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Best OpenRouter offer right now UP TO $5KUp to $5,000 in startup credits, 0% feesApply NowSee all 5 offers
Checked on the official page
Billing explained in plain English
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OpenRouter free credits, trials and programs for November 2026
We may earn a commission when you sign up through links here. It never changes what you pay. Details
OpenRouter issues promo codes only occasionally, and none is live right now. OpenRouter does issue credit codes, but through partners, hackathons and VC perks portals rather than public campaigns. Each code works once per account and may carry its own expiry. Codes that circulate on coupon sites are usually single-use ones somebody already spent. The savings you can count on are the free variants, the Batch API and the $5,000 startup program.
Up to $5,000 one-time, fees waived 12 monthsVerified Nov 2Sample
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Who qualifies: Pre-Series B AI-native startups with a partner referral key and under $500 lifetime spend
The OpenRouter Startup Program grants up to $5,000 in universal inference credits across the whole catalog and waives platform and BYOK fees for 12 months. Apply from a company-domain email with a referral key from an approved VC, accelerator or ecosystem partner. Reviews are rolling and credits land on the account tied to the applicant email.
One award per applicant. Most credits expire 6 months after issuance. Public company website required. OpenRouter may change availability at any time.
50 requests/day, 20 per minuteVerified Nov 2Sample
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Who qualifies: Every account, no card required, models with the :free suffix
Any model ID ending in :free bills nothing per token. New accounts get 20 requests a minute and 50 a day across all free variants combined. Free variants rotate and can be retired, so keep a paid model ID in your fallback list.
A negative balance blocks free requests too. Limits are per account, not per model.
Generally 50% of per-token price, 70+ modelsVerified Nov 2Sample
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Who qualifies: Any account with credits, batch-capable models only
Bundle chat, responses, messages or embedding requests into a batch and one provider runs them within a 24-hour window at generally half the normal per-token rate, sometimes less. In the beta the median batch finished in 7 minutes. Batches through your own key pay only the BYOK fee.
Discount varies by model and provider. Audio, video and the web search plugin are excluded; web search inside a batch bills at standard rates.
$10 one-time purchase, 1,000 free requests/dayVerified Nov 2Sample
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Who qualifies: Accounts with at least $10 in lifetime credit purchases
The daily cap on free model variants rises from 50 to 1,000 requests once your account has purchased at least $10 of credits, all time. The balance doesn’t need to be spent. With the 5.5% fee the purchase costs about $10.55 and the higher limit stays for the life of the account.
$25,000/month list-price usage, then 5%Verified Nov 2Sample
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Who qualifies: Standard and Business accounts that add their own provider keys
Add your OpenAI, Anthropic, Google or other provider keys under settings and the provider bills you directly while OpenRouter keeps routing and failover. The first $25,000 of list-price inference each month carries no OpenRouter fee; usage above that pays 5% of list price from your credits.
Enterprise allowances are custom. The startup program waives the BYOK fee for 12 months.
Last checked November 2, 2026. 0 codes, 5 credits, programs and tips live.
Official OpenRouter programs
Every way OpenRouter itself hands out credits or free usage, checked on its own pages. The offers above are the ones worth acting on today.
Up to $5,000 in credits plus 0% fees for 12 months
Pre-Series B startups building an AI-native product full time, with a public website, a company-domain email, under $500 lifetime OpenRouter spend and a referral key from an approved partner. One award per applicant.
Every account. Models with the :free suffix cost nothing per token and are limited to 20 requests a minute. Accounts that have bought at least $10 of credits all time get the 1,000 a day ceiling.
Any funded account. Bundle chat, responses, messages or embedding requests into a batch, which one provider completes within a 24-hour window. Batches through your own key pay only the BYOK fee.
Standard and Business accounts that add their own provider API keys. Usage above the monthly allowance pays 5% of the OpenRouter list price, deducted from credits. Enterprise allowances are custom.
Organizations with volume that justifies a contract. Pricing is set by contract based on volume, prepaid credits and annual commitments. Private Endpoints are an add-on to this plan.
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Free tier that matters
20 free-model requests per minute on every account
50 free-model requests per day before buying any credits
1,000 free-model requests per day after $10 of lifetime purchases
Zero per-token cost on any model ID ending in :free
Free variants can be withdrawn, such as one retiring November 30, 2026
Paid variants of the same models carry no platform request cap
Recent program changes
Private Endpoints added as an Enterprise plan add-on OpenRouter’s announcement introduced Private Endpoints, which let organizations route their own fine-tuned models, dedicated deployments and reserved capacity through OpenRouter with public providers as fallback. It’s an Enterprise add-on, usage is billed by the underlying provider, and each organization gets 10 endpoints by default. Source
Batch API launches at around half the per-token price OpenRouter’s announcement says batched requests generally cost 50% of a provider’s normal per-token price across more than 70 models, completed within a 24-hour window. The beta median was 7 minutes. Chat, responses, messages and embeddings are supported; audio, video and web search are not. Source
In-region US and EU routing arrives on the Business plan The announcement introduced us.openrouter.ai and eu.openrouter.ai endpoints that keep prompts and completions inside the chosen region, available on the Business and Enterprise plans. OpenRouter’s price list now shows Business as a pay-as-you-go plan with an 8% fee on credit purchases against 5.5% on Standard. Source
OpenRouter announces it is joining Stripe OpenRouter’s blog post said the company agreed to be acquired by Stripe, subject to closing conditions, and that nothing about existing integrations, the product, name or roadmap changes. The post made no changes to pricing, fees or credits, and the pass-through pricing model stayed as documented. Source
OpenRouter is a reseller, so the credits question is really a fee question. Inference bills at each provider’s own list price with no markup, and OpenRouter takes 5.5% when you buy credits on the Standard plan or 8% on Business. This page covers the free model variants, the $10 purchase that raises their daily cap, the Batch API, BYOK allowances and the startup program that grants up to $5,000.
Credits are a prepaid dollar balance on your account. You load them at openrouter.ai under Credits, every paid request deducts the provider price, and the fee was already taken at purchase. Purchases run from a $5 minimum to a $25,000 maximum per transaction, refunds are only possible within 24 hours, and OpenRouter can expire unused credits 365 days after purchase. Don’t load a year’s budget at once.
What runs out first on a zero-dollar account is the free model request count, 50 a day across all :free variants. A single $10 purchase lifts that to 1,000 a day for the life of the account, which is the cheapest upgrade in this niche by a wide margin. Free variants also disappear without much warning, so build with a paid fallback model ID in your routing list.
How to claim OpenRouter credits
Create an account at openrouter.aiSign up with Google, GitHub, MetaMask or email. Nothing is charged at sign-up and the free model variants work right away, subject to 20 requests a minute and 50 a day.
Open Credits under settingsFrom your avatar choose Credits, or go straight to openrouter.ai/settings/credits. The page shows the balance, credit history and the Add Credits button, plus a field for any promotional code you got from a partner.
Buy at least $10 of creditsPick card, AliPay or USDC crypto and enter at least $10. The 5.5% fee shows before you confirm. Crossing $10 in lifetime purchases raises your free model limit to 1,000 requests a day, so don’t stop at the $5 minimum.
Create a key with a spend limitUnder Keys, create an API key and set a credit limit on it. Per-key limits are the only hard budget OpenRouter offers on Standard, so give each project or environment its own capped key.
Enable auto top-up only if neededOn the Credits page you can enable auto recharge with a threshold and an amount. Each recharge pays the fee again, so larger, less frequent top-ups cost slightly less than many small ones.
Apply for startup credits if eligibleIf a VC or accelerator in your network lists OpenRouter in its perks portal, use their referral key on the startup program form at openrouter.ai/startup-program. Approved credits and the 12-month fee waiver land on the account tied to your application email.
Ways to stretch your OpenRouter credits
Make one $10 purchase early
Free models are capped at 50 requests a day for accounts with under $10 of lifetime purchases and 1,000 a day once you pass that line. The threshold counts purchases, not balance, so the $10 can sit unspent forever. For prototyping on free variants that’s a 20 times increase for about $10.55 including the fee. We’d do it on day one.
Route bulk work through the Batch API
Batched requests generally cost 50% of a provider’s normal per-token price, sometimes less, across 70 or more models. During the beta the median batch finished in 7 minutes and 90% within an hour, though the window is 24 hours. Use it for evals, enrichment and nightly jobs, which is most of the token volume on a typical project.
Bring your own keys for big spenders
If you already hold provider accounts with negotiated rates or committed spend, add their keys under settings. Standard and Business accounts get $25,000 of list-price usage a month through those keys with no fee, then 5% deducted from credits. You keep OpenRouter routing and fallbacks while paying the provider directly.
Sort the model page by price
Because OpenRouter passes through list prices, the same model often has several providers at different rates and throughput. Use the provider routing settings to sort by price or set an allowlist, and OpenRouter picks the cheapest eligible endpoint for each request. Fallback routing still kicks in if that endpoint returns a 429.
Cap each key instead of the account
OpenRouter has no account-level monthly budget on Standard, but every API key can carry a credit limit. Create one key per app and environment with a limit that matches its expected month, and rotate or raise it deliberately. The Security Center added in September 2026 flags exposed keys, which is the other way a balance disappears.
Ask for enterprise pricing at volume
The Enterprise plan brings fee discounts, invoicing and contract pricing based on volume, prepaid credits and annual commitments. If your fee line is already thousands of dollars a month at 5.5%, a prepaid commitment that lowers the percentage pays for the sales call many times over.
OpenRouter billing, explained
There’s no trial and no card is required to start, because the free model variants don’t draw on credits at all. The moment you buy credits you pay the provider list price for every paid request plus a one-time fee on the purchase, 5.5% on Standard and 8% on Business. The fee never appears on individual requests, and it isn’t refundable even when the credits are.
Credits are consumed per request at the rate shown on the model page for the provider that served it, and the activity page records each one. Refunds for unused credits are only available within 24 hours of the transaction, crypto payments are never refundable, and OpenRouter reserves the right to expire unused credits 365 days after purchase. A negative balance blocks requests, including free ones, until you top up.
Two things sit outside the plain pass-through. BYOK usage above $25,000 a month at list price carries a 5% fee, and web search or other plugins bill at their own standard rates even inside a batch. OpenRouter doesn’t publish a fixed percentage for the crypto purchase fee; it shows the number at checkout, so read the confirmation screen before you pay.
OpenRouter credits FAQ
does openrouter give free credits on signup
Not for signing up. What you get free is usage of models with the :free suffix, 20 requests a minute and 50 a day, rising to 1,000 a day once you’ve bought $10 of credits. Promotional codes exist through partners and the redeem page, and eligible pre-Series B startups can apply for up to $5,000 through the startup program.
what is the openrouter fee on credits
OpenRouter charges 5.5% when you buy credits on the Standard plan and 8% on the Business plan, never on individual requests. So $100 of Standard credits costs $105.50. Token prices are the provider’s list price with no markup. Enterprise contracts can carry lower fees, and the startup program waives fees for 12 months.
how many free requests per day on openrouter
Accounts that have bought fewer than $10 of credits get 50 free-model requests a day and 20 a minute. Accounts with at least $10 of lifetime purchases get 1,000 a day at the same per-minute rate. The limit is per account and counts across every :free model together, so two free models don’t get you 100.
does openrouter charge a markup on tokens
No. OpenRouter passes through the pricing of the underlying providers with no markup on inference. Its revenue comes from the fee on credit purchases, 5.5% on Standard and 8% on Business, plus the 5% BYOK fee above the monthly allowance and enterprise contracts.
openrouter startup program how to apply
Get a referral key from a VC, accelerator or ecosystem partner that lists OpenRouter in its perks, then submit the form at openrouter.ai/startup-program from an email on your company domain. You need to be pre-Series B, building an AI-native product full time, with a public website and under $500 of lifetime spend. Reviews are rolling.
do openrouter credits expire after a year
They can. Section 4.2 of the terms lets OpenRouter expire unused credits 365 days after purchase, and promo credits expire on the date set when issued. Startup program credits mostly expire 6 months after issuance with an email reminder. Refunds for unused credits are only possible within 24 hours of buying them, so buy what you’ll use.
can i pay openrouter with crypto
Yes. USDC crypto is accepted alongside cards and AliPay on the Standard and Business plans, handled through Coinbase checkout on the credits page. Crypto payments are never refundable, and the old crypto purchase API endpoint was retired, so pay through the web flow.
is there a byok fee on openrouter
Only above an allowance. Pay-as-you-go accounts get $25,000 of list-price inference a month through their own keys with no fee, then pay 5% of what the same request would cost on OpenRouter, deducted from credits. Enterprise allowances are custom and the startup program waives the fee for 12 months.
