August 2026 was a tough month for developer free tiers. With 2 negative changes versus 0 positive, the trend continues toward tighter limits and eliminated offerings. Developers relying on free tiers should review their dependencies.
2
Total Changes
2
Negative
0
Positive
0
Neutral
Changes by Type
Change Type
Count
Free Tier Removed
1
Product Deprecated
1
Biggest Losers
Vendors that eliminated or reduced free tiers
OpenAI (1 negative change)
Assistants API deprecated, full shutdown August 26, 2026. Developers must migrate to Responses API + Conversations API
MiniMax (1 negative change)
Several discrepancies were found. Music generation APIs (Music-3.0, Music-2.6, Lyrics Generation) are discontinued for new users as of August 20, 2026, and free versions are being removed. The Hailuo video pricing is significantly different, with new models and pricing structures. The M2.7 pricing is also different. The page introduces MiniMax-M3 with different pricing tiers.