Sam Altman, OpenAI’s chief executive, says the number of tokens consumed measures computational activity but not the value a business receives from AI. He maintains that tokens remain technically valid and that many customers prefer their stable, predictable pricing despite potentially inflated volumes, rather than outcome-based pricing, which is harder to forecast. His comments come amid “tokenmaxxing,” in which token consumption is treated as a sign of productivity and forward-thinking adoption. OpenAI’s top internal user increased from roughly 100,000 tokens per month in late 2019 to about 100 billion tokens per month in 2026. Amazon and Uber, which describe token-consumption metrics as deeply flawed, have capped usage after exhausting their budgets and now treat AI-token spending as a cost center rather than a growth driver.
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