ChatGPT credits, short answer: they are a pay-as-you-go add-on for personal ChatGPT plans. When a Plus or Pro user runs out of the usage included in the plan for Codex, ChatGPT Work, or ChatGPT in Word, Excel and PowerPoint, credits let you keep going without upgrading. Your plan’s included usage is used first; credits are only drawn after that. You buy them in ChatGPT under Settings → Usage, or in the Codex app under Usage & Billing, and Codex also offers to add credits when you hit a limit. Each purchase is a separate card charge from your monthly subscription, and on our cards it shows as “OPENAI* CHATGPT CREDIT SAN FRANCISCO” or “… DUBLIN”. Credits are valid for 12 months, are generally non-refundable, and are not API credits.
Written by the Pink Card team (pinkcard.cc). OpenAI rules are taken from the help article “Using credits for flexible usage in ChatGPT” and the Codex pricing page as of October 2026 and may change; what your account shows wins. Pink Card fees are those shown on the purchase page on 2026-10-18. Pink Card is not affiliated with OpenAI.
Who can buy credits and what they pay for
- Plans: Plus and Pro can buy credits. OpenAI says purchases are open to “a limited group of Free and Go users”. Business, Edu and Enterprise buy workspace credits under a separate rate card, which this guide does not cover.
- Features: Codex, ChatGPT Work, and ChatGPT for Word, Excel and PowerPoint, depending on plan and account. One balance is shared across them.
- Not everything: OpenAI states that credits do not add usage for every ChatGPT model or feature.
- How they are used: Codex is billed in credits per million tokens, so stronger models cost more, Fast mode uses 2× the Standard rate and Ultrafast 6×. OpenAI’s own examples: a typical Codex task may use 2–15 credits, an Excel message 5–20, a PowerPoint message 10–50.
How much credits cost
OpenAI does not publish one price list. The help article says available purchase amounts, prices, payment methods and spending limits “can vary by account, region, and plan”. The figure you see most often, 1,000 credits for $40 (about $0.04 per credit), comes from third-party write-ups and OpenAI Developer Community posts, not from an OpenAI page, so check the amount on your own purchase screen. On our cards the most common successful amounts were $10 and $20, with some at $40 and $80, and others settled in pounds, Danish kroner or Philippine pesos and converted to dollars, so the options and the currency clearly differ by account.
How to buy credits, step by step
- On chatgpt.com open Settings → Usage. In the Codex app open Usage & Billing.
- Check your current balance and when your plan usage resets. If you only go over now and then, waiting for the reset can be cheaper than buying.
- Pick an amount and read the final total and currency (some accounts are billed in local currency, and tax may be added).
- The purchase uses your default payment method. Make sure the card holds more than the total, then submit once.
- Go back to Usage and confirm the balance went up. If it has not changed, refresh after a few minutes before trying again.
Expiry, refunds and negative balances
- Expiry: 12 months from purchase. Unused credits expire and do not roll over.
- Refunds: non-refundable unless required by law or contract, or for a verified billing error, confirmed unauthorized activity, or a confirmed OpenAI service failure.
- Credits are non-transferable, have no cash value, and cannot be resold. Gifting credits is a separate purchase.
- Your balance can go negative; a later purchase or reload first covers the negative part.
ChatGPT credits are not API credits
OpenAI says it directly: “These credits are not API credits.” Calls made with an API key follow API pricing and draw from the separate prepaid balance at platform.openai.com → Billing (minimum purchase $5, default $10, USD only, expires after one year). If you sign in to Codex with an API key, you are spending API balance, not ChatGPT credits. If you sign in with your ChatGPT account, plan usage goes first, then credits.
Need API credits instead? See: Pay OpenAI and Anthropic API credits with USDT or USDC
Why a credit purchase gets declined
- The card holds exactly the amount you picked, but local currency or tax makes the charge slightly higher. A card with $20 left cannot pay a $20.50 charge.
- The charge goes over the card’s per-transaction, daily or monthly limit, for example one large purchase or several purchases in one day.
- Wrong CVV or expiry date.
- The card is frozen or closed but is still your default payment method, so automatic reload keeps trying it.
- Many attempts or card switches in a short time, which trips risk checks at the payment processor or the issuer.
What happened on our own cards
We checked charges named “OPENAI* CHATGPT CREDIT” on our own Pink Cards for the last 90 days (July 19 to October 17, 2026). There were 45 successful purchases on 23 cards (38 from the SAN FRANCISCO descriptor, 7 from DUBLIN), $1,181.51 in total, and 14 of those 23 cards were also paying a ChatGPT subscription. The most common amounts were $10 and $20 (7 each); others were $40, $80, and charges settled in DKK, GBP or PHP. In the same period 14 purchases were declined: 11 because the balance or a card limit (per transaction, daily, monthly or total) was too low, 2 for a wrong CVV, and 1 because the card had been locked. Since May 2026 the full record is 56 successful and 42 declined purchases on 38 cards. Many cards work, but that is not a guarantee for your card or your next purchase. Keep a buffer and submit once.
Paying with a prepaid virtual card (USDT or USDC)
- Open pinkcard.cc/en and choose an amount: presets start at $110 ($110, $220, $500, $1000), or enter a custom amount from $100.
- Pay with USDT on BEP-20 (shown as BSC or BNB Smart Chain on most exchanges; network fee usually under $1) or ERC-20, or with USDC on ERC-20. Send exactly the amount shown, on exactly the network you picked.
- Enter your email twice. No account and no sign-up are needed.
- The card number, expiry, CVV and billing address arrive by email about 1–2 minutes after the payment confirms (check spam).
- In ChatGPT add the card as your payment method with the billing address from the email, then buy credits once from Settings → Usage.
- Top up the same card before it runs low. The number does not change, and top-ups usually arrive within about 30 minutes.
How much to load (worked examples)
- One $20 credit purchase: $20 + $1 per transaction = $21 from the card (more if your account is billed in local currency or with tax).
- A $110 card paying Plus ($20 + $1), the $2.50 monthly fee and two $20 credit purchases ($42) uses about $65.50 a month.
- Paying for a $110 card: ($110 + $10) × 1.03 = $123.60. Topping up $100 later: $5 + ($100 + $5) × 5% = $10.25 in fees, $110.25 in total.
- Automatic reload on a prepaid card: every reload is a charge, and every declined reload costs a $1 failed-transaction fee, so cap the monthly maximum.
Pink Card fees (as of 2026-10-18)
- Card issuance: $10 one-time, plus a 3% service fee on (card amount + $10).
- From the card balance after activation: $1 per transaction and $2.50 per month.
- Failed authorizations are charged $1 too (at most 3 failed charges per card per month), so do not retry a declined payment in a loop.
- Top-up of the same card: $5 plus 5% of (top-up amount + $5), usually on the card within about 30 minutes. Full fee table: pinkcard.cc/en/fees.
- Once the card details are emailed, the order cannot be cancelled, so double-check your email address before paying.
Paying for the Plus subscription itself? See: How to pay for ChatGPT Plus with USDT
Paying for Cursor as well as Codex? See: Pay ChatGPT, Claude and Cursor with USDT
Chinese version (中文版，付款方式按中文站): ChatGPT Credits（积分）怎么买
Related guides: ChatGPT Plus declines in detail at pinkcard.cc/en/ai-tips/chatgpt-plus-payment-declined and a comparison of prepaid virtual cards at pinkcard.cc/en/guides/prepaid-virtual-cards-for-ai-subscriptions-compared. Fees: pinkcard.cc/en/fees. The Pink Card Android app (Google Play: cc.pinkcard.app) shows the balance and every transaction.