AI Content Is 4.7x Cheaper Than Human Content [+ New Research Report]

In this article, we’re looking specifically at the costs and budgets associated with AI content. How much does AI content cost? Are companies investing more, or less?

We asked respondents how much they spend to create a single blog post. Unsurprisingly, AI-created content is much cheaper than human-written content.

At the lowest end of the spectrum, 87% of AI users reported a cost of $0–100 per blog post, compared to 39% of non-AI users.

At the high end, 11% of non-AI users reported spending greater than $1,000 per blog post, compared to just 2% of AI users. 4% of non-AI users report spending greater than $5,000 per blog post.

We used the midpoints for each range to calculate an approximate weighted average cost. For AI-generated content, this average cost was $131; for human-created content, it was $611, or 4.7x greater.

Whether or not they use AI, our respondents spend the same amount on their content marketing strategies.

The average monthly spend on content marketing was almost the same in the AI and non-AI segments: $2,475 and $2,442, respectively.

Given the reduced marginal cost of AI content and the increased publishing frequency it enables, this suggests that AI content is primarily a cost-cutting measure, allowing companies to publish more content with the same budget—instead of unlocking radically new or different content strategies.

Segmenting the data further by company size, AI use seems to save the most money for the smallest (micro) and largest (enterprise) companies:

Unsurprisingly, almost none of our respondents plan to reduce their spend on AI content.

Over half of respondents plan to increase spend on AI content in the next year (17% “increase significantly” and 34% “increase”). 43% plan to keep their spend the same, while just 6% plan to decrease spending (5% “decrease” and 1% “decrease significantly”).

Grouping data by company size, micro (1–9 employee) companies are the most likely to increase their spend, while enterprises (1,000+ employees) are the least likely to decrease their spend:

AI tools are extremely cheap. Almost two-thirds of our survey respondents (64%) spend less than $500 per month on content tools.

At the low end of the spectrum, 47% of respondents reported spending $1–100 on AI tools per month, with 15% spending $101–250. Only 2.6% of respondents spend over $1,000 per month.

Using the midpoints of each range, we can calculate an estimated weighted average spend of just $188 per month.

Although it seems possible that AI content will eat away at the market for freelance writing, our data suggest that AI content is far from a wholesale replacement.

When asked how much money AI users saved per month, the most common response (45%) was that they were not saving money.

38% of respondents reported reducing their expenditure on writers and freelance writers as a result of adopting AI. Only a very small percentage (2.99%) reported saving over $5,000 per month.

The most commonly reported savings fell into the $1–500 and $501–1,000 range. Using the midpoints of each range we can calculate an estimated weighted average saving of $603.

Want to learn how marketers use AI for content creation, or how well it ranks relative to human-written content?

You can download and read our full PDF report here (no email required): The State of AI in Content Marketing.