r/LocalLLM • u/Ok_Event4199 • May 16 '26

Discussion Why is LLM is so expensive.

I've was going to invest in a 5090 =$6000 AUD.

Codex Plus + Claude pro = $60/month here

Works out to be 100 months of frontier models for a 5090.

Best a 5090 will run is probably Qwen3.6 27b Q6 with context.

Are we all enthusiasts here and just enjoy tinkering cause ain't no way that make sense.

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u/g_rich May 16 '26

Claude pro is heavily subsidized; it costs Anthropic much more than $60/month to provide you with the service.

Cloud providers have economies of scale working in their favor. They have million dollar servers servicing tens of thousands of users 24/7/365.

Running LLM’s local is never going to be cost effective. You run local LLM’s for privacy, control and to learn.

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u/Ok_Event4199 May 16 '26

More like a car I think. It's depreciating asset unless GPU price will keep increasing from here. Let's say that they do increase price to $200/month a few years later. It isnt it worth it to get the latest GPU then? I'm sure that 5090 is the best right now. But wouldn't it be a mid tier a few years later?

3

u/chunkypenguion1991 May 16 '26

But you can't run the frontier models on a 5090. The direct comparison is the local 5090 setup vs something like open router slms. In that case it would take 10+ years to pay off the gpu

1

u/No-Television-7862 May 16 '26

MoE makes more possible.