The formula
credits = price_per_image × uploads_per_month × variants_tested- price_per_image
- the same 1-to-30-credit flat rate a one-off image batch documents — a designed thumbnail is not a distinct, separately-priced item in the catalogue.
- uploads_per_month
- the channel's posting schedule — 8 for a twice-weekly series, far fewer than a daily short-form cadence.
- variants_tested
- candidate thumbnails generated per upload before the highest-CTR one gets published — 3 here. This is the multiplier a one-off product shoot doesn't have: it isn't about retries, it's a deliberate testing habit.
Worked example — 8 uploads a month, 3 thumbnail variants tested each, at 4 credits a call
- 1.variants: 8 × 3 = 24 generations
- 2.24 × 4
= 96 credits
Free frame-grab versus a designed generation
Versely's own thumbnail tool pulls a frame straight out of your footage, and that costs nothing at all; it isn't a model call, so there's no meter to price. This page starts where that tool stops: a designed thumbnail, generated fresh to be more clickable than a frame the camera happened to catch, bills on the exact same flat per-call meter as any other AI image.
A one-off product shoot's multiplier is retries — regenerating what didn't come out right. A thumbnail's multiplier is different: creators routinely generate a small set of candidates for the same upload and publish only the one that tests best, which is a deliberate habit, not a failure rate. At 3 variants across 8 uploads that's 24 generations a month for one channel.
Set against a full production budget, this line is small. A month of daily short-form footage can eat most of a plan's credits on its own; a month of thumbnails at series cadence rounds to a fraction of it.
Cadence, variants and the flat-rate spread
Every figure below is computed from Versely's live price matrix — the same matrix the app quotes you from before it charges. These are prices, not verdicts: the buyer's guides are where models get ranked.
Thumbnails needed at different upload schedules
Uploads a month times variants tested per upload — reusing the same flat rate throughout.
| Uploads/month | At 1 variant | At 3 variants | At 5 variants |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4 | 4 generations | 12 generations | 20 generations |
| 8 | 8 generations | 24 generations | 40 generations |
| 12 | 12 generations | 36 generations | 60 generations |
| 20 | 20 generations | 60 generations | 100 generations |
| 30 | 30 generations | 90 generations | 150 generations |
8 uploads at 3 variants each is the 24-generation figure this page prices throughout.
Where the 74 flat-billed image models sit, at 24 thumbnails a month
The same price distribution a one-off image batch's page uses, recomputed against a monthly thumbnail habit instead of a one-off 100-image shoot.
| Credits per image | Models at that price | 24 thumbnails/month | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 | 24 | Luma UNI 1 Max |
| 2 | 10 | 48 | Nano Banana Edit |
| 3 | 10 | 72 | ByteDance Seedream 4 |
| 4 | 18 | 96 | Nano Banana 2 |
| 5 | 9 | 120 | Mai Image 2.5 Edit |
| 6 | 3 | 144 | Imagen 4 Ultra |
| 7 | 4 | 168 | Seedream 5.0 Pro |
| 8 | 7 | 192 | Wan 2.7 Pro Edit |
| 10 | 2 | 240 | Midjourney V7 |
| 14 | 1 | 336 | Riverflow 2.0 |
| 21 | 2 | 504 | Recraft 4.1 Utility Pro Text to Image |
| 23 | 1 | 552 | Higgsfield |
| 25 | 1 | 600 | Recraft 4 Pro Text to Image |
| 30 | 2 | 720 | Recraft 4 Pro Text to Vector |
The highlighted row is the most populated price point — 18 models charge 4 credits a call, the sensible figure to budget an unspecified thumbnail habit against.
What changes a monthly thumbnail bill
Variants tested per upload
Directly proportional and the real driver here — dropping from 3 variants to 1 cuts the monthly total to a third.
Upload cadence
Linear against the schedule — a daily uploader needs roughly 3.8× the thumbnails a twice-weekly series does.
Model choice
30× between the cheapest and dearest flat-billed image model, applied to every variant of every upload.
Pulling a frame instead of designing one
Free, via the built-in frame-grab tool — the option to reach for whenever a frame from the footage is good enough.
What a thumbnail charge does not cover
- Extracting a raw frame from your own footage as a thumbnail — that's free and isn't a model call at all.
- The upload's own video generation cost, priced on its own page.
- A/B test infrastructure or click-through measurement — this formula prices the generations, not the testing platform.
How many thumbnails a month of credits buys
A Monthly plan's 580 credits covers 145 thumbnail generations at the typical 4-credit rate — 48 uploads' worth of testing, well past a twice-weekly series' 8.
Plan sizes and what each grants are on the cost hub.
Flat-billed image models
Every model page shows its own price matrix, its published credit range, and the option table this formula reads from.
Luma UNI 1 Max
flatLuma · 1–1 credits
Nano Banana Edit
flatGoogle · 2–2 credits
ByteDance Seedream 4
flatByteDance · 3–3 credits
Nano Banana 2
flatGoogle · 4–4 credits
Mai Image 2.5 Edit
flatMicrosoft · 5–5 credits
Imagen 4 Ultra
flatGoogle · 6–6 credits
Nano Banana 2 Lite
flatGoogle · 4–4 credits
Imagen 4
flatGoogle · 4–4 credits
Imagen 4 Fast
flatGoogle · 2–2 credits
Nano Banana
flatGoogle · 4–4 credits
Nano Banana 2 Edit
flatGoogle · 4–4 credits
GPT Image 1.5
flatOpenAI · 2–2 credits
Frequently asked questions
Is generating a custom thumbnail more expensive than a normal AI image?+
No — there's no thumbnail-specific pricing in the catalogue. A designed thumbnail bills at the exact same flat per-call rate as any other image from the same model.
Can I get a thumbnail for free?+
Yes — the built-in frame-grab tool pulls an existing frame from your footage at no charge. This page prices the alternative: a freshly generated, designed thumbnail rather than a frame from the video.
Why variants instead of a keep rate?+
A product photo batch multiplies on retries — generations that didn't come out right. A thumbnail habit multiplies on deliberate CTR testing — candidates that all came out fine, with only the best-performing one published.
Does a longer video cost more to make a thumbnail for?+
No — the flat per-call rate ignores the source video's length entirely, exactly as it ignores an image's resolution or aspect ratio.
How does this compare to a month of daily short-form video?+
Far cheaper. A-month-of-daily-short-form's footage and voiceover stack can approach a whole plan's credits; a series-cadence thumbnail habit at 24 generations a month is a small fraction of that.
Different job, different arithmetic
These are not variations on the formula above — each one meters something else entirely.
What does a batch of 100 AI product images cost?
credits = price_per_image × images_generatedIt charges one fixed price per call, so the image's size and shape are free.
What does a month of daily short-form video cost?
credits = (video_rate × seconds + ceil(chars ÷ 1,000 × 12)) × days_postedIt multiplies a small per-clip stack by a whole month of posting, where a single ad's stack never multiplies by cadence at all.
What does a print-resolution AI image cost?
credits = rate_per_megapixel × (width × height ÷ 1,000,000)It prices the area of the canvas, so doubling both edges quadruples the charge.
Which model should I actually pick?
This page prices the job. The buyer's guides rank the models, with the sort criterion stated on every one.
Cheapest AI image model
Filtered to text-to-image models that publish a complete-job cost, sorted by the credits one generation costs, ascending.
Best value AI image model
Filtered to image models that hold a leaderboard position and publish a complete-job cost, sorted by (leaderboard Elo ÷ credits per job) descending.
Best AI image generator
Filtered to models with the text-to-image category, sorted by best leaderboard position (unranked models after, cheapest complete job first).
Jobs billed this way
Further reading
AI Thumbnail Generator: How to Make Click-Worthy YouTube Thumbnails
The 2026 AI thumbnail stack — Ideogram V3 for in-image text, Flux 2 Pro for photoreal characters, MrBeast-style breakdowns, and CTR uplift you can replicate.
Extracting Frames: Thumbnails and Stills From Your Best Takes
How to extract frames from AI video for thumbnails, stills, and anchor images: exact-moment picking, resolution fixes, and a repeatable workflow.
See the price before you spend it
Versely quotes the exact credit cost of every generation before it runs, and the agent will estimate a whole batch on request. The all-in-one AI studio for creators. 60+ models for video, image, voice, music and lipsync in a single app.