liveuprouter — AI API router and gateway

Find the best AI API routers.
Use them all with one API key.

UPROUTER is an OpenAI- and Claude-compatible gateway: plug in your API keys from 310 routers (eg. OpenRouter, AWS Bedrock, Alibaba Cloud), then route every request with any model, through any vendor — via a single URL with failover aliases, daily spend caps and per-request compute metering you can audit line by line.

BYOK keys — AES-256-GCM encrypted
failover aliases, cheapest-first
daily caps with soft-limit headers
per-request compute metering

Open Connect Get free welcome compute

Explore the directory

gateway — first request

$ curl https://uprouter.online/api/connect/v1/chat/completions \
   -H "Authorization: Bearer upr_live_…" \
   -d '{"model": "sandbox-echo"'}'

← 200 OK · 412ms · 0.0002 compute · routed via sandbox-echo
  audit log: tokens in/out, latency, cost — per request

  {
    "id": "chatcmpl_9f2…",
    "model": "sandbox-echo",
    "routed_via": "sandbox-echo",
    "usage": { "compute": 0.0002, "tokens": "42/310" }
  }

endpoint

/api/connect/v1

auth

Bearer upr_live_…

metering

compute / request

routers 310 free-tier 215 connect 211 live up 116 models 490 free quota 215

refer a developer+50 compute

they get 10 — you get 50

// the index — expansive, community-regulatedno affiliate ordering · no pay-to-rank · uprouter.online

310 routers & providers · 490 models tracked · $4.3k free credits

// community-regulatedthe ranking is earned, never bought

Every entry answers to the community

The index is expansive; the community keeps it honest. Votes, reviews and verified corrections feed straight back into rankings and data confidence.

Vote
Upvote routers that deliver, downvote the ones that don’t — the score re-ranks the index.
Review
Evidence-based reviews with verification tags. Ratings, not vibes.
Verify
Corrections that survive review earn compute — and flip the entry to verified.

Join & start voting Earn compute for reviews →

Anyone can edit this index

Every router page has an edit button — propose corrections to descriptions, prices and free tiers. Editors review each proposal before it goes live, and accepted edits earn compute.

Propose
Open a router page, hit the edit button, and detail your proposed corrections.
Review
Editors rigorously verify every proposed correction against primary sources.
Live
Accepted edits are published instantly, and you earn compute for your work.

Browse the index → pick edit

Paid API

$ 105 entries match — showing 1–24 · sort: Free credits ↓

Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
cloud.google.com
source · cloud.google.com/vertex-ai/generative-ai/pricing
overview
Google Cloud's enterprise-grade AI platform (Vertex AI) providing managed access to Gemini models and third-party models like Llama and Mistral. Offers advanced features like grounding with Google Search, model tuning, and provisioned throughput for predictable performance.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
Gemini 2.5 FlashGemini 2.5 ProMeta: Llama 3.1 405B InstructMistral Large 2407
see cloud.google.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
up65msupdated 13h ago
aws.amazon.com
source · aws.amazon.com/bedrock/pricing
overview
Amazon Bedrock is a fully managed service that offers a choice of high-performing foundation models from leading AI companies like Anthropic, Meta, and Mistral via a single API. It is primarily pay-as-you-go with various service tiers (Standard, Flex, Priority).
free quota
Bedrock itself has no permanent free tier and bills per use from the first call; new AWS accounts opened after 2025-07-15 receive $200 in credits (expire in 6 months) usable across services including Bedrock.
free models
Nova Lite 1.0Nova Pro 1.0Claude familyLlama 3Amazon Titan
see aws.amazon.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
www.voyageai.com
source · docs.voyageai.com/docs/pricing
overview
Voyage AI specializes in state-of-the-art embedding models and rerankers. It provides a managed API for high-quality vector embeddings (voyage-4 family) and efficient reranking, optimized for RAG applications. Offers a highly generous free tier for developers.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
— none tracked
see www.voyageai.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
deepinfra.com
source · deepinfra.com/pricing
overview
DeepInfra is a high-speed inference cloud for open-source AI models. It provides an OpenAI-compatible API for text generation, embeddings, and image generation. Authentication uses a standard API key from its dashboard.
free quota
$20 trial credit reported for new accounts (DeepStart).
free models
Meta: Llama 3.1 405B InstructMeta-Llama-3.1-70B-InstructLlama-3.1-8B-InstructQwen2.5 72B InstructDeepSeek ChatMixtral 8x22B Instruct
see deepinfra.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
docs.sarvam.ai
source · docs.sarvam.ai
overview
Sarvam AI is a leading Indian AI startup focused on large-scale models for Indic languages. Their API platform provides access to the Sarvam series models for text and voice, targeting applications in the Indian market with high-performance regional language support.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
Sarvam: Sarvam-1 (2B Instruct)
see docs.sarvam.ai’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
v0.dev
source · v0.app/pricing
overview
v0 by Vercel is an AI-powered full-stack web application builder that generates React components and backend logic. Usage is metered on input and output tokens which convert to credits. It provides access to various models including v0 Mini, Pro, and Max tiers.
free quota
No public free-tier information found (researched 2026-08-29).
free models
— none tracked
see v0.dev’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
dify.ai
source · dify.ai/pricing/dify-cloud
overview
Dify is an open-source LLM app development platform. Its cloud service (Dify Cloud) provides hosted model access via an API, with credits consumable across OpenAI, Anthropic, Gemini, and others. Details were checked against the provider's own page at dify.ai.
free quota
200 message credits on Sandbox plan; value varies by model (e.g. GPT-4o = 10 credits).
free models
— none tracked
see dify.ai’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
deepai.org
source · deepai.org/pricing
overview
DeepAI offers a comprehensive suite of AI APIs for text-to-image, text generation, and audio. It features a $9.99/month Pro subscription that bundles substantial monthly allowances with affordable pay-as-you-go overage rates.
free quota
Estimated value of basic free allowance based on overage rates.
free models
— none tracked
see deepai.org’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
piapi.ai
source · piapi.ai/pricing
overview
PiAPI offers a model aggregation platform with native API formats. It provides subscription tiers that include bonus credits and pay-as-you-go usage. New users receive a $0.50 starting credit. Details were checked against the provider's own page at piapi.ai.
free quota
No public free-tier information found (researched 2026-08-29).
free models
GPT-4oclaude-sonnet-4-6
see piapi.ai’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
ai.360.cn
source · ai.360.cn
overview
360 AI (360智脑) is a Chinese LLM API provider by 360 Group, offering conversational models with support for multiple file formats and LlamaIndex compatibility. Access is managed through a dashboard-generated API key, primarily serving enterprise and developer needs in China.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
— none tracked
see ai.360.cn’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
aimlapi.com
source · aimlapi.com/pricing
overview
AI/ML API is a major AI model aggregator providing unified access to 1000+ models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, DeepSeek, and more. It offers a single API key for LLM, image, voice, and video models with a focus on production-ready pay-as-you-go access.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
Phi 4Claude 3 HaikuGemini 2.5 FlashDeepSeek ChatMeta-Llama-3.1-70B-InstructReka Flash 3+6
see aimlapi.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
ainative.studio
source · ainative.studio/pricing
overview
AINative Studio specializes in AI agent infrastructure, providing multimodal APIs, persistent agent memory, and MCP server hosting. It offers tiered subscription plans that include 'ZeroTime' credits for agentic workflows and specialized model access.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
DeepSeek Chatglm-5.3kimi-k3
see ainative.studio’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
developer.ant-ling.com
source · developer.ant-ling.com/en/docs
overview
Ant Ling (by inclusionAI) provides an OpenAI-compatible API for its proprietary Ling model family. It supports high-speed inference and is designed to integrate seamlessly with standard SDKs by switching the base URL, serving both developer and enterprise needs.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
Ling 3.0 FlashLing 3.0 Flash FininclusionAI: Ling 3.0 Flash Sante (free)
see developer.ant-ling.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
platform.claude.com
source · anthropic.com/pricing
overview
Anthropic is a leading AI research company and official provider of the Claude model family. Its API platform (platform.claude.com) offers pay-as-you-go access to frontier models like Claude 3.7 Sonnet and Opus, emphasizing safety and steerability for enterprise applications.
free quota
No public free-tier information found (researched 2026-08-29).
free models
Claude 3 HaikuClaude Sonnet 4.5Claude Opus 4.5Claude Haiku 4.5Claude Fable 5.1
see platform.claude.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
arcee.ai
source · docs.arcee.ai/arcee-conductor/pricing
overview
Arcee AI provides a domain-specific model platform (Arcee Conductor) and inference API for open-weight models. It uses a native API format but Conductor provides a unified interface. Access is pay-as-you-go with no added premium on 3rd party model inference costs.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
Trinity Large Thinking
see arcee.ai’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
www.auriko.ai
source · auriko.ai
overview
Auriko is an AI API router and aggregator that provides a unified interface to multiple LLM providers. It offers both platform-managed and Bring Your Own Key (BYOK) modes. It publishes high rate limits for both modes.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
— none tracked
see www.auriko.ai’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
learn.microsoft.com
source · azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/cognitive-services/openai-service
overview
Azure AI Foundry (formerly Azure AI Studio) provides access to a vast catalog of models including OpenAI, Anthropic, and Llama. It features a unified API surface and enterprise-grade management. Pricing is unified under Azure's pay-as-you-go model.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
Claude 3 HaikuDeepSeek ChatPhi 4GPT-4o
see learn.microsoft.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
azure.microsoft.com
source · azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/cognitive-services/openai-service
overview
Azure OpenAI Service provides REST API access to OpenAI's powerful language models including the GPT-4 and GPT-5 series with Azure's enterprise capabilities. It uses a strictly pay-as-you-go or provisioned throughput model.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
gpt-5.6-lunaGPT-4o-miniGPT-4ogpt-5.5GPT-6 Astra
see azure.microsoft.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
www.baichuan-ai.com
source · platform.baichuan-ai.com/prices
overview
Baichuan is a leading Chinese AI company offering large-scale language models. Its platform provides model inference via native and OpenAI-compatible APIs, focusing on high-quality Chinese language performance.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
— none tracked
see www.baichuan-ai.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
ernie.baidu.com
source · cloud.baidu.com/doc/qianfan/s/wmh4sv6ya
overview
Baidu's Qianfan platform provides access to the ERNIE Bot model family. It is a full-stack AI development platform offering model training, fine-tuning, and inference. New users typically receive a small trial credit.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
Baidu: ERNIE LiteBaidu: ERNIE SpeedBaidu: ERNIE 3.5Baidu: ERNIE 4.0 TurboERNIE 4.5 VL 424B A47B
see ernie.baidu.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
cloud.baidu.com
source · intl.cloud.baidu.com/en/product/qianfan.html
overview
Baidu Qianfan is the official Model-as-a-Service (MaaS) platform of Baidu Intelligent Cloud. It serves the ERNIE (Wenxin Yiyan) series models and other third-party models via an OpenAI-compatible v2 API, offering high-performance inference for enterprise and individual developers.
free quota
No public free-tier information found (researched 2026-08-29).
free models
Baidu: ERNIE 4.0 TurboERNIE 4.5 VL 424B A47B Baidu: ERNIE 4.0Baidu: ERNIE 3.5
see cloud.baidu.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
blackbox.ai
source · blackbox.ai/pricing
overview
Blackbox AI provides a unified endpoint for 300+ models with end-to-end encryption. The service has migrated to an enterprise-focused gated model (enterprise.blackbox.ai) after deprecating its public inference surface (api.blackbox.ai).
free quota
No free tier — the source marks this service as deprecated/discontinued.
free models
Anthropic: Claude 3.5 SonnetGoogle: Gemini Pro 1.5GPT-4oMeta: Llama 3.1 405B Instruct
see blackbox.ai’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
console.byteplus.com
source · byteplus.com/en/pricing
overview
BytePlus ModelArk is ByteDance's international enterprise AI platform providing access to the Doubao model family. It features a tiered pricing structure and integrates with BytePlus's global cloud ecosystem.
free quota
No public free-tier information found (researched 2026-08-29).
free models
ByteDance: Doubao Lite 32kByteDance: Doubao Pro 32kSeed 2.1 TurboSeed-2.0-Code
see console.byteplus.com’s free quota / risk review →
Paid API
unknownupdated 3d ago
hyper.charm.land
source · hyper.charm.land/pricing
overview
Hyper (by Charm) is an AI inference solution purpose-built for coding. It manages its own infrastructure to optimize open-source coding models. It provides 100 free Hypercredits monthly on signup. Details were checked against the provider's own page at hyper.charm.land.
free quota
No public free-tier information found in the source reference; treat free-tier availability as unverified rather than confirmed absent.
free models
DeepSeek: DeepSeek Coder V2 InstructQwen2.5 72B InstructMeta-Llama-3.1-70B-Instructdeepseek-v4-pro
see hyper.charm.land’s free quota / risk review →

// about_uprouter

UPROUTER.ONLINE is an independent, developer-facing directory of AI API providers. It tracks model aggregators, official first-party APIs, free relays, subscription routers and cloud platforms in one index. Inclusion is an editorial decision made on the merits of the data — it is never sold, and no listing position can be bought.

We do the normalization once so you can compare on facts instead of marketing: prices are expressed in USD per 1M tokens, free tiers are valued at each provider’s own pay-as-you-go rates, and reliability comes from our own best-effort uptime probes rather than self-reported status pages. Every entry carries source URLs, a verification date, a data-confidence flag and a change history.

The directory is informational only and is not an endorsement of any provider. Prices and free-tier values change frequently — always confirm current terms with the provider before you purchase. The full methodology, independence and non-endorsement policies are documented in detail, and you can reach the editors via /contact for corrections, takedowns or partnership questions.

$ free AI API key — a practical guide

Everything below is written for the person who just typed free AI API key into a search box: what the key is, how to get one, what “free” really costs, and how to use more than one without managing six dashboards. It is the prose companion to the live index above, which tracks the same providers with current numbers.

What is a free AI API key?

An AI API key is the credential your program uses to call a language model. Think of it as a password for a specific service: it identifies you, authorizes the request, and is what the provider meters and bills. A free AI API key is the same object, except the usage behind it is covered by the provider rather than your credit card — at least for a while.

Under the hood, the flow is always the same. You create a key in a provider’s dashboard, you send it with each request, and the provider runs your prompt on a model and returns tokens. The free part is a policy layer on top of that plumbing: a monthly credit budget, a per-minute and per-day rate cap, or a restricted list of models marked free. None of those policies change the fact that a free key and a paid key are the same shape of string pointed at the same kind of endpoint.

The reason the distinction matters in practice is that a free key is usually metered against a budget you did not choose to spend. When the budget empties, your request stops working until you reset the period, top up, or switch models. A paid key is metered against money you explicitly put there. Everything else — the header, the JSON request, the streaming response — is identical, which is exactly why a single gateway can sit in front of both.

How to get a free AI API key in 2026

Getting a free key takes minutes. The steps are the same at nearly every provider, so you can pick whichever free tier fits your use case and follow the pattern:

Choose a provider. If you want the easiest first experience, Google AI Studio or Groq are the most forgiving. If you want the widest choice of models behind one key, OpenRouter is hard to beat. The directory above lists each option with its current free-credit value so you are not guessing.
Create an account. An email address is enough for most free tiers. A handful ask for a card on file for abuse prevention but will not charge you until you move to a paid plan — read that note before you enter it.
Generate the key. In the dashboard’s “API keys” or “credentials” page, click create. The key is shown once; copy it to a secrets manager or environment variable immediately. Do not paste it into client-side code or a public repo.
Make a test call. Send a tiny completion request to confirm the key works and the free tier is active. If the response includes a usage or rate-limit header, note the numbers — those are the real limits you are working within.
Decide where to keep it. Either point your application straight at the provider, or drop the key into a gateway like Uprouter Connect so you can add more keys, set spend caps, and fail over when a free tier throttles you.

One nuance worth internalizing: the value of a free key is not that it exists, it is that it is portable. Because every free key talks the same OpenAI- or Claude-compatible protocol, the code you write against one key will run against another with only the base URL and the credential changed. That portability is what makes it sensible to hold several free keys and route among them.

Free key vs. free credits vs. free tier

People say “free AI API key” and “free credits” interchangeably, but they are three different things, and confusing them is how a project quietly stops working at exactly the wrong moment.

The key is the credential. It has a value only in that it grants access to whatever budget is attached to your account.
Free credits are a dollar amount of usage the provider has fronted for you — a signup grant or a trial balance. They are one-time in most cases: spend them and they are gone until the provider replenishes them.
A free tier is a standing, rate-limited plan you can use month after month. It is usually the “always available” part of a free key, with credits layered on top for a burst.

When you evaluate a provider for a free key, ask three questions. First, how many credits do I get on signup, and do they ever come back? Second, what is the standing free tier — which models, and what are the per-minute and per-day caps? Third, is there a hard wall — a day when the key requires payment to keep working? The directory above values the free tier at each provider’s own pay-as-you-go rates so the “how much is this actually worth” question is answered in one comparable number.

Safety and terms: what “free” actually means

The three things a free key’s terms almost always get wrong for the user are privacy, durability, and data use. Read for all three before you build on top of a free tier.

Data and training

Many free tiers may use your prompts and completions to improve models; paid plans usually may not, or let you opt out. If your traffic contains anything you would not want a model vendor to see, this single clause can disqualify a free key for production regardless of how generous the credits are.

Durability

A free tier is a marketing surface, not a service level. Limits can be reduced, models can rotate, and free previews can end. Treat any free key as best-effort and keep at least one alternative key warm so an upstream change is a config swap, not an outage.

Responsible use

Rate limits exist for the provider’s cost and your neighbors’ latency. Hitting them aggressively, or routing shared keys across many users, is the fastest way to get a free account suspended. Meter your own calls, cache what you can, and keep a per-user or per-project cap so one caller cannot burn the shared budget.

The risk tier on each entry in the directory above is our editorial read of exactly these questions — established operator versus young relay, clear terms versus vague ones, stable history versus a history of limit changes. It is one signal among many, and it is always paired with the source so you can verify it yourself.

The most useful free AI API keys right now

A shortlist to start from, grouped by what the free tier is best for. Free tiers change often, so treat the notes as the shape of the offer, not a spec — the live index above has the current credit values, rate-limit observations, and risk tier for each.

Provider	Models	Free offer	Notes
Google AI Studio	Gemini API	Free tier with rate limits	Standard models are free to key with no card; heavy or pro models move to paid. Good first key for chat and embeddings.
Groq	Llama, Gemma, and more	Free API key, fast inference	One of the lowest-latency free keys around; per-minute and per-day rate limits apply.
OpenRouter	Hundreds of models	Free :free model routes	A router with free variants of many models marked :free, plus a credit system for paid ones.
Mistral AI	Mistral, Codestral	Free La Plateforme tier	Free-tier keys with rate limits; a paid tier unlocks higher throughput.
Hugging Face	Open models	Free inference providers	Free access to a range of open models through hosted inference, subject to per-day quotas.
Cohere	Command, Embed	Free trial key	A trial key with a usage budget for text generation, embeddings, and reranking.
Cerebras	Llama, Qwen	Free fast inference	Very high token rates on a small set of open models, free while in preview.

verify current terms with the provider before relying on a free tier in production.

Using one gateway across many free keys

The natural next step after collecting a few free keys is to stop calling each provider by its own URL. Because the keys all speak the same protocol, you can point them at a single gateway and drive them like one API. That is the job of Uprouter Connect: it takes your OpenAI- and Claude-compatible calls, routes them to whichever provider you name, and gives you one base URL and one auth scheme in exchange.

The payoff is threefold. Failover: when a free tier rate-limits you mid-request, the gateway can try the next provider on an alias instead of returning an error. Metering: every call is logged with tokens in, tokens out, latency, and compute cost, so you can see exactly how hard each free key is working. And caps: you can set a daily compute ceiling so a runaway loop cannot drain a shared budget before you notice. For anyone managing more than one free AI API key, that single point of control is usually worth the hop.

Frequently asked questions

What is a free AI API key?

A free AI API key is a credential that lets your code call a large-language-model or AI service without paying, usually within a free tier or a set of free models. You sign up with an email, the provider issues a key, and you send it with each request (typically as an Authorization header) to hit an endpoint such as /chat/completions. "Free" almost always means "free up to a limit" — a monthly credit allowance, per-minute and per-day rate caps, or a subset of free models — not unlimited usage forever.

How do I get a free AI API key in 2026?

Pick a provider that offers a free tier (Google AI Studio, Groq, Mistral, OpenRouter, Hugging Face, Cohere, Cerebras are common starting points), create an account, open the API-keys console in the dashboard, and generate a key. Copy it into your client or into a gateway. Most free keys require no credit card, though some providers ask for one to prevent abuse and refund nothing until you top up.

Are free AI API keys really free, or is there a catch?

They are free to use within the stated limits, and the catch is the limit — not a hidden fee. Typical constraints: a monthly or one-time credit budget, rate limits (requests per minute, tokens per day), a restricted set of models, and data-handling rules that differ from paid plans. The important catches to read before you rely on a free key are (1) whether free-tier data may be used for training, (2) what happens to your key when the trial budget is exhausted, and (3) whether the free tier is guaranteed or best-effort.

What is the difference between a free key, free credits, and a free tier?

A free key is the credential itself. Free credits are a dollar amount of usage the provider grants so you can run paid models at no cost until the budget runs out. A free tier is an ongoing, rate-limited free plan you can keep using. A provider may give you all three at once: a free key, a one-time credit grant, and a persistent free tier for cheaper models. Knowing which of the three you are using tells you what happens the moment the number hits zero.

Which providers have the most useful free AI API keys?

For a first key, Google AI Studio (Gemini) and Groq are the friendliest: no card for standard models and fast responses. For breadth, OpenRouter gives you one key across hundreds of models with explicit :free variants. For open-weight models at speed, Cerebras and Hugging Face are strong. The right choice depends on whether you value raw speed, model variety, or a large credit budget — the directory on this page ranks all of these by free-credit value, risk, and live status so you can compare on facts.

Is it safe to use a free AI API key for a production app?

Use a free key for prototypes, demos, and light internal tooling, but treat it as best-effort: free tiers change limits, can be throttled, and usually sit behind paid plans for production SLAs and higher throughput. Before you ship something user-facing, read the provider’s terms on data retention and training use, confirm your rate limits cover real traffic, and have a paid or gateway-based fallback. If you are juggling several free keys, route them through a single gateway so you can switch providers and meter usage in one place.

What is Uprouter Connect and how does it help with free keys?

UPROUTER CONNECT is an OpenAI- and Claude-compatible gateway. You bring your keys (the free ones from the directory, your paid ones, or a mix), and every request goes through one URL with one auth scheme. That means failover across providers when a free tier rate-limits you, per-request compute metering so you can see exactly what each call costs, and daily spend caps. The directory above maps which providers work through Connect, their free-credit values, and their risk profile, so you can start with the best free key and graduate to paid without rewriting your integration.

Start with a free key, stay on one gateway

Claim welcome compute, add the free keys from this page, and make a real gateway call in under a minute. Every provider in the index above is marked for which ones route through Connect, so you can start free and scale to paid without changing a line of application code.

Get your key Browse free tiers

Informational only — not an endorsement. Verify pricing with the provider. ToS compliance is your responsibility.

// from_the_blog

Guides on AI API routers, free tiers, pricing and reliability — written by the Uprouter editorial team, data-true and linked to the live directory.

read the blog →

News & Methodology

Find the best AI API routers.
Use them all with one API key.

Every entry answers to the community

Anyone can edit this index

$ free AI API key — a practical guide

What is a free AI API key?

How to get a free AI API key in 2026

Free key vs. free credits vs. free tier

Safety and terms: what “free” actually means

Data and training

Durability

Responsible use

The most useful free AI API keys right now

Using one gateway across many free keys

Frequently asked questions

What is a free AI API key?

How do I get a free AI API key in 2026?

Are free AI API keys really free, or is there a catch?

What is the difference between a free key, free credits, and a free tier?

Which providers have the most useful free AI API keys?

Is it safe to use a free AI API key for a production app?

What is Uprouter Connect and how does it help with free keys?

Start with a free key, stay on one gateway

How Uprouter Verifies Data: Our Methodology, in Plain Language

The Real Risks of Using Third-Party AI API Routers: Data & Privacy

How We Check AI API Provider Reliability (and What "Up" Really Means)

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$ free AI API key — a practical guide

What is a free AI API key?

How to get a free AI API key in 2026

Free key vs. free credits vs. free tier

Safety and terms: what “free” actually means

Data and training

Durability

Responsible use

The most useful free AI API keys right now

Using one gateway across many free keys

Frequently asked questions

What is a free AI API key?

How do I get a free AI API key in 2026?

Are free AI API keys really free, or is there a catch?

What is the difference between a free key, free credits, and a free tier?

Which providers have the most useful free AI API keys?

Is it safe to use a free AI API key for a production app?

What is Uprouter Connect and how does it help with free keys?

Start with a free key, stay on one gateway

How Uprouter Verifies Data: Our Methodology, in Plain Language

The Real Risks of Using Third-Party AI API Routers: Data & Privacy

How We Check AI API Provider Reliability (and What "Up" Really Means)

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Find the best AI API routers.
Use them all with one API key.