> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.secapi.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Evaluate Pricing and Limits

> Evaluate SEC API pricing, starter grant, pay-as-you-go behavior, plan rights, budget controls, quotas, and agent-safe usage limits.

Use this page before running broad crawls, recurring monitors, or agent loops. Pricing and limits are part of the integration contract, not a purchasing footnote.

<CardGroup cols={3}>
  <Card title="Get an API key" icon="key-round" href="https://secapi.ai/signup">
    Create an account, receive the starter grant, and inspect live billing state.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Open the sandbox" icon="terminal-square" href="https://secapi.ai/sandbox">
    Explore API usage before choosing a plan.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Public pricing" icon="credit-card" href="https://secapi.ai/pricing">
    Compare plans, rights, and commercial options.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Rate reference" icon="receipt-text" href="/api-reference/platform/get-v1-billing-rates">
    Inspect the current meter-family rates for API calls.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>

## What to check

* Starter grant and first API key path
* Meter class for the endpoints in your workflow
* Plan rights for internal use, redistribution, embedding, and external commercial workflows
* Budget alerts and hard caps
* AI-query and MCP quota posture
* Rate-limit and retry headers
* Current meter-family rates from [GET /v1/billing/rates](/api-reference/platform/get-v1-billing-rates)

## Proof-of-concept prompt

<Prompt>
  Evaluate SEC API pricing and limits for this workflow before implementation. Identify the endpoint families involved, estimate call volume by meter class, check GET /v1/billing and GET /v1/limits, call POST /v1/billing/quote for repeated heavy workflows where available, and return a go/no-go note with budget, quota, plan-rights, and retry-header caveats.
</Prompt>

## Evaluation path

<Steps>
  <Step title="Map the workflow to endpoint families">
    Filing search, section extraction, facts, ownership, delivery events, and intelligence routes can have different cost and quota behavior.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Check live billing state">
    Agents should read billing and limits before high-fanout work. Do not infer plan posture from a cached note.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Choose the right commercial boundary">
    Internal research, shared-team use, redistribution, embedding, and resale have different rights expectations.
  </Step>
</Steps>

## Read next

<CardGroup cols={3}>
  <Card title="Plans and pricing" icon="credit-card" href="/plans-and-pricing">
    Detailed plan, meter, quota, and rights documentation.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Buyer pricing page" icon="globe" href="https://secapi.ai/pricing">
    Public plan comparison and signup path.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Agent billing" icon="bot" href="/agent-billing">
    Guardrails for agents that can spend money or exhaust quota.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>