OpenAI Researchers Now Burn $600/Day in Tokens as Coding Agents Take Over Research
downingARK · x · 2026-09-09
OpenAI offered a peek at how coding agents have transformed its research workflow.
- At the start of the year, the median OpenAI researcher didn't use coding agents; today they spend over $600/day on tokens ($12,000/month)
- The top 10% consume $7,000+/day, roughly $140,000 per month — an order of magnitude more
- The data shows research inside frontier labs is accelerating as model capabilities improve, and reveals the real cost structure of heavy agentic usage
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