Beyond free models, there is a second source of free AI compute: credits. Some are standing free tiers you can use forever, some are one-time signup bonuses, and some are startup programs worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. We checked each program below against its official page on September 24, 2026. The full, filterable list lives on the AI credits page.
Free tiers you can use today, no card
| Program | What you get |
|---|---|
| Gemini API (Google AI Studio) | Free Gemini Flash and Flash-Lite with rate limits; free-tier content may be used to improve Google products |
OpenRouter :free models | 50 requests/day, or 1,000/day after a one-time $10 top-up; 20 requests/min |
| Groq free plan | Rate-limited access, e.g. gpt-oss-120b at 30 RPM and 1,000 requests/day |
| Cloudflare Workers AI | 10,000 Neurons per day |
| Cohere trial key | 1,000 API calls per month for evaluation |
| Z.ai Flash models | GLM-4.7-Flash, GLM-4.5-Flash, and GLM-4.6V-Flash free for input and output |
These pair naturally with the free model routes in our catalog — see the complete guide for how to stack them.
One-time signup credits
- Google Cloud: $300 for 90 days (card required) — covers Vertex AI models too.
- AWS Free Tier: up to $200 for new accounts, usable on Amazon Bedrock.
- Azure: $200 for 30 days (card required).
- AI21 Studio: $10 for 7 days; Fireworks AI: $1; Scaleway Generative APIs: the first 1M tokens.
- Speech: Deepgram gives $200 and AssemblyAI $50 in credits without a card; Voyage AI gives 200M free embedding tokens.
Startup programs
| Program | Amount | Main condition |
|---|---|---|
| Google for Startups Cloud — AI | up to $350,000 | Funded AI-first startup |
| AWS Activate Portfolio | up to $200,000 | Org ID from a VC, accelerator, or angel partner |
| Microsoft for Startups | up to $150,000 in Azure credits | Privately held software startup |
| Cloudflare for Startups | $10,000–$350,000 | Funded in the last 12 months |
| Together AI Startup Accelerator | $15K–$50K | Tier depends on funding raised |
| DeepInfra DeepStart | 1 billion tokens | Raised $250K–$10M |
| ElevenLabs Startup Grants | 33M characters for 12 months | Under 25 employees |
Tip: most programs ask for a live website and a company email on the same domain. Apply to the bootstrapped tiers (AWS Activate Founders, Google Start) first — they are easier and do not require investors.
Students
- GitHub Copilot Student: free Copilot with unlimited completions for verified students.
- GitHub Student Developer Pack: 100+ offers, including $100 of Azure credit.
- Google AI Pro / AI Plus for students: one year free; claim by December 31, 2026.
- Azure for Students ($100 credit), JetBrains Student Pack (all IDEs), Mistral Pro at $5.99/month.
Before you apply
- Read what happens when credits run out — some trials switch to paid billing automatically.
- Credits usually expire (30 days to 2 years). Plan the heavy work inside the window.
- Terms change often; the date of our last check is on the credits page.
Want tools to spend those credits with? Browse free AI software — agents, IDEs, and local model runners.