Pay for ChatGPT Plus, Claude Pro and Google AI Pro at the same time and the bill is $59.99 a month, or $719.88 a year, before your site has earned a dollar. It’s an easy place to end up, because each plan seems to do one thing the others don’t. They mostly overlap. A solo builder can research a niche, write articles and scripts, make images and code a static site inside one plan, then cover the few things no chat plan does well with free tools.
This guide picks the plan by the work you’ll do most, shows what to set up inside it, and lists the free fix for each gap. Anthropic, OpenAI and Google pay publishers no affiliate commission, so LeverSolo earns nothing whichever plan you choose (we checked each vendor).
The short answer
- Writing articles and building your own site? Claude Pro ($20/month, $17 if paid yearly). Its coding agent, Claude Code, is included.
- Making faceless video? Google AI Pro ($19.99/month). It’s the only plan around $20 that lists video generation, with 1,000 Flow credits a month.
- Need lots of images plus general help? ChatGPT Plus ($20/month).
- Budget close to zero? Google AI Plus ($4.99/month) or ChatGPT Go ($8/month, select regions, may show ads).
- Fill gaps for free first: Search Console for search data, Make Free or a scheduled script for automation, Remotion for templated video. Pay for a licensed voice (ElevenLabs from $6/month) once you publish.
- Stay portable: keep prompts, briefs and code as Markdown files in Git, and keep a second AI on its free tier.
Step 1: Pick the plan by the work you do most
The three main plans cost about the same and include different things. Video generation, image generation and the coding agent are where they split, so decide by which of those you’ll use every week. Everything else (chat, web search, file uploads, research reports) is close enough across them that it shouldn’t drive the choice.
US prices and features from each vendor’s pricing page and help center, checked November 9, 2026. Limits change often; the vendors publish relative limits (“expanded”, “4x”) instead of fixed counts.
| Plan | US price | Video generation | Image generation | Coding agent | Deep research | Scheduled tasks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Google AI Plus | $4.99/mo | Yes, 200 Flow credits | Yes | Antigravity, basic limits | Yes | Yes |
| ChatGPT Go | $8/mo | Not listed | “More image creation” | Codex, limited | Limited | Yes, 3 active |
| Google AI Pro | $19.99/mo | Yes, 1,000 Flow credits | Yes | Antigravity, entry limits | Yes, 1M-token context | Yes |
| ChatGPT Plus | $20/mo | Not listed | Yes | Codex on web, CLI, IDE, iOS | Expanded | Yes, 5 active |
| Claude Pro | $20/mo or $17/mo yearly | Not listed | Not listed | Claude Code included | Yes (Research) | Yes |
Sources: Claude pricing, ChatGPT pricing and OpenAI’s Codex pricing page for the dollar amounts, Google AI plans and the Gemini Apps limits help page, and OpenAI’s help article on scheduled tasks (3 active tasks on Free and Go, 5 on Plus, none more than once an hour).
A few details the table can’t hold:
- Claude Pro also includes Claude in Chrome and Cowork, an agent mode for multi-step work like sorting files or building a spreadsheet (Claude help center). Usage is metered “every 5 hours and every week.”
- Google AI Pro adds 5 TB of storage, Gemini inside Gmail and Docs, and Chrome auto browse. Gemini limits refresh every 5 hours until you hit a weekly cap, and Google says they “may change without notice.”
- ChatGPT Go says it’s “available in select regions” and “may include ads.” Custom GPTs aren’t listed until Plus.
- Google AI Plus is the cheapest plan here that generates video. Its context window is 128k tokens, against 1M on AI Pro.
Match the plan to your builder type
| You mostly… | Pay for | What you’ll still miss |
|---|---|---|
| Write articles and want to build and fix the site yourself | Claude Pro | Image generation. Make diagrams and social cards as SVG or HTML with the coding agent, or use Gemini’s free image tool |
| Run a faceless video or short-form channel | Google AI Pro | A voice with a commercial license (see Step 3) |
| Need many featured images and a capable all-rounder | ChatGPT Plus | Video generation |
| Spend under $10 a month | Google AI Plus, or ChatGPT Go if it’s offered where you live | Higher limits and the full coding agents |
For a site like LeverSolo, which is articles plus a static site, we think the coding agent matters more than the image generator. A coding agent can write the site, the link checker and the image templates. An image generator only makes images. That points to Claude Pro or ChatGPT Plus, and the deciding question is whether you want built-in image generation (Plus) or the agent features bundled with Claude Code (Pro). If video is the business, Google AI Pro wins on that alone.
Unsure? Use the free tiers of two of them on real work for a week, then pay for whichever one you kept opening.
Step 2: Use everything the plan already includes
Five features inside these plans replace tools beginners often buy separately, and each takes about ten minutes to set up.
Projects. Make one project per site and load it with the files the AI should always know: your brand rules, audience description, affiliate disclosure, and a list of prices you’ve verified with dates. ChatGPT includes Projects on every plan, and Claude’s free plan allows up to 5.
Reusable instructions. Claude calls them Skills, Google calls them Gems, OpenAI calls them custom GPTs (Plus and up). Write your editorial rules once instead of pasting them into every chat. Here’s a starting block to copy into any of the three:
You help me write for [SITE], a site for [AUDIENCE].
Rules:
1. Every price, limit, or date must come from a source I give you or that you
cite with a URL. If you can't cite it, write [VERIFY] instead of a number.
2. Never invent experience. Write "here's how to set it up", not "I tested".
3. Prefer plain words and short sentences. No hype words.
4. When you suggest a tool, also say who should NOT buy it.
5. End drafts with a list of every factual claim and its source, so I can check them.Scheduled tasks. All three plans can run a prompt on a schedule. ChatGPT Plus allows 5 active tasks, none more often than hourly. Claude’s scheduled tasks run in the cloud from Cowork, so your computer can be off. Use them for jobs that end in a message to you: “Every Monday, check these five pricing pages and list anything that changed,” or “Every Friday, summarize new posts in these three subreddits about [niche].” Results land in the chat. When the result has to go somewhere else, like a spreadsheet row or a social post, you need real automation (Step 3). The pricing page monitor guide shows the full version.
Connectors. Claude lists connectors on every plan, ChatGPT Plus connects apps to deep research, and Google AI Pro puts Gemini inside Gmail and Docs. Point the AI at your drafts folder instead of pasting text in.
The coding agent. Claude Code, Codex and Antigravity can build an Astro site, write a script that checks every affiliate link, or turn a design into a reusable image template. Our static site guide covers the guardrails, mainly that you review every change before it ships.
Deep research is in every plan too. Use it for the competitor and pain-point steps in our niche validation workflow, then check the sources it cites before trusting a number.
Step 3: Fill the four gaps with free tools first
A chat plan is strong where the value is the model’s output: research summaries, drafts, scripts, code. It’s weak where the value is data it can’t see, a schedule it doesn’t control, a license it can’t grant, or a format you need to repeat exactly. Those four gaps all have a free or cheap fix.
| Gap | Why the AI plan can’t cover it | Free fix | When to pay |
|---|---|---|---|
| Search demand data | The model guesses volumes; it has no access to real search counts | Google Search Console for your own queries; Google Ads Keyword Planner for ideas | When traffic justifies a paid SEO tool (Semrush’s lowest plan is $139.95/month) |
| Automation that writes or posts somewhere | In-chat tasks are capped (5 on ChatGPT Plus) and their output stays in the chat | Make Free (1,000 credits a month, runs as often as every 15 minutes), self-hosted n8n, or a script the coding agent writes | When volume outgrows the free plan |
| Voice-over you can monetize | Chat voice modes aren’t a voice-over license | Write and time the script in your AI plan | ElevenLabs Starter at $6/month includes a commercial license; Free has 10,000 credits but lists none |
| Templated video | Generated clips vary every time; a series needs the same layout | Remotion, where the coding agent writes a video template in code | Remotion is free for individuals and teams of up to 3 people |
Make, n8n, ElevenLabs, Semrush and Remotion details from their own pricing, docs and license pages, checked November 9, 2026.
Keyword Planner needs a Google Ads account, and Google’s help page says you finish setup by entering billing information. Accounts with little or no ad spend often see volumes as broad ranges like 1K–10K (reported by Screaming Frog, not stated by Google). For a new site, Search Console’s real queries beat any estimate once you have a few weeks of impressions. Our first 30 days in Search Console guide covers what to look at.
For automation, the free route your plan already pays for is the coding agent. It can write a small script that runs on GitHub Actions’ scheduler or a Cloudflare Worker cron trigger. You then own the upkeep: when an API changes, you or the agent fix the code. Do you still need Make or n8n if AI can write the script? compares the three routes, and Make vs n8n prices out the visual tools.
Step 4: Keep your work portable
Vendors change limits, retire models and close products. OpenAI did the last two in 2026 alone. It retired GPT-4o, GPT-4.1, GPT-4.1 mini and o4-mini from ChatGPT on February 13, 2026, though they stayed available in the API (OpenAI help center). It discontinued the Sora app and web experience on April 26, 2026, and the Sora API on September 24, 2026 (OpenAI help center). Anyone whose video workflow lived inside Sora had to rebuild it; our Sora shutdown guide covers the alternatives.
You can’t stop a vendor from changing its plan. You can make switching cost an afternoon instead of a month by keeping everything that matters in plain files you own:
my-site/
prompts/ # your instruction blocks, one .md file each
briefs/ # article briefs and research notes (.md)
content/ # the articles themselves (.md)
data/prices.md # verified prices with source URL and date
scripts/ # anything the coding agent wrotePut that folder in a Git repository. Paste from these files into the AI instead of letting your only copy of a prompt live inside a chat app’s settings. If you build an Astro site, your articles are already Markdown in the repo.
Then keep a second AI on its free tier as a backup. Claude Free includes Projects (up to 5) and Skills, Gemini without a plan includes Gems and Deep Research, and ChatGPT Free includes Projects. When your main plan hits its weekly limit or drops a feature, you open the backup, paste your instruction file, and keep working.
If you already know you need several models
Some builders want Claude for drafting and GPT for images in one place. Multi-model apps sell that:
- Abacus.AI ChatLLM Basic is $10/month ($7 the first month) with 20,000 credits a month. Pro is $20/month with 30,000 credits (Abacus pricing).
- Magai Standard is $20/month and Pro is $40/month. The page says usage “matches what you pay” and premium models cost “3x or more” to run than standard ones (Magai pricing).
You pay with credits, and how far they go depends on which models you pick, so a month of heavy use on top models runs out faster than the plan price suggests. You also get the models through the app’s interface. Extras the vendors bundle into their own plans, such as Claude Code with Claude Pro or Flow credits with Google AI Pro, aren’t part of the deal. For a beginner, one vendor plan used well is the better start. Both apps run affiliate programs that LeverSolo may apply to; we haven’t joined either, so the links above earn nothing today.
Who this is for, and who it isn’t
For you if you’re starting a content site, channel or small online business alone, and you want to spend under $20 a month on AI until something earns.
Not for you if you run coding agents for hours every day. All three vendors push heavy agent users to their $100–$200 tiers (Claude Max $100, ChatGPT Pro from $100, Google AI Ultra from $99.99), and those limits are a separate decision.
Quick answers
Is a free plan enough to start? For research and drafting, often yes. The free tiers drop the paid coding agents (Claude Code isn’t on Claude Free; Codex is limited on ChatGPT Free) and have tighter limits, so the first upgrade is usually worth it once you’re building the site.
Should I pay yearly? Not in the first two months. Of the three, only Claude showed a yearly price on the pages we checked ($17/month, $200 up front). Pay monthly until you’re sure the plan fits your work.
What about Perplexity Pro? It costs $17/month billed annually (Perplexity pricing page, checked November 9, 2026) and is built around search and research. We’d treat it as a research add-on rather than your one plan, because the picks in this guide hinge on the coding agent and media generation listed in the three plans above.
More research workflows live in the AI Research Workflow pillar. Next, use your plan to validate a micro-niche in six steps, or see which AI tools actually pay affiliates.