Kimi Code

tom@tomrochette.com (Tom Rochette) — Sat, 26 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Kimi Code is Moonshot AI’s developer coding subscription, selling the K-series models through a CLI, desktop app, and VS Code extension under a membership quota. The same membership is sold at a yen ladder on kimi.com and a dollar ladder on kimi.ai, and the entry tiers do not convert between them.

What it is
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Moonshot AI sells Kimi Code as the developer service inside a Kimi membership, with CLI, desktop, IDE, and third-party requests drawing on one shared quota. Third-party harnesses connect through OpenAI-compatible and Anthropic-compatible endpoints on api.kimi.com. Model access is tiered: K2.7 Code for every paying member, K3 at full 1M context from the mid tier up, with RMB-billed Extra Usage as overflow.

Status
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Active and restructuring quickly: K3 shipped into Kimi Code on July 17, 2026, and by late September a restructure had renamed tiers and dropped the weekly quota window for new members. The CLI is published on GitHub under MoonshotAI, with third-party coverage putting it at 3.2k stars in July 2026. Independent guides multiplied through 2026, which I read as real adoption.

Strengths
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The $19 entry ($15 billed annually) undercuts Claude Pro and Cursor Pro while including a 1M-context frontier-class model at the mid tier.
The yen ladder starts at ¥49 per month, well below the $19 international entry at any recent exchange rate.
Anthropic-compatible endpoints mean Claude Code and OpenCode work without new tooling.

Cautions
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Coding quota shares one pool with chat, Deep Research, and other Kimi features, so non-coding usage drains your coding allowance.
The plan ladder moved twice in 2026, so quota rules at signup may not persist.
A February 2026 checkout experiment offered personalized first months between $0.99 and $11.99, so two subscribers on one tier can pay different prices.
One four-month user quit, reporting that higher tiers bought less inference per dollar, not more.

Pricing
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On kimi.ai: Moderato $19, Allegretto $39, Allegro $99, Vivace $199 per month, annual effective $15/$31/$79/$159 (as of 2026-09-26). On kimi.com: Andante ¥49, Moderato ¥99, Allegretto ¥199, Allegro ¥699 per month (as of 2026-09-26). Under the new ladder, Go has no coding quota, Plus and above include Kimi Code, and Pro and above unlock K3 at 1M context. Extra Usage is pay-as-you-go overflow with a ¥25 minimum top-up, generally non-refundable.

Price history
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Date	Plan	Change	Source
2026-07-17	Moderato to Vivace	Listed $19/$39/$99/$199 with time-limited promos at $15/$31/$79/$159; Kimi and Kimi Code separation announced	https://www.digitalapplied.com/blog/kimi-code-k3-hands-on-setup-plans-cache-2026
2026-09-26	Same tiers	Promos became standard annual pricing; new plans released at unchanged prices, weekly window dropped for new members	https://www.kimi.ai/help/membership/membership-pricing

Compared to
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MiniMax Coding Plan (../minimax-coding-plan/index.md) meters tokens across modalities instead of time windows, cheaper at the top end but carrying 2026 billing-change baggage. NanoGPT (../nanogpt/index.md) fits when open-weight breadth matters more than one lab’s flagship. Claude Code or Cursor remain the picks when reliability per hour beats price per hour.

Bottom line
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Recommended for cost-sensitive daily coders who want K3’s 1M context at $15 to $39 per month and accept quota churn. Not for teams needing contract-stable plan terms after two restructures in one year. I will claim something arguable: the ¥49 China-market ladder proves this product profits at roughly a third of the international price, which makes $19 a regional tax, not a cost.

Changes
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2026-09-26 - Created.

References
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https://www.kimi.com/code/en - official product page; surfaces and the K3 1M-context claim.
https://www.kimi.com/code/docs/en/kimi-code/membership.html - membership docs; new ladder (Go/Plus/Pro), weekly window removal, Extra Usage terms.
https://www.kimi.ai/help/membership/membership-pricing - dollar pricing $19/$39/$99/$199 monthly, $15/$31/$79/$159 annual, as of 2026-09-26.
https://www.kimi.com/en/help/membership/membership-pricing - yen pricing ¥49/¥99/¥199/¥699 and shared credit pool rules, as of 2026-09-26.
https://www.digitalapplied.com/blog/kimi-code-k3-hands-on-setup-plans-cache-2026 - July 17, 2026 snapshot of listed vs promo prices and the separation banner.
https://aihackers.net/value/deals/kimi-haggle/ - documented February 2026 first-month offers of $0.99 to $11.99, marked historical.
https://www.noemititarenco.com/blog/kimi-code-plan-after-4-months-of-use-honest-review/ - skeptical four-month user review and cancellation rationale.

moonshot-ai on tomrochette.com

Kimi Code

What it is
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Status
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Strengths
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Cautions
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Pricing
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Price history
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Compared to
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Bottom line
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Changes
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See also
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References
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moonshot-ai on tomrochette.com

Kimi Code

What it is #

Status #

Strengths #

Cautions #

Pricing #

Price history #

Compared to #

Bottom line #

Changes #

See also #

References #

What it is
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Status
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Strengths
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Cautions
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Pricing
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Price history
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Compared to
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Bottom line
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Changes
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See also
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References
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