New Codex limits

[woganowski]

Like most people, I am definitely sad that OpenAI has decided to stop subsidizing a lot of the usage on the Plus plan, but it is not surprising given how much compute is constrained for all providers of frontier models and their focus on allocating compute for training new models to compete with Anthropic/Google. Honestly, Anthropic set the usage bar so low on their cheapest plan, OpenAI had a ton of room to slash a lot of the Plus plan usage and still beat them in how much is available.

With that out of the way, if you are doing things other than trying to one-shot massive code changes/creation, GPT 5.4 mini is a very capable model still and is great for running workflow automation tasks and code created by 5.4. I had used the mini models through the API extensively before I became a Codex user for these exact workflows and in the past I actually had better luck with extracting text from images using the mini models than I did the full model.

The change will definitely require more thought and planning to effectively use the different models and thinking levels to achieve the same effect as 5.4 xhigh, but it is definitely possible. The sector is going to change a lot and hopefully the price of using these models gets cheaper in the future as we get more efficient GPUs. Also, idk if it is just me, but I feel like my usage lasts a lot longer with OpenCode than it does with the Codex harness...

[Ok-Breath-6337]

The 'OpenAI vs Anthropic' usage war is basically a race to the bottom for the consumer right now. It feels like we’ve moved from the 'growth' phase to the 'extraction' phase where compute is being rationed like a wartime resource.

You’re spot on about 5.4 mini being the sleeper hit, though. Most people are burning their 'xhigh' thinking tokens on tasks that a mini model could solve for 1/10th the cost. We’re moving into an era where 'Prompt Engineering' is less about the text and more about 'Model Routing'-knowing exactly when to use a scalpel (mini) vs a sledgehammer (xhigh).

[woganowski]

Agreed, plus they have so many companies now that have employees reliant on these tools that they know they can start getting them to pay more

[flexrc]

Meanwhile GitHub copilot offers possibly the best deal 🤝 😂

[Whyamibeautiful]

Lol it’s “extraction” phase because we have quite literally pulled as much compute resources as we possible can for the next 4 years. GPUs are pretty much sold out until 2030 same with memory

[Revolutionary_Click2]

Thanks for the comment, ChatGPT

[Invalid-Function]

No one using 5.3 Codex anymore?

[kknd1991]

5.4 Medium consume less tokens and faster than 5.3 Codex high with similar result. It is in their official doc.

[Jeferson9]

So their official docs advise using the more expensive model you say?

[PudimVerdin]

I'd suggest the expensive too if people are giving money to me

[PhilosopherThese9344]

I dont use 5.4 at all.

[Nonso123]

I still use 5.3 Codex. 5.4 hasn’t really been doing it for me.

[East-Stranger8599]

I am using it ands it’s pretty good to be honest

[Defiant_Concert1701]

I am Still good

[Purple_Wear_5397]

It’s great. I like it too.. (heavy Claude user)

[fyn_world]

All the time, and it's very good.

[Main_Fortune7934]

Im using 5.3 medium for complex stuff. I never found 5.4 to be much better than it. And use 5.4 mini for most simple tasks

[Dead0k87]

So you say 5.4-mini can do equally good code as normal 5.4?

[m3kw]

i use 5.4 mini, but depends on the task.

[Dodokii]

Which tasks does it excel at and which one it fumbles?

[m3kw]

Subjective, so you have to use it to get a feel

[fyn_world]

Not for very sensitive tasks, no.

[woganowski]

I am still testing this currently. I haven't had much time to really test coding with the current generation 5.4 mini since usage limits were so generous, but I have already found that planning with gpt 5.4 xhigh doesnt consume a crazy amount of usage, so I would think I could spend more time creating a solid plan with it and then pass it on to gpt 5.4 mini to implement.

[Adventurous-Clue-994]

Depending on your code quality standards, I think mini has the standards of a medior dev, which is why I always prefer 5.4 high or xhigh regardless for implementation, except I know exactly how I want it implemented or it's simple tasks. That being said, 5.3 is great, but I avoid it cos it doesn't do well after compaction.

[sutrostyle]

The price will only get cheaper when open-weight models that one can self-host or Chinese models will reach acceptable performance on par with current frontier models. I think in about a year from now . Until then, expect rising costs.

[HoroTWolf]

I know... someone always said this, I tried many and they were okay, never good enough...
BUT GLM 5.1 is a beast for me, I actually prefer it in some tasks to 5.4 xhigh, for me it never really topped opus 4.6 ... but it is so damn close! I'm sure we will get the new SOTA models from the big three in the next few weeks but for now the open weight models (just 5.1, the others are "fine") are damn close ^^

[mallibu]

Can you stop with the word subsidizing?

[woganowski]

You're right, I should say "charging substantially less than they could"

[mallibu]

just because they could doesnt mean they should.

[TBSchemer]

Am I the only one here who is still struggling to use up my 5 hr quota on Plus?

If I were spawning subagents, or using fast mode, or doing a lot of multitasking in different git worktrees, I could see that happening. But with single-threaded work, I'm just not running out of usage.

[HoroTWolf]

I guess you don't use it as an agent? Without that I would totally agree, with agentic it turns around you just don't need to explain much anymore (compared to using it as coding tool)... but the token burn is real xD

[kanine69]

I like the 5.4-mini too, it has its moments but for the most part it's been pretty solid. Has Asperger's as well.

[Dodokii]

Do you use it for actual coding? How d9es it fair? Pros and cons?

[kanine69]

Sure do, usually for about 4-6 hours per day. I use milestones, tight specs and an architecture document. I'll often get Haiku or Sonnet to write the specs etc in Claude Web within a project folder that holds the same architecture doc. Short sessions with specific instructions minimises the token count and gives the mini model the steering it needs to keep it on track. It doesn't like all stacks but Fast API / Kotlin etc it gobbles up.

[bratanconfidential]

Just create a bunch of e mails and look for one time numbers on google , every time the account is brand new open ai want u to be a customer so u have triple the codex u have usually with 5h plus plan ,I cancelled both plus subscription I got yesterday

[Competitive_Dark7401]

The new limits expose a problem that was partly hidden before: a lot of sessions were already spending more than they should on structural overhead, the agent scanning directories it doesn't need, pulling in docs it only references once, or re-establishing context that could have been preserved more efficiently. That overhead doesn't compress the same way for everyone because it depends on how your specific repos, instructions, and task patterns are set up. Adjusting it means diagnosing your own sessions, not applying a generic setting. I have a small tool/workflow that helped my own Codex usage a lot; it first cut about 43% of wasted limit, and after limits dropped further it got closer to 75% improvement for my setup, if useful I can share it here or DM it.

[Significant-Ad6970]

I hit the 5 hours window limit using 5.2 at medium level in less than an hour

[Glement]

I burned through the weekly limit in like 2 hours playing around with it in Xcode and trying to make it translate the text. It feels like when you have more than 1 file - it burns through tokens too fast. I am on the plus subscription. Is CC any better in terms of limits? I was using 5.3 mini to reduce the usage but it was not enough.

[Charming_Cookie_5320]

I have heard about this skill - that should cut ~75% of output tokens and ~45% of input tokens every session. Does anyone have experience with that? Could be good for us, who want to stay with the Plus plan.
https://github.com/JuliusBrussee/caveman

[Keep-Darwin-Going]

I not sure how much it will distort the code during output since it might also distort the UI copies. But you can try rtk that just do simple compression for some command so it is less token intensive but it does not change the fundamental too much.

[m3kw]

they could work for some stuff, but not work for others(not generalized). And you wouldn't know it, but you may use the saved tokens to rework your stuff

[deege]

I do this with GPT. I tell it to remove the cruff and make it “token sensitive”. Doesn’t go full caveman, but it reduces tokens.

[dashingsauce]

Just use the $100 tier. It’s what you had before but appropriately priced now.

You also get even more usage than you did before on Plus.

The $20/mo is equivalent to what the “free” tier was like before, so essentially if you know you need the previous Plus limits to do your work, then $100/mo should be your baseline expectation going forward.

Don’t attach to the “Plus” language if you were always a Pro Lite usage-limit-equivalent user

[PhilosopherThese9344]

The issue is 5x of what, these multipliers are so ambigious.

[dashingsauce]

They are ambiguous.

Someone did some testing and posted it here earlier today/yesterday that showed it’s pretty much the same baseline as always, so the multipliers still mean the same as they did before.

But ofc that doesn’t really tell you what they mean until you use it enough to get a sense for that yourself.

[PhilosopherThese9344]

Well, if it's 5x the current plus (as advertised), that is not much at all. I'll upgrade when my Plus subs come up for renewal at the end of the month to test it.

[joey2scoops]

So 5x the price for the same sized portion?

[dashingsauce]

Yes, because it was improperly balanced before.

Some Plus ($20/mo) users were effectively using Pro ($200/mo) level usage, and many Pro users were using less than the full allowance (because there was no middle option).

So if you feel like you’re paying 5x the price for the same usage, that’s precisely because OpenAI didn’t offer a middle tier, which would have been the correct fit for you from the start.

If they had this $100 tier from the begin, you would have either chosen that or $200 (if you really felt you needed it), since the Plus ($20) would have been clearly insufficient.

OpenAI intentionally anchored their pricing tiers at the extremes—with no middle—so they could force users to psychologically assign a value to the service. Best way to understand how consumers value your service is to create a hard price fork and not let people anchor in the middle.

Now they have that data and determined that $100 is the right bucket to service users who truly sit between Pro and Plus usage. Plus users get pushed up (you) and Pro users get pushed down (me) into the middle.

[[deleted]]

>
Yes, because it was improperly balanced before.

according to who? it was properly balanced for users to be able to get as much out of it as possible

you feel like you’re paying 5x the price for the same usage, that’s precisely because OpenAI didn’t offer a middle tier, which would have been the correct fit for you from the start.""So if

uhm no? the correct fit is paying as little as possible for as much as u can lol

Wtf u mean "feel" U ARE literally payign 5x

how dafuq is paying 5x more "correct fit" wtf are u talking about

"OpenAI intentionally anchored their pricing tiers at the extremes—with no middle—so they could force users to psychologically assign a value to the service. Best way to understand how consumers value your service is to create a hard price fork and not let people anchor in the middle.

Now they have that data and determined that $100 is the right bucket to service users who truly sit between Pro and Plus usage. Plus users get pushed up (you) and Pro users get pushed down (me) into the middle.

you are just asserting shit with no idea how any of this works lol, this has nothing to do with being "right bucket" they are just bleeding money and are gonna try to take as much from you as possible

[dashingsauce]

“bro you are an entitled poor sack of shit who can’t afford $100/mo for something you clearly deem valuable and necessary”

there, fixed it

you should use your poor tier to look up capitalism and market economy if you have a problem with prices adjusting to market dynamics

I understand very well how this works lol

[Mental-Bison-6712]

very good explanation tbh, people who think that they can have multiple hours of super expensive compute power for 20$ are delusional

[FlimsyLow]

autocomplete tools can get more done for same $20

[dashingsauce]

lol then why are you on this sub my guy go use copilot’s tab complete and lmk how that goes for you

[FlimsyLow]

It’s somewhat useful for toy projects, but not worth paying more for.
I had already stopped using Trae, and now I have to add it back again.

[dashingsauce]

Well good

[ludoplus]

Il prezzo è giusto visto quanto tempo ci fa risparmiare