# How to track LLM cost on Groq > Open-weight model lineups move fast, so a price book lags. What Culpa records for a model it has no rate for, and why a visible zero beats a guess. URL: https://getculpa.com/track-llm-cost-groq Last reviewed: 2026-08-02 ## Answer Open-weight lineups change faster than any price book tracks, so a Groq model can arrive or vanish between updates. Culpa, a local-first LLM cost, margin, and forecast ledger, prices a call it has no rate for at zero and flags it as incomplete, so an unpriced model shows up as a visible gap rather than as a silently wrong total. ## Why this happens A price book is a snapshot and a model catalogue is a moving target, and open-weight hosting moves fastest of all. Two models sitting in this book are already off the vendor's page, and the reverse happens just as often: a new model id appears in production before any rate exists for it. Every ledger faces the same choice at that moment, which is to guess a rate, drop the call, or record it and admit it can't price it. Only the third one leaves you able to find out later. ## What this usually looks like - A model id appears in your traffic that nobody added to a price book. - Your totals reconcile for most models and one of them contributes nothing. - A model you're still calling has disappeared from the vendor's pricing page. - Nobody reviews the flagged-incomplete count, so an unpriced model can run for months. ## Common mistakes - Filling an unknown rate with a similar model's price. Why it hurts: You get a total that looks complete and is wrong, and nothing marks which rows were invented. Do instead: Record zero and flag it. A gap you can see gets fixed and a guess gets trusted. - Dropping calls you can't price. Why it hurts: You lose the token counts too, so the spend can't be recovered once a rate exists. Do instead: Keep the call with its counts. Adding the rate later reprices history rather than rebuilding it. - Never reviewing the incomplete count. Why it hurts: It's the one number that tells you your price book has fallen behind your traffic. Do instead: Put flagged-row count on the same dashboard as spend, and treat a rise as a data problem. ## Self-check - List every distinct model id in last month's traffic and check each has a rate. - Total the calls flagged incomplete and see which models they belong to. - Check whether any model you still call has left the vendor's pricing page. - Confirm your unpriced calls kept their token counts rather than being discarded. - Add a rate for one unpriced model and confirm the history reprices rather than staying blank. ## What an unpriced model does to a month (illustrative) 800,000 calls a month on a Groq model with no rate in the book, each sending 2,000 input tokens and returning 400. Priced afterwards at Llama 3.3 70B's real rates of $0.59 per million input and $0.79 output for scale. Volumes are modelled. Per call once a rate exists: (2 x $0.00059) + (0.4 x $0.00079) = $0.00118 + $0.000316 = $0.001496 Real monthly spend: 800,000 x $0.001496 = $1,196.80 With no rate in the book the ledger records $0.00 across all 800,000 calls Every one of them is flagged incomplete, so the count reads 800,000 rather than the cost reading low Adding the rate reprices the stored counts, and the month resolves to $1,196.80 without recapture A visible zero on 800,000 flagged rows is a question anyone can act on. A plausible estimate on the same rows is a number nobody questions and nobody can check. ## Cost figures Every figure carries its confidence and its source. No figure on this site is provider-reported. - $1,196.80 — modelled monthly spend recoverable from stored counts once a missing rate is added [calculated] Source: 800,000 calls x $0.001496, using real Groq Llama 3.3 70B rates per million from the price book, effective 2026-07-02 and re-verified 2026-08-01. Call volume and token counts are modelled. - $0.00 — what an unpriced model contributes to a total before its rate exists, alongside an incomplete flag [calculated] Source: A model with no price-book row prices to zero by construction, and the completeness flag rather than the amount carries the meaning. ## FAQ Q: What happens when Culpa has no price for a model? A: The call is stored with its token counts, priced at zero and flagged as incomplete. The reporting layer reads that flag as an estimate rather than a calculation, so an unpriceable call can never masquerade as a measured one. Q: Do I lose the data until a rate exists? A: No. The token counts are kept, so adding the rate later reprices the stored history. That's the reason to record and flag rather than to drop, because a discarded call can't be recovered once the rate arrives. Q: Why not estimate the rate from a similar model? A: Because the total then looks complete while being wrong, and nothing marks which rows were invented. Open-weight models differ enough in price that a neighbour's rate is a guess, and a guess inside a cost ledger is the thing the whole tool exists to remove. ## Sources - Groq pricing: https://groq.com/pricing Run the free Cost Leak Scan: https://app.getculpa.com/scan?source=pseo&slug=track-llm-cost-groq&cluster=integration Machine-readable index of every guide: https://getculpa.com/api/pages Human-readable index of every guide: https://getculpa.com/guides Site overview: https://app.getculpa.com/llms.txt Privacy: Culpa runs on your infrastructure. Your prompts and responses never leave it. Culpa counts calls to run your plan, and it fails open, so if it ever breaks your app keeps running.