Google I/O 2026: AI subscription tiers are now cheaper

Google restructured its AI subscription lineup at I/O 2026 today, introducing a new mid-tier Ultra plan and cutting the price of its most expensive plan, while stating it wants to rethink how usage limits work across the board.

The headline number is $99.99 per month for a new AI Ultra entry point, aimed at developers, technical leads, and power users. It comes with 5x the usage limits of the Pro plan, Gemini 3.5 Flash, priority access to Google Antigravity — the company's agent-first coding platform — 20TB of cloud storage, and a full YouTube Premium individual plan bundled in. For those already on the $250-per-month top tier, Google dropped that price to $200, with all the same capabilities intact.

The three-tier structure now looks like this: AI Plus at $7.99/month, AI Pro at $19.99/month, and AI Ultra starting at $99.99/month. Gemini Spark, the new autonomous AI agent announced earlier today, is exclusive to Ultra subscribers and rolling out in beta next week in the U.S.

Google also overhauled how it measures usage. Instead of counting individual prompts, the new system measures compute used. This means that a simple text question costs far less against your limit than a complex video or coding task.

Limits now refresh every five hours rather than resetting daily. If you hit your cap on a top-tier model, Google automatically drops you to a faster, lighter model instead of cutting you off. AI Pro and Ultra subscribers will also be able to buy pay-as-you-go credits for Google Antigravity and Google Flow, with Gemini app support coming soon.

Looking for more Google I/O announcements? Follow the Mashable Google I/O live blog to see all of the latest news on Gemini, Chrome, and Android.