Release2026-10-28
OpenRouter replaced its default provider router. It now scores each provider on price, throughput, reliability, availability, and output quality for every request. The new system reacts in real time to performance changes. Providers that improve their inference automatically win more traffic. A switchback experiment measured the impact. TTFT improved by 16.9%. Throughput rose by 16.3%. Capacity errors fell by 67%. Costs rose by 6.0%. Price-only routing remains available via pinning or sorting.
What changed
Provider routing ranked mostly by prompt token price.
What it unlocks
Getting faster, more reliable, and more cost-effective inference without changing code.
- 16.9% faster TTFT
- 16.3% higher throughput
- 67% fewer capacity errors
- 6.0% cost increase
Sources