Last month I got a bill from AI usage that made me stop and look twice.
Not because the model was bad. Because the workflow was sloppy.
The real cost was not tokens. It was the invisible stuff around the tokens:
- duplicate calls
- unnecessary retries
- expensive models used for boring tasks
- prompts that were too long
- no quick way to see what was happening
That is why I built TokenBar.
I wanted a dead simple menu bar view of what AI was costing me in real time. Not a dashboard I would open later. Not a spreadsheet I would forget to check. Just the number, always visible.
What surprised me was this:
Cost visibility changes behavior faster than cost warnings.
When you can see spend as you work, you naturally tighten prompts, remove loops, and stop paying premium rates for mechanical tasks.
If you are building with AI and the bill feels weirdly high, do one thing first:
make the cost visible.
TokenBar is my answer to that problem. It keeps me honest while I ship.
