Why ChatGPT Pro and Codex Are the Best Value for Indie Developers

Why ChatGPT Pro Is a Strong Recommendation for Indie Developers

After using it hard, I realized Codex may be the cheapest serious option for solo development

AI development tools all look inexpensive at first.

GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Claude, Devin, and Google Antigravity all appear to start around the $20-per-month range.

But once you start using them seriously for indie development, the picture changes.

If you only use them lightly, almost every service feels affordable. But if you develop every day, ask AI to read code, modify code, run tests, discuss design, create content, analyze files, and generate images, the real cost of AI development tools becomes visible.

The point of this article is not simply that ChatGPT can do many things.

The point I want to make is this:

If you are going to use AI heavily for indie development, ChatGPT Pro plus Codex has far better cost performance than many other AI development tools.

In particular, the $100 and $200 ChatGPT Pro tiers are realistic options for individual developers who are paying out of pocket.

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I used Cursor Ultra

I used Cursor quite heavily before moving more of my work to Codex.

I developed personal projects while switching between Claude-family models, using multiple models, and relying on Composer-style workflows.

At first, I assumed Cursor's regular Pro plan would be enough. Once development became serious, it was not enough at all.

The plan I eventually moved to was Cursor Ultra.

Cursor Ultra costs $200 per month. At an exchange rate of 160 yen to the dollar, that is roughly 32,000 yen.

Cursor describes Ultra as a higher tier with 20 times the usage of Pro. In ordinary terms, that should be a plan for fairly heavy usage.

But in my case, even Ultra ran out before half the month had passed.

That was a shock.

I was paying $200 per month, and yet serious development still consumed the allowance too quickly. My honest feeling was that if I continued adding paid usage on top, I could easily end up around $400 per month, or about 64,000 yen.

That experience made me realize that AI development tools should not be judged only by their monthly sticker price.

The real questions are these:

• How quickly does the included usage disappear when you use the tool seriously?
• Where is the practical monthly ceiling when you actually use it as your main development environment?

For a light user, a $20-per-month tool looks cheap. For an indie developer using AI every day, $20 is often only the entrance fee.

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That is when I started using Codex

When Cursor Ultra still felt tight, I started using Codex.

After subscribing to the $200 ChatGPT Pro plan and using Codex seriously, the situation changed quite a lot.

I was developing in the same way. I was still asking AI to read code, modify code, investigate issues, and discuss architecture. But the moment of "I cannot use this anymore" almost disappeared.

Of course, ChatGPT Pro is not literally unlimited. OpenAI's own materials explain that abuse, resale, credential sharing, programmatic extraction, and similar behavior are not allowed, and usage can be limited depending on circumstances.

Still, for a normal individual developer using the service heavily but normally every day, ChatGPT Pro 200 creates a very high practical ceiling.

In my own usage, even when I kept Codex working a lot, it almost never felt depleted as long as the work stayed within what a normal person could actually supervise and handle.

That matters enormously.

When an AI development tool makes you worry about usage, your concentration drops.

"If I ask for this fix, will I burn more credits?" "Would it be cheaper to do this task manually?" "I want to ask one more thing, but maybe I should stop because it feels wasteful."

Once those thoughts enter the workflow, the value of AI starts to shrink.

With ChatGPT Pro 200, that anxiety became much smaller.

$200 per month. Roughly 32,000 yen.

It looks expensive at first. But once you enter a world where you are adding paid usage to Cursor Ultra, consuming GitHub Copilot AI Credits, burning Devin ACUs, or considering Claude Code Max and additional credits, ChatGPT Pro 200 can actually feel cheap.

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ChatGPT Pro is not just an expensive ChatGPT

ChatGPT Pro is not merely a more expensive chat AI.

The way I see it, it is closer to a fixed-price AI development environment for indie developers.

OpenAI describes ChatGPT Pro as having $100 and $200 tiers.

The $100 tier provides five times the usage of Plus. The $200 tier provides twenty times the usage of Plus.

Both tiers include access to core capabilities such as the Pro model, Codex, Deep Research, image generation, file uploads, and memory.

In other words, ChatGPT Pro is not just an upper version of chat.

It can support a surprisingly wide range of tasks that indie developers need: planning, research, design, implementation, code review, fixes, testing, article creation, and image generation.

However, that is not the point I want to emphasize most.

The point is not simply that ChatGPT Pro is convenient because it can do many things.

Even if you evaluate it purely as an AI environment for software development, Codex is very strong.

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Price comparison from the perspective of people who use AI hard

If you look only at the monthly fee, AI development tool pricing is easy to misread.

What matters is the effective cost when you really use the tool.

The important question in this table is not which service is cheapest to start.

The important question is:

How far can the bill grow when you actually build seriously?

From my experience, ChatGPT Pro 100 and 200 are unusually strong on that point.

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Cursor is strong, but heavy use can become expensive

Cursor is a very good tool.

Its IDE experience is polished. Composer-like workflows are convenient, and the ability to switch between multiple models is powerful.

But Cursor is a service where model usage matters.

It has tiers such as Pro, Pro+, and Ultra, and higher tiers give you more usage. But once you exceed what is included, additional billing becomes relevant.

I actually used Ultra. Even so, when I used it seriously for development, the allowance was exhausted before half the month had passed.

Based on that experience, I would describe Cursor as strong as an IDE, but potentially expensive as the main daily AI development battlefield for an individual paying out of pocket.

This is not an argument that Cursor is bad. It is excellent.

The problem is that because it is excellent, you use it more. And once you use it more, the bill becomes visible.

That is the practical reality.

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GitHub Copilot has also entered the usage-based world for heavy workflows

GitHub Copilot is still useful.

Its integration with IDEs and GitHub is strong. It is also easy to introduce in companies, so it remains a practical AI development support tool.

However, GitHub Copilot also moved to an AI Credits-based billing system on June 1, 2026.

For light uses such as code completion, it remains easy to use. But heavier AI usage through Chat, CLI, Cloud Agent, Spaces, Spark, and third-party coding agents consumes AI Credits.

In the field, I have seen agentic usage move through something like $20 or $30 over two days.

If the pace is $20 every two days, that is equivalent to $300 over 30 days. If it is $30 every two days, that becomes $450 over 30 days.

In Japanese yen, that is roughly 48,000 to 72,000 yen.

That is heavy for an individual paying out of pocket.

GitHub Copilot is cheap as a light completion tool. But if you use it seriously as an AI agent environment, it can move into a several-hundred-dollar-per-month range.

Viewed from that angle, ChatGPT Pro 200 starts to look quite inexpensive.

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Devin looks convenient, but it is expensive to use casually as an individual

Devin is also a fascinating service.

It behaves like a cloud-based AI engineer. You give it a task, and it proceeds autonomously.

When it fits the job, it can be very useful. For companies, it can absolutely be worth considering.

But for an individual paying personally, cost deserves caution.

Devin measures usage with ACUs. Complex tasks, long sessions, large codebases, and many file changes can consume a lot of ACUs.

In practice, complex sessions can reach the 20-ACU range. My own impression was that credit can disappear quickly over only a few days.

If you spend the equivalent of $40 every two days, that is $600 over 30 days. In Japanese yen, that is about 96,000 yen.

Of course, Devin is powerful. If corporate or Enterprise contracts reduce the unit cost, it can be a good option.

But for an indie developer who wants to use it casually every day, it feels a little scary.

Useful, but expensive. That is my honest impression of Devin.

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Claude Code is popular, but Max enters the same price range as ChatGPT Pro

Claude Code is getting a lot of attention.

It is highly regarded among developers, and more people are using it. Its code understanding and reasoning ability have a strong reputation.

But if you use Claude Code heavily, you still need to look calmly at pricing.

Claude Pro is $20 per month. Claude Max is $100 or $200 per month.

Claude Code usage is shared with Claude usage. In other words, if you use Claude for conversation and Claude Code for development, they consume the same usage allowance.

When you hit the limit, your choices are to upgrade to Max, buy additional credits, move to API billing, or wait for the reset.

In the past, many people said Claude Code hit limits very quickly. Recently, usage limits have improved, so judging only from that older reputation would be unfair.

Even so, if you use it seriously, you enter the $100 to $200 range.

At that point, it becomes a direct comparison with ChatGPT Pro.

If I had to choose only one, I would choose ChatGPT Pro plus Codex.

That is not because Claude Code is weak. It is because ChatGPT Pro tends to keep Codex, design discussions, research, writing, image generation, file analysis, and smartphone-based continuity inside one $100 to $200 monthly environment.

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Google AI Pro is worth keeping, but Codex is my main development battlefield

Google AI Pro is also a very good service.

In Japan, it costs 2,900 yen per month and includes Gemini, Deep Research, NotebookLM, Flow, Google Drive storage, and related benefits.

When you consider Drive storage, family sharing, integration with Google Docs and Gmail, NotebookLM, and video generation through Flow, Google AI Pro is very attractive.

Although I recommend ChatGPT Pro, I also think Google AI Pro is worth keeping.

However, when viewed as an AI development agent, Google Antigravity still does not feel as stable to me as Codex or Cursor.

In my own experience, there were moments where it made unintended changes, broke code, or became difficult to control.

Gemini-family models are certainly fast. There are times when I want a bit of careful research but do not want to wait as long as I might for a deep ChatGPT reasoning mode. In those cases, Gemini can feel just right.

This is one of ChatGPT's weaknesses.

ChatGPT's Instant-style modes are fast, but they can feel insufficient in accuracy or depth for important questions. Pro and deeper-thinking modes are careful, but slow.

The middle ground between speed and quality can be difficult to tune.

Gemini sometimes produces answers that feel reasonably fast and reasonably deep.

So my split is this:

ChatGPT Pro plus Codex is the main battlefield for indie development. Google AI Pro is for Google service integration, Drive, NotebookLM, video generation, and lighter fast research.

That combination is very strong in practice.

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Codex is also strong because of smartphone continuity

One thing I like about Codex is its smartphone continuity.

Codex work running on a Mac or Windows machine can be checked and continued from the ChatGPT app on iOS or Android.

You can start a thread from your phone. You can add instructions. You can answer questions. You can approve actions. You can inspect diffs. You can see test results. You can change direction if necessary.

For indie development, that is huge.

Unlike company development, personal development often happens in fragments of available time.

You can give Codex a task from your home computer in the morning. You can check progress from your phone while traveling. If needed, you can approve or redirect it. Later, you can come home, review the diff, and give the next instruction.

Once that workflow exists, AI stops being merely a chat partner.

It becomes a working partner that helps development move forward in the gaps of everyday life.

That experience matters a lot.

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The market is no longer OpenAI-only, but ChatGPT is still strong

Recently, the market no longer feels like OpenAI alone dominates everything.

Claude Code, Cursor, Gemini, Google Antigravity, GitHub Copilot, and Devin are all highly visible.

Among developers, Claude Code and Cursor have gained a strong presence. Some people feel that other companies are now generating more excitement than OpenAI.

That is not wrong.

But it does not mean OpenAI is weak.

ChatGPT still has a very large share as an AI chat service. In developer AI usage, ChatGPT, GitHub Copilot, Gemini, Claude Code, and similar tools remain major options.

OpenAI can look relatively less exciting in terms of buzz. But in actual usage, it is still very strong.

Codex may also grow further from here.

Especially when viewed as a daily AI development environment for indie developers, ChatGPT Pro plus Codex is highly practical.

The conclusion is not that OpenAI is finished.

If anything, heavy usage teaches the opposite.

After all is said and done, ChatGPT Pro is cheap. And Codex is genuinely good.

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The real problem with AI development tools is that they are almost right but still break things

The most troublesome thing about AI development tools is not a completely wrong answer.

The hardest problem is this:

They are almost right, but they subtly break things.

They produce code that looks like it should work. But it breaks an existing specification. Some tests fail. Another feature is affected. The intention behind the fix is understandable, but the finish is loose.

That is the most troublesome pattern.

I felt this "almost right but breaks things" problem with Google Antigravity as well. It is convenient when AI moves forward on its own, but if it breaks code in a way that is hard to control, the human ends up doing a lot of repair work.

In indie development, the important thing is not that AI produces perfect code in one shot.

It is that when something breaks, you can fix it. When you get lost, you can return. When the direction changes, you can continue. You can move the project forward through a long conversation.

In that sense, ChatGPT Pro plus Codex is strong.

You can ask it not only to write code, but to explain why something broke. You can inspect the diff and change direction. You can feed it test results and ask for another fix. You can return to design discussion. You can organize the specification and implement again.

Codex's strength is that it makes this loop easy to run.

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I still have complaints about ChatGPT

I have recommended ChatGPT Pro and Codex strongly so far, but I also have complaints about ChatGPT.

My biggest complaint is that it is hard to tune the middle point between speed and quality.

Instant-style modes are fast. But for important content, accuracy and depth can feel insufficient.

Pro and deeper-thinking modes are careful. But they are slow.

Sometimes I want a little verification. But I do not want to wait a long time. I do not want a sloppy answer. But I also do not want every small question to trigger deep deliberation.

In those cases, Gemini can feel better.

Gemini's stronger answers often feel moderately fast and moderately deep. For light research and speed-focused checks, I sometimes want to use Gemini instead.

So ChatGPT is not perfect at everything.

Still, if I think about the main development environment, I choose ChatGPT Pro plus Codex.

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Recommended setups

My recommendation depends on how you use AI.

The option I especially recommend is ChatGPT Pro 100.

Plus is not enough. But $200 every month can feel heavy.

Having a $100 Pro tier in between is very important for indie developers.

Use Pro 100 normally. Move to Pro 200 only during development peaks.

That feels like a realistic pattern.

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In effective cost terms, ChatGPT Pro is quite cheap

If you look only at the monthly price, ChatGPT Pro looks expensive.

$100 is about 16,000 yen. $200 is about 32,000 yen.

But if you seriously use AI development tools, the following costs can appear in other services.

This table makes the point clear.

ChatGPT Pro 200 looks expensive by itself. But compared with the effective cost of using other AI development tools heavily, it is surprisingly cheap.

For indie developers, the important thing is the feeling of an upper ceiling.

If you pay $200 per month, you can use Codex with much less fear. You can develop without constantly worrying about credit balance. Design discussion, code modification, article writing, and image generation all happen in the same environment.

That is a major value.

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Conclusion: for indie development, start with ChatGPT Pro plus Codex

ChatGPT Pro is expensive.

Many people feel that way.

But if you seriously use AI for indie development, the way it looks changes.

You may add usage on top of Cursor Ultra. You may consume Copilot AI Credits. You may burn Devin ACUs. You may move Claude Code to Max or additional credits. You may begin thinking about higher tiers or additional credits for Google Antigravity.

Once you enter that world, ChatGPT Pro 100 and 200 look much cheaper.

I actually exhausted Cursor Ultra before half the month had passed. If I had continued in the same way, I think I could have reached a $400-per-month level.

But after moving to ChatGPT Pro 200 plus Codex, I could develop with similar intensity and almost never stop.

That is the real reason I recommend ChatGPT Pro.

ChatGPT Pro is not merely an AI that can do many things. For indie developers, it is a practical AI development base available for about $100 to $200 per month.

And Codex is genuinely good.

Claude Code, Cursor, Devin, and Google AI Pro all have their strengths. I also think Google AI Pro is worth keeping.

But if I had to choose only one for indie development, I would say this:

Start with ChatGPT Pro plus Codex. When cost performance is included, it is the real main option.

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References and confirmation date

The prices and specifications in this article are based on information checked on June 4, 2026. For readability, the currency conversion uses a rough rate of 1 USD = 160 JPY. Actual billing can vary depending on tax, exchange rates, regional pricing, card issuer rates, and future pricing changes by each service.

Main references:

• OpenAI ChatGPT Pro Tiers
• OpenAI Codex Pricing
• OpenAI Codex App
• OpenAI Codex Remote Connections
• Cursor Pricing
• GitHub Copilot Pricing
• GitHub Copilot usage-based billing
• GitHub Copilot billing updates, 2026-06-01
• Anthropic Claude Pricing
• Anthropic Claude Code with Pro or Max
• Devin Pricing
• Devin Session Insights
• Google AI Plans
• Google AI subscription changes
• Google Workspace Pricing
• Stack Overflow Developer Survey 2025 - AI
• JetBrains AI Coding Tools Survey 2026
• Statcounter AI Chatbot Market Share