Claude Opus 5.5 relay service receipt: $1.32 per 1M input tokens

01 / The before-and-after receipt for Claude Opus 5.5

Here is the shape of the bill I want to show you: one request profile, priced twice, once against the official list price and once against the CheapRelay price list. The model is Claude Opus 5.5, with model id claude-opus-5-5. The prices below are per 1,000,000 tokens, and every scenario is an example rather than a forecast of what you will spend.

For a simple workload of 1,000,000 input tokens, 1,000,000 output tokens, and 1,000,000 cache-read tokens, the official list price adds up like this: $4.00 for input, $20.00 for output, and $0.20 for the cache read. That is $24.20 before the work begins. The official list prices shown here are converted at 7.2 yuan per US dollar.

Now the same workload on CheapRelay: $1.32 for input, $6.24 for output, and $0.0597 for the cache read. The line items add to $7.6197. The arithmetic is simple subtraction: $24.20 minus $7.6197 equals $16.5803 saved on this example. That is about 68.5% of the list-price bill removed, without changing the model id you send.

02 / Each line on the Claude Opus 5.5 bill

Developers like line items because they can check them. Here are the three lines for Claude Opus 5.5 on the CheapRelay price list, compared with the official list price for the same model.

• ■ Input: CheapRelay charges $1.32 per 1,000,000 tokens. The official list price is $4.00. Example: 1,000,000 input tokens cost $1.32 on CheapRelay and $4.00 at list. The difference is $2.68, and $1.32 divided by $4.00 is 33%, so the CheapRelay input line is 67% below the list line.
• ■ Output: CheapRelay charges $6.24 per 1,000,000 tokens. The official list price is $20.00. Example: 1,000,000 output tokens cost $6.24 on CheapRelay and $20.00 at list. The difference is $13.76, and $6.24 divided by $20.00 is 31.2%, which is a 68.8% reduction, rounded to the 69% figure attached to this row.
• ■ Cache read: CheapRelay charges $0.0597 per 1,000,000 tokens. The official list price is $0.20. Example: 1,000,000 cache-read tokens cost $0.0597 on CheapRelay and $0.20 at list. The difference is $0.1403, and $0.0597 divided by $0.20 is 29.85%, so the cache-read line is about 70.15% below the list line.

Notice what the receipt does not contain. There is no monthly fee, because CheapRelay is pay-as-you-go only. There is no separate subscription charge standing in front of the token bill. You pay per real token, and the balance you have paid for does not expire.

03 / Putting a larger example on the same form

Small examples can look tidy without telling us much, so let us scale the workload. Consider an example month with 10,000,000 input tokens, 2,000,000 output tokens, and 5,000,000 cache-read tokens on Claude Opus 5.5.

At the official list price, the arithmetic is 10 multiplied by $4.00, plus 2 multiplied by $20.00, plus 5 multiplied by $0.20. That gives $40.00 plus $40.00 plus $1.00, or $81.00 for the example.

On the CheapRelay price list, the same example is 10 multiplied by $1.32, plus 2 multiplied by $6.24, plus 5 multiplied by $0.0597. That gives $13.20 plus $12.48 plus $0.2985, or $25.9785. Subtracting line by line, the example saves $16.00 on input, $27.52 on output, and $0.7015 on cache reads. The total difference is $55.0215, which is about 67.9% of the $81.00 list-price example.

The useful thing about this second form is that the savings are not hiding in one exotic line. Input is lower, output is lower, and cache reads are lower. If your workload is mostly one of the three, you can calculate that portion on its own and add it up.

04 / Where the money goes instead

A lower token price is only half of the value story. The other half is how the money behaves after you top up. CheapRelay uses a prepaid balance. You pay per real token, there is no monthly fee, and the balance does not expire. That means an unused balance is still there when you need it, rather than being tied to a recurring charge.

There is also a sign-up credit on every new account, worth $0.09 and usable on any model. In an example, that credit covers 0.09 divided by $1.32, which is about 68,181 input tokens on Claude Opus 5.5. It is a small amount, but it is a starting balance rather than a promise.

Refunds are handled on a clear rule: unused balance within 12 days of the top-up can be refunded, minus what was spent and the payment fee. And the referral program adds a little arithmetic of its own. A directly invited user contributes 20% of what they pay, and the second level contributes 6%. Those amounts land in a withdrawable rewards balance, with the smallest withdrawal set at ¥20 through Alipay.

05 / Connecting the model without extra machinery

Getting Claude Opus 5.5 running should not become its own project. On CheapRelay, Claude models work only with the official Claude Code and Claude Desktop clients, version 2.1.285 or newer. That is the whole client list for this model family. Cursor, Cherry Studio, Cline, Roo Code, OpenCode, an SDK, cURL, and OpenAI-compatible setups are not supported for Claude models, so there is no second configuration to maintain or debug.

The base address is https://api.cheapapirelay.com, and the model id to enter is claude-opus-5-5. If you are weighing Claude Opus 5.5 against Claude Opus 5, the price list gives another clean comparison. Claude Opus 5.5 charges $1.32 input, $6.24 output, and $0.0597 cache read per 1,000,000 tokens. Claude Opus 5 charges $1.66 input, $8.28 output, and $0.1222 cache read. In an example using 1,000,000 of each token type, Claude Opus 5.5 totals $1.32 plus $6.24 plus $0.0597, which is $7.6197. Claude Opus 5 totals $1.66 plus $8.28 plus $0.1222, which is $10.0622. The difference in this example is $2.4425.

Rate limits are also stated plainly: 120 calls per minute per key and 8 concurrent calls per account. If you receive HTTP 402, the balance is at or below zero, so the fix is to top up rather than to hunt through client settings.

06 / Reading the final receipt yourself

I would rather you check the arithmetic than take my word for it. Open the CheapRelay price list, find the claude-opus-5-5 row, and multiply your own token counts by $1.32, $6.24, and $0.0597. Then take the official list figures of $4.00, $20.00, and $0.20, multiply the same counts, and subtract.

For the first example workload, the list-price bill is $24.20 and the CheapRelay bill is $7.6197. For the larger example, the bills are $81.00 and $25.9785. Both examples use the same published numbers, and both come out in your favor because the price list itself is lower.

The setup is short as well. Create an account, use the $0.09 sign-up credit on any model, top up the prepaid balance when you want it, point the official Claude Code or Claude Desktop client version 2.1.285 or newer at https://api.cheapapirelay.com, and enter claude-opus-5-5. Then watch the token lines accumulate. No monthly fee, no expiring balance, and a bill you can reproduce line by line.