What is the cheapest way to access the OpenAI API?

LLMsRelay offers pay-as-you-go OpenAI API access with no subscription and crypto or card payment. You pay published OpenAI token rates from your LLMsRelay credit balance — start with the smallest package.

Is there a subscription or minimum?

No subscription and no waitlist. Buy credits once and use the shared balance through a Codex key for OpenAI or a Basic/Pro key for Claude.

How do I keep OpenAI API costs down?

Keep a task inside one session to benefit from caching, cap max output tokens, and use GET /v1/models to pick the right model for the job.

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Cheapest OpenAI API — Pay-as-You-Go, No Subscription

The cheapest way to use the OpenAI API: pay-as-you-go credits, crypto or card, no subscription and no waitlist. Use a Codex-group key for OpenAI models.

TL;DR

No subscription, no waitlist. Buy credits once and spend them on the OpenAI API. Select the Codex group for the key used with OpenAI models. OpenAI requests are billed at the published token rates.

How to keep costs down

Stay in one session — repeated context is cached and billed at a heavy discount.
Cap output tokens — output is the expensive part; set a sensible max_tokens.
Pick the right model — use GET /v1/models and choose the smallest model that does the job.
Start small — buy the smallest credit package to test, then scale.

Get started

Create an sk-cs4 key, select the Codex group, and call https://api.llmsrelay.com/v1. See OpenAI API Access for the quick start and How Billing Works for the credit model.

Ready to start?

Create a key and configure a compatible API route in under 2 minutes.

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