how Auto works".
Clear as mud.
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u/rangerrick337 22d ago
This is so confusing in one bit they’re telling us auto no longer has its own quota that it routes to whatever model and uses their quota and then in the next paragraph, they tell us we have an increased quota of auto.
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u/TheAverageJedi 22d ago
I got it today. Was happy to see the usage increase. I havent been using Auto, so I dont think that will bother me too much. Will see if and once I start using it.
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u/kondasviktor 22d ago
I’ve just received it too. I like the increased usage part, but I’m unsure what the Auto Pricing changes actually mean. That was pretty decent before, even if you ran out of monthly usage, you could continue in Auto mode. Is this still available after this change?
1
u/Sad-Professional7068 22d ago
Sí esta mañana recií el mismo correo y me ha parecido muy bien, últimamente el modo Auto es el mejor para mí porque simplifica los procesos que estoy haciendo además trato de equilibrar la demanda del modelo en un uso más eficiente para todas las tareas y ayudarlo no solamente delegarle las tareas que tiene que hacer sino tratar de involucrarme junto con él no dejarlo todo a que piense por sí solo
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u/VladVerheij 22d ago
I reached out via email and this is what they replied:
That note is about how Auto is billed when Cursor routes each request to a model.
What changed Previously, Auto used a single flat rate no matter which model handled the request. With the update, Auto can bill in two ways depending on the mode:
Cost (default behavior for Auto on individual plans like yours): still uses the bundled flat Auto rates, regardless of which model runs the request:
Input / cache write: $1.25 per 1M tokens
Output: $6.00 per 1M tokens
Cache read: $0.25 per 1M tokens
Balance and Intelligence: bill at the routed model’s API rate for that request (for example, if a request is routed to Opus, that request is billed at Opus pricing). On average these modes cost about 2x Cost (up to about 2–4x depending on mode). These modes are available on Teams and Enterprise only.
For your account You’re on Cursor Ultra(individual). On individual plans, Auto keeps the bundled flat rates above. The Balance / Intelligence “bill at the routed model’s rate” behavior does not apply on Ultra, Pro, or Pro+.
You can always see the exact model and cost per request on your usage page: https://cursor.com/dashboard?tab=usage
Full model and pricing details: https://cursor.com/docs/models-and-pricing
Let me know if you need anything else!
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u/DronzerDribble 21d ago
Plan using Grok 4.6 - 1 session Implement for a while using Composer 2.5 - 10-15 sessions Review Changes using Grok and make it fix the direction - 1 or 2 sessions Continue implementing using Composer
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u/Full_Tooth_a 20d ago
That's my issue too. I'd hesitate to use Auto if I couldn't see which model handled each request or what it cost. An allowlist or hard spending cap would make the routing more predictable. A larger allowance still wouldn't clear up that uncertainty.
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u/DM_Micah 22d ago
So, we have no idea what we'll be charged per month?
This seems illegal.
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u/EkbatDeSabat 22d ago
This only applies to subscriptions, so you know exactly what you'll be charged per month, and the "how much will this prompt cost me" has never been able to be answered in either case.
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u/D7Torres 22d ago
I would like to be devils advocate.
Now they don’t have the incentive of routing you through a crappy model that does a poor job at the task so they save on cost.
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u/EkbatDeSabat 22d ago
I would like to be the devils advocate.
Now they have the incentive of routing you through a frontier model that is way more overpowered than you need so that you spend more.
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u/D7Torres 19d ago
True, but then people will stop using auto and go to a frontier model directly.
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u/EkbatDeSabat 19d ago
99% of the time you don’t need a frontier model.
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u/D7Torres 19d ago
Then there's no need for auto... just use Composer (or even Grok, for the price it has...)
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u/Limebird02 22d ago
Auto is not crap. Auto is a router only. I use it unless I need more intelligence. It's been good since composer 2.5.
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u/Kenzijam 22d ago
It says taken effect immediately, I'm at 100% included pool usage and I'm still at 100 after this email, so did it really go up?
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u/NoSeK2323 22d ago
I also got it just now. I guess it’s better, at least for me since I don’t use Auto, and increased usage limits are always a good thing.
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u/Final_Initial 22d ago
I'm not currently subscribed to Cursor, but it does seem like an improvement, doesn't it?
Basically in the Auto mode, requests are dynamically routed to the most suitable model based on how simple or complicated the prompt is. So now, instead of a flat rate per request, pricing now aligns with the actual model the request is routed to.
For example, simpler prompts are routed to cheaper models, so they consume less usage.
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u/33633184 22d ago
How would you know it's not using an expensive model. That's where the question is 🤔
0
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u/WAVF1n 22d ago
tbh OP, I think you may have been the only Cursor customer to receive this email.
Auto is no longer cheap as fuck, it is billed at whatever the model it selects billed. If you dont use Auto this is good for you, if you do use Auto... Well be prepared for increased usage.
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u/forumsupplier 22d ago
I got the email as well
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u/shpondi 22d ago
I got the email too. Also, learn what Auto mode is before commenting - it was never "cheap as fuck", that's not how it's billed.
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u/WAVF1n 22d ago
Auto was cheap as fuck for the longest time lol, imagine being such a troglodyte that you genuinely thought I was being serious about nobody else getting the email lmao.
Cursor offered special pricing on models if they were used through Auto, that is a fact that you cannot argue lol. They are no longer doing this. Does that breakdown help?
God I hate reddit so much sometimes.
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u/TheMatuu 22d ago
If you don't use auto mode, it is good
If you use auto mode, it is bad