Chinese Open-Source AI Models MiniMax and Moonshot Lead US Rivals in Global Token Usage

OpenRouter aggregates APIs from multiple large language model providers, and token usage on the platform offers a measure of actual developer adoption. MiniMax and Moonshot have gained market share with open-weight models optimized for agentic tasks and offered at low prices. MiniMax M2.5 charges just $0.15 per million input tokens and $0.90 per million output tokens, lowering barriers to enterprise deployment.

OpenRouter released its February rankings on February 25, 2026. MiniMax M2.5, launched on February 12, ranked first with 4.55 trillion tokens, followed by Moonshot’s Kimi K2.5, released in January, with 4.02 trillion. MiniMax, Moonshot and DeepSeek together accounted for nearly two-thirds of usage among the top five models, ending an approximately year-long run of US models leading the platform.