Commercial production
AI Video Cost: Budget Beyond the Subscription
Estimate AI video production costs with a transparent credits worksheet. Include retries, editing, sound and delivery instead of confusing generated seconds with a finished ad.
The useful cost of AI video is the cost of a finished, approved film, not just a generator subscription. Estimate generated seconds, attempts per shot and the selected model's credit rate, then add planning, editing, sound, revisions and exports. A thirty-second advertisement can require substantially more than thirty seconds of generated footage.
What is a verified subscription price example?
On 20 October 2026, Runway's official pricing page displayed Standard at US$12 per month when billed annually, with 625 monthly credits. This is an annual-billing equivalent, not a promise of a US$12 month-to-month checkout. The same page listed Gen-4.5 at 12 credits per generated second. Check the current page, billing term, taxes and local currency before buying; these figures are a dated example, not a production quote.
How do I estimate generation credits?
Use this planning equation: number of shots multiplied by generated seconds per attempt, multiplied by attempts per shot, multiplied by credits per second. Add separate allowances for image generation, other models and any paid finishing steps. Replace the assumptions with observations from a small test.
Illustrative example: six shots, five seconds per attempt, four attempts for each shot and twelve credits per second require 1,440 video credits. The six chosen takes would total thirty seconds before editing, but the generation budget includes 120 seconds of attempts. Four attempts is a planning assumption, not a measured success rate or a guarantee.
If the same example needs two attempts per shot, it uses 720 credits; at eight attempts it uses 2,880. This sensitivity matters more than a tiny difference in the advertised monthly fee. The equation also does not include image references or sound work.
Which costs belong outside the credit calculation?
- Creative work: brief, script, visual research and shot planning.
- Asset preparation: approved product artwork, reference images and continuity sheets.
- Production: generations, retries and manually corrected material.
- Finishing: editing, colour matching, voice, music and sound design.
- Delivery: ratios, captions, language versions, review exports and archiving.
A freelancer's or studio's quote pays for this work and responsibility as well as software. Do not calculate a fair production fee by dividing a subscription by the number of videos in a marketing example. Two ads with the same duration can have very different accuracy and continuity requirements.
How can I reduce waste without weakening the film?
Test the hardest shot first. If the concept depends on a hand opening a detailed pack, test that interaction before generating establishing shots. Approve a storyboard and product references early. Keep rejection notes so each retry addresses an identifiable problem.
When a shot repeatedly fails, simplify the action, change the framing or consider a controlled CGI or compositing approach. Repeating a vague prompt indefinitely is not a production plan. A still-image animatic can reveal an unclear story before motion generation begins.
How should I compare two quotes?
Ask both providers to price the same deliverables. Check the number of concepts, approval stages, revision rounds, product accuracy requirements, music permissions and source-file expectations. Confirm how a changed brief is handled. Ask for an example matching your requirement, rather than choosing solely from a spectacular showreel.
Use the AI ad production brief for the enquiry and the AI versus CGI comparison when precision is critical. Request a project discussion with your intended duration and placements; this worksheet is an estimate framework, not a fixed-price offer.
