Ideogram
Ideogram pricing sells a monthly bucket of priority credits, and priority buys speed rather than access.
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Ideogram pricing: one credit, two queues, two separate wallets
Ideogram pricing sells a monthly bucket of priority credits, and priority buys speed rather than access. Paid plans run $20, $30 and $60 a month for 1,000 to 3,500 credits, and when those run out most generations keep working in an unlimited slow queue. The API is a separate prepaid wallet at a flat $0.02 a credit.
Key takeaways
Ideogram charges 1 credit for a 4.0 Turbo image, 2 for Balanced and 3 for Quality, and halved all three between July and September 2026.
Slow generation is genuinely unlimited on Plus, Pro and Team, so priority credits buy queue position, not the right to generate.
Monthly plan credits expire every billing cycle. Top-ups survive a year and outlive the subscription that bought them.
The API bills a flat $0.02 a credit across all 80 published line items, while Pro's plan credits cost $0.017 monthly and $0.012 annually.
Ideogram pricing in 2026
Tier | Monthly | Annual | Priority credits | Slow credits
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
Free | $0 | $0 | None | Weekly, amount not published |
Plus | $20 | $180/yr ($15/mo) | 1,000/mo | Unlimited |
Team | $30/user | $20/user/mo | 1,500/user/mo | Unlimited |
Pro | $60 | $504/yr ($42/mo) | 3,500/mo | Unlimited |
Enterprise | Custom | Custom | Custom | Unlimited, with contract |
API | Prepaid balance | n/a | $0.02 per credit | None |
What Ideogram actually meters
Ideogram meters a credit whose cost depends on the model and render speed you pick, and it publishes the whole table. Turbo, Balanced and Quality spend different amounts on the same model.
Model | Turbo | Balanced or Default | Quality
|
|---|---|---|---|
4.0 (2K) | 1 / image | 2 / image | 3 / image |
3.0 | 2 / 4 images | 4 / 4 images | 6 / 4 images |
Upscale 1.0 | 1 / image, paid plans only |
So Plus buys 1,000 4.0 Turbo images a month, or 333 at Quality. Pro buys 3,500 and 1,166.
The API uses the same word for a different thing. It runs on a prepaid balance at a flat $0.02 a credit and charges more credits for identical work: 4.0 Turbo costs 1.5 there against 1 in the app, and Quality costs 5 against 3. Nano Banana runs 10 credits, Topaz Upscale 8K runs 24, and a custom model training run costs 2,000, or $40. There's no video product, so nothing to price.
How priority and slow credits work
Priority credits are the metered allowance, and slow credits are only a real allowance on the free tier. Paid plans get unlimited slow generation, which makes the second currency a queue rather than a wallet. Free accounts get a weekly slow grant the page no longer quantifies, listing it only as slow credits "weekly for eligible accounts".
Plan credits don't roll over. Ideogram's FAQ says unused subscription priority credits expire at the end of each billing cycle, so if you don't use them you lose them. Leonardo banks three months of unused tokens by comparison.
Top-ups behave better. The monthly allowance drains first, then the top-up balance. Unused top-ups carry month to month, outlive the subscription, and expire a year from purchase.
Then there's the gap. Every pack costs $4, and the page no longer says what $4 buys. Until July 2026 it did: 150 credits on Plus, 250 on Pro, or $0.027 and $0.016 a credit. Now that number lives in the checkout dialog.
What happens when you hit the limit
Generation carries on, more slowly. Once priority credits hit zero, eligible generations move to the slow queue, where wait times track server capacity and your recent usage. Nothing auto-charges and nothing hard-stops.
The exception matters. Editing with AI and Image Reference always spend priority credits on paid plans and never run in the slow queue, so an empty balance blocks exactly the tools people pay for. Free accounts run those same tools on slow credits.
The API blocks outright. Requests only succeed with a payment method and a positive balance, funded in $20, $50 or $100 chunks or a custom amount from $1, capped at $300.
How Ideogram's pricing has changed across all these years
Date | Milestone | Source
|
|---|---|---|
22 Sep 2026 | Plan prices, credit rates and the $4 top-up with no pack size all unchanged | Vendor |
19 Sep 2026 | Annual saving now billed as up to 33%, up from 30% | Vendor |
By 4 Sep 2026 | Pricing page rebuilt with separate Plans and API usage costs tabs | Vendor |
3 Sep 2026 | Ideogram 4.0 halves to 1, 2 and 3 credits from 2, 4 and 6. Top-up pack sizes drop off the page | Vendor |
21 Aug 2026 | Docs confirm top-ups carry over and expire a year from purchase | Vendor |
11 Jul 2026 | Free card switches to credits for Google, Apple or Microsoft sign-in | Vendor |
By 4 Jun 2026 | Basic retired, Team added at $20/user. Plus drops to $15, Pro to $42. Top-ups published at 150 credits for $4 on Plus, 250 on Pro | Vendor |
4 Apr 2025 | Four tiers: Basic $7, Plus $16, Pro $48 annually. Free gets 10 slow credits a week | Vendor |
Customer
Sentiment Highlights
I selected a custom top-up amount of $10, but they charged me $30 instead
Ideogram customer describing a top-up charge, Trustpilot, July 2026
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How much does Ideogram cost?
How many credits does an Ideogram image cost?
Do unused Ideogram credits roll over?
What happens when you run out of priority credits on Ideogram?
