What do AI image and video upscalers really cost?
Eleven upscalers for photos and video, priced for how much you'd use them. Some charge per image, some a flat monthly fee, some run free on your own computer — so pick your volume.
Last checked: 1 Nov 2026 · every price read off the vendor's own page, monthly billing · no affiliate links
The short answer
Free, if you have the computer for it: Upscayl is a free, open-source desktop app, so any volume costs nothing on your own machine. waifu2x is a free web tool for small images (input up to 1500px).
At about 1,000 images a month, flat-rate plans win: Icons8 $6.50 (about 1,111 upscales), Pixelcut $10 ("Unlimited Upscale"), Topaz for Web $12, Upscale.media £17.99 for 1,000 credits. Credit plans cost far more at that volume: Let's Enhance $72, Magnific £78.
Video is mostly desktop software. An hour a month costs $39.95 (AVCLabs), $53.99 (HitPaw, list price) or $59 (Topaz Video), each processing on your own computer.
Buying once is still possible, but not from Topaz: it now sells only subscriptions. One-off licences remain at UniFab ($84.99 lifetime, video), VanceAI ($129.90, images), AVCLabs ($149.90, video) and HitPaw ($437.99 list, video).
Several pages lead with the yearly price. Let's Enhance shows $9 with "$12/month if billed monthly" in small print; Pixelcut shows $8 against $10 monthly. Every figure here is the monthly-billing price.
Prepaid, not monthly: Bigjpg sells passes instead of a subscription: $6 for two months at 500 images a month.
When the cheapest is not the answer
- Free and desktop tools need a capable computer. Upscayl and the desktop apps process on your own machine; a slow graphics card means slow results, especially for video.
- Output size and quality differ. Maximum resolution, faces and text handling vary by tool; try the free tier or trial on your own images before paying.
- Discount banners are everywhere. Struck-through "was" prices and countdowns come and go; this page uses the list price where an offer is temporary.
- Most of these charge a UK visitor in dollars, often before tax. Dollar prices move with the exchange rate.
Who made this page
An AI agent read each tool's pricing page in a real browser, switched it to monthly billing, and copied the sentence behind every figure; code checked each sentence was really on the page before it could be used. This page replaces two older lists of upscalers on this site.
There are no affiliate links on this page. If that changes, each paid link will be marked (Ad), with a plain link beside it, and the order will stay what it is: by price, nothing else.
How the numbers are worked out
monthly cost = the cheapest monthly plan that covers that volume at the vendor's own stated rate per upscale, billed monthly
| Tool | About 100 images a month | About 1,000 images a month | An hour of video a month |
|---|---|---|---|
| Topaz Labsunlimited in the browser; video is a desktop app | £8.96Topaz for Web - Image (browser, unlimited cloud) · $12.00 | £8.96Topaz for Web - Image (browser, unlimited cloud) · $12.00 | £44.03Topaz Video (Mac/PC desktop, unlimited local rendering) · $59.00 |
| Let's Enhancecredits: 1 image each | £8.96Starter, 100 credits · $12.00 | £53.74Business 1000 credits · $72.00 | no planno plan |
| Upscale.mediacredits; shown in pounds | £8.99Subscription, 200 credits | £17.99Subscription, 1000 credits | no planno plan |
| VanceAIweb credits, or a Windows app at 1,000 | £14.93Starter, 260 credits (4x upscale = 2 credits) · $20.00 | £29.78VanceAI for PC, 1 month (Windows, unlimited local processing) · $39.90 | no planno plan |
| PixelcutPro says "Unlimited Upscale" | £7.46Pro · $10.00 | £7.46Pro ('Unlimited Upscale') · $10.00 | no planno plan |
| Icons8 Smart Upscaler10k AI credits, 9 per upscale | £4.85Only AI tools (10k AI credits; upscale = 9 credits, about 1,111 a month) · $6.50 | £4.85Only AI tools (10k AI credits = about 1,111 upscales) · $6.50 | no planno plan |
| Upscaylfree, open source, runs on your computer | freeUpscayl Desktop (free, open source) · $0.00 | freeUpscayl Desktop (free, open source) · $0.00 | no planno plan |
| waifu2xfree web tool; input up to 1500px | freeFree web tool · $0.00 | freeFree web tool · $0.00 | no planno plan |
| Magnificcredits; Freepik rebranded | £14.00Premium (20K credits = 222 Magnific Precision 2K upscales) | £78.00Pro Starter (112.5K credits = 1,250 upscales) | no planno plan |
| AVCLabsdesktop apps, processed locally | £14.89Photo Enhancer AI, 1-month (desktop) · $19.95 | £14.89Photo Enhancer AI, 1-month (desktop) · $19.95 | £29.82Video Enhancer AI, 1-month plan (desktop) · $39.95 |
| HitPawdesktop apps; list price, not the offer | £20.89FotorPea, 1 Month License (Windows) · $27.99 | £20.89FotorPea, 1 Month License ('Enhance photos in bulk without limits') · $27.99 | £40.29VikPea, 1 Month License (Windows) · $53.99 |
Exchange rates. ECB euro reference rates of 30 October 2026: 1 EUR = 0.83380 GBP, 1 EUR = 1.1172 USD, so 1 USD = 0.74633 GBP.
Left out: Krea (Enhancer) — The upscaler is one feature of a generation suite priced in 'compute units'; the pricing page never says how many units an upscale uses, so no tier can be mapped. Monthly: Basic $9 (5,000 units), Pro $35 (20,000), Max $105 (60,000). Card prices render outside the page text; figures from the page's own comparison table.; Remini — No public web pricing: remini.ai/pricing returns a 'page doesn't exist' error and the site redirects to a sign-up web app; prices are in-app only.; Adobe (Photoshop Super Resolution / Firefly) — Not priced as a standalone upscaler: Super Resolution comes inside Photoshop/Lightroom plans, and the UK plans page shows only 'Annual, billed monthly' prices (Photoshop £21.98/mo) with no month-to-month option on the default view.; Bigjpg — prepaid passes only, no monthly plan (see findings); UniFab — lifetime licence only, no monthly plan (see findings).
If you'll recommend one: what each pays you
From each tool's own affiliate page. VanceAI, Icons8, Bigjpg, Upscayl and waifu2x publish no affiliate programme. This plays no part in the order.
| Platform | Commission | Cookie |
|---|---|---|
| Topaz Labs | 20% of orders through your link | 30 days |
| Let's Enhance | 20% recurring, for as long as the customer stays | 60 days |
| Upscale.media (Pixelbin) | Up to 30% (page also says 20% recurring for up to 12 months) | 30 days |
| Magnific | 10% of the referral's first subscription payment | not stated |
| Pixelcut | 30% of every payment in the referral's first year | 60 days |
| AVCLabs | Up to 40% of monthly sales | not stated |
| HitPaw | Up to 60%, first billing cycle only | 120 days |
| UniFab | Generally 30% per sale, up to 40% | not stated |
There are no affiliate links on this page. The research is done by AI agents reading each vendor's own pricing pages. Product names and logos are trademarks of their owners, used only to identify the products compared. No analytics cookies, no tracking scripts, no third-party requests. A personal project, separate from the author's day job.