---
title: "Credits & Billing"
description: "Buying credits, automatic top-ups, per-key budgets, and the hard stop at zero"
canonical: "https://inference.boundless.network/docs/billing"
last-updated: "2018-10-20T01:46:40.000Z"
---

# Credits & Billing

Prepaid credits, topping up, automatic top-ups, per-key budgets, and the hard stop at zero.


Boundless is prepaid. You buy credits, requests debit them exactly, and when the balance reaches zero requests stop. There is no overage and no end-of-month invoice, and every charge can be recomputed from the [rate card](/docs/pricing#rate-card) and each response's `usage` object.

## Where billing lives

The [billing page](/billing) is visible to team admins. Members see the shared balance on the [usage page](/usage) instead, and only admins can add credits or change payment details.

## Topping up

- **By card**: where card payment is enabled for your team; pick an amount, pay, and the credits land as soon as the payment clears.
- **By invoice**: request one from the same page, or [email support](/support) with an amount, and we add the credits.

## Auto top-off

With a card on file, an admin can turn on auto top-off: choose an amount and a threshold, and when the balance drops below the threshold we charge the card and add the amount. The balance is checked regularly, so a fast burn can still reach zero between checks, and the hard stop below catches it.

## When credits run out

Requests return `429 budget_exceeded` and nothing is charged past your balance, so the most you can spend is what you have already paid for. The console warns as the balance runs low, and team admins get an email before the stop and another at it.

## Key budgets

Every key you create can carry its own budget: a ceiling on what that one key may spend. Give the key for a new app a $20 budget and a bug in it costs $20 rather than your balance.

A key budget is a sub-cap on the team's credits. Spend on the key still comes out of them; the budget decides how much of them this key can reach.

### Setting one

In the console, on the [API Keys page](/api-keys), enter an amount beside the key name when you create it. Leave it blank and the key draws on the whole team balance.

The Budget column shows what each key has left. Click it to change the amount, or clear the field to remove the cap.

Budgets run from `$0.01` to `$100,000`.