# Can you help me understand the pricing?

It would be very simple if we could charge per minute and leave it at that. However, Transloadit can
handle any kind of file, not only those with a duration.

A fixed price per GB could also be nice but that would leave some Robots overpriced in our opinion. For
that reason, we offer discounts that vary per <dfn>Robot</dfn>.

These discounts work by ignoring a percentage of your usage.

Suppose you had a 1 GB video file and wanted to extract 10 thumbnails, each being a
1 MB JPEG. What would the usage be in this case?

Without a discount, it's 1 GB + (10 × 1 MB) = 1034 MB. However, [🤖/video/thumbs](/docs/robots/video-thumbs.md)
has a 90% discount, so we only charge 10%. This means you'll be billed for **103.4 MB**.

We also charge for import and export operations. For example, if you import a 1 GB file from S3, we'll
charge you 10% of that file size, which is 0.1 GB. The same applies to exporting files to S3.

Here are some [more calculation examples](#calc-example-modal) for your convenience.

By using plans, you can commit to a monthly usage, for which we can offer a lower GB pricing. You
will still be able to process files beyond your plan limit, but we can't offer the same discount for
that. We will notify you when you are close to your plan's limit, so you can always find the most
economical spot for your usage.

For information on the specific usage for each month, check out the Monthly usage section under your
account's Billing & Plan tab.

<span id="calc-example-modal"></span>

### Calculation examples

#### Video encoding

Let’s say you have a **150 MB** video and want to upload it, encode it into WebM and MP4 formats, and export the results to S3.

|Operation|Charge|Total|
|-|-|-|
|Upload files|15 MB — 10% of source file size|15 MB|
|Convert to WebM — Compressed to 60 MB|150 MB + 60 MB — Input + output file sizes|210 MB|
|Convert to MP4 — Compressed to 30 MB|150 MB + 30 MB — Input + output file sizes|180 MB|
|Export files to S3|6 MB + 3 MB — 10% of output file sizes|9 MB|

**Total: 414 MB**

Taking the uploads, compressed outputs, and exports into account, **414 MB** will count toward your monthly limit.

***

#### Deciding what plan to choose

Let’s say you want to convert files with a combined size of 3 GB. You have already run a test and calculated that this will mean 10 GB of video encoding, 5 GB of image resizing, and 4 GB of audio encoding per month. You also want to store all uploaded files and encoding results on Amazon S3.

Since some [Robots are discounted](/docs/faq/discounts.md), you won’t be charged 100% for every operation:

|Operation|Charged|Total|
|-|-|-|
|File uploads (3 GB)|10%|0.3 GB|
|Video encoding (10 GB) — Input + output file sizes are counted|100%|10 GB|
|Image resizing (5 GB) — Input + output file sizes are counted|100%|5 GB|
|Audio encoding (4 GB) — Input + output file sizes are counted|25%|1 GB|
|Storing the original files on S3 (3 GB)|10%|0.3 GB|
|Storing all encoding and resizing results on S3 (19 GB)|10%|1.9 GB|

**Total: 18.5 GB**

In this case, you would do best to choose the **Startup** plan, which costs $69, includes 40 GB, and charges $1.80 per additional GB.

If you have any questions about pricing or choosing a plan, [don’t hesitate to ask](mailto:support@transloadit.com?subject=Pricing%20question)!