Gartner Says Token Pricing Could Make AI Coding Tools Costlier Than Developers by 2028

Gartner warns enterprise AI coding tool spend could surpass the average developer salary by 2028, driven by per‑token billing and surging consumption. Peer Insights data shows 23% of leaders spend $200–$500 per developer monthly, while 6% exceed $2,000. Uber exhausted its 2026 AI budget in four months, imposing a $1,500 cap per employee for tools like Claude Code and Cursor. Gartner urges smaller models for simple tasks and “tokenomics” linking usage to business value.