OpenAI, Anthropic See Slower Growth in Some Enterprise AI Measures

OpenAI and Anthropic continued expanding paid-business adoption in August, while adoption growth slowed and spending among the highest-spending companies declined as cheaper standard models drove more AI token volume.

Businesses paying for Anthropic subscriptions or tokens accounted for 43.8% of the U.S. companies tracked, up 0.34 percentage points from the previous month. OpenAI reached 39.8%, an increase of 0.09 percentage points.

The figures do not show a broad decline in developer traffic to either company. They measure business payments, token usage and model economics rather than visits to documentation sites or use of software development kits.

Median monthly AI spending per employee among the top 1% of AI-spending companies fell 9.7%, from $7,976 to $7,205. The estimate covers a small group and may have been affected by August vacations.

“In general, new AI adoption continues to grow but is decelerating,” said Ara Kharazian, the index’s lead economist.

The effective price of AI fell 41% to $0.68 per 1 million tokens, down from a 2026 peak of $1.15 in March. Standard, lower-cost models drove volume increases, while frontier models represented 45% of token share, down from an August peak of 53%.

“The models driving volume increases are relatively cheap, standard models like GPT-5.6 Terra and Claude’s Sonnet series,” Kharazian said.

OpenAI also reduced API prices for GPT-6 Sol and GPT-6 Luna. Sol pricing fell to $2 from $4 per 1 million input tokens and to $10 from $20 per 1 million output tokens. Luna pricing dropped to $0.10 from $0.20 per 1 million input tokens and to $0.50 from $1.20 per 1 million output tokens.

“We’re passing those savings directly on to users and customers by reducing API prices for Sol and Luna by 50% compared with their GPT-5.6 promotional pricing,” OpenAI said.

The price cuts could allow usage to rise even as spending growth slows. Open-source models accounted for 6.4% of businesses that spend on AI, although routing platforms may provide access to closed models as well.

The data suggests a more price-sensitive and competitive AI market, with businesses increasing usage without relying as heavily on the most expensive frontier models.