Plans and credits
The four Manuscript Studio plans, what a credit is, what each AI feature costs, and how monthly credits and top-up packs differ.
Manuscript Studio is a subscription. There is no free tier — an account without a plan has no credits and no book slots, and the app shows the pricing page until you choose one.
The plans
| Starter | Creator | Premium | Studio | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price / month | $5 | $12 | $25 | $100 |
| Books | 1 | 5 | 30 | 150 |
| Credits / month | 60 | 180 | 430 | 2,000 |
| AI models | Efficient | + Standard | All | All |
| Print PDF · EPUB · DOCX | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Cover Studio + downloads | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| AI-narrated audiobook | — | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Priority rendering | — | — | ✓ | ✓ |
Nothing is unlimited. Every tier carries a finite book cap, including Studio. An earlier version of Premium advertised unlimited books; that was withdrawn because it was a promise with no ceiling on storage or render time behind it.
Change plan from Settings → Account, or from the pricing page. A change is a proration on your existing subscription — you are never charged twice.
What a credit is
A credit is the unit of AI work. It is not a token count and not a dollar — it is a weight, so that a cheap model and an expensive one cost visibly different amounts for the same action.
You are always shown the price before you spend it. Every AI control in the
app carries its cost: ✦ Enhance · ≈2 cr, 🔎 Deep research · 10 cr. If a
control shows no number, the app could not reach the backend to get a quote — it
will not guess.
What things cost
| Action | Cost |
|---|---|
| Enhance a chapter, or a selection | 1 credit and up, by model |
| Generate an outline | 1 metered call |
| Consistency check across chapters | 1 metered call |
| Deep research | 10 credits, flat |
| Cover art or a promo background | 2 credits |
| Auto-draft the whole book | Metered per chapter, resumable |
| Audiobook narration | From 15 credits, by length |
| Page art for a layout book | Per page, by image tier — quoted before you start |
Model-based costs vary because models do. An Efficient model is roughly a credit an enhance; a Standard or Advanced model costs more per call and is only reachable on the plans that include it.
Monthly credits vs top-up packs
Two different things, and the difference matters.
- Monthly credits are your plan's allotment. They reset each billing cycle — they do not roll over.
- Pack credits are a one-time top-up (100 or 300 credits). They never expire.
Spending drains the monthly bucket first, packs second. That ordering is deliberate: it means a pack is a genuine reserve for the month a job overruns, rather than something that quietly evaporates at renewal. Buy packs from Settings → Account (subscribers only).
When a job fails
You are refunded. Credits are reserved before the AI provider is called and returned in full if the call fails. This applies to enhancement, research, narration and page art alike.
Cancelling is different from failing, and narration is the one place they differ meaningfully: cancelling a narration refunds only the passages that had not been rendered yet, because the rendered ones stay cached and are free to reuse.
What to watch for
- Downgrading caps your credits, it does not refill them. Moving from Premium to Starter mid-cycle leaves you with at most the new plan's allotment, not a fresh 60.
- Archiving a book does not free a book slot. The cap counts every book you have made, archived or not. This is deliberate — otherwise the cap means nothing.
- If you go over a cap after a downgrade, nothing is deleted. The newest books stay editable and the rest become read-only until you upgrade again.
- Exports are not metered. Rendering a PDF, EPUB, DOCX, cover or release bundle costs no credits on any plan.