“If this is really going to unlock paid acquisition and some other things such as the marginal cost of AI features for us, then why not do it? It gives our marketing team so much more room to operate.”

Higher margins from pricing unlock the AI feature budget you could not previously afford

AI features carry real per-request costs that a flat $40/year subscription struggled to absorb at scale. The price increase to $80 did not just improve marketing economics — it funded the product roadmap. When every active user consumes more backend compute, unit economics either improve via pricing or erode via feature cuts. Pricing is now as much a product decision as a revenue one.