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Budget & Limits

Configure safety limits to prevent runaway provider costs.

BYOK Pricing: Budget tracking monitors your provider costs (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, xAI bills), not RelayPlane fees. RelayPlane is BYOK (Bring Your Own Keys) — we do not charge for API usage.

Default Limits

LimitDefaultPurpose
Daily budget$5.00Maximum provider spend per day (resets at midnight UTC)
Single call limit$0.50Maximum cost for any single API call
Calls per hour100Rate limit to prevent runaway loops

How It Works

Before each API call, the MCP server:

  • 1.Estimates the cost based on prompt length and model pricing
  • 2.Checks against single-call limit — rejects if too expensive
  • 3.Checks against daily budget — rejects if would exceed
  • 4.Checks hourly rate limit — rejects if too many calls
  • 5.After execution, records actual cost for accurate tracking

Error Messages

When a limit is exceeded, you'll see clear error messages:

Daily Budget Exceeded

1{
2  "error": {
3    "code": "BUDGET_EXCEEDED",
4    "message": "Daily provider budget exceeded. Estimated spend: $4.82 / $5.00. This tracks your OpenAI/Anthropic bills, not RelayPlane fees (we're BYOK). Resets at midnight UTC. Use relay_workflow_validate (free) for syntax checks."
5  }
6}

Single Call Limit Exceeded

1{
2  "error": {
3    "code": "SINGLE_CALL_LIMIT",
4    "message": "Estimated provider cost ($0.72) exceeds single-call limit ($0.50). Try a smaller model (gpt-4o-mini) or shorter prompt."
5  }
6}

Rate Limit Exceeded

1{
2  "error": {
3    "code": "RATE_LIMIT",
4    "message": "Hourly call limit reached (100 calls). Use relay_workflow_validate (free) for syntax checks, or wait for reset."
5  }
6}

Configuring Limits

CLI Flags

1# Increase daily budget to $10
2claude mcp add relayplane -- npx @relayplane/mcp-server --max-daily-cost 10
3
4# Increase single-call limit to $1
5claude mcp add relayplane -- npx @relayplane/mcp-server --max-single-call-cost 1
6
7# Increase rate limit to 200/hour
8claude mcp add relayplane -- npx @relayplane/mcp-server --max-calls-per-hour 200
9
10# All options
11claude mcp add relayplane -- npx @relayplane/mcp-server \
12  --max-daily-cost 10 \
13  --max-single-call-cost 1 \
14  --max-calls-per-hour 200

Config File

Create ~/.relayplane/mcp-config.json:

1{
2  "maxDailyCostUsd": 10.00,
3  "maxSingleCallCostUsd": 1.00,
4  "maxCallsPerHour": 200
5}

Free Tools

These tools never count against your budget:

  • Freerelay_workflow_validate — Validate workflow structure without LLM calls
  • Freerelay_models_list — List available models
  • Freerelay_skills_list — Discover pre-built skills
  • Freerelay_runs_list — View recent runs
  • Freerelay_run_get — Get run details
Use relay_workflow_validate to check workflow syntax before running. This catches structural errors without spending on provider costs.

Cost Estimation

The server estimates costs using current model pricing (per 1M tokens):

ModelInput ($/1M)Output ($/1M)
openai:gpt-5.2$5.00$20.00
openai:gpt-5-mini$1.00$4.00
openai:gpt-5-nano$0.25$1.00
anthropic:claude-sonnet-4.5$3.00$15.00
anthropic:claude-haiku-4.5$0.80$4.00
google:gemini-2.5-flash$0.075$0.30
xai:grok-4$3.00$15.00

Cost-Saving Tips

  • 1.Use cheaper models for simple tasks: gpt-5-nano and claude-haiku-4.5 are 10-20x cheaper than flagship models
  • 2.Validate before running: Use relay_workflow_validate to catch errors without spending
  • 3.Use skills: Pre-built skills are optimized for cost and quality
  • 4.Batch workflows: Multi-step workflows are more efficient than individual calls

Next Steps