A huge problem is the use of the terms “quota” and “refresh”, neither of which are used by according to their common or dictionary definitions. Here’s how to think of it, as best as I can determine:
You have a remote fuel tank with a limited capacity. This is your monthly quota.
You have a local fuel tank with a limited capacity. This is the “quota” presented in the IDE.
Your local tank is refilled by a fuel truck. This is a “refresh”.
Any fuel remaining in the truck after refilling your local tank is returned to your remote tank. You don’t lose it.
If the truck is empty, your local tank cannot be refilled.
The truck is refilled from your remote tank.
The truck cannot be refilled with more than the remote tank has.
If your remote tank is empty, the truck cannot be refilled.
The truck delivery is scheduled only after you begin using what you have in your local tank. This is when the “refresh” countdown starts.
If you don’t begin using the fuel in your local tank , no delivery is scheduled.
Your remote tank is refilled each month. Unused quota does not carry over month-to-month.
No refresh “every” 5 hours? It’s 5 hours after you begin using it, not strictly every 5 wall-clock hours.
No refresh at the scheduled time? Your remote tank is empty, so nothing to deliver.
Refreshed quota less than expected? Your remote tank emptied while filling the truck, so less to deliver.
Gemini Pro models share a single (“generous”) remote tank.
Non-Gemini models share a single (less-“generous”) remote tank.
Gemini Flash 3 has its own (more-“generous”) remote tank.
How large your remote tank is depends on your subscription tier: free: “generous”, pro: “more generous”, ultra: “most generous”.
If your remote tank is empty, the refill countdown of your truck is 7 days; otherwise, it depends on your subscription tier: free: 7 days, pro & ultra: 5 hours.
It’s a nice explanation. But to be honest, I don’t think understanding that concept has been the issue here lately.
The issue is that Google silently decided that (at least for Pro) users, there won’t be any “refueling” anymore for Gemini Pro, Claude and GPT models; neither after 5 hours nor 7 days.
Instead, only Gemini Flash gets regularly refueled.
For all other models, you only get those fixed 1000 AI credits once a month now, which are merely good enough for getting a taste of the bigger models, not actually planning to work with them.
Those credits also get consumed for using some other Google AI services. All in all, this simply means a huge service reduction of the Pro plan. For which we paid upfront, some even for a whole year.
I’m not convinced they will give anyone anymore quota to use after this month, TBH. The lack of transparency on this speaks volumes, and the fact they won’t give anything other than canned, meaningless answers in this forums supports that the reality is probably much worse than what any one person is guessing, and so it’s benefitting them to stay quiet.
All I can say is that where one month ago I was encouraging people to subscribe to and take advantage of the Gemini ecosystem because it was a great value,
Whoever is making these decisions is ultimately hurting Google in reputation and good will much faster than any negative news in the media possibly could. And the fact it’s crickets about it just reinforces that this is exactly what they expected.
