Is Hailuo AI worth it in 2026?

Hailuo’s regular monthly prices are $14.99 (Standard), $54.99 (Pro), $94.99 (Master), $124.99 (Ultra) and $199.99 (Max). Each paid plan includes a monthly credit allowance of 1,000, 4,500, 10,000, 12,000 and 20,000 credits. Standard is the natural starting point for an individual creator. The price per credit is about 1.5 cents on Standard and under 1 cent on Master, the lowest rate on the list.

Hailuo also shows limited-time offers beside the regular prices: Standard at $7.99, Pro at $24.99 and Master at $63.99. The page says the regular price returns when each offer ends. Budget on the regular figure and treat the offer as a bonus, not as the plan’s price.

One figure needs checking before you buy the top tier. The Max plan text lists 20,000 credits a month, but a notice shown to existing Max members says their renewals now include 27,000 credits, alongside a one-time bonus added when Hailuo 3.0 launched. Confirm the allowance on the plan screen at the moment you subscribe.

Hailuo 3.0 (MiniMax H3) is Hailuo’s newest model, and its plan cards list the video seconds each monthly plan includes. At 768p, Standard gets about 143 seconds a month, Pro about 643, Master about 1,500 and Max about 3,857. At 480p the same four plans give 250, 1,125, 2,625 and 6,750 seconds. Those figures are for monthly billing. Yearly billing shows the same seconds at lower per-second rates.

For a six-second clip, that works out to about 23 clips a month on Standard at 768p, about 107 on Pro, 250 on Master and 642 on Max. Hailuo does not explain on the pricing page how those seconds relate to the plan price, so this review counts clips and does not put a dollar figure on each one. New users get three unlimited days, which is enough time to check your prompts on 3.0 before you subscribe.

The FAQ still prices Hailuo 2.3 and 2.0 per clip in credits. A six-second 1080p clip uses 80 credits, the same clip on Hailuo 2.3-Fast uses 50, and a six-second 768p clip uses 25. Failed generations cost nothing, so a prompt that does not render does not burn the allowance.

On Standard’s 1,000 credits, that means 12 six-second 1080p clips on 2.3, or 20 on the Fast model. At list price, one 1080p clip costs about $1.25 on Standard, and about $0.75 on Fast. You pay for the whole plan either way, so the clip count matters more than the per-clip figure.

Here is the scenario for a creator who needs 40 six-second 1080p clips a month on Hailuo 2.3. That is 3,200 credits. Standard cannot deliver it in one month. Pro can, at $54.99, or about $1.37 a clip. Master would cost about $2.37 a clip for the same 40, because you pay for 10,000 credits and use about a third of them. If the Pro offer of $24.99 is still running when you read this, the same 40 clips cost about 62 cents each, but that is an offer, and it ends.

This is where Hailuo gives up ground to Runway. Runway’s free plan includes 125 one-time credits that never expire. Hailuo’s pricing page publishes no standing monthly video allowance. New users get three days of unlimited access as a welcome gift, and after that the free plan’s video count depends on the credits left.

If you downgrade to the free plan, the account switches when the current plan expires. Refunds are not currently supported, so treat the three unlimited days as the test window and have your prompts ready before the clock runs out.

Watermark removal is a subscriber perk. The FAQ says buying credits alone will not get you watermark-free downloads, and the bullets for Standard, Pro and Master list them. The same FAQ says that videos you can download without a watermark are yours, and that you keep full rights to them for commercial use. In practice, commercial work means a paid plan. A watermarked free download should not go into a client deliverable.

The top two plans need a closer read. The Ultra and Max bullets do not repeat the watermark line, even though the FAQ treats watermark removal as a subscriber perk. What the top tiers do add is unlimited Hailuo 01 at no credit cost on Ultra, and on Hailuo 01 and 02 on Max. If most of your clips come from the older model, that is the most useful perk on the page. Confirm the watermark rule on the plan screen before you pay $124.99 or $199.99 a month.

Runway is the clearest alternative on price. Its Standard plan costs $15 a month, or $12 billed annually, for 625 credits a month. Its Gen-4.5 model uses 12 credits a second, so that plan buys about 52 seconds. Pro is $35 a month ($28 billed annually) for 2,250 credits, and Max is $95 a month ($76 billed annually) for 9,500.

Put the same need on both: 240 seconds of video a month, or 40 six-second clips. Runway needs 2,880 credits for that, more than Pro’s 2,250, so its cheapest covering plan is Max at $95 a month ($76 billed annually). Hailuo covers the same 40 six-second 1080p clips on 2.3 with Pro at $54.99. Both figures are the vendors’ own credit counts. The models and resolutions differ, so this is a price comparison, not a quality test.

Kling and Higgsfield have their own reviews on this site, linked below, and their prices are not repeated here.

Academy data: our prompt library holds a 30-prompt Hailuo collection across six categories, and the Academy has no Hailuo tutorial yet. Start with the Hailuo prompt collection before you spend credits on a first render.

Failed generations are free, but a clip that renders and then gets rejected is not. Every rerun spends credits again, so a prompt that gives you a usable clip on the first full run is the best use of your allowance.