A lot of users of AI products ask whether they should use credits ortheir own API keys, and even more commonly what either of those two things means! Here’s a detailed video discussing using AI credits vs API keys. The ideas in video are applicable not just to Pickaxe, but probably a wide array of AI products and AI platforms out there, as credit/API-key paradigms are very common pricing models for AI companies.
Most AI platforms are paying for usage of AI models via API. And then pass along the cost to users via the abstraction of “a credit”. In reality, these AI platforms are paying per-token, so the costs are not fixed. They’re highly variable. It’s like pumping gasoline at a station. But that’s a complicated concept to pass along to users and a speed bump against a simple user experience. So platforms often simplify it into uniform units (i.e. credits). I hope this video is informative to anyone wondering about the question.