Keys

A key is the unit of control here: the cap, the usage and the receipts all hang off it.

Minting

Keys are minted in the dashboard. Each one can carry a lifetime cap, a monthly cap, or both. The plaintext appears once, at creation; the gateway keeps only a hash, so a leaked database does not leak anyone’s key.

Sending it

FormatHeader
OpenAIauthorization: Bearer rl-...
Anthropicx-api-key: rl-..., or the same bearer header, which Claude Code sends