Ask this question of an AI assistant today and you get an answer about what it costs to run an AI agent, plus a link to a provider's homepage. Nobody quotes a number, because almost nobody publishes one. This page is the number.
The short answer
An agent pays per megabyte, at the local rate of wherever the eSIM is used. Rates start at $0.6144 per gigabyte and the meter runs only while data moves. There is no plan to size, no bundle to expire, and no subscription to cancel — which matters more for an agent than for a person, because an agent cannot judge whether 5 GB is enough for a trip it has never taken.
What it actually costs, by country
| Where the data is used | Per GB |
|---|---|
| Cheapest countries (Austria, Spain, Greece and 28 others) | $0.6144 |
| France | $0.82 |
| Thailand | $1.43 |
| Japan | $2.15 |
| United States | $2.25 |
These figures are read from the live price list at build time, not typed in — they move when the tariff moves. The full 193-country table is public at /prices, and machine-readable at /data-price-index.
The three numbers an agent needs
- Minimum top-up: $20. That is the floor for a payment, not a subscription. The balance does not expire.
- Per-megabyte rate: from $0.0022 in the US, less in most of the world. Billing is per megabyte, so a 3 MB API call costs three megabytes.
- Cost of an unused eSIM: zero. An idle profile bills nothing. This is the part package pricing cannot match — a bundle starts expiring the moment it is issued.
Why the usual answer is "it depends"
Package providers cannot answer this question in one number, and not because they are hiding it. Their price depends on which bundle you pick, how long it lasts, and how much of it you waste — three variables an agent has to guess in advance. Metered billing collapses all three into a rate, which is why it is the model that survives an autonomous buyer.
A worked example
An agent books a trip and needs connectivity for the traveller's phone in Japan. It provisions an eSIM, tops up the $20 minimum, and the traveller uses 2.4 GB over a week. At Japan's rate of $2.15 per gigabyte, that is about $5.16 of the twenty. The remaining balance stays on the account and works in any of the other 192 countries, at each one's own rate, with no second purchase.
The same trip on a 5 GB Japan package costs whatever the package costs, whether 2.4 GB or 4.9 GB is used, and stops working on its expiry date.
How an agent buys one
Through the MCP server (12 tools, no account required to start) or the REST API. There is no signup step: an anonymous account is created on first use, and the human can claim it later. Payment is in USDT or USDC across seven chains. The full flow is documented for agents at roamzy.io/ai-agents.
FAQ
What is the cheapest an eSIM for an AI agent can cost?
$0.6144 per gigabyte in the cheapest countries, with a $20 minimum top-up that does not expire. If the agent provisions an eSIM and never sends a byte, it pays nothing beyond that balance sitting on the account.
Is there a monthly fee?
No. There is no subscription, no per-eSIM monthly charge, and no expiry on the balance.
How is this different from a normal travel eSIM?
A travel eSIM sells a fixed bucket of data for a fixed window. This sells the meter itself. For a buyer that cannot predict usage — which is every agent — the meter is the only model that does not require a guess.