Free and paid use

Flovia pays for a call in one of two ways: from your free allowance, or from your purchased balance. Both work with every service offered to your account. Adding to the purchased balance is paused for now and may be limited during the first days after launch; once it opens, group buying keeps prices below standard API rates. Free use and existing purchased balances are unchanged. Flovia is in alpha, so this may change.

At a glance

Free allowance: no charge. It starts when Console issues your key and is limited by a 5-hour window and a weekly window shared across all services.
Purchased balance: paid in USDC and used when the free allowance cannot cover a call. It is not bound by the 5-hour or weekly window, does not expire, and any unused amount can be refunded on request.
Both: the same data-use notice applies, so paying does not change what Flovia shares or how long it keeps it. Rate limits and provider capacity apply either way.

Free allowance

The free allowance works like Claude’s usage limits. There is a 5-hour window and a weekly window, each counted from your first free use after the previous window ended, and they reset after 5 hours and after 7 days. They do not follow calendar days or weeks.
One allowance covers every service. Sources you don’t use cost nothing.
Whichever window reaches 100% first pauses free lookups until it resets. Unused allowance does not carry over.
Flovia shows each window as the percentage used and the time it resets. Flovia sets the amounts behind the percentages, and they can change during the alpha.
When a lookup takes a window past 75% or 90% used, your agent tells you once how much is left and when it resets. Flovia does not ask before each lookup.
A single call larger than the whole 5-hour window can still run for free if the weekly window has room; it counts against the weekly window only. A call larger than the whole weekly window cannot run for free.
It starts when Console issues your key, and each confirmed email address can start it only once.

Purchased balance

The points below are about a purchased balance you already have, and about purchases once they open.

A call uses your purchased balance only when the free allowance cannot cover the whole call. Flovia never splits one call between the two.
Your purchased balance works for any service (Nansen, CoinGecko, Quicknode, Exa, Firecrawl, Zerion, OpenAI) and is not bound by the 5-hour and weekly windows.
Your balance and usage are shown in US dollars, for example $4.20 left, or <$0.01 when very little remains.
Your purchased balance does not expire.
Any unused purchased balance can be refunded on request. Ask your agent to “Send Flovia feedback asking for a refund”. Refunds are paid in USDC. If you ask after you stop sharing, send it within 30 days, because feedback is also deleted after 30 days. If Flovia suspends or terminates your account for a Terms violation, the unused purchased balance is not refunded unless the law requires it (Terms §3 (opens in new tab)).
While sharing is stopped, or while Flovia has stopped your key, your balance stays but cannot be used (it is frozen). Answer y to resume sharing, or wait until the stop is lifted.
If a payment could not be confirmed (Flovia answered “unknown”), your agent resends the same payment instead of making a new one. If it still cannot be confirmed, Flovia checks the blockchain within 3 business days (Japan business days) and either adds the amount to your purchased balance or tells you why not.

What a call costs

Each call uses your free allowance or purchased balance according to the service and the request. A single lookup deducts at most its usual cost, and less if the answer is wrong.
Nothing is used when the data source is busy, does not answer or fails on its side, or when Flovia reuses an earlier answer or reopens a saved one. Resending the same question never uses the allowance twice.
A lookup the source rejects because of the request itself, such as a wrong address, may still use credits.
If Flovia cannot tell whether a call ran, it may count the usual cost. Keep the same operation ID and never send the request again with a new one.
Flovia does not ask before each lookup. When a lookup takes a free window past 75% or 90% used, your agent tells you once how much is left.

Limits for free and paid use

Rate limits and provider capacity can stop a request even when your allowance or balance has room. Try again later; when the reply gives a wait time, wait that long first.
Some services also limit how many calls one person can make per day.
Flovia may pause a service briefly to protect a data provider’s account. Unused credits stay in your balance.
Flovia is in alpha. Tools, limits and prices may change significantly without notice.

Check your usage

Ask your agent to show your remaining Flovia allowance. flovia_status shows the percentage used in each window, when each resets, your purchased balance and recent changes.
flovia_usage_today lists your lookups today, or since a time within the last 7 days.
In Flovia Console (opens in new tab) you receive your key, which is shown only once, and can see your usage.