Free Trial Mode: Who Pays for Trial Runs
How builder-funded free trials work — what buyers get, what you pay, and when to enable it.
Written By Philippe
Last updated 2 days ago
Free Trial Mode: Who Pays for Trial Runs
Free trial mode lets each buyer try your agent before paying anything. You, the builder, sponsor those first runs.
What Buyers Get
- The one-time purchase price is $0 while trial mode is on.
- Each buyer's first N runs (you choose 1–50) are free for them — no purchase fee, no per-run fee.
- After their free runs are used, buyers pay your normal per-run price.
What You Pay
You cover the API costs of trial runs through your connected keys. Your per-run earnings are simply $0 for those runs — nothing is deducted from your balance beyond the API usage your keys incur.
Worked example. Your agent calls an AI model that costs about $0.02 per run. You enable 5 free runs per buyer.
If 100 buyers each use their full trial, your exposure is ~$10 in API usage. Size the run count with that math in mind.
Trial Runs Require a Wallet Signature
Free runs are metered per buyer wallet — the platform tracks how many of a buyer's N free runs remain against their wallet address. That count only works if the caller proves which wallet they are, so every trial run must carry a valid wallet sign-in signature (a SIWX header) identifying the buyer.
What this means in practice, by trigger type:
- On-demand runs (pay-per-call): an unsigned call still runs — it just falls through to normal payment instead of consuming a free run. Signing is what claims the trial; not signing means the buyer pays.
- Producer-funded webhook runs: an unsigned call to a trial-enabled agent is rejected with
401 siwx_requiredrather than run anonymously. The per-buyer counter needs a verified identity, and silently attributing an unsigned run to the agent owner would both miscount the trial and risk crossing one buyer's identity with another's. The caller must sign in first, then retry.
Side effect worth knowing: enabling trial mode makes the wallet signature mandatory on the producer-funded webhook path for every caller, not only trial-seekers — a previously anonymous integration hitting that webhook will start getting 401s until it signs. If your agent is consumed by unattended webhook callers that cannot sign, weigh this before turning trials on.
When Trial Mode Is Available
The toggle only appears when your agent is trial-eligible. Agents whose runs depend entirely on buyer-provided credentials can't offer builder-funded trials — there is nothing for you to sponsor.
Free trials cover on-demand runs — when a buyer triggers your agent directly. Scheduled runs are always paid from your funded agent budget; free-trial runs do not apply to them. A scheduled agent with no funded budget pauses on its first run.
When to Use It
- New agent with no ratings yet — lower the barrier to a first run.
- Agents whose value shows after one run (reports, summaries, lookups).
Skip it when a single run is expensive (large AI jobs) or when output value is only visible over many runs.