Google halved the price of AI Ultra — and now it costs less than ChatGPT Pro
At Google I/O 2026, the company launched a new AI Ultra tier for $100 per month, while simultaneously reducing the old top-tier plan from $250 to $200. This is not a discount—it's a new pricing tier that directly targets subscribers of OpenAI and Anthropic.
By Tetiana Suchkova-Ladik
May 20, 2026 · 2 min read
At the I/O 2026 conference, Google restructured its AI subscription lineup: a new AI Ultra tier for $100 per month has appeared, while the former flagship $250 plan has been reduced to $200, retaining all its capabilities. In other words, the $250 price point simply disappeared from the pricing—replaced by two separate Ultra tiers instead.
What's included in the $100 tier
The new tier is aimed at developers, technical leads, and "advanced creators." For this amount, subscribers get 5 times higher Gemini usage limits compared to the Pro plan, 20 TB of cloud storage, an individual YouTube Premium subscription, and priority access to Google Antigravity platform. Also included is access to Gemini 3.5 Flash and the upcoming Gemini Spark agentic assistant.
The upper Ultra tier at $200 maintains a 20-fold usage limit and adds Project Genie—an experimental tool for generating game environments.
Where the competition comes in
The pricing logic becomes clear when looking at market competitors. OpenAI's ChatGPT Pro costs $200 per month, Anthropic's Claude Max—$100 or $200 depending on the limit. Google essentially copied this tiered structure and positioned its $100 tier directly against Anthropic.
"The subscription restructuring puts Google in direct competition with ChatGPT Pro and Anthropic's plans, as all three companies compete for power users"
Digital Trends
Previously, Google's AI Ultra at $250 looked more expensive than anything else on the market—which hindered migration. Now the psychological barrier is removed: $100 is already "what top AI costs."
A nuance that's easy to miss
A higher limit doesn't mean better model access. Both Ultra tiers use the same models: the difference is only in how many queries you can make. This means choosing between $100 and $200 is purely about usage intensity, not response quality.
It's also worth noting the geographic scope: as of I/O 2026, the new tiers are available primarily in the US, with Google not announcing dates for international rollout.
The company also confirmed that it will increase AI capital expenditures to $190 billion in 2026—against which backdrop the subscription price reduction looks not like a concession, but a bet on audience scale.
If Gemini Spark exits beta before OpenAI releases its own agentic assistant for mass consumer use—the $100 tier will have a clear argument for switching. If not, the difference between $100 and $200 will remain a matter of limits rather than real value.
