Z.ai: GLM 5.3 (batch) API Pricing
Z.ai: GLM 5.3 (batch) costs $0.450 per 1M input tokens and $2.00 per 1M output tokens (cache reads: $0.100). Context window: 1.0M. Prices verified 2026-10-21 · source
Alternatives to consider
Cheapest z-ai model — 90% less per month
+8.2 quality points for 18% more
Cheapest z-ai model — 90% less per month
Rebuilt daily from our snapshot archive — the chart appears once a model has 5+ snapshots of history.
High adoption means battle-tested weights, more fine-tunes/quants, and faster bug fixes. View on HuggingFace →
From our own daily snapshot archive — independent of provider announcements.
Intelligence measures reasoning/knowledge/coding benchmarks. A high score with a low blended price = value pick; check the value chart to see where this model lands.
Token economics
| Token type | Price | vs base input |
|---|---|---|
| Standard input | $0.450 | — |
| Cache read | $0.100 | −78% |
| Output | $2.00 | — |
Prompt caching stores repeated context server-side: reads cost far less, but writes carry a one-time premium.
Higher effort = deeper thinking = more reasoning tokens billed as output.
What would Z.ai: GLM 5.3 (batch) cost you per month?
| Workload | Requests/mo | Avg tokens (in/out) | Est. monthly cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Light chatbot | 10,000 | 800 / 400 | $11.60 |
| Coding agent | 5,000 | 8,000 / 2,000 | $38.00 |
| RAG pipeline | 30,000 | 4,000 / 500 | $84.00 |
| Doc summarizer | 2,000 | 20,000 / 1,000 | $22.00 |
Estimates use list prices without prompt caching. Caching can cut input cost by up to 90% on repeated context.
About Z.ai: GLM 5.3 (batch)
GLM-5.3 is a large-scale reasoning model from Z.ai, built for complex software engineering and long-horizon agent tasks. It supports text input and output with a 1M-token context window, and improves...
Compare Z.ai: GLM 5.3 (batch) with
- 5.3 (batch) vs OpenAI: GPT-5.6 Terra Pro
- 5.3 (batch) vs Anthropic: Claude Fable 5
- 5.3 (batch) vs Anthropic: Claude Opus 5
- 5.3 (batch) vs OpenAI: GPT-5.6 Sol
Popular head-to-heads — see all on the comparisons index.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Z.ai: GLM 5.3 (batch) cost?
Z.ai: GLM 5.3 (batch) costs $0.450 per 1M input tokens and $2.00 per 1M output tokens; cached input tokens cost $0.100 per 1M. Verified 2026-10-21 — provider source.
What is the context window?
1.0M tokens, with up to 131K output tokens per response. That's roughly 1311 pages of text in a single request.
Does it support prompt caching?
Yes — cached input is $0.100/1M, about 78% cheaper than standard input. Agents and RAG workloads with repeated context benefit most.
What's a cheaper alternative?
ScaleDown: Summarize saves about 97% on a typical workload with comparable quality.
Official resources
- Z.ai: GLM 5.3 (batch) on OpenRouter — live endpoint, pricing source of record.
- Artificial Analysis leaderboard → — independent intelligence and performance rankings.
- Shred your current bill — paste a CSV and see if switching saves money.