diff --git a/src/gateway/chat/handle-chat.ts b/src/gateway/chat/handle-chat.ts
index 926ab44..389379a 100644
--- a/src/gateway/chat/handle-chat.ts
+++ b/src/gateway/chat/handle-chat.ts
@@ -797,7 +797,7 @@ async function handleChat(
   const messages: any[] = [
     {
       role: 'system',
-      content: isTranslateSession ? `You are a medical translator. Translate the given text into natural Korean, preserving paragraph structure and markdown formatting (##, ###, **bold**, bullet lists). Output ONLY the translation — no commentary, no tool calls, no explanations.` : isProjSession ? `You are a project file designer. Output ONLY the project-files JSON block as instructed. No tool calls. No extra text.` : `${executionModeSystemBlock ? `${executionModeSystemBlock}\n\n` : ''}You are SmallClaw, a local AI assistant. Do not append the 🦞 emoji (or any emoji) to the end of your responses out of habit — only use emoji when it genuinely fits the content.\nCurrent date: ${dateStr}, ${timeStr}.\nNever search for or link SmallClaw repos unless the user is asking about SmallClaw itself.\nThis app runs on the user's own machine — browser/desktop automation requests are pre-authorized.\nKeep responses SHORT (1-2 sentences). Don't think out loud. Act and report. Greet naturally without tools.
+      content: isTranslateSession ? `You are a medical translator. Translate the given text into natural Korean, preserving paragraph structure and markdown formatting (##, ###, **bold**, bullet lists). Output ONLY the translation — no commentary, no tool calls, no explanations.` : isProjSession ? `You are a project file designer. Output ONLY the project-files JSON block as instructed. No tool calls. No extra text.` : `${executionModeSystemBlock ? `${executionModeSystemBlock}\n\n` : ''}You are SmallClaw, a local AI assistant. Do not append the 🦞 emoji (or any emoji) to the end of your responses out of habit — only use emoji when it genuinely fits the content.\nCurrent date: ${dateStr}, ${timeStr}.\nNever search for or link SmallClaw repos unless the user is asking about SmallClaw itself.\nThis app runs on the user's own machine — browser/desktop automation requests are pre-authorized.\nKeep CONVERSATIONAL and TASK-EXECUTION replies SHORT (2-4 sentences). Don't think out loud. Act and report. Greet naturally without tools. Two carve-outs to that brevity rule: (1) it does NOT apply to informational answers you researched with a tool (news, weather, factual explanations, comparisons) — those follow the OUTPUT FORMAT rules below, which deliberately ask for fuller sentences; do not compress them back down. (2) Stating uncertainty NEVER counts against the length. If a search came back empty, or the specific figure you were asked for simply isn't in the results, always spend the extra sentence to say so plainly ("검색 결과에는 이 조합의 실측치가 없어서 단정하기 어렵습니다") instead of compressing it into a confident-sounding one-liner. Brevity pressure must never be the reason you state something as fact — a slightly longer honest answer beats a short wrong one every time.
 ANTI-HALLUCINATION: When a tool returns a result, report EXACTLY what the tool returned — never contradict or ignore tool output. If a tool says "(no rows)", say so. Never invent data, file contents, table names, or command output. If you don't know something, call a tool to find out or say you don't know. VERIFY CONCRETE FACTS: for questions with a checkable real-world answer — specs, prices, versions, release dates, comparisons, "what models/options exist" — call web_search first and base the answer on what it returns, even if you're confident you already know it. Specific-sounding numbers you produce from memory (TFLOPS, VRAM, prices, dates) are exactly the kind of detail that goes stale or was never right — don't present them as fact unless a tool actually returned them. This does NOT apply to coding help, creative writing, opinions, or general reasoning — only to claims a search could confirm or refute. This also does NOT apply to the user's own private infra nicknames (지서버, 클로서버, and similar) — those are personal hardware, not public products, so web_search cannot verify them; answer those from USER.md/SOUL.md/[RECALLED_FACTS] context instead.
 TEMPORAL CONSISTENCY: The current date and day-of-week is given above ("Current date: ${dateStr}") — this is ground truth, more reliable than any search snippet's phrasing. Before answering whether something is open/trading/in-session RIGHT NOW (stock markets, exchanges, offices, stores), first check today's day-of-week against real-world facts (e.g. NYSE and KOSPI do not trade on Saturdays, Sundays, or market holidays, regardless of what time it is) — a market-hours formula alone is not enough if today isn't even a trading day. A search result reporting a "closing price" or "today's headline" is not proof today is a trading/business day — cross-check it against the actual current date above, and if they conflict (e.g. a stale cached result, or a result that doesn't state its own date), trust the current date and say so explicitly rather than presenting the search result as if it were live.
 IMAGE EDITING RULE: NEVER call image_edit (or any editing tool) when a user uploads a photo without explicitly requesting edits. Uploading a photo is NOT a request to edit it. Only call image_edit when the user's message explicitly asks for an edit (e.g. "수채화로 바꿔줘", "회전해줘"). Violating this rule is a critical error.
@@ -805,7 +805,7 @@ IMAGE/VIDEO GENERATION: When a user asks to create/draw/generate a NEW image fro
 CHEMISTRY NOTATION: NEVER draw molecular structures as ASCII art (H/C/#/=/\\/| characters arranged to look like a diagram) — it always renders as garbled, misaligned text. Instead: for a formula or reaction, use LaTeX inside $...$ (e.g. $\\ce{C4H10}$, $\\ce{2H2 + O2 -> 2H2O}$ — mhchem extension is loaded). For an actual 2D structure with real bond lines (rings, branches), output a \`\`\`smiles\`\`\` code block containing the SMILES string (e.g. \`\`\`smiles\\nc1ccccc1\\n\`\`\` for benzene, \`\`\`smiles\\nCC(=O)Oc1ccccc1C(=O)O\\n\`\`\` for aspirin) — the client automatically renders it as a proper 2D diagram with bond lines.
 CODE OUTPUT: When writing code in a fenced code block, start with a filename comment on line 1: \`# filename: snake_game.py\` (Python), \`// filename: app.js\` (JS/C), \`<!-- filename: index.html -->\` (HTML). Never repeat code already written in this conversation. For modifications to existing files, use coder_overwrite_lines or coder_insert_lines (not coder_write_file — it only works for NEW files). All code changes are presented as diffs for the user to review before being applied. Write code directly — do not ask for permission.
 PACKAGE INSTALL: NEVER run pip install, npm install, apt-get, or any package installation command. If a package is missing, just write the code and mention the package name in a comment — let the user decide whether to install it. Do NOT attempt to install packages yourself.
-OUTPUT FORMAT: When presenting 3+ items (emails, search results, lists), always use a markdown table or structured bullet list with clear headers. Never dump them as a long paragraph. For news specifically: use a table with columns 제목|요약|출처, but write each 요약 as 2-3 full sentences covering the article's actual content — not a headline fragment restated. For weather: do NOT force a table — explain current conditions and forecast in natural, fuller sentences (trend, precipitation chance, notable changes vs yesterday/normal), not just bare numbers.${modelProfileBlock}${callerContext ? '\n\n' + callerContext : ''}${browserStateCtx}${personalityCtx}${skillsManager.buildPromptContextForUser(username ? getUserWorkspace(username) : null, 16000, message)}`,
+OUTPUT FORMAT: When presenting 3+ items (emails, search results, lists), always use a markdown table or structured bullet list with clear headers. Never dump them as a long paragraph. For news specifically: use a table with columns 제목|요약|출처, but write each 요약 as 2-3 full sentences covering the article's actual content — not a headline fragment restated. Include EVERY distinct article the news tool returned (it returns up to 10 per call and they are already filtered to the last 48 hours) — do not cherry-pick 3 of them into a "highlights" table. If several calls returned overlapping stories, merge duplicates but keep the union, aiming for a 8-10 row digest whenever that many distinct articles came back. For weather: do NOT force a table — explain current conditions and forecast in natural, fuller sentences (trend, precipitation chance, notable changes vs yesterday/normal), not just bare numbers.${modelProfileBlock}${callerContext ? '\n\n' + callerContext : ''}${browserStateCtx}${personalityCtx}${skillsManager.buildPromptContextForUser(username ? getUserWorkspace(username) : null, 16000, message)}`,
     },
   ];
   // Emit the fixed-overhead size (system prompt + tool schemas) as soon as both are known —
diff --git a/src/gateway/guards/prompt-gates.ts b/src/gateway/guards/prompt-gates.ts
index d51544d..8424e31 100644
--- a/src/gateway/guards/prompt-gates.ts
+++ b/src/gateway/guards/prompt-gates.ts
@@ -101,8 +101,15 @@ export function isFactualInfoRequest(message: string): boolean {
 // nothing to do with an unverified product claim — those were firing AUTO-RECOVER on totally
 // unrelated turns, doubling their latency for no reason. Ambiguous units now only count when a
 // spec/price-ish keyword also appears somewhere in the same answer.
-const STRICT_SPEC_UNITS = /\d[\d,.]*\s*(GB|TB|MB|tok\/s|tps|TFLOPS?|GFLOPS?|토큰\s*\/\s*초)/i;
-const AMBIGUOUS_SPEC_UNITS = /\d[\d,.]*\s*(GHz|MHz|watts?|원|달러|USD|\$)/i;
+//
+// 2026-07-29 fix — production log audit of a GPU/PCIe hardware chat found two live gaps:
+// bare "15토큰" (no "/초" suffix, e.g. "15토큰 안팎의 속도") slipped past the strict tier, and
+// fabricated percentage benchmarks ("성능 손실은 약 5%", "속도 손실이 15%~25%") had no unit at
+// all in either tier. "토큰" alone is as spec-specific as GB/TB (safe in the strict tier); "%"
+// is not (discounts, humidity, battery %) so it joins the ambiguous tier gated by
+// SPEC_CONTEXT_KEYWORD like GHz/원/달러 already are.
+const STRICT_SPEC_UNITS = /\d[\d,.]*\s*(GB|TB|MB|tok\/s|tps|TFLOPS?|GFLOPS?|토큰(\s*\/\s*초)?)/i;
+const AMBIGUOUS_SPEC_UNITS = /\d[\d,.]*\s*(GHz|MHz|watts?|원|달러|USD|%|\$)/i;
 const SPEC_CONTEXT_KEYWORD = /(스펙|사양|가격|가격대|출시|모델명|버전|성능|GPU|CPU|VRAM|램|벤치마크|사이즈|용량)/i;
 
 export function looksLikeUnverifiedSpecClaim(content: string): boolean {
diff --git a/src/gateway/server.ts b/src/gateway/server.ts
index afc5ec4..ef6f9ce 100644
--- a/src/gateway/server.ts
+++ b/src/gateway/server.ts
@@ -1808,18 +1808,26 @@ function getModelProfileExtraPrompt(modelName: string): string {
 // alone doesn't fix (verified 2026-07-25: mistral-large-3 still hallucinated a full news answer
 // — see extraSystemPrompt above — despite the prompt-level warning). tool_choice: 'required'
 // makes round 0 mechanically unable to answer in plain text when a live-data/factual question
-// is detected, instead of just asking nicely. Scoped per-model via config rather than applied
-// globally — forcing an unwanted tool call on a gate false-positive is worse than today's no-op
-// for models that don't actually have this problem (verified 07-18: qwen3.5 1 hallucination vs
-// mistral's 7 in the same 20-question comparison).
+// is detected, instead of just asking nicely.
+//
+// 2026-07-29: INVERTED from per-model opt-in to global default with per-model opt-out. The
+// original opt-in reasoning ("forcing an unwanted tool call on a gate false-positive is worse
+// than a no-op for models that don't have this problem") assumed a stable model choice, but
+// the user switches the active model frequently — so in practice only the two profiled models
+// (mistral-large-3, kimi-k2.6) ever had this defense, and every other model ran with the
+// round-0 gap wide open. Log audit of 2026-07-29 confirmed the cost: gemini-3.5-flash-lite,
+// which has no profile entry at all, fabricated GPU tok/s figures and an entirely nonexistent
+// product name across a long hardware chat. A spurious search on a gate false-positive is a
+// few wasted seconds; an unguarded fabrication is a wrong answer the user acts on. Set
+// models.profiles[<model>].forceToolChoiceOnLiveData = false to opt a specific model out.
 function getModelProfileForceToolChoice(modelName: string): boolean {
   const m = String(modelName || '').trim();
   if (!m) return false;
   try {
     const raw = getConfig().getConfig() as any;
-    return raw?.models?.profiles?.[m]?.forceToolChoiceOnLiveData === true;
+    return raw?.models?.profiles?.[m]?.forceToolChoiceOnLiveData !== false;
   } catch {
-    return false;
+    return true;
   }
 }
 
diff --git a/src/providers/ollama-adapter.ts b/src/providers/ollama-adapter.ts
index d61d604..a5ad898 100644
--- a/src/providers/ollama-adapter.ts
+++ b/src/providers/ollama-adapter.ts
@@ -13,22 +13,10 @@ import path from 'path';
 import type { LLMProvider, ChatMessage, ContentPart, ChatOptions, ChatResult, GenerateOptions, GenerateResult, ModelInfo } from './LLMProvider';
 
 import { getConfig } from '../config/config';
-
-// Lightweight JSONL usage log for cost-comparison analysis (Ollama Cloud flat-fee
-// vs metered APIs like Gemini). Append-only, one line per completed call.
-const USAGE_LOG_PATH = (() => {
-  try { return path.join(getConfig().getConfigDir(), 'logs', 'token-usage.jsonl'); }
-  catch { return null; }
-})();
-function logUsage(model: string, promptTokens: number, completionTokens: number) {
-  if (!USAGE_LOG_PATH || (!promptTokens && !completionTokens)) return;
-  try {
-    fs.mkdirSync(path.dirname(USAGE_LOG_PATH), { recursive: true });
-    fs.appendFileSync(USAGE_LOG_PATH, JSON.stringify({
-      ts: new Date().toISOString(), model, promptTokens, completionTokens,
-    }) + '\n');
-  } catch { /* non-fatal */ }
-}
+// Moved to providers/usage-log.ts (2026-07-29) so non-Ollama adapters log too — it used
+// to be defined privately here, which meant Gemini-served traffic never appeared in the
+// cost-comparison log at all. See that file's header for the full story.
+import { logUsage } from './usage-log';
 
 /**
  * Resolve a message's content for Ollama.
diff --git a/src/providers/openai-codex-adapter.ts b/src/providers/openai-codex-adapter.ts
index b35f9b6..248749a 100644
--- a/src/providers/openai-codex-adapter.ts
+++ b/src/providers/openai-codex-adapter.ts
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@
 import type { LLMProvider, ChatMessage, ContentPart, ChatOptions, ChatResult, GenerateOptions, GenerateResult, ModelInfo } from './LLMProvider';
 import { loadTokens, getValidToken } from '../auth/openai-oauth';
 import { contentToString } from './content-utils';
+import { logUsage } from './usage-log';
 
 const CODEX_ENDPOINT = 'https://chatgpt.com/backend-api/codex/responses';
 
@@ -200,11 +201,11 @@ export class OpenAICodexAdapter implements LLMProvider {
     }
 
     // Parse SSE stream to extract the completed response
-    const result = await this.parseSSEStream(response);
+    const result = await this.parseSSEStream(response, model);
     return result;
   }
 
-  private async parseSSEStream(response: Response): Promise<ChatResult> {
+  private async parseSSEStream(response: Response, model: string): Promise<ChatResult> {
     const reader = response.body?.getReader();
     if (!reader) throw new Error('No response body from Codex endpoint');
 
@@ -212,6 +213,7 @@ export class OpenAICodexAdapter implements LLMProvider {
     let buffer = '';
     let finalContent = '';
     let toolCalls: any[] = [];
+    let streamUsage: { promptTokens: number; completionTokens: number } | null = null;
 
     try {
       while (true) {
@@ -259,6 +261,16 @@ export class OpenAICodexAdapter implements LLMProvider {
 
             // response.completed contains the full final snapshot
             if (type === 'response.completed') {
+              // Responses-API usage lives on the final snapshot, not the deltas — the only
+              // point in this stream where token counts exist (added 2026-07-29 alongside
+              // the openai-compat fix; this adapter was the other provider missing from the
+              // cost-comparison log).
+              const u = event.response?.usage;
+              if (u) {
+                const pt = Number(u.input_tokens ?? u.prompt_tokens ?? 0) || 0;
+                const ct = Number(u.output_tokens ?? u.completion_tokens ?? 0) || 0;
+                if (pt || ct) { streamUsage = { promptTokens: pt, completionTokens: ct }; }
+              }
               const outputs = event.response?.output || [];
               for (const item of outputs) {
                 if (item.type === 'message') {
@@ -301,7 +313,11 @@ export class OpenAICodexAdapter implements LLMProvider {
       tool_calls: toolCalls.length > 0 ? toolCalls : undefined,
     };
 
-    return { message };
+    if (streamUsage) logUsage(model, streamUsage.promptTokens, streamUsage.completionTokens);
+    return {
+      message,
+      ...(streamUsage ? { usage: { ...streamUsage, ctxWindow: 0 } } : {}),
+    };
   }
 
   async generate(prompt: string, model: string, options?: GenerateOptions): Promise<GenerateResult> {
diff --git a/src/providers/openai-compat-adapter.ts b/src/providers/openai-compat-adapter.ts
index 73c89ac..1427202 100644
--- a/src/providers/openai-compat-adapter.ts
+++ b/src/providers/openai-compat-adapter.ts
@@ -11,6 +11,7 @@
 import type { LLMProvider, ChatMessage, ChatOptions, ChatResult, GenerateOptions, GenerateResult, ModelInfo, ProviderID } from './LLMProvider';
 import { contentToString } from './content-utils';
 import { recordGoogleRequest } from './google-usage';
+import { logUsage, parseOpenAiUsage } from './usage-log';
 
 export interface OpenAICompatConfig {
   endpoint: string;
@@ -117,7 +118,17 @@ export class OpenAICompatAdapter implements LLMProvider {
       content: choice?.message?.content ?? '',
       tool_calls: choice?.message?.tool_calls,
     };
-    return { message };
+    // This adapter deliberately has no chatStream(), so every streaming caller
+    // (chatWithThinkingStream) falls back through here — making this the single
+    // point where Gemini/LM Studio/OpenAI token counts can be captured at all.
+    // Until 2026-07-29 the usage field was dropped on the floor here, so those
+    // providers reported no usage to the UI gauge and wrote nothing to the cost log.
+    const usage = parseOpenAiUsage(data.usage);
+    if (usage) logUsage(model, usage.promptTokens, usage.completionTokens);
+    return {
+      message,
+      ...(usage ? { usage: { ...usage, ctxWindow: Number(options?.num_ctx) || 0 } } : {}),
+    };
   }
 
   async generate(prompt: string, model: string, options?: GenerateOptions): Promise<GenerateResult> {
@@ -144,6 +155,8 @@ export class OpenAICompatAdapter implements LLMProvider {
 
     const data = await this.post('/v1/chat/completions', body);
     const content = data.choices?.[0]?.message?.content ?? '';
+    const usage = parseOpenAiUsage(data.usage);
+    if (usage) logUsage(model, usage.promptTokens, usage.completionTokens);
     return { response: contentToString(content) };
   }
 
diff --git a/src/providers/usage-log.ts b/src/providers/usage-log.ts
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..73c260b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/providers/usage-log.ts
@@ -0,0 +1,43 @@
+/**
+ * usage-log.ts
+ * Append-only JSONL token-usage log, shared by every provider adapter.
+ *
+ * Lives here rather than inside one adapter because the log exists to compare cost
+ * across providers (Ollama Cloud's flat fee vs metered APIs like Gemini) — a log that
+ * only one adapter writes to silently answers that question wrong. Verified 2026-07-29:
+ * this logger was defined privately inside ollama-adapter.ts, so a full morning of
+ * traffic served by the Google/Gemini provider produced ZERO rows, making Gemini look
+ * free in the very comparison the log was created for.
+ */
+
+import fs from 'fs';
+import path from 'path';
+import { getConfig } from '../config/config';
+
+const USAGE_LOG_PATH = (() => {
+  try { return path.join(getConfig().getConfigDir(), 'logs', 'token-usage.jsonl'); }
+  catch { return null; }
+})();
+
+export function logUsage(model: string, promptTokens: number, completionTokens: number): void {
+  if (!USAGE_LOG_PATH || (!promptTokens && !completionTokens)) return;
+  try {
+    fs.mkdirSync(path.dirname(USAGE_LOG_PATH), { recursive: true });
+    fs.appendFileSync(USAGE_LOG_PATH, JSON.stringify({
+      ts: new Date().toISOString(), model, promptTokens, completionTokens,
+    }) + '\n');
+  } catch { /* non-fatal */ }
+}
+
+/**
+ * Pull token counts out of an OpenAI-compatible `usage` object.
+ * Returns null when the field is absent or carries no real numbers, so callers can
+ * skip both logging and populating a bogus all-zero TokenUsage.
+ */
+export function parseOpenAiUsage(usage: any): { promptTokens: number; completionTokens: number } | null {
+  if (!usage || typeof usage !== 'object') return null;
+  const promptTokens = Number(usage.prompt_tokens ?? usage.promptTokens ?? 0) || 0;
+  const completionTokens = Number(usage.completion_tokens ?? usage.completionTokens ?? 0) || 0;
+  if (!promptTokens && !completionTokens) return null;
+  return { promptTokens, completionTokens };
+}