Chutes, a service many AI roleplay enthusiasts use to access LLM models, now requires a $5 deposit before you can generate up to 200 free messages per day.
Earlier this year, OpenRouter, another service that offered free access to LLM models, reduced the daily limit of free messages from 200 to 50. Depositing $10 into your OpenRouter account raised the daily limit of free messages to 1,000.
Technically, Chutes Is No Longer Free
Chutes attracted people who didn’t want to deposit $10 into their OpenRouter account but still wanted to generate more than 50 messages a day. The majority of them chose it to roleplay with their AI characters using Deepseek.
Also Read: Chutes’ New Subscription Plans
However, running LLMs like Deepseek requires significant computational resources and comes at a high cost. It’s unrealistic to expect Chutes, or any provider, to avoid gatekeeping free usage to prevent abuse of their service.
Chutes is no longer free; you need to deposit $5 into your account to generate up to 200 free messages per day. After you exceed the 200 message limit, they charge your account balance according to their usage pricing.
The $5 is still a drop in the ocean when it comes to recovering the cost of offering 200 messages per day. But providers like Chutes need to balance accessibility with sustainability. People use free access to LLMs for various productive purposes, while those who use them for roleplay or interactive entertainment make up only a small subset.
You’re Still Getting A Great Deal
Generating 200 messages a day after depositing $5 into your Chutes account is still a great deal. The alternative is to use the official Deepseek API service, deposit $2 into your account, and roleplay during discounted pricing hours.
Additionally, re-rolling a message to generate another, something roleplayers obsessively do, costs only 1/10th of a message.
And don’t expect Chute’s 200 free messages per day limit to last forever either. They can and will change the free limit if it’s leading them towards generational debt. After all, Chutes is a service, not a charity.
While Chutes is no longer free, switching to local roleplay is. If you want a no-cost alternative, get started with SillyTavern and KoboldCpp today.
