Speech-to-Text API · decision tool

What Groq (Whisper) really costs at your usage

Groq (Whisper) priced at YOUR usage from verified pricing pages — no free tier — paid from day one. See the free-tier ceiling, the per-unit overage, and exactly when it starts costing real money.

Prices verified 2026-07-17 against official pricing pages · fit weights are our estimates (see methodology) · share the URL to share your configuration

As of Jul 2026, with 1,000 hours of audio transcribed/month, a $50 budget for this slot, Groq (Whisper) ranks first for these inputs at 66% fit and a StackSays-estimated $40.00/month. Fit weights are our estimates; prices trace to official pages. Change any input below and the verdict recomputes.

Your situation

The verdict updates as you move these.

Audio transcribed / month (hours)100 hours ≈ 200 half-hour calls; streaming vendors may also bill connection timeBudget for this slot ($/mo)what you'd accept paying for the speech-to-text API layerTeam size1 = solo; bundled platforms save glue time for small teams

Clear pick for your inputs

Groq (Whisper)fit 66% · est $40.00/mo

Hosted open-source Whisper at the lowest verified batch rate, with extreme speed

Groq (Whisper)fit 66%

$40.00/mo

Comparing 1 tools head-to-head. Open the full field (6 options) →

The decision, in plain words

For a solo builder at 1,000 hours of audio transcribed/month and a $50.00/mo budget for the speech-to-text API slot, Groq (Whisper) leads at 66% fit and $40.00/mo. The two rules doing the work: budget fit (~$40/mo is 80% of your $50/mo budget); batteries included (Bundles TTS from the same vendor — fewer services to glue at team size 1).

Honest weak spot of the pick: no free tier — paying from day one.

Generated from the calculation above — every number traces to the sourced data; nothing here is written by an AI making things up.

Why Groq (Whisper) scores 66%

Budget fit (weight 30, our estimate) — ~$40/mo is 80% of your $50/mo budget+21

Batteries included (weight 12, our estimate) — Bundles TTS from the same vendor — fewer services to glue at team size 1+4

Exit cost (weight 4, our estimate) — Open-weights model (Whisper) — the same model runs anywhere, including self-hosted+3.2

Ecosystem maturity (weight 8, our estimate) — growing — our estimate from ecosystem age, docs and hiring pool-1.6

Free-tier runway (weight 10, our estimate) — No free tier — paying from day one-6

Total (lines sum exactly)20.6

Possible range −64…+64 (sum of active rule weights) · fit % = (total + max) / (2 × max)(20.6 + 64) / 128 = 66%

How the $40.00/mo estimate is calculated

audio transcribed overage — 1000hours over 0hours included × $0.04/hours$40.00

Note — $0.04/hour transcribed (whisper-large-v3 is $0.111/hour); 10-second minimum billed per request$0

Monthly total (lines sum exactly)$40.00

What could change this verdict

No single input change within the tested range changes the winner.

Cost risk

Estimated now (StackSays estimate, not your final bill)$40.00/mo · whisper-large-v3-turbo

Free-tier statusNo free tier — paid from the first unit

Official prices verified 2026-07-17; calculation is deterministic code over those prices.

At a glance

Tool	Free tier	Paid entry	Verified
Groq (Whisper)	No free tier	Pay-as-you-go — $0.04/hour transcribed (whisper-large-v3 is $0.111/hour); 10-second minimum billed per request	2026-07-17

Where did you land?anonymous, one click

Data sources

Tool	Source	Verified
Groq (Whisper)	Groq pricing	2026-07-17

A monitor re-checks these pages for changes; when a vendor moves a price, the date updates and every verdict recomputes.

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