Top 10 Free AI APIs for Developers in 2026

If you are building an AI agent or a side project in 2026, you probably do not want to rack up a massive bill just testing things out. I have spent the last few weeks running actual workloads against every free tier I could find.[1] Most providers offer generous limits for prototyping, but they all have distinct bottlenecks you need to know about.

Here is a breakdown of 10 free AI APIs you can use right now, including what models they offer, their hard limits, and how to get access.

1. Google Gemini API (Google AI Studio)

Google offers a very generous free tier for its Flash models, making it a great starting point.

• Models: Gemini 2.5 Flash, Gemini 2.0 Flash, Gemini 2.5 Pro (heavily restricted), Gemma 2.
• Limits: 2.5 Flash gives you 10 RPM (Requests Per Minute) and 1,500 RPD (Requests Per Day).[2] The 2.5 Pro model is capped at just 50 RPD.[3]
• How to get the key: Head over to Google AI Studio, sign in with your Google account, and click "Get API Key". You will need to attach it to a Google Cloud Project.[4]

2. Groq

Groq runs on specialized hardware (LPUs) and is ridiculously fast.

• Models: Llama 3.3 70B, Llama 3.1 8B, Whisper.[5]
• Limits: You get 30 RPM.[5] However, the daily token limits are strict. You get 100,000 tokens per day for the 70B model and 500,000 for the 8B model.[5]
• How to get the key: Go to console.groq.com, sign up, and generate a key in the API Keys section.[6]

3. Cohere

Cohere is fantastic for Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) and handling massive documents.

• Models: Command R, Command R+, Embed, Rerank.[7]
• Limits: Trial keys give you 20 RPM for chat endpoints, but there is a hard cap of 1,000 total API calls per month.[7]
• How to get the key: Register on the Cohere dashboard. A trial key is automatically provisioned for you upon account creation.[8]

4. Mistral AI

Mistral provides a massive suite of open-weight models with a solid "Experiment" tier.

• Models: Mistral Small, Mistral Large, Codestral, Pixtral.[9]
• Limits: You are limited to 1 request per second globally.[9] Mistral Small gets 50,000 tokens per minute, while Large gets a 600,000 token bucket every 5 minutes.[9]
• How to get the key: Log into the Mistral Developer Console, select the Experiment tier, and generate your key.[10]

5. Cerebras

Like Groq, Cerebras focuses on ultra-fast inference, often hitting over 1,000 tokens per second.[11]

• Models: Llama 3.3 70B, Qwen3 235B, GPT-OSS-120B.[2]
• Limits: 30 RPM and 14,400 RPD.[2]
• How to get the key: Sign up at the Cerebras Cloud Console and grab a key from the API Keys tab.[12]

6. OpenRouter

OpenRouter routes your requests to the cheapest or best provider.

• Models: They have a specific openrouter/free endpoint that auto-routes to free models.[13]
• Limits: If your account has a $0 balance, you are limited to 50 requests per day.[1] If you deposit $10, that limit jumps to 1,000 RPD for free models (and your balance is never drained).[1]
• How to get the key: Register at openrouter.ai, click "Create Key", and save it. They only show it once.[14]

7. Cloudflare Workers AI

Run models directly on Cloudflare's edge network.

• Models: Over 50 open-source models including Llama 3.3 and QwQ.[2]
• Limits: The free plan gives you 10,000 "Neurons" per day.[15] Once you hit that, it throws a 4006 error.[16]
• How to get the key: In the Cloudflare dashboard, go to Workers AI. You will need your Account ID and to generate an API token.[17]

8. Jina AI

Jina is not an LLM provider; it is an infrastructure tool for getting data into your LLM.

• Models: Reader API (HTML to Markdown), Embeddings, Reranker.[18]
• Limits: You get 10 million free tokens on signup.[18] Rate limits sit at 100-500 RPM depending on the endpoint.[18]
• How to get the key: You can use r.jina.ai/URL for free without a key, but for higher limits, grab an API key from the Jina API Dashboard.[19]

9. CometAPI

A drop-in OpenAI replacement that aggregates hundreds of models.

• Models: Over 500 models across text, image, and video.[20]
• Limits: You get 1 million free tokens when you register. After that, it is pay-as-you-go.[20]
• How to get the key: Sign in to the CometAPI Token Console, click "Create API Key", and check "Unlimited Quota" for testing.[21]

10. GitHub Models

If you live in GitHub, this is the easiest way to test models without a credit card.

• Models: GPT-4o, Llama 3.3 70B, DeepSeek-R1.[2]
• Limits: Around 10-15 RPM and 50-150 RPD depending on whether you have a Copilot subscription.[22]
• How to get the key: You do not need a special API key. Just generate a standard GitHub Personal Access Token (PAT) and give it the models scope.[23]

I personally have not gone back to setting up local models since discovering how generous some of these tiers are, but that depends heavily on the project context. Start with Gemini for high volume, Groq for speed, and OpenRouter if you want to play with everything.