Docs / Pricing & Limits

Pricing & quota behavior

Philosophy

Near-cost pass-through

Soundside aims to break even on provider API costs with a minimal margin (~10%). We don't make money on pass-through provider calls — revenue comes from the editing engine, library management, and self-hosted models.

Read-only tools (lib_list) are free. Analysis (analyze_media) is 3¢/call. Editing and library writes (edit_video, lib_manage, lib_share) are $0.01/call (1 credit). Generation tools vary by provider.

Live pricing

Machine-readable pricing endpoint

Prices are DB-driven and may change without redeployment. Always check this endpoint:

GET https://mcp.soundside.ai/api/x402/status
{
  "enabled": true,
  "endpoint": "https://mcp.soundside.ai/mcp",
  "network": "eip155:8453",
  "token": "USDC",
  "pricing_model": "ceiling-quote",
  "enabled_tools": [
    { "tool": "create_text", "provider": "vertex", "price_usdc": "0.01", "sync": true },
    { "tool": "create_image", "provider": "minimax", "price_usdc": "0.04", "sync": true },
    { "tool": "create_video", "provider": "luma", "price_usdc": "0.39", "sync": false },
    ...
  ]
}

This returns per-tool, per-provider USDC prices for all enabled tools. The same prices apply to credit-based usage (1 credit = $0.01 USD).

Credit system

How credits work

1 credit = $0.01 USD. Credits are deducted per tool call.

  • • Credit types: subscription, purchased, bonus
  • • Deduction priority: subscription → bonus → purchased
  • • New users: 300 free credits ($3.00) on signup

x402

Pay-per-call with crypto

No credits needed. Pay with USDC on Base (chain ID 8453) per tool call. See /docs/x402 for setup.

Purchasing

Credit packs

POST /api/stripe/create-checkout
{ "pack_id": "starter_1000" }

Pay-as-you-go packs do not require a subscription.

Quota

Rate limits and quota behavior

  • • Hourly call cap: 60 calls per OAuth client
  • • Pending async operations cap: 10 concurrent
  • • Quota denials include Retry-After and rate-limit headers
  • • Insufficient credits should trigger refill, not blind retries

Error behaviors

Commercial and quota failures

  • • Invalid credit packs return 400
  • • Quota denials on MCP calls include Retry-After and rate-limit headers
  • • See /docs/errors-rate-limits for full error reference