llm cost_error ai_generated true

BillingError: Image input token count exceeded budget

ID: llm/multimodal-image-token-cost

Also available as: JSON · Markdown
82%Fix Rate
80%Confidence
3Evidence
2023-01-01First Seen

Version Compatibility

VersionStatusIntroducedDeprecatedNotes
any active — — —

Root Cause

High-resolution images consume many tokens, causing unexpected API costs.

generic

Workarounds

  1. 88% success Resize images to the minimum resolution needed 
    Resize to 512x512 or use detail:"low" for thumbnails
  2. 85% success Use detail parameter to control image token usage 
    detail:"low" uses 85 tokens; detail:"high" uses up to 1445 per tile

Dead Ends

Common approaches that don't work:

  1. Send full-resolution images assuming tokens are cheap 80% fail

    A single 4K image can use 10K+ tokens at high detail.

  2. Convert images to base64 to reduce token count 90% fail

    Base64 encoding does not affect token count; it is how images are transmitted.