Credits and billing
What a request costs
Each engine has a base price in credits, listed on the pricing page. Add-ons raise it: some flags form a group that adds its cost once however many you enable, Google charges per extra results page, and AI Mode per expanded product cluster. Synchronous calls add 2 credits; async tasks don't.
| Request | Credits | How |
|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT, synchronous, include.searchQueries | 9 | 5 base + 2 add-on + 2 synchronous |
| ChatGPT task, include.searchQueries and include.ads | 7 | 5 base + 2 add-on, counted once |
| Google Search task, pages: 3, include.aioverview | 9 | 3 base + 2 × 2 per extra page + 2 AI Overview |
Reservation and charge
An accepted request reserves its maximum possible cost; a task shows it as credits.creditsToCharge. On success it is charged the actual cost, which
depends on what the result contains (for example the Google pages or AI Mode product clusters returned) and never exceeds the reservation. The charge appears as
credits.creditsCharged and in X-Credits-Charged. A request that fails is charged nothing and its reservation is released, and tasks
cleared from the queue were never charged.
A new request is accepted only while your balance, less what open requests have reserved, covers its maximum cost. The tasks of a batch are checked in order, so
later ones can fail with INSUFFICIENT_CREDITS while earlier ones are queued.
Billing cycles
Your plan grants its monthly credits at the start of each billing cycle, and unused credits do not roll over. A paid subscription starts its next cycle when the invoice is paid; while a payment is outstanding no new cycle starts, and the credits you have stay usable.
Checking your balance
GET /v1/credits returns remaining, perCycle and cycleResetsAt; the last two are null without a
subscription.
curl -X GET "https://api.answerline.dev/v1/credits" \ -H "Authorization: Bearer $API_KEY"
const { remaining, perCycle, cycleResetsAt } = await client.credits();balance = client.credits() print(balance["remaining"], balance["cycleResetsAt"])
Running out
Requests your balance can't cover are refused with 403 INSUFFICIENT_CREDITS until the next cycle or an upgrade on the Billing page of the
dashboard. Self-serve plans are never billed for overage; overage is available only by contract and invoiced after each cycle.
Account owners get an email once per cycle when credits run low.
More credits
Write a review, link to us or introduce yourself in our community, then claim the bonus on the Billing page; approved claims add credits to every cycle. The Referrals page has a link that earns a commission on what the accounts you refer pay.