AI cost intelligence
Know what your AI agent
will cost — before you build it
Describe the agent you’re planning. PitCrew forecasts what it’ll cost at real volume and shows you the cheapest way to ship it.
5–10×
How much most builds overpay
60s
Time to first forecast
20+
Providers supported
How it works
01
Describe your agent
Tell us what your agent will do, paste a draft system prompt, and sketch the volume you expect.
02
Get your forecast
PitCrew turns your design into a real cost estimate and a side-by-side of cheaper ways to ship it.
03
Build it the cheap way
Follow the action plan. Ship with the right model, caching, and batch lanes already dialed in.
How PitCrew finds your cheapest path
Here’s a real AI support agent that cost $402/mo. PitCrew was able to forecast a build that’s almost 90% cheaper. Below are some of the many filters within PitCrew that were used to determine the most cost-effective path for this agent.
01
Default build (Sonnet on every call)
Tier-1 model, no caching, real-time pricing on async work
starting point
02
Right model for the task
Swap to Haiku 4.5 — same task quality, fraction of the cost
−$280/mo
$280 saved so far
03
+ Prompt caching
System prompt cached after first call — pay 10% on repeats
−$38/mo
$318 saved so far
04
+ Batch lane for async work
Move overnight summaries to the Batch API at 50% off
−$11/mo
$329 saved so far
05
+ Trim redundant prompt
Cut 600 tokens of boilerplate from the system prompt
−$18/mo
$347 saved so far
Started at
$402/mo
→
PitCrew plan
$55/mo
$347 saved every month · 86% off the default build
Built for accuracy, not for show
Every dollar in your forecast traces back to three things: a counted token, a published rate, and an honest confidence band.
inputyour agent description
parse→ wizard form// LLM, structured output
count→ tokens// gpt-tokenizer · count_tokens API
multiplyrate × volume → cost// pure arithmetic, no model
propagatecost → band// closed-form uncertainty
output$347/mo · band $240–$460/mo
Where new builders burn money
Most cost overruns aren’t bugs. They’re defaults — picked at design time, paid every single day after launch.
01
Wrong tier for the job
Sonnet by default. GPT-4 because it's familiar. Most agents do tier-2 work on tier-1 models — paying 5–10× for capability they never use.
Typical waste$200–800/mo
02
No prompt caching
A 2,000-token system prompt riding on every call. Without caching, you pay full freight 1,000 times a day for the same instructions.
Typical waste$40–200/mo
03
Real-time pricing on batch work
Overnight summaries, scheduled imports, async ETL — all running on real-time pricing when the Batch API is 50% off.
Typical waste$30–500/mo
04
Tool-call sprawl
Eight tools loaded “just in case.” Each one inflates the system prompt and triggers extra round-trips you didn’t budget for.
Typical waste$50–400/mo
Know the number
before you build
Takes 60 seconds. No credit card required.
Audit my agent