Epoch AI: Cost of Equal-Capability AI Drops 47% Per Quarter
Epoch AI released a report, "The plunging price of thought," quantifying the trend of AI prices falling over time at a constant intelligence level: since 2023, the cost of achieving equivalent performance has dropped roughly 47% per quarter on average—about 13x cheaper per year—a decline faster than any transformative technology in history.
Confirmed
- The report's comparisons show AI cost declines are 4x faster than DNA sequencing, 6x faster than computing costs, 18x faster than lithium batteries, and 54x faster than pre-1973 electricity.
- Decline rates vary by performance tier: SOTA (frontier) performance costs fall about 66% per quarter, slowing to 32% after two years.
- LeviTurk cited figures claiming the price of "intelligence" is collapsing at roughly 13x per year, comparing it with Epoch AI's measurement from about 18 months ago of a 9-900x drop in LLM prices, and said he accepts the 13x figure.
Why it matters
- Sharing the chart, jeffweinstein noted that at a given intelligence level, AI costs are falling significantly faster than any prior technology—a trend with major implications for AI adoption and economic impact.
- LeviTurk predicted on this basis that, at the current pace, he could run a Claude Opus-level model locally on his laptop within a year, suggesting local, low-cost, highly capable AI may arrive soon.
- Sustained price collapses mean equally capable AI services will rapidly become cheap, potentially reshaping the industry's competitive landscape and application ecosystem.
2026-09-25 ~ 2026-09-26 · 5 related posts
Primary sources
- Epoch AI chart shows AI price per intelligence level falling faster than any prior tech — jeff_weinstein · 2026-09-25
- [source] Price of intelligence collapsing 13x per year, says blogger citing Epoch AI data — LeviTurk · 2026-09-26
- [source] AI capability costs plunge 13x per year, 4x faster than DNA sequencing: Epoch AI — LeviTurk · 2026-09-26
- AI costs fall ~47% per quarter at constant performance, outpacing every past tech — FinanceYF5 · 2026-09-26
1 near-duplicate retellings: FinanceYF5