--- title: How to Build a Cost-Efficient AI Agent with Tiered Model... description: A practical tutorial on building a tiered model routing system for AI agents that minimizes API costs. The 'cost curve' pattern routes tasks through three... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/how-to-build-a-cost-efficient-ai-agent-with-tiered-model-routing-zrc6k7gmk twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: How to Build a Cost-Efficient AI Agent with Tiered Model Routing | daily.dev og:description: A practical tutorial on building a tiered model routing system for AI agents that minimizes API costs. The 'cost curve' pattern routes tasks through three... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/how-to-build-a-cost-efficient-ai-agent-with-tiered-model-routing-zrc6k7gmk og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/ZrC6k7gmK.png og:image:alt: How to Build a Cost-Efficient AI Agent with Tiered Model Routing og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # How to Build a Cost-Efficient AI Agent with Tiered Model Routing **[freeCodeCamp](https://daily.dev/sources/freecodecamp)** · 14 min read · 1 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A practical tutorial on building a tiered model routing system for AI agents that minimizes API costs. The 'cost curve' pattern routes tasks through three tiers: deterministic Python checks (free), Claude Haiku for ambiguous cases (~$0.0001/call), and Claude Sonnet only for semantic judgment (~$0.006/call). Applied to an SEO audit agent, this reduced per-URL cost from $0.006 to effectively $0 for most pages. The tutorial includes full Python implementation of each tier, a router function with backward-compatible tiered/non-tiered modes, graceful fallback on API errors, and unit tests using mocks. The pattern generalizes to customer support, code review, and content moderation agents. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Multi-Model API Cost Governance with the Inference Router](https://daily.dev/posts/multi-model-api-cost-governance-with-the-inference-router-jtiigukdg) · DigitalOcean Community · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [We Built a Routing Layer to Cut Our AI Costs. It Broke the Product.](https://daily.dev/posts/we-built-a-routing-layer-to-cut-our-ai-costs-it-broke-the-product--74ka47hyk) · Towards Data Science · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [Five keys to controlling AI token costs](https://daily.dev/posts/five-keys-to-controlling-ai-token-costs-hu2lr27uv) · InfoWorld · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Claude API Token Optimization](https://daily.dev/posts/claude-api-token-optimization-4sbqfmbsk) · SitePoint · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [AI Agent Token Costs: How to Cut Your Bill by 60-80%](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-agent-token-costs-how-to-cut-your-bill-by-60-80--nglqddiuw) · Alex CloudStar · 1 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#python](https://daily.dev/tags/python), [#ai-agents](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-agents), [#claude](https://daily.dev/tags/claude), [#finops](https://daily.dev/tags/finops) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/how-to-build-a-cost-efficient-ai-agent-with-tiered-model-routing-zrc6k7gmk) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"How to Build a Cost-Efficient AI Agent with Tiered Model Routing","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/how-to-build-a-cost-efficient-ai-agent-with-tiered-model-routing-zrc6k7gmk","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/how-to-build-a-cost-efficient-ai-agent-with-tiered-model-routing-zrc6k7gmk"},"datePublished":"2026-04-09T04:41:07.882Z","dateModified":"2026-04-09T04:41:33.499Z","description":"A practical tutorial on building a tiered model routing system for AI agents that minimizes API costs. The 'cost curve' pattern routes tasks through three...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/4fe2ea57e0c62a10a28823633e963a58?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/4fe2ea57e0c62a10a28823633e963a58?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"freeCodeCamp","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"freeCodeCamp","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1628412854/logos/freecodecamp","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/freecodecamp"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/how-to-build-a-cost-efficient-ai-agent-with-tiered-model-routing-zrc6k7gmk","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":1},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"python,ai-agents,claude,finops","timeRequired":"PT14M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"freeCodeCamp","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/freecodecamp"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"How to Build a Cost-Efficient AI Agent with Tiered Model Routing"}]} ```