Quick answer
The local whoburnedmore CLI command is npx whoburnedmore --local. Decline its optional publish offer to keep the report local. The standard command signs in and submits daily aggregates. Neither mode submits prompts, source code, or filenames.
What this guide answers
The reader wants to understand Devin's Agent Compute Unit billing model.
Best for
Teams evaluating Devin or comparing autonomous agents to terminal coding assistants.
Key facts, checked November 8, 2026
- An ACU reflects the agent effort a task needs and scales with the inference used and the model selected. For local agents (Devin CLI, Devin Local), tokens are converted to ACUs at per-token model rates. For cloud agents and code review, ACUs mix tokens, compute, VMs and other infrastructure costs. source
- Devin sleeps after 5 minutes of inactivity by default and consumes no usage while sleeping. It also uses almost nothing while waiting for your reply, waiting on tests, or cloning repositories. source
- Windows sessions use about 9% more than equivalent Linux sessions. macOS sessions currently cost the same as Linux under promotional launch pricing. source
- Any user can see the ACU cost of a single session in Session Insights. Admins see totals under Settings > Consumption (enterprise) and Consumption Analytics (organization). source
ACUs are not chat messages
Autonomous agents spend compute while they investigate, edit, test, and recover from failures. Compare ACU cost to delegated task value.
- Task duration
- Tool work
- Review burden
- Shipped result
Use clear delegation briefs
The broader the brief, the more autonomy you are buying. Give Devin a bounded task and a clear stop condition.
- Repository context.
- Expected output.
- Tests to run.
- When to stop.
Compare with local agents
Claude Code or Codex may be better for interactive work. Devin-style autonomy is more compelling when the task can be delegated cleanly.
- Interactive patch
- Autonomous chore
- Long investigation
- Human architecture
Review ACU ROI
At the end of the month, compare ACU spend with merged work, avoided human time, and failed tasks. This is the only way to know whether autonomy paid off.
- Merged PRs
- Human hours saved
- Failed tasks
- Retry rate
Budgets and user limits for ACUs
Enterprise admins cap ACUs with two controls, currently in beta and enabled per enterprise. Budgets form a tree: an Account budget at the root with child budgets up to three levels deep. Usage in a child counts toward its parents, and child limits can add up to more than the parent. User limits give each member a monthly allocation through usage tiers. Guided setup can suggest tiers from your last three billing cycles. Limits reset monthly on your contract's billing day.
- Devin Desktop, Devin CLI and cloud Devin sessions count against the same limits.
- Devin Review counts toward budgets but not toward user limits.
- When a budget is used up, new work is blocked until an admin raises it or sets a temporary limit, or the next monthly window starts.
What moves ACU cost on a task
Devin's docs list the variables: task complexity, how specific the prompt is, codebase and context size, files touched, session runtime, and how much back-and-forth there is. The practical habits follow from that. Give one clearly scoped task per session, split large projects into sub-sessions run in parallel, and keep conversations short. Devin Coach, an enterprise feature, flags inefficient prompts before you send them.
Comparing ACUs with token-tracked tools
whoburnedmore does not read Devin usage, so it cannot put ACUs on your board. To compare, take the ACU figure for a delegated task from Session Insights, then run npx whoburnedmore --local to see what similar interactive work cost you that day in tools it does read, such as Claude Code or Codex.
Common questions
How much does a Devin ACU cost?
Devin does not publish a list price per ACU. Enterprise ACUs are priced in each customer's order form, and self-serve plans use quotas and on-demand credits instead.
Does Devin use ACUs while idle?
Almost none. Devin sleeps after 5 minutes of inactivity by default and does not consume usage while asleep.
How do I see what one Devin session cost?
Open Session Insights for that session. It shows per-session usage under either pricing model.