Understanding Credits
How credits work, how a generation's cost is calculated, and the order they are spent in.
Credits are ScriptMotion's generation currency. Every video generation and every image generation consumes them. Nothing else does — browsing, editing a workflow, sharing a review link, and inviting a teammate are all free.
Where credits come from
- Your monthly plan grant — a fresh grant arrives at the start of each billing period. Annual plans grant the whole year up front.
- Top-up packs — one-off purchases, valid for 12 months from the date of purchase, usable on any plan including pay-as-you-go.
A free account has no grant, so you need a plan or a pack before your first generation.
How a generation's cost is calculated
Every AI model burns credits at a rate per second of finished video, and that rate varies with the output resolution. The arithmetic is just:
cost = the model's burn rate at your chosen resolution × the clip duration in seconds
That means the three levers on cost are the model you pick, the resolution you render at, and how long the clip is. A draft at a lower resolution on a budget model costs a small fraction of the same clip rendered on a premium model at its top resolution.
The exact credit cost of the generation you have configured is shown on the Generate button before you commit. You never have to work it out yourself — change the model, resolution, or duration and the number updates.
See Credit Costs by Model for the full per-model, per-resolution rate table.
When credits are deducted
Credits are checked before a generation starts and deducted when it completes. Two consequences worth knowing:
- If your balance is too low for the configured generation, it is blocked up front rather than failing halfway through. Check the credit meter in the header.
- Failed generations do not consume credits. If a generation errors out, you are not charged for it, so retrying is always safe.
The order credits are spent in
When a generation completes, credits come out of your balance in this order:
Your monthly plan grant
Subscription credits are always drawn down first.
Top-up packs, oldest first
Packs are then drawn down in the order you bought them, so a pack that is closer to its 12-month expiry is spent before a newer one.
Fixed costs for image generation
Generating a character or a background image costs a flat number of credits per image rather than a per-second rate — see Image Generation Credits. Generated images are saved to your brand's asset library and can be reused across any number of videos at no further cost.