5 entries
Route mechanical tasks to budget or free models (MiniMax 2.5 via Kilo Gateway, Gemini Flash), reserve premium models for reasoning. Result: mechanical tasks (~65% of volume) cost nothing, with no perceived quality loss.
The tool wasn't the problem, the model was. Kilo Code + Mistral looked perfect on paper. In practice, Mistral nearly killed adoption. Pivot to OVH AI Gateway + Gemini. It works now.
Kilo Code CLI is a fork of OpenCode with Kilo Gateway on top. In practice, the TUI is identical, custom commands work the same, and migration took 15 minutes. The real difference: free models via the gateway change the workflow economics.
On mechanical, repetitive PHP/TypeScript tasks, budget models (MiniMax 2.5 via Kilo Gateway, Gemini Flash) produce results indistinguishable from Claude Sonnet. On complex reasoning tasks, Claude maintains a real edge. The takeaway isn't "use the cheapest" — it's "use the right model for each type of task."