Vercel AI Gateway shows open models dominating token volume over closed ones

Open-weight models reached 56% of all token volume on Vercel's AI Gateway as of August 2026, up from 11% in April, according to Vercel AI Gateway data, marking the first time open models have overtaken closed models on that metric. Anthropic's closed Claude models still captured 61-65% of total gateway spend while processing about 30% of tokens, with premiums up to 4.4 times the average token price, and average price per token fell 23.2% in August alone, the third consecutive monthly decline. DeepSeek frequently ranked first or second in volume contribution with roughly 25% or more of total token share, while Google sat at around 11%.

FoxTPNL / Wikimedia Commons CC BY 4.0 Vercel AI Gateway shows open models dominating token volume over closed ones Open-weight models surged from 11% to 56% of token volume in just four months, but closed models still capture the lion's share of revenue The AI model landscape just hit a tipping point. Open-weight models now account for 56% of all token volume flowing through Vercel’s AI Gateway as of August 2026, up from a mere 11% in April. That’s a fivefold jump in four months, and it marks the first time open models have overtaken their closed counterparts on this metric. On a single day, August 22, the share spiked to roughly 62%. More recent leaderboard data has shown it touching 78.4%. The volume-revenue paradox Before anyone declares total victory for the open-source crowd, there’s a wrinkle worth examining. Anthropic, maker of the Claude family of closed models, still commands 61-65% of total gateway spend despite representing only about 30% of tokens processed. Its models carry premiums of up to 4.4 times the average token price. That’s the “barbell” pattern emerging across enterprise AI usage. On one end: massive volumes of cheap inference running through open-weight models from labs like DeepSeek, Z.ai, and Moonshot. On the other: premium, high-stakes workloads where companies pay a significant markup for Anthropic’s quality guarantees. The news moving money, markets, and the world—before your day starts. Daily. Free. Join 34,000+ readers across crypto, finance, and policy. DeepSeek has become particularly prominent in this shift, frequently ranking first or second in volume contribution with roughly 25% or more of total token share. Google https://cryptobriefing.com/markets/alphabet/ , by comparison, sits at around 11%. A race to the bottom on price The economics driving this shift are stark. Average price per token fell 23.2% in August alone, the third consecutive monthly decline. Over the past five months, prices have dropped more than 50%. Open-weight models are running high-volume workloads at approximately one-seventh the cost of frontier closed models. Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy https://cryptobriefing.com/editorial-policy/ .