Document summarization cost drivers
Document summarization is input-heavy, while requested summary length and repeated boilerplate determine how much output and cache pricing matter.
Workload cost scenario
Document Summarization API Cost Calculator
Estimate the cost of summarizing long documents with a large input-to-output ratio across tracked AI models.
Document, legal operations, and knowledge-management teams.
Lowest tracked estimate
$55.50
Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite for the current assumptions
Lowest cost does not mean best model. Test output quality, latency, retries, and reliability on your own workload.
Cost comparison
Estimated monthly cost by model
Comparing 22 models that fit the initial input length.
| Model | Provider | Input cost | Output cost | Monthly estimate | Context usage |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | $45.50 | $10.00 | $55.50 | 4.8% | |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash non-thinking | DeepSeek | $63.14 | $7.00 | $70.14 | 5.0% |
| GPT-4o mini | OpenAI | $71.25 | $15.00 | $86.25 | 39.1% |
| gpt-5.4-nano | OpenAI | $91.00 | $31.25 | $122.25 | 12.5% |
| Gemini 3.5 Live Translate Preview | $113.75 | $37.50 | $151.25 | 38.1% | |
| Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite | $113.75 | $37.50 | $151.25 | 4.8% | |
| Gemini 2.5 Flash | $136.50 | $62.50 | $199.00 | 4.8% | |
| deepseek-v4-pro | DeepSeek | $195.93 | $21.75 | $217.68 | 5.0% |
| Gemini 3 Flash Preview | $227.50 | $75.00 | $302.50 | 4.8% | |
| gpt-5.4-mini | OpenAI | $341.25 | $112.50 | $453.75 | 12.5% |
| Claude Haiku 4.5 | Anthropic | $455.00 | $125.00 | $580.00 | 25.0% |
| gpt-5.6-luna | OpenAI | $455.00 | $150.00 | $605.00 | 4.8% |
| Gemini 2.5 Pro | $568.75 | $250.00 | $818.75 | 4.8% | |
| Gemini 3.5 Flash | $682.50 | $225.00 | $907.50 | 4.8% | |
| Claude Sonnet 5 | Anthropic | $910.00 | $250.00 | $1,160.00 | 5.0% |
| Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | $910.00 | $300.00 | $1,210.00 | 4.8% | |
| GPT-4o | OpenAI | $1,187.50 | $250.00 | $1,437.50 | 39.1% |
| gpt-5.6-terra | OpenAI | $1,137.50 | $375.00 | $1,512.50 | 4.8% |
| Claude Sonnet 4.6 | Anthropic | $1,365.00 | $375.00 | $1,740.00 | 5.0% |
| Claude Opus 4.8 | Anthropic | $2,275.00 | $625.00 | $2,900.00 | 5.0% |
| gpt-5.6-sol | OpenAI | $2,275.00 | $750.00 | $3,025.00 | 4.8% |
| Claude Fable 5 | Anthropic | $5,000.00 | $1,250.00 | $6,250.00 | 5.0% |
What to measure
- Sample real document lengths instead of relying only on an average.
- Set summary-length targets by document type.
- Check whether map-reduce summarization adds extra calls.
Estimate boundary: OCR, file ingestion, multimodal document processing, and multi-pass summarization are not included.
View pricing sources
OpenAI model pricingHigh confidenceChecked 2026-07-13
Tracked prices for included OpenAI models are checked against official provider documentation.
Anthropic model pricingHigh confidenceChecked 2026-07-12
Tracked prices for included Anthropic models are checked against official provider documentation.
Google model pricingHigh confidenceChecked 2026-07-14
Tracked prices for included Google models are checked against official provider documentation.
DeepSeek model pricingHigh confidenceChecked 2026-07-12
Tracked prices for included DeepSeek models are checked against official provider documentation.
Anthropic model pricingHigh confidenceChecked 2026-07-14
Tracked prices for included Anthropic models are checked against official provider documentation.