Nope it’s a monthly subscription but there’s the Standard subscription and the uhhh Entry subscription, which is like subscription lite.
Standard is $14.99 a month like WoW, Entry is I think $8* a month? but you can only have 1 character per server and 8 across your whole account.
It sounds kinda weak but in FF one character can learn EVERY class and profession (and you never unlearn those things even if you switch), so you’re not actually missing out on content by only playing 1 char. In fact I think it’s what a lot of players do, they just level everything on their main character because leveling alts from scratch is kind of a pain.
*((EDIT)) apparently it’s closer to $12-13?? not much savings lol
Entry is $12.99 per month, paid every month, 1 character per server, 8 total.
Standard is $14.99 per month paid monthly OR $13.99 per month if you pay for three months at a time OR $12.99 per month if you pay for six months at a time, for up to 8 characters per server, 50 total.
The $8 per month is the discounted legacy rate for people who paid for more than a certain amount of time in 1.0, since they essentially helped finance ARR.