Two things we do not charge for.
A cache hit is free — you already paid for that image. And a failed render is
free, which we can promise literally rather than as marketing: the renderer
detects a blank capture using two independent signals, so a bot wall that
returns an empty page does not come out of your quota.
How overage works
Go past your included renders on a paid plan and the extra are billed at the
plan's overage rate — which is lower than the rate you already pay.
On Starter you pay $8.50 per 1,000 included renders. Overage is
$7.90. A spiky month costs you less per render, not more. That is deliberate:
the reason to choose this API is correct output on hard pages, so an unusual
month should not be punished.
The free plan has no overage at all. It stops at 100 and waits for the next
month, because nobody entered a card and an unexpected invoice is not something
we will ever send.
Questions
Do I need a credit card to start?
No. The free plan takes an email and returns a working key immediately.
There is no confirmation email and no trial clock.
What counts as a render?
One successful capture. Cache hits and failures do not count. A full-page
screenshot is one render, the same as a viewport one.
Is Markdown extraction billed the same?
Yes — /extract runs the same render, so it costs one render.
What happens if I cancel?
You drop to the free plan, not to nothing. Your keys keep working at 100
renders a month, so whatever you built stays alive.
Can I self-host instead?
Yes. The renderer is the same one running here. The paid product is the
hosted API — the warm browser pool, the cache and the uptime.
Who handles payment?
Polar, as merchant of record. They handle billing, invoices and sales tax
in your jurisdiction.