Pricing AI Products: Seats, Usage and Credits Quiz

Answers and explanations appear as you take the quiz.

1. Why does AI make per-seat pricing riskier for vendors than in traditional software?
   • Seats are illegal for AI products
   • Every AI request has a real compute cost, and heavy users can cost far more than light users
   • AI users never log in more than once
   • Traditional software has higher marginal costs
2. What is the main drawback of usage-based pricing for buyers?
   • It is less aligned with value
   • It cannot be used for APIs
   • It makes spending unpredictable and harder to budget
   • It always costs more than seats
3. What advantage do credits offer vendors?
   • They let actions with very different compute costs be priced under one balance, with rates adjustable as costs change
   • They remove all compute costs
   • They guarantee customers understand exactly what they pay for
   • They eliminate the need for metering
4. What is the key customer complaint about credit systems described in the guide?
   • Credits expire too slowly
   • Credits are always more expensive than seats
   • Credits cannot be bought by businesses
   • Opacity: customers may not know what a credit buys, and rate changes can feel like hidden price increases
5. What does a typical hybrid pricing model look like?
   • A seat price with an included usage allowance plus overage charges
   • A free product with no limits
   • A one-time perpetual licence
   • A price that changes randomly each month
6. Why should vendors study the distribution of usage rather than just the average?
   • Averages are too hard to calculate
   • Regulators require usage histograms
   • A small group of heavy users often drives most of the cost
   • Distribution determines the product's name
7. Which engineering choice can reduce cost per action?
   • Always using the largest available model
   • Removing all usage limits
   • Doubling output length
   • Routing simple requests to smaller models
8. What lesson does the guide draw from reactions to AI coding tool pricing changes in 2025?
   • Customers never notice pricing changes
   • Transparency about what is included and advance notice matter as much as the pricing structure
   • Usage pricing should be abandoned entirely
   • Prices should only ever go down