tokn.watch vs CUStats: an honest comparison

Choose CUStats if you need deeper Claude and Codex tracking, multiple accounts, history, pace forecasts, alerts, and scheduled actions. Choose tokn.watch if you want a free, simpler meter for Claude and consumer ChatGPT. Both run on macOS 13 or later, but they cover different OpenAI use cases, so the right choice depends mainly on whether you use Codex or chatgpt.com.

The 30-second verdict

We write the comparison pages on this site ourselves, which is a good reason to be suspicious of them. So here is the summary up front, including the parts that do not favour us.

The deciding rows are provider scope and depth. CUStats does more analysis around coding usage. tokn.watch deliberately keeps the view smaller and covers the ordinary ChatGPT website that CUStats does not claim to track.

What CUStats does well

CUStats is a focused but deep tracker for Claude, OpenAI Codex, and xAI Grok. Its Mac App Store listing says you can manage up to 10 accounts in any combination. That is genuinely useful if work and personal subscriptions need separate limits.

It gives you context beyond a percentage. CUStats includes day, week, and month history, a monthly activity heat map, weekly pace prediction, detailed sessions, service status, and optional notifications. Its scheduled triggers can start a fresh session at chosen times, and its local data analysis can show tokens, messages, and cache use. That is the clearest place where CUStats earns its price.

Its Codex support has real depth. CUStats shows Codex plan limits, reset availability, weekly-only windows, pace, history, alerts, and service health. This is Codex usage attached to an eligible ChatGPT plan, not token billing for the OpenAI API. If Codex is where you spend your working day, this depth matters more than consumer ChatGPT coverage.

It is actively maintained. The App Store listed version 1.16.0 on August 22, 2026, adding a weekly usage graph for accounts with weekly-only limits. Earlier July releases added keep-awake controls, recovery alerts, per-model weekly rows, and Codex reset alerts. CUStats also says it has shipped 31 releases. That activity is reassuring in a category tied to provider interfaces that change often.

What tokn.watch does differently

tokn.watch is narrower by design. It shows remaining session and weekly percentages plus reset countdowns for Claude and consumer ChatGPT in 1 menu bar item. It offers 5 display formats and refresh intervals from 1 minute to 1 hour.

The phrase consumer ChatGPT matters. CUStats tracks Codex usage attached to a ChatGPT plan, but its product list does not claim the ordinary ChatGPT web app. If the cap surprising you is inside chatgpt.com rather than Codex, tokn.watch covers the thing you actually use.

Free means the whole product

There is no tokn.watch trial, license key, paid tier, feature lock, or account to create. CUStats is reasonably priced commercial software. Its official site says "from $9.99," and the US Mac App Store lists $9.99 as a one-time purchase. Apple sets the local price. CUStats says there are no subscriptions, in-app purchases, or hidden fees.

Consumer ChatGPT, not Codex

This is the central difference in this Claude tracker comparison. CUStats tracks Codex access provided through a ChatGPT plan. Its current site does not claim to read consumer usage from chatgpt.com. tokn.watch tracks the normal ChatGPT web service alongside Claude. If you rarely use Codex, CUStats's strongest advantage may not solve your actual problem.

tokn.watch shows remaining percentages and reset timers for session and weekly windows. CUStats generally presents usage consumed, pace, history, and status. Both views are valid: one answers "how much is left?" quickly, while the other helps explain how you are spending it.

Where CUStats is genuinely the better choice

Comparison pages written by one of the two products usually bury this section. It is the most useful part, so here it is in full.

• You use Codex every day. CUStats gives Codex more analysis than tokn.watch, which tracks consumer ChatGPT instead.
• You need alerts before a lockout. tokn.watch does not send threshold notifications.
• You want history and pace analysis. CUStats's charts and burn-rate tools can reveal patterns a current percentage cannot.
• You run several Claude or Codex accounts. CUStats can put up to 10 provider accounts in one overview.
• You want scheduled session actions. CUStats can trigger fresh sessions at planned times.

What the two have in common

Both are small menu bar apps for macOS 13 or later. Both show percentages and reset information, refresh automatically, and say credentials and usage data stay on your Mac. Both direct account requests to the providers rather than routing quota data through their own tracking server.

The authentication details differ. CUStats's Claude guide asks you to copy the sessionKey value from browser developer tools. For Codex, its release notes document authentication through the local Codex auth.json file or manual login credentials. CUStats says it encrypts credentials locally with AES-GCM. tokn.watch offers in-app provider sign-in, with manual cookie paste as a backup, and stores the resulting session cookies locally. Our connection FAQ explains both paths.

On privacy, CUStats makes strong, specific claims: App Sandbox enabled, credentials encrypted locally, no cloud sync, and no analytics or telemetry. Apple displays "Data Not Collected" for the app, while noting that privacy disclosures come from the developer. tokn.watch also says it has no analytics, telemetry, or account system. It is Apple-signed & notarized as a direct download and is also available on the Mac App Store.

Both depend on provider interfaces that can change. The CUStats feedback repository provides a public place for bug reports and feature requests. We describe Claude's underlying windows in our Claude usage limits guide.

So which one should you install?

If you have read this far you probably already know, but to state it plainly:

1. Heavy Claude Code or Codex workflow: CUStats. Its history, pace tools, alerts, triggers, and multiple accounts earn their place.
2. Claude plus ordinary ChatGPT: tokn.watch. It covers that exact pair for free.
3. Claude plus Grok: CUStats, because tokn.watch does not track Grok.
4. Unsure whether history helps: CUStats has a demo mode, so inspect the workflow before paying.

If you are still weighing up the wider field rather than just these two, we keep a broader roundup of the best Mac menu bar apps for tracking AI usage, which covers the paid multi-provider options as well.