In this article, we’ll explain how Poe Ai compute points are spent, and we’ll try out some of the various text bots in Poe.
In Poe Ai , ‘compute points’ are used to determine how much you can actually use these AI tools each day.
⚠️ Update (December 29th, 2025): Since this article was originally published, the compute point costs of Poe’s AI bots have changed.
To ensure readers get accurate information, scroll to the December 2025 section for the latest compute points data
⚠️ Update (March 30th, 2026) — Poe reduces daily, free compute points allowance from 3,000 points to 300 points. Scroll to the March 2026 section for details.
⚠️ Update (August 2025): Since this article was originally published, the compute point costs of Poe’s AI bots have changed.
To ensure readers get accurate information, scroll to the bottom of this article for an updated compute points table
[I am adding this note because outdated information from this exact web page was being surfaced by Ai research tools like GPT 5, and so updating it helps reduce misinformation. ]
To try out the text-bots in Poe, we’ll give each bot the same 1-sentence prompt:
“Please write a 5-page book about how to be safe on the Australian outback“.
If you’d like to read all of the Ai’s outputs in a single place, click here to read the resulting ‘Australia Guide’ Ai articles we made in Poe Ai, and you can see their various compute-point costs.
How Compute Points Work in Poe
‘Compute Points’ are kind of like Poe’s virtual currency; every message you send to one of Poe’s AI bots will cost compute points.
If you’re using Poe with a free account (as of December 2024), then that means you get 3,000 compute points every day.
Update (March 2026): As of approximately March 30, 2026, free Poe users receive 300 compute points per day, which is lower than the previous amount of 3,000 free compute points per day.[1]
See the March 2026 update section below for details about the amount of free Compute Points available to Poe users.
However, free users of Poe can never have more than 3,000 points at once – compute points don’t accumulate or roll over.
As of late March, 2026, ‘free tier’ users of Poe can never have more than 300 points at once — compute points don’t accumulate or roll over.
The Cost of Different AI Bots
Poe’s varied Ai bots cost different amounts of compute points.
Some Ai bots are incredibly cheap, while others can use up all of your daily compute points in just one or two messages.
So, how can you maximize your compute-point budget in Poe?
As I mentioned earlier in this article, I conducted an experiment where a variety of different AI bots were asked to do the exact same task:
‘write a five-page book about how to stay safe in the Australian Outback’
I gave this identical text prompt to 12 different Large Language Models (bots) on Poe.
Click here, if you want to read all of the ‘Australia Guide’ Ai articles we made.
How to Check Compute Points Cost
In Poe, you can check how many compute points each message has cost you.
Find a message from a Poe bot and look for a circle with three small dots in it, click it and select ‘ Info’.
On the ‘Info’ screen for that Ai bot, you’ll see how many compute points it costs to send a message to it.
Low-Cost Poe Ai Compute Points Bots
On the most affordable end, you’ve got Poe bots like f1-preview and Solar Pro, which each only cost 1 compute point per message.
Using these 1-point-per-message bots on Poe, combined with the Poe’s daily allowance of compute-points, a free user of Poe could theoretically have 3,000 daily conversations!
With the current 300-point daily allowance, a free user of Poe can have up to 300 daily conversations with the cheapest 1-point bots, compared to the 3,000 that were previously possible.
Moving up the scale, you’ll find Ai models like GPT-3.5-Turbo-Instruct, which costs around 20 points per message, and Claude-3.5-Haiku that costs 95 points.
Medium-Range Poe Ai Compute Points Bots
In the middle range, there’s Gemini-1.5-Pro at 175 points and Mistral-Medium at 165 points. These are both highly-capable writing bots, and their articles were comparably useful and well-written.
Moving up a few rungs on the metaphorical ‘compute-points ladder’ in Poe, you get to the more expensive options for text-generation LLMs.
GPT-4o will cost you 293 points per message, Claude-3.5-Sonnet uses 344 points, and you can even talk to an outdated version of Claude 2 for 620 compute points.
High-End Poe Ai Compute Points Bots
If you’re feeling really extravagant, you can talk to an Ai called o1-mini, and doing so will set you back 1,800 points – that’s more than half your daily allowance in one go!
Claude-3-Opus tops the list as the most expensive option, with a detailed and useful article output, but it cost upward of 2,200 compute points.
A Real-World Test Case
After talking to 12 different Ai’s in Poe, I was surprised that there wasn’t a direct correlation between ‘compute points spent’ and ‘useful information provided’.
For example, I discovered that the 1-point bots in Poe (Solar Pro, f1-preview) produced content which was just as comprehensive and useful as bots which cost hundreds or thousands of compute points (o1-mini, Claude Opus 3).
For example, Solar Pro, costing just 1 compute point, gave a well-structured guide with accurate information about outback safety.
Gemini-1.5-Pro, costing 175 points per message, stood out for its narrative style and flow, but not necessarily for having more accurate or useful information.
Even o1-mini, at 1,800 compute points, didn’t necessarily provide better content than its more affordable counterparts, although the output from o1-mini was indeed the longest and most-comprehensive article of the 12 bots that I tested.
Making the Most of Your Points
The biggest takeaway of this experiment, to me, is: you don’t need to use the most expensive bots to get good results.
Here’s a table that lists the various Compute Point costs for each of the 12 bots that were tested for this article:
| Bot Name | Base Rate (points/message) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| f1-preview | 1 | Efficient, smart & low-cost for daily use |
| Solar-Pro | 1 | Useful output with minimal resources used |
| GPT-3.5-Turbo-Instruct | 20 | Basic, short-ish, and consistent responses |
| Google-PaLM | 27 | Efficient at writing for information delivery |
| Claude-3.5-Haiku | 95 | Writes shorter, structured content |
| Gemini-2.0-Flash | 100 | Performance issues in testing; it never gave an output |
| Mistral-Medium | 165 | Balanced writing capabilities overall |
| Gemini-1.5-Pro | 175 | Superior writing style and narrative flow |
| GPT-4o | 293 | Detailed responses, formatted well |
| Claude-3.5-Sonnet | 344 | Steady performance at higher compute-point cost |
| Claude-2 | 620 | Basic and straightfoward; expensive compute-points cost. |
| o1-mini | 1,800 | Produced the longest text output, but high compute-point costs. |
| Claude-3-Opus | Variable* | Produced a thorough article, and cost the most compute points on this list |
If you’re using a free account, you could spend all day chatting with f1-preview or Solar Pro and never run out of points, often getting just as good results as you would from the more expensive options.
If you’re using a free account with the current 300 daily points, you can still have up to 300 exchanges with the cheapest 1-point bots, often getting results comparable to the more expensive options.
Even if you only ever use the 1-point bots on a free Poe account, you can still have thousands of back-and-forth exchanges per day, and you can use Poe’s Ai’s to help you think through problems, develop ideas, or work on projects.
With the reduced 300-point daily allowance, free users who stick to the cheapest bots can still have hundreds of back-and-forth exchanges per day, and can use Poe’s Ai’s to help you think through problems, develop ideas, or work on projects.
The Real Value
Poe’s Ai tools are like having a toolbox sitting in the corner of your room – it only becomes valuable when you have a specific project, or problem, that you want to tackle.
Whether you’re writing, researching, or just exploring ideas, understanding how compute points work helps you make the most of this powerful Ai platform.
With Poe Ai’s compute-points system, you don’t need to spend a lot of points to get great results – sometimes the most affordable options are exactly what you need.
Daily Compute Points Update (March 2026): 3,000 → 300
On approximately March 30, 2026, Poe reduced the daily free compute points allowance from 3,000 to 300[1][2] — a reduction of 90%. The change was rolled out globally, following earlier regional testing in late 2025, during which users in Brazil and Mexico first saw reduced limits.[3]
In response to user feedback on app store reviews, Poe’s official developer account stated: “We understand this change may be disappointing. Supporting free usage comes at a cost… We appreciate your understanding as we work to keep the service sustainable and high-quality for all users.”[4][6]
What Changed for Free Users
The following table summarizes the practical impact of the daily allowance reduction:
| Scenario | Before (3,000/day) | After (300/day) |
|---|---|---|
| Messages with cheapest bots (~6 pts) | ~500 messages | ~50 messages |
| Messages with GPT-4o-mini (~9 pts) | ~333 messages | ~33 messages |
| Messages with GPT-4o (~224 pts) | ~13 messages | ~1 message |
| Messages with Claude-Sonnet-4.5 (~276+ pts) | ~10 messages | ~1 message (or 0, depending on length) |
| Messages with Claude-Opus-4.5 (~4,000+ pts) | 0 (exceeded daily limit) | 0 (exceeds daily limit) |
| Agentic tasks (Script-Bot-Creator, Manus-AI) | Limited (often 10,000s of pts per task) | Not possible on free tier |
Several bots on Poe cost more than 300 points per message, which means a free user’s entire daily budget can be consumed by a single exchange with those models. Agentic bots like Script-Bot-Creator and Manus-AI, which orchestrate multi-step workflows involving multiple bot calls, can consume tens of thousands of compute points per task — well beyond the 300-point daily allowance.
For context, during the same period in which the daily allowance was reduced by 90%, the compute point costs of many individual bots on Poe decreased. For example, o1-mini dropped 81% (from 1,800 to ~337 points), Gemini-2.0-Flash dropped 91% (from 100 to ~9 points), and GPT-4o dropped 24% (from 293 to ~224 points).[5]
Poe (owned by Quora) offers access to AI models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, xAI, Mistral, and others on a single platform. A paid subscription removes the daily compute point cap and provides access to the full range of models and features. Free users who wish to use higher-cost bots or agentic workflows will need a paid account to do so.[4]
Updated Compute Points (December 2025)
The following table lists the latest (December 2025) compute point costs for text-generation LLMs on Poe, reflecting updates since both the original publication and the August 2025 update.
What’s New in December 2025
- New OpenAI Models: GPT-5.2 and GPT-5.2 Pro (released December 11, 2025)
- New Anthropic Models: Claude-Haiku-4.5 (October 2025), Claude-Sonnet-4.5 (September 2025), Claude-Opus-4.5
- New Google Models: Gemini-3 and Gemini-3-Pro (November 2025) with 1M-token context
- New Agentic Bots: Manus-AI and Script-Bot-Creator for automated multi-step workflows
| Bot Name | Base Rate (points/message) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| GPT-5.2-Pro | ~300-500 | NEW: OpenAI’s newest flagship (Dec 11, 2025), enhanced reasoning |
| GPT-5.2 | ~150-250 | NEW: Latest GPT model with Instant/Thinking variants |
| GPT-5.1 | ~130-200 | Previous flagship with 400k context, web search support |
| GPT-5 / GPT-5-Chat | ~130 | Strong general-purpose model |
| GPT-5-nano | ~6 | Extremely cheap variant |
| GPT-4o | ~224 | High-quality, moderate cost |
| GPT-4o-mini | ~9 | Mini variant, very affordable |
| GPT-4-Turbo | ~378 | Long context support |
| GPT-3.5-Turbo | ~11 | General-purpose model (legacy) |
| Claude-Opus-4.5 | ~4,000-5,000+ | NEW: Most powerful reasoning, very costly |
| Claude-Sonnet-4.5 | ~276-400 | NEW: Thinking budget support (0-32k tokens), released Sept 2025 |
| Claude-Haiku-4.5 | ~80-120 | NEW: Sonnet-4-level coding at 1/3 cost, released Oct 2025 |
| Claude-Opus-4 | ~4,105 | Top-level reasoning |
| Claude-Sonnet-4 | ~276 | Strong coding performance |
| Claude-3-Opus | ~1,697 | High cost, deep reasoning |
| Claude-Haiku-3.5 | ~82 | Upgraded Haiku model |
| Claude-Haiku-3 | ~17 | Affordable, high speed |
| Gemini-3-Pro | ~500-800 | NEW: Flagship model (Nov 2025), 1M context |
| Gemini-3 | ~300-500 | NEW: Standard Gemini 3 variant |
| Gemini-2.5-Pro | ~716 | Strong reasoning with thinking budget |
| Gemini-2.5-Flash | ~50-100 | Fast with thinking budget support |
| Gemini-2.0-Flash | ~9 | Fast, low-cost |
| Gemini-1.5-Pro | ~63 | Mid-range professional model |
| o4-mini | ~248 | Enhanced mini reasoning model |
| o3-mini | ~202 | Intermediate reasoning model |
| o1-mini | ~337 | Original reasoning model (80% cheaper than Dec 2024) |
| Mistral-Large-2 | ~210 | Large variant, 128k context |
| Mistral-Medium | ~218 | Mid-range, strong performance |
| Solar-Pro-2 | ~70 | Upstage frontier-scale model |
| Manus-AI | ~500-2,000+ | NEW: Autonomous AI agent for complex multi-step tasks |
| Script-Bot-Creator | ~200-500 | NEW: Creates Python-code apps and bots easily |
Note: Rows highlighted in green indicate new models added in late 2025. Costs shown with “~” are approximate and may vary based on message length and model parameters.
Historical Compute Point Trends
The following spreadsheet shows how compute point costs have changed over time for various Poe AI text bots. This helps you see pricing trends and identify which models have become more affordable (or expensive) since this article was first published.
| Bot Name | Dec 2024 | Aug 2025 | Dec 2025 | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| f1-preview | 1 | 1 | — | Deprecated |
| Solar-Pro / Solar-Pro-2 | 1 | 70 | ~70 | ↑ Increased |
| GPT-3.5-Turbo-Instruct / GPT-3.5-Turbo | 20 | 11 | ~11 | ↓ 45% cheaper |
| Google-PaLM | 27 | — | — | Deprecated |
| Claude-3.5-Haiku / Claude-Haiku-3.5 | 95 | 82 | ~82 | ↓ 14% cheaper |
| Gemini-2.0-Flash | 100 | 9 | ~9 | ↓ 91% cheaper |
| Mistral-Medium | 165 | 218 | ~218 | ↑ 32% more |
| Gemini-1.5-Pro | 175 | 63 | ~63 | ↓ 64% cheaper |
| GPT-4o | 293 | 224 | ~224 | ↓ 24% cheaper |
| Claude-3.5-Sonnet / Claude-Sonnet-3.5 | 344 | 276 | ~276 | ↓ 20% cheaper |
| Claude-2 | 620 | 620 | — | Deprecated |
| o1-mini | 1,800 | 337 | ~337 | ↓ 81% cheaper |
| Claude-3-Opus | 2,200+ | 1,697 | ~1,697 | ↓ 23% cheaper |
| GPT-5 / GPT-5-Chat | — | 130 | ~130 | New in 2025 |
| GPT-5-nano | — | 6 | ~6 | New in 2025 |
| GPT-4o-mini | — | 9 | ~9 | New in 2025 |
| GPT-4-Turbo | — | 378 | ~378 | New in 2025 |
| Claude-Haiku-3 | — | 17 | ~17 | New in 2025 |
| Claude-Opus-4 | — | 4,105 | ~4,105 | New in 2025 |
| o3-mini | — | 202 | ~202 | New in 2025 |
| o4-mini | — | 248 | ~248 | New in 2025 |
| Gemini-2.5-Pro | — | 716 | ~716 | New in 2025 |
| Mistral-Large-2 | — | 210 | ~210 | New in 2025 |
| GPT-5.2-Pro | — | — | ~300-500 | NEW Dec 2025 |
| GPT-5.2 | — | — | ~150-250 | NEW Dec 2025 |
| GPT-5.1 | — | — | ~130-200 | NEW Dec 2025 |
| Claude-Opus-4.5 | — | — | ~4,000-5,000+ | NEW Dec 2025 |
| Claude-Sonnet-4.5 | — | — | ~276-400 | NEW Dec 2025 |
| Claude-Haiku-4.5 | — | — | ~80-120 | NEW Dec 2025 |
| Gemini-3-Pro | — | — | ~500-800 | NEW Dec 2025 |
| Gemini-3 | — | — | ~300-500 | NEW Dec 2025 |
| Gemini-2.5-Flash | — | — | ~50-100 | NEW Dec 2025 |
| Manus-AI | — | — | ~500-2,000+ | NEW Dec 2025 |
| Script-Bot-Creator | — | — | ~200-500 | NEW Dec 2025 |
Legend: “—” indicates model was not available during that period. Green rows indicate models newly added in December 2025.
Key Observations (December 2025)
1. Budget-Friendly Options Are Still Excellent: GPT-4o-mini (~9 points), Gemini-2.0-Flash (~9 points), and GPT-5-nano (~6 points) remain excellent for daily use. Free users with 3,000 daily points can have 300-500+ conversations using these models. Update (March 2026): Free users now receive 300 daily points, which allows approximately 30-50 conversations with these models.
2. The Claude 4.5 Family Is Here: Haiku-4.5 delivers Sonnet-4-level coding performance at approximately 1/3 the cost and twice the speed, making it an excellent value proposition for developers.
3. GPT-5.2 Represents the Cutting Edge: Released December 11, 2025, GPT-5.2 comes in Instant, Thinking, and Pro variants. Expect premium compute point costs for the Pro version, but standard GPT-5.2 remains reasonably priced.
4. Gemini 3 Pro Leads Benchmarks: Scored 91.9% on a benchmark called GPQA Diamond (vs. GPT-5.1’s 88.1%). Gemini 3 Pro offers cutting-edge performance at reasonable prices.
5. Agentic Bots Are Expensive But Powerful: Manus-AI and Script-Bot-Creator can automate complex multi-step workflows and their variable costs reflect the extensive reasoning and tool use involved, though Script-Bot-Creator is generally far cheaper than Manus-Ai, in late 2025, at least.
6. Most Models Got Cheaper: Compared to December 2024, the majority of Poe bots have decreased in compute point cost. The biggest winner was o1-mini, which dropped 81% from 1,800 to 337 points.
Recommendations for Poe users in December 2025
- Daily Text Use: GPT-4o-mini, Gemini 2.0-Flash, or GPT-5-nano (6-9 points)
- Coding Tasks: Claude Haiku 4.5 for speed/cost balance, Claude Sonnet 4.5 for complex projects
- Cutting-Edge Reasoning: GPT-5.2 Pro, Claude Opus 4.5, or Gemini-3-Pro for maximum capability
- Autonomous Workflows: Manus-AI or Script-Bot-Creator for multi-step automation
- Budget-Conscious Users:
3,000 daily free points supports 300-500+ messages with affordable models like Solar Pro or Claude Haiku 4.5Update (March 2026): With 300 daily free points, free users can have approximately 30-50 messages with affordable models. A paid subscription is required to access higher-cost bots and agentic workflows.
Updated Compute Points (August 2025)
The following table lists the latest (Aug. 2025) compute point costs for a wider selection of official Poe Ai bots, reflecting updates since the original publication of this article.
Note: This section has been superseded by the December 2025 update above. The August 2025 data is preserved below for historical reference only.
| Bot Name | Base Rate (points/message) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| f1-preview | 1 | If available; efficient and low-cost |
| Solar-Pro-2 | 70 | Upstage frontier-scale model |
| GPT-3.5-Turbo | 11 | General-purpose model |
| Claude-Haiku-3 | 17 | Affordable, high speed |
| Gemini-2.0-Flash | 9 | Fast, low-cost |
| Mistral-Medium | 218 | Mid-range, strong performance |
| Gemini-1.5-Pro | 63 | Mid-range professional model |
| GPT-4o | 224 | High-quality, moderate cost |
| Claude-Sonnet-3.5 | 276 | Higher cost, strong writing |
| Claude-2 | 620 | Outdated; cost approximate |
| o1-mini | 337 | High cost, long output |
| Claude-3-Opus | 1697 | High cost, deep reasoning |
| GPT-5 | 130 | Latest general LLM |
| GPT-5-Chat | 130 | Chat variant of GPT-5 |
| GPT-5-nano | 6 | Extremely cheap variant |
| GPT-4-Turbo | 378 | High cost, long context |
| GPT-4o-mini | 9 | Mini variant of GPT-4o |
| ChatGPT-4o-Latest | 337 | Latest GPT-4o snapshot |
| Mistral-Large-2 | 210 | Large variant, 128k context |
| Claude-Haiku-3.5 | 82 | Upgraded Haiku model |
| Claude-Opus-4 | 4105 | Top-level reasoning, very costly |
| o3-mini | 202 | Intermediate ‘o’ model |
| o4-mini | 248 | Enhanced mini variant |
| Gemini-2.5-Pro | 716 | Advanced Gemini model |
Compared to their compute-point costs from 2024, most Poe bots are cheaper to use in the year 2025.
The biggest drop was o1-mini, which became over 80% cheaper, and a few others like Mistral-Medium actually went up in price.
To reiterate: This article update is provided because I discovered that outdated compute-point data from this article was being cited by Ai research tools, which can inadvertently lead to misinformation.
When I recently asked GPT-5 to tell me which Poe ai bot might be good for a low-compute-point project I am planning to do, GPT-5’s answer cited two resources from CarletonTorpin.com (and they were literally linking to this article, and the YouTube video of this article).
So, that just goes to show that a single website’s ‘opinion’ can influence the results of an Ai bot; GPT-5 was telling me incorrect information, because I had inadvertently (and asynchronously) had provided it with that inaccurate information on my blog post (this blog post that you’re reading, right now).
Updating this table with December 2025 data helps ensure that readers and Ai systems alike have accurate, current information.
Compute point costs are approximate and may vary based on message length, model parameters, and platform updates. Always check the “Info” button on any bot’s message to see actual costs. Last updated: April 5, 2026.
Suggested Articles:
- How To Type Prompt With Poe Ai Learn how to use Poe AI, an AI tool with various large language models for chatbots, image generation, and website search. Discover popular AI models like Claude 3.5 Sonnet and FLUX Pro.
- What is Poe Ai? Discover Poe AI, a platform for generating text, images, videos, and audio. Learn how to create various content types using simple prompts and AI-powered tools.
- Poe Ai Web Search Tools & Image Upscalers Explore Poe AI’s web search tools like Command R and Gemini Pro Search. Learn how to upscale images with Playground Upscaler for printing and digital displays.
Citations
[1] Reddit r/PoeAI, “How do we get absolutely everyone off our platform?” (March 28, 2026). Contains the full text of the official email sent by Poe to users, which states: “Starting March 30, 2026, the daily free point allocation will be 300 points in most markets.” ↩ back to article
[2] Reddit r/PoeAI, “In March the 30th, Poe is about to change its points from 3000 to 300” (March 2026). Community discussion confirming the change date. ↩ back to article
[3] Reddit r/PoeAI, “My points reset was changed overnight” (November 2025). Documents earlier regional testing of reduced limits in Brazil and Mexico. ↩ back to article
[4] Apple App Store, Poe – Fast AI Chat — Ratings & Reviews (2026). Contains Poe’s official developer response: “We understand this change may be disappointing. Supporting free usage comes at a cost.” ↩ back to article
[5] Compute point cost trends documented in the December 2025 update and Historical Compute Point Trends table within this article. ↩ back to article
[6] Google Play Store, Poe – Fast AI Chat — Reviews (2026). User reviews confirm the change, including one stating: “From 3000 points to 300?…I was rooting for Poe, but it’s been going downhill for a while now.” ↩ back to article
How many points do you get with a subscription?
Is that on a daily, weekly or monthly basis?
Do compute points accumulate or roll over in case of a subscription?
If I run out of points, can I buy extra?
How does this compute point system compare to say subscriptions for ChatGPT and Gemini, do they have a similar point system to cap the number of prompts?
Here are some answers about Poe’s compute points, based on January 2025 info:
Paid Poe Account options:
– 10,000 compute points per week ($10 monthly)
– 1,000,000 compute points per month ($20 monthly)
– 2,500,000 compute points per month ($50 monthly)
– 5,000,000 compute points per month ($100 monthly)
With a paid Poe subscription, the points do not roll over from one month into the next, instead, you’ll get a refund/ discount for any unused points from that monthly billing period.
If you run out of compute points in Poe, you can definitely buy more, by changing your subscription.
As for comparison to other services like ChatGPT and Gemini, I don’t have any direct experience with their contemporary user-interfaces or system of tracking point / message usage.