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MCP uses your Developer Balance, shared with the REST API and separate from consumer subscription credits. Connecting, browsing models, checking your balance and estimating costs are free.

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Free credits

  • Eligible accounts can claim a $0.50 starter balance after phone verification in the developer portal.
  • Eligible paid NinjaChat subscribers receive $1 of agent credit per calendar month. Check your balance to claim the available allowance.
Signing up or creating an API key alone does not guarantee a funded balance. Check your eligibility and balance in Developers.

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Get a quote

Ask your agent to use search_models for current prices, then estimate_cost for the exact request. Include the model, quantity, video duration or literal speech script. Wait for approval before generation. Speech charges round up to $0.0001, with that minimum. Voice, output format and speed do not change its character-based price. The result’s cost.charged_cents reports the actual charge.

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Set your limits

Prompt approval guides your agent; saved spending limits and tool ceilings enforce the budget. A quote does not reserve funds, so generation rechecks available balance and limits.

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Add credits

Fund your balance in Billing, or ask your agent for a checkout link with add_credits. It supports $25, $100 or $250 packs. You complete the payment yourself. An 8% service fee is added when buying credits: $25 in credit costs $27. Buying credits does not enable auto-reload; that is a separate setting in Billing.

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Retries and refunds

Use the same idempotency_key and unchanged arguments when retrying an uncertain generation response. Within the one-hour replay window, a completed request returns its stored result without a second charge. Use a new key for new content. Speech requires this key; other generation tools support it. For video, retain the job ID and poll get_generation_status. A failed generation is refunded; async video refunds may complete after submission. In a partially successful comparison, successful outputs remain billed.

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Rate limits

Limits are counted per API key, or per client and user for OAuth. add_credits allows 6 requests per 10 minutes. For rate_limited, wait for the returned retry_after_seconds before retrying.