How much will Google Veo 2 charge per second of generated video?

AI has come a long way from being a simple text-based chatbot. Google's Gemini Live now handles voice interactions, Meta’s AI powers platforms like Instagram and WhatsApp to create cartoonish images, and OpenAI’s Sora can generate videos from text prompts. Now, Google is stepping up with the release of Veo version 2, its rival to OpenAI's video generation model, and has revealed the costs involved in processing and convenience.

If you haven't heard much about Google Veo, it's understandable since Gemini is the company's more consumer-focused AI product. Veo was announced at Google I/O last year and entered the preview stage in early December. The updated version allows users to upload short video clips and images alongside text prompts before processing begins. However, the pricing details were only recently shared, though somewhat quietly.

According to TechCrunch, Google Veo 2 will charge users 50 cents per second of generated video. This translates to $30 per minute or $1,800 per hour. In comparison, OpenAI's Sora is available to all ChatGPT Pro users for the same $200 per month, offering additional features like the Operator, which can perform complex actions on your behalf.

Google promotes Veo 2 as an ideal solution for creating longer video clips (two minutes or more) without the artifacts and poor imagination that plagued the first version. To make the pricing appear more attractive, Google DeepMind researcher Jon Barron drew a comparison between Veo 2's costs and the $356 million production budget for Marvel's Avengers: Endgame, which comes out to around $32,000 per second of film.

However, it’s important to note that Sora, Veo, and similar AI models are not yet ready for feature film production and are far from being the ultimate solution for video generation. Nonetheless, Google now stands in direct competition with OpenAI and other services, offering Veo 2 through Vertex AI on Google Cloud and VideoFX via Labs in select countries.