As of now, India has created 21.9 million GitHub developers, which is the largest software-sharing platform in the world, thus making it the second-largest community of developers after the United States. In 2025 alone, it added 5.2 million developers. In all, GitHub anticipates that this number will rise to 57.5 million by 2030.
India is expected to be home to numerous developers who will be using AI to produce software, however, there is an increase in the cost of the best-performing AI solutions. Claude Max costs $100 a month, which would amount to approximately ₹12000 after taking into account the taxes and the exchange rate.
Freelancers and solo builders
- Income versus Payout. The cost of a program set considering American rates appears to be one thing, but the matter seems to be different for anyone who has a salary in rupees.
- Hurdles in learning. A side initiative that may not generate any revenue is difficult to agree to, as the cost of the technology is so high.
- Less costly projects do not use the best AI available. There is now a new India-specific project from Cursor introduced in July, which has a lower price, but does not have the most advanced models produced by OpenAI and Anthropic in its features.
Small teams and early startups
- Costs increase as team size increases. Each member has to use his own plan, and heavy users have to use more expensive plans.
- Every cent counts. If money is used for tools, it can no longer be utilized for hiring or marketing.
- Teams are conservative. They use the best tools for the hardest jobs and opt for inferior tools for other tasks.
The bigger problem: nobody knows what the bill will be
Earlier, AI tools used to have only a fixed monthly charge. Nowadays, many are charging a base fee plus additional fees depending on usage. One industry analysis highlights that GitHub’s AI assistant changed to a credit system in June 2026, while that of OpenAI did the same in April 2026. The same analysis states that one has to now check the expenses related to AI instead of considering it a fixed entry in the budget.
In the case of large companies, this is just about creating a spreadsheet. But for startups that have limited funds, it is a matter of serious concern and risk:
- Consider dollar rates. If the rupee declines in value, the same service costs a lot more next month.
- It is difficult to predict the usage. Sometimes a single task uses up several weeks of regular work.
- Work can be left undone. If the credits run out while the process is still unpaid, one will have to replenish their account and begin the process again.
What this changes
“Unpredictable pricing hits every kind of developer, just in different ways. A student can’t risk a job that runs over budget. A freelancer can’t absorb a surprise bill on a client project. A three-person startup can’t afford to burn the runway on experiments that break. Even larger teams struggle to plan spend when the cost of a single run is a guess. People who learn by building try things, break things and start over, and when every attempt feels like it costs money, they try less. That’s a loss for the whole ecosystem. At ML.ai, we’re building for every kind of developer, and the question we keep coming back to is simple: can a developer start a job without worrying whether they’ll be able to finish it? Predictable pricing isn’t a small feature. It decides who gets to experiment at all.” says Taran Srivastava, Co-founder of ML.ai.
As a result, people engage less in experiments. Developers are siding with cheaper options, are skipping larger project and are keeping the most advanced tools for jobs that already bring in returns.
Whether this mechanism will succeed remains to be seen, but for the coming wave of Indian builders, business predictability is just as important as intelligence of AI technology.
For more information, please visit: https://ml.ai/
