# Credits vs subscriptions on eroq — which plan actually pays off > Packs versus plans on eroq, with the arithmetic. Roll-over credits, plan-gated engines, seats, clip length, annual billing and the 3-hour welcome offer. Published 2026-09-12 · eroq.ai — canonical: https://eroq.ai/blog/credits-vs-subscriptions-which-plan eroq sells credits two ways: as one-off packs, or as a monthly plan that drops credits into your wallet and unlocks things a pack cannot. Both spend from the same wallet at the same flat prices, and neither expires. So the question is not "which is cheaper" in the abstract — it is which one fits how you actually render. Here is the arithmetic, then the gates, then who should pick what. (The reasoning behind flat [credit pricing](/blog/credit-pricing-for-ai-apis) in the first place is its own post.) ## The two ways to pay **Packs**, bought once, no commitment: - Starter — $10 for 1,000 credits - Builder — $50 for 5,500 credits - Scale — $100 for 12,000 credits **Plans**, billed monthly, credits roll over forever: - Hobby — $15 for 1,800 credits a month - Creator — $49 for 6,000 - Studio — $149 for 20,000 - Team — $249 for 36,000 - Agency — $499 for 80,000 Annual billing takes 20% off any plan. Enterprise is a conversation at hello@eroq.ai. And every new account starts with 50 free [credits](/glossary/credits), Motion One, every image, voice and text model, and clips up to 10 seconds — enough to find out whether you like the output before paying anything. ## Price per credit, side by side Divide and you get the real ladder: - Starter 1.00¢ · Builder 0.91¢ · Scale 0.83¢ per credit - Hobby 0.83¢ · Creator 0.82¢ · Studio 0.75¢ · Team 0.69¢ · Agency 0.62¢ per credit - Annual, at 20% off: Creator about 0.65¢, Studio about 0.60¢ Read it once and a pattern jumps out: a $15 plan already matches the best pack rate, and everything above it beats every pack. What packs buy is the absence of a subscription — nothing else. So you do not choose a plan for the price per credit. You choose it for what the plan unlocks, and packs are for people whose usage is too spiky to want a monthly line. ## What only a plan unlocks Credits buy renders; plans buy capabilities. The gates, from the [pricing page](/pricing): - **Video engines.** [Motion One](/models/eroq-motion-one) is on every account, free tier included, and it is the uncensored engine. Hobby unlocks Seedance 1.0 Lite and Hailuo 02. Creator and above unlock every engine — [Seedance 2.5](/models/seedance-2-5), Seedance 1.0 Pro, Kling 2.5 Turbo, Veo 3 Fast — all SFW only, moderated upstream. A locked engine answers `plan_required` before any billing; the [engine roster](/models) shows the gate on each card. - **Clip length.** Free 10 s, Hobby 15 s, Creator 20 s, Studio and above 30 s. The engine has to support the length too — Motion One renders 5 or 10 s whatever your plan; Seedance 2.5 goes to 30. - **Rate limits.** Creator 2×, Studio 4× the base limits per key. - **Seats and keys.** Hobby 2 seats and 10 API keys; Creator 5 and 20; Studio 15 and 50; Team 25 and 100; Agency 50 and 200. Seats share one workspace wallet. - **Queue and access.** Creator gets a priority video queue; Studio gets early access to new engines. If none of those matter to you — you render stills, or Motion One clips under 10 seconds, at your own pace — packs are a perfectly rational choice. ## Three profiles, worked **The hobbyist.** Ten 5-second Motion One clips (1,000 credits) and eighty images (800) a month — 1,800 exactly, which is Hobby's allowance for $15. On packs, Builder's 5,500 credits last three months for $50 — $16.67 a month, no extra engines, no 15-second clips. Hobby wins on price and on capability; if you skip a month, the credits are still there. **The creator posting shorts.** Thirty 10-second clips a month is 5,400 credits on Motion One; on Kling or Seedance 2.5 it is more, and those engines need Creator anyway. Creator's 6,000 for $49 covers the Motion One version with 600 spare, unlocks every engine and 20-second clips, and jumps the video queue. The same 5,400 credits are about $45 worth of a Scale pack, with none of the rest. **The studio or agency.** Three-scene films at 380 credits each, four takes on the hard scene, three clients — call it 12,000 to 20,000 credits a month, five or more people rendering, and a client-facing need for 1080p engines. Studio at $149 covers the credits with 15 seats and 4× limits; Team and Agency are the same deal with 25 and 50 seats. Annual billing on Studio brings it to about $119 a month equivalent. ## Roll-over changes the math Most subscriptions punish under-use. Here they do not: monthly credits roll over forever, and credits never expire, on plans or packs. A quiet month builds a buffer for the busy one. That removes the usual reason to under-buy — "I'll take Hobby and top up" — because Creator's surplus is not lost, it accumulates. The one thing that can lapse is the plan itself: cancel and you keep your credits but lose the gates — engines, clip length, seats — at the end of the period. ## The 3-hour welcome offer Subscribe within three hours of signing up and the first month is 50% off. Creator becomes $24.50 for 6,000 credits — about 0.41¢ per credit, the lowest rate on the site — and the roll-over means nothing is wasted if you overshoot. It applies to the first month of a monthly plan and is not combined with the annual discount. If you already know you will subscribe, do it inside the window; the 50 free credits are for deciding, not for waiting. ## Who should pick what - **Just looking.** Free credits, then a Starter pack. No plan until you know your monthly number. - **Occasional and spiky.** Packs — Builder or Scale. You pay a little more per credit and nothing on quiet months. - **Regular, stills and Motion One only.** Hobby, unless you never use the 15-second clips and the Lite engines, in which case Scale packs are equivalent. - **Regular, video with premium engines or longer clips.** Creator. This is where most people who render weekly end up. - **Teams.** Pick by seats first, credits second: Studio for up to 15, Team for 25, Agency for 50. Annual for 20% off once the workload is steady. - **Larger than that.** Enterprise, hello@eroq.ai. ## FAQ ### Do plan credits expire if I don't use them? No. Monthly credits roll over forever, and pack credits never expire either. ### Can I combine a plan and packs? Yes. Both land in the same workspace wallet; buy a pack in a heavy month without changing your plan. ### What happens to my credits if I cancel? You keep them. What you lose at the end of the period is the plan's gates — premium engines, longer clips, extra seats and keys. See the full matrix on the [pricing page](/pricing), or open [Film mode](/studio/video) and spend the free 50 first.