what's actually free in ai right now
27 ai apis and apps, with limits read from the official page and dated. when a free tier gets cut, it goes in the changelog.
| provider | type | status | headline limit | card? | verified |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anthropic Claude Free |
app | free tier | 'usage limits apply'. no numbers published. Claude Code: not included on Free. | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| Cerebras Cerebras Inference API |
api | trial only | 1M TPD (trial) | yes | 2026-10-16 3 gaps |
| Cloudflare Workers AI |
api | free tier | 10,000 Neurons/day, resets 00:00 UTC | not verified | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Cohere Cohere API trial key |
api | free tier | 1,000 API calls/month | not verified | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Cursor Cursor Free |
coding | free tier | 'limited agent requests', 'limited chat requests'. no numbers published. | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| DeepSeek DeepSeek API |
api | no free tier stated | off-peak prices are half of peak. | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| ElevenLabs ElevenLabs Free |
api | free tier | 10,000 credits/month | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| Exa Exa Starter (free) |
tooling | free tier | $10 credits/month (+$10 one-time onboarding bonus) | no | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Firecrawl Firecrawl Free |
tooling | free tier | 1,000 credits/month (refreshed monthly) | no | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Fireworks AI Fireworks serverless |
api | no free inference stated | Muse Glimmer 30B SFT free via UI and Serverless Training API until 2026-11-30, no credit card required. | yes | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| GitHub GitHub Copilot Free |
coding | free tier | 'limited chat and agent usage' (no number published). paid plans use GitHub AI Credits. | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| GitHub GitHub Models |
api | retired | not verified | not verified | 2026-10-16 6 gaps |
| Google Gemini API (AI Studio) |
api | free tier | per-model RPM/TPM/RPD shown only in AI Studio (not on the public docs page). RPD resets at midnight Pacific. Google Search grounding: 500 RPD free on 2.5 Flash/Flash-Lite. | no | 2026-10-16 1 gap |
| Google Gemini app (free) |
app | free tier | no numeric limits published on the plans page. | not verified | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Google Google Antigravity (agentic IDE) |
coding | free tier | unlimited Tab completions; unlimited Command requests; 'basic weekly rate limits'. | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| Groq GroqCloud API |
api | free tier | 1K RPD, 200K TPD (same models) | not verified | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Hugging Face Inference Providers |
api | no free credits | Free users: none. PRO: $2.00/month in credits | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| Jina AI Jina Reader (r.jina.ai) |
tooling | free tier | not verified | not verified | 2026-10-16 6 gaps |
| Microsoft Microsoft Copilot (free) |
app | unverified | not verified | not verified | 2026-10-16 7 gaps |
| Mistral AI Mistral Free plan (Vibe + Studio) |
app | free tier | 'limited messages and web searches', 'limited coding sessions', 'basic image generation and editing'. no numbers published. | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| NVIDIA build.nvidia.com API endpoints |
api | free tier | not verified | not verified | 2026-10-16 5 gaps |
| OpenAI ChatGPT Free |
app | free tier | unlimited text chats with GPT-6; limited messages with uploads, image creation, voice chats, deep research, memory/context, Codex access, ChatGPT Work access. no numbers published. | not verified | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| OpenRouter OpenRouter free models (:free) |
api | free tier | 50 RPD (<10 credits ever purchased) / 1,000 RPD (>=10 credits purchased) | not verified | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Perplexity Perplexity Free |
app | unverified | not verified | not verified | 2026-10-16 7 gaps |
| SambaNova SambaCloud API |
api | free tier | 20 RPD, 200,000 TPD per model | not verified | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Tavily Tavily Researcher (free) |
tooling | free tier | 1,000 API credits/month | no | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
| Together AI Together serverless inference |
api | promo / select models | Muse Spark Open free promo valid until 2026-10-18 12:00 PT. Ternary Bonsai 27B listed at $0.00/$0.00. Tev1 4B Experimental listed as free. | not verified | 2026-10-16 4 gaps |
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