UPDATE: I removed 1 star due to the heavy credit consumption for image generation compared to competitors. (Ideogram 2.0 / Recraft v3 ... )
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Few tools make me really satisfied, but Merlin AI is truly a wonderful combination of useful features.
I'm considered a heavy user of AI, and I use it for work. Tier 3 is what I consider acceptable in terms of credit amounts.

But to better explain why it's the best tool available right now, we need to compare it with current alternatives:
- ChatGPT (OpenAI): Tier 3 is almost the same price as a year of using ChatGPT. Even if you choose a subscription, it's still cheaper while allowing you to use other AI tools.
- Claude: Almost all marketers now use Claude because of the project feature. This alone can replace many AI tools I see on AppSumo. Merlin has this too, which is amazing! Combined with the fact that with the same subscription, a marketer can also use their credits to generate high-quality visuals. The pricing is similar—a little more than a year plan if you purchase on AppSumo, and cheaper if you purchase an annual subscription.
- Straico: This was my main hesitation before choosing Merlin. Sure, they have API access, and it would be amazing if Merlin allowed the same, but you need to do some math and testing to really understand their credit consumption.To generate a simple output, it's definitely cheaper because it's based on the number of characters, and you get better value for generating images. However, when you start having exchanges with AI in a conversation, the number of credits consumed goes crazy because in some situations, it takes as input characters that are part of the chat history. Try it, for example, with code writing and correction—you'll deplete your credits very quickly. For marketers, this is bad news because we need it to write and correct SEO text, so using Claude, ChatGPT, or Merlin is better. Additionally, it does not have projects, which means you need to teach it context each time, making it worse for credit consumption. Merlin uses a fixed unit of credit consumption for each message. Maybe Straico it’s better suited for people who have business applications and need to connect it with api for AI tasks.

On top of all that, it has a very nice Chrome integration with web pages, which just makes it more accessible and reduces the number of clicks I had before. The mobile app is very nice.

Highly recommended! For heavy AI users, if you want a fair cost comparison, don't use Tier 1 or 2.

Tier 2 should be for normal users, and Tier 1 for occasional users.