# Why your AI bill tripled while token prices fell 75%

DevFeed: [Why your AI bill tripled while token prices fell 75%](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/why-your-ai-bill-tripled-while-token-prices-fell-75-4841.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://www.elastic.co/blog/token-costs-ai-bills>)

Author: Sunile Manjee

Published: 2026-09-04T00:00:00Z

Content type: article

Language: en

Sources: [Elastic Blog - Elasticsearch, Kibana, and ELK Stack](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/elastic-blog-elasticsearch-kibana-and-elk-stack.md>)

Topics: [long-context](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/long-context.md>), [Inference](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/inference.md>), [Chat Bot](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/chatbot.md>)

Tags: [agent](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/agent.md>), [agentic-ai](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/agentic-ai.md>), [ai](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ai.md>), [cost](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/cost.md>), [inference](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/inference.md>), [reasoning](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/reasoning.md>)

## AI overview

The article explains why spending on agentic AI can rise despite lower token prices: multistep, multiturn, and multihop work repeats and expands context, increasing billed token use.

## Source excerpt

Token prices dropped 75%, so why did your agentic AI bill triple? Here's the real math behind agentic AI cost and how IT leaders can measure it.