I keep hitting the usage limits on my Claude Code Pro subscription because I work on several large projects every day. I usually prefer Opus because the larger context window is much more useful for long-running sessions than Sonnet. Rebuilding context after switching sessions slows me down a lot. Unfortunately, upgrading to Claude’s $100/$200 plans isn’t an option for me—it’s simply beyond my budget. My absolute limit is $50/month total. Please don’t suggest upgrading to the $100 or $200 plan, as that simply won’t work for my situation. I’ve seen people use Claude Code as the main orchestrator while connecting other models (through OpenRouter, Zed, etc.) to handle coding or review tasks. If you had a hard budget of $50/month, what would you recommend? Which models/providers would you use? Is OpenRouter the best option? Which models work well alongside Claude (GLM, Gemini, Qwen, DeepSeek, GPT, etc.)? What’s the best balance between cost, coding quality, and long-context support? I’m looking for recommendations from people who’ve actually used this kind of workflow in real projects. If your suggestion requires spending more than $50/month, it unfortunately won’t work for my situation. Thanks! submitted by /u/Sickle_Machine
Originally posted by u/Sickle_Machine on r/ClaudeCode
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