There's been a surge in AI use recently. Here's what's behind it.

"AI models break down words and other inputs into numerical tokens to make them easier to process and understand. One token is about ¾ of a word. OpenRouter, which helps developers access different AI models, has seen activity roughly double in the first weeks of 2026. This is measured by the number of AI tokens OpenRouter processes. OpenRouter handled 13 trillion AI tokens in the week that ended February 9. That's up from 6.4 trillion during the first week of January."

"This data excludes AI tokens processed directly by the major AI companies, so it represents a small fraction of total activity. For instance, Google was processing 1.3 quadrillion tokens a month this past summer. However, the recent rate of change in OpenRouter's data is a valuable signal. Anand Iyer, a partner at VC firm Lightspeed, said the recent surge has been driven by an explosion in AI agent activity and especially the rapid emergence of OpenClaw, an open-source agentic system."

AI token processing activity roughly doubled at OpenRouter in early 2026, rising from 6.4 trillion tokens in early January to 13 trillion in the week ending February 9. OpenRouter connects developers to models including Google's Gemini, Anthropic's Claude, xAI's Grok, OpenAI's GPTs, and a range of open-source models. The OpenRouter data excludes direct token processing by major AI companies, so it represents a small fraction of overall activity; Google processed about 1.3 quadrillion tokens monthly last summer. The recent surge is attributed to a shift from simple chatbots to agentic automation, notably the open-source OpenClaw, driving exponential growth in inference demand. Rising inference needs are coinciding with higher Nvidia GPU prices, signaling increased compute demand for advanced models.

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