Studio
A visual spec editor with graph visualization, parallel artifacts, and frontend mockups. Prepare and validate your spec before the agent runs — far beyond plan mode.
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Claude Code alternative
Claude Code alternative — cheaper per token than the Claude API
Aexol exposes more generation parameters and includes a visual Studio. Spectral Flash Fast runs at $0.149 per 1M input and $0.447 per 1M output tokens — see how that compares to Claude API list prices in the table below. Credit-based billing, with usage you can cap per project.
Honest comparison
Where Aexol differs from Claude Code
Claude Code is a capable agentic CLI. This is a fair, five-axis comparison of where the two actually diverge.
| Feature | Claude Code | Aexol |
|---|---|---|
| Per-token API price | Pay-per-token Claude API list prices: Sonnet 4.5 $3.00/$15.00, Haiku 4.5 $1.00/$5.00, Opus 4.1 $15.00/$75.00 per 1M tokens. | Credit-based billing metered through Stripe — Spectral Flash Fast runs at $0.149 per 1M input and $0.447 per 1M output tokens, with per-project usage you can cap. |
| Provider routing | Locked to Claude models only (Sonnet 4.5, Opus 4.1, Haiku 4.5). No provider switching. | Route through OpenRouter or Codex (OpenAI) — pick the cheapest supported model per task. |
| Generation parameters | Limited agent parameters exposed through the CLI. | Full control: temperature, max tokens, top-p, frequency/penalty, and spec-level parameters (models, providers, concurrency). |
| Visual Studio | Terminal/IDE only. No visual spec editor. | Visual Studio with graph visualization, parallel artifacts, frontend mockups, and real-time validation. |
| Cost transparency | Shared usage pool across web chat and Claude Code. Credits consumed from your subscription. | Per-project and per-person usage caps. Bring-your-own-keys means you pay provider-direct pricing. |
TRANSPARENT PRICING
API price comparison — pay per token
We compare pay-per-token API list prices — not consumer subscription plans. Spectral rates are effective rates from the Pro plan ($149/mo = 10,000 credits at $0.0149 per credit); Claude rates are Anthropic public API list prices.
| Model | $/1M input | $/1M output | Context window | Output speed | Output vs Flash Fast |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spectral Flash FastSpectral | $0.149 | $0.447 | 1,300,000 | ~120 tok/s | 1× (baseline) |
| Spectral FlashSpectral | $0.104 | $0.209 | 1,000,000 | ~30 tok/s | 0.5× |
| Spectral ProSpectral | $0.3725 | $0.6705 | 1,000,000 | ~30 tok/s | 1.5× |
| GPT-5.5OpenAI | $5.00 | $30.00 | 1,050,000 | — | 67.1× |
| GPT-4oOpenAI | $2.50 | $10.00 | 128,000 | — | 22.4× |
| Claude Sonnet 4.5Anthropic | $3.00 | $15.00 | — | — | 33.6× |
| Claude Haiku 4.5Anthropic | $1.00 | $5.00 | — | — | 11.2× |
| Claude Opus 4.1Anthropic | $15.00 | $75.00 | — | — | 167.8× |
| Gemini 2.5 FlashGoogle | $0.30 | $2.50 | 1,048,576 | — | 5.6× |
| DeepSeek V4 ProDeepSeek | $0.66 | $1.98 | 1,048,576 | — | 4.4× |
We compare pay-per-token API list prices — not consumer subscription plans. Spectral rates are effective rates from the Pro plan: $149/mo includes 10,000 credits, so one credit costs $0.0149 — Spectral Flash Fast consumes 10 credits per 1M input tokens ($0.149), 30 credits per 1M output tokens ($0.447), and 5 credits per 1M cached input tokens ($0.0745). Competitor figures are public pay-per-token API list prices (models.dev sync 2026-08-18; Claude models from anthropic.com/pricing). 'Output vs Flash Fast' shows how many times Flash Fast's output price fits into the row's output price — above 1× means Flash Fast output is cheaper.
Output speed is measured on Spectral production inference (approximate output tokens per second). Competitor API throughput varies by provider and load and is not shown.
Aexol's contrast: Credit-based billing with per-project caps — effective per-token rates shown in the table above. Route inference to the provider you choose; bring your own API keys through OpenRouter or Codex (OpenAI).
Why Aexol
Three advantages over Claude Code
Aexol is built around a visual Studio, granular generation parameters, and cost-efficient provider routing — cheaper per token than the Claude API.
More parameters
Full control over generation: temperature, max tokens, top-p, frequency/penalty, model selection, provider routing, and concurrency. Spec-level parameters exposed in the Studio, per project.
Explore agent→Cheaper per token
Spectral Flash Fast runs at $0.149 per 1M input and $0.447 per 1M output tokens — compare it against Claude API list prices in the table above. Credit-based billing, with usage you can cap per project.
See provider routing→FAQ
Questions about switching
We compare pay-per-token API list prices — not consumer subscription plans. Aexol uses credit-based billing: on the Pro plan ($149/mo = 10,000 credits, $0.0149 per credit) Spectral Flash Fast runs at $0.149 per 1M input tokens and $0.447 per 1M output tokens. Claude API list prices are $3.00/$15.00 per 1M for Sonnet 4.5 and $15.00/$75.00 for Opus 4.1 — Flash Fast output is about 33.6× cheaper than Sonnet 4.5's. See the table above for the full breakdown.