Billing.

Nilux has no subscription and no monthly fee. You top up a balance and pay only for what you use. When the balance runs out, Nilux pauses until you top up again.

How you are charged

Every reply costs a little, depending on how much text the model reads and writes. That amount is counted in tokens, small pieces of text, roughly a short word each:

• Input: what the model reads. That is your message, plus the conversation so far and the files it looked at.
• Cached input: the part of the conversation the model already read on the previous reply. It costs much less than new input, and in an ongoing conversation it is most of what is read.
• Output: what the model writes, including its thinking.

Prices per token for each model are on the pricing page.

During peak hours, usage costs more. The status line shows peak 2x while they last, and a note in the conversation tells you when they start and end. The hours are listed on the pricing page.

New accounts start with $0.50 to try Nilux. It is valid for 14 days.

Top up and see your spending

• Top up on the billing page of your dashboard.
• /balance shows your balance inside a session.
• The status line shows what the current conversation has cost so far.
• The usage page of the dashboard lists every charge.

On the billing page you can also choose the balance at which Nilux warns you that it is running low.

How long credit lasts

A top-up stays valid for 12 months from the purchase. After that, whatever is left of it expires and is removed from your balance. Spending always draws on the credit that expires first, so the oldest money goes first.

About 30 days before purchased credit expires, you get an email and a notification about it. The $0.50 a new account starts with lasts 14 days and expires without a warning. The details are in the refund policy.

When the balance runs out

New requests are paused with a message telling you so. Top up and continue where you stopped. The last charge can take the balance slightly below zero; your next top-up covers it.

Paying less

• Start a new task with /clear instead of continuing a long conversation; a shorter conversation is cheaper to read.
• Use /compact to shorten a long conversation you want to continue.
• Set Context Limit in /config to keep conversations from growing too large.
• Use /effort low for routine changes.
• If you stop a reply with Esc, you pay only for the part produced so far.