{
  "notice": "Please credit \"Is software solved?\" and the sources listed in credits when you reuse these numbers. They are our own aggregates. For original records, go to each source.",
  "id": "token-usage",
  "name": "AI token usage",
  "question": "Is AI use still growing?",
  "metric": "Tokens used through OpenRouter, latest full month",
  "solvedIf": "AI handles a large share of software work",
  "value": "787T",
  "change": "+3423%",
  "trend": [
    {
      "label": "2025-01",
      "value": 2
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-02",
      "value": 3
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-03",
      "value": 6
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-04",
      "value": 8
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-05",
      "value": 10
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-06",
      "value": 9
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-07",
      "value": 11
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-08",
      "value": 15
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-09",
      "value": 21
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-10",
      "value": 22
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-11",
      "value": 27
    },
    {
      "label": "2025-12",
      "value": 26
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-01",
      "value": 32
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-02",
      "value": 50
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-03",
      "value": 84
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-04",
      "value": 97
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-05",
      "value": 123
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-06",
      "value": 188
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-07",
      "value": 248
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-08",
      "value": 379
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-09",
      "value": 576
    },
    {
      "label": "2026-10",
      "value": 787
    }
  ],
  "trendLabel": "Tokens used through OpenRouter per month, in trillions.",
  "caution": [
    "This covers one service, not all AI. Part of this growth is OpenRouter itself becoming popular, and big companies mostly buy from AI labs directly.",
    "Tokens are not all software work, and cheap or free models can raise the count without much more being built. Newer models also use more tokens for the same task."
  ],
  "score": 85,
  "scoreReason": "353 times the tokens of January 2025, against a goal of 1,000 times.",
  "analysis": {
    "title": "Most used models",
    "intro": "No single model dominates. These are the top five of 2026-10.",
    "points": [
      "deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash: 119T, 15% of all tokens.",
      "deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash: 79T, 10% of all tokens.",
      "z-ai/glm-5.3-flash: 57T, 7% of all tokens.",
      "tencent/hy4-preview: 36T, 5% of all tokens.",
      "xiaomi/mimo-v2.6-flash: 35T, 5% of all tokens."
    ]
  },
  "fromHigh": "At its high",
  "status": "Growing",
  "rule": "Growing when more tokens are used than in the same month a year before.",
  "direction": "toward",
  "checks": [
    {
      "date": "2026-11-02",
      "value": "787T",
      "change": "+3423%",
      "status": "Growing"
    },
    {
      "date": "2026-11-01",
      "value": "787T",
      "change": "+3423%",
      "status": "Growing"
    }
  ],
  "url": "/signals/token-usage",
  "api": "/api/signals/token-usage.json",
  "credits": [
    {
      "name": "OpenRouter",
      "url": "https://openrouter.ai/rankings",
      "signal": "token-usage",
      "license": "CC BY 4.0",
      "credit": "Source: OpenRouter (openrouter.ai/rankings), as of 2026-11-01T09:28:31.358Z. Licensed under CC BY 4.0."
    }
  ]
}