AI coding tokens have fallen ~90% in 18 months - what that means for what you're paying right now

Cursor Composer 2 dropped 86% versus Composer 1.5. GitHub Copilot launched a permanent free tier in December 2024. Codeium/Windsurf shipped free unlimited completions. Claude Sonnet input/output prices have been the most stable data point - and even there the per-token cost of frontier-level coding has dropped roughly 10x since GPT-4 launch in 2023. If you're on a per-seat coding subscription you signed in 2024, you're almost certainly overpaying for what you're using - the underlying token economics have shifted. The right move once a quarter: re-check your Cursor / Copilot / Cody Auto-mode usage against what's free or near-free now. The tools that matter most to your daily work usually still warrant paying. The ones you barely touch can go to free tiers without losing anything.