Stripe unbundles usage-based billing into Metronome
Stripe moved advanced usage-based billing out of its 0.7% Billing rate into Metronome, a Stripe product with its own Startup and Custom plans; basic metering stays at 100M events/mo.
Billing at 0.7% of Billing volume covered recurring AND usage-based (metered) billing, with 100 million metered events per month included in the rate.
Billing stays 0.7% of Billing volume for recurring subscriptions. Usage-based billing now shows a Contact Metronome CTA instead of an Included checkmark. Metronome Startup: US$100,000.00 billing allotment + 10 million usage events, overages subject to additional pricing. Metronome Custom: custom pricing. Basic usage-based billing remains via Stripe's Meters API, up to 100M events per month, inside Billing pricing.
Proof of change
Stripe Billing's pricing pages, as we captured them on two dates.
Showing the whole page as captured — scroll either panel, or open it at full size.
- 2 pages had no counterpart in the earlier capture and are not shown.
Both images are our own captures, taken on the dates shown. The pixels are unmodified — nothing is retouched, and where a region is highlighted the marker is drawn over the image, not into it. Open either capture to see it at full resolution.
Stripe’s Billing pricing page no longer marks usage-based billing as “Included”. The feature row now reads “Usage-based billing*” with a Contact Metronome link, and the asterisk resolves to: “Basic usage-based billing features will continue to be available via Stripe’s Meters API as part of Billing pricing, with up to 100M events per month included.”
On stripe.com/pricing, Metronome has been inserted as its own product card between Billing and Invoicing, described as “Real-time metering, pricing and analytics for usage-based billing” and labelled “a Stripe product” on the Billing page. It carries two plans: Startup — priced “Included” with a US$100,000.00 billing allotment, 10 million usage events, and “Overages subject to additional pricing” — and Custom, quoted via “Contact Metronome”. The Billing card’s own description narrowed from “recurring, usage-based, and one-time billing” to “recurring revenue models and one-time billing”.
Headline rates were unchanged. Billing remains 0.7% of Billing volume, covering transactions processed on and off Stripe and excluding one-off invoices, and Invoicing Starter remains 0.4% per paid invoice. Connect still starts at a 0.25% fee, Workflows still includes 10,000 steps per month, and the customer portal custom domain is listed at US$10 per month.
The packaging move matters beyond Stripe. The default billing engine for much of the SaaS and AI market has priced high-end usage metering as a separately-quoted product rather than a bundled feature, which changes the build-vs-buy math for anyone metering tokens or events at volume.
Stripe split advanced usage-based billing out of the 0.7% Billing rate. The Billing pricing page now shows 'Usage-based billing*' with a Contact Metronome CTA instead of an Included checkmark, footnoted 'Basic usage-based billing features will continue to be available via Stripe's Meters API as part of Billing pricing, with up to 100M events per month included.' On stripe.com/pricing, Metronome appears as its own product card between Billing and Invoicing with two plans — Startup (Included; US$100,000.00 billing allotment, 10 million usage events, overages subject to additional pricing) and Custom (custom pricing, contact Metronome). Billing stays 0.7% of Billing volume and Invoicing Starter stays 0.4% per paid invoice; the customer portal custom domain is listed at US$10 per month. Stripe's Billing FAQ states 'Metronome, a Stripe product, is not included in Stripe Billing', and Stripe's docs direct all new usage-based integrations to Metronome while keeping the Meters API supported for existing ones. Metronome's own pricing page resolves Stripe's unpriced overage to 0.8% of billing volume above the US$100,000 allotment and $0.04 per 1,000 events above 10 million.