Making Sage AI Billing Simpler: More Transparent and Easier to Predict

AI has become an essential part of modern newsrooms, helping editorial teams generate headlines, summarize stories, suggest tags, and speed up publishing.

But while using AI has become simpler, understanding AI usage hasn't always been. Traditional token-based billing can be difficult to interpret, making it challenging to estimate costs and plan budgets with confidence.

At Quintype, we're committed to making every aspect of Sage AI easier to use, including how you understand and manage its usage.That's why we're introducing a simpler, more transparent way to measure Sage AI usage, one that's built around how publishers actually work.

What has changed

Starting July 1, 2026, Sage AI uses a request-based billing model.

Instead of tracking token consumption behind the scenes, every use of an AI feature now counts as one AI request.

Whether you're generating a headline, creating a summary, auto-tagging a story, or using another Sage AI capability, each action is measured as a request. It's a straightforward approach that's easier to understand and much easier to track.

More importantly, it aligns AI usage with something every newsroom already measures: the amount of content they produce.

Why We're Making This Change

Our goal isn't simply to change how Sage AI is billed. It's to make AI usage easier to understand, easier to monitor, and easier to plan.

With the new request-based model, publishers can expect:

Greater Transparency

You know exactly how AI usage is measured. Every AI interaction counts as a request, eliminating the complexity of token calculations and hidden variables.

Better Predictability

Editorial and business teams can estimate AI usage more confidently based on publishing activity instead of technical metrics that are difficult to interpret.

Simpler Budget Planning

Since AI requests closely reflect newsroom activity, forecasting monthly usage becomes more straightforward, making it easier to plan and manage AI adoption across teams.

New Plans for you 

Every newsroom has different publishing needs, which is why Sage AI now offers plans designed for different stages of growth.

• Freemium: Explore Sage AI at no cost and experience its core capabilities before deciding on a paid plan.

• Starter: Built for growing newsrooms that publish consistently and want to integrate AI into their everyday editorial workflows.

• Pro: Designed for high-volume publishers who rely on AI across multiple editorial processes and require access to the complete Sage AI feature set with higher request capacity.

Whether you're just beginning your AI journey or using AI across thousands of stories each month, there's a plan that fits your newsroom.

Complete Visibility Into Your AI Usage

Alongside the new billing model, we're introducing the AI Billing Dashboard within Bold.

Available under Billing → AI, the dashboard provides real-time visibility into how Sage AI is being used across your organization.

You'll be able to view usage:

• By AI feature

• By story

• By date

• Against your monthly request allowance

This gives editorial and business teams complete visibility into AI consumption throughout the month, helping eliminate surprises and making usage easier to manage.

If your newsroom reaches its monthly request limit, AI features will pause until additional capacity is enabled. If you need more requests, your Customer Success Manager can help activate overage access upon request, ensuring you remain in control without unexpected charges.

Built Around How Publishers Work

AI has become an essential part of modern publishing. As adoption grows, understanding and managing AI usage should be just as simple as using the technology itself.

By moving to a request-based billing model, we're making Sage AI easier to understand, easier to forecast, and easier to scale, giving publishers greater transparency without adding complexity.

It's another step in our commitment to building AI that works the way newsrooms do: practical, predictable, and designed to support better publishing every day.

If you have questions about your Sage AI plan or would like to learn more about the new billing model, please reach out us, we'd be happy to help.