---
title: BYOK setup
description: Bring your own Anthropic or OpenAI key to Niyra. Reduce cost, control your vendor budget, run on your enterprise terms.
url: /docs/byok-setup
lastUpdated: 2026-06-10
---

# BYOK setup


## What is BYOK

By default, Niyra uses our hosted LLM access — you pay in credits, we pay the providers. With BYOK, you plug in your own Anthropic or OpenAI API key and Niyra runs on **your** vendor account. Credits don't tick down for LLM calls; you pay your provider directly.

Available on Pro and Alpha plans.

## Why use BYOK

- **Cost control at scale.** If you're a heavy user, your vendor bill may be lower than credit equivalents (especially with Anthropic enterprise rates or OpenAI volume discounts).
- **Enterprise terms.** Some employers require all LLM use to go through their account. BYOK respects that.
- **Apex mode access.** Apex / Fable 5 (Claude Opus 4 tier) is BYOK-only.
- **No vendor lock-in.** Your data, your contract.

## Add a key

1. **Dashboard → Settings → BYOK.**
2. Pick a provider: Anthropic or OpenAI.
3. Paste your key. Niyra immediately validates it (sends a single test prompt).
4. Done — Niyra starts routing through your key on the next message.

Your key is encrypted at rest (AES-256-GCM). The encryption key lives in Fly secrets, separate from the database. Decrypted only inside the request handler. Never logged, never returned over the API.

## Validate / rotate

- **Validate**: Settings → BYOK → "Test key". One round-trip; doesn't burn meaningful tokens.
- **Rotate**: Just paste a new key, the old one is overwritten.
- **Remove**: Click "Disconnect". Niyra reverts to the credit pool.

## What still costs credits

BYOK covers LLM calls. **Other things still cost credits**:
- Embeddings (memory search).
- Tool calls via Composio (Gmail, Slack, etc.).
- Voice (TTS / STT).
- Apollo enrichment.
- Outbound phone calls (telephony charges).

This is usually <10% of total cost; LLM is the dominant component.

## Token refresh

Niyra's token refresh daemon polls every 5 minutes to refresh OAuth tokens proactively (60s before expiry). Your BYOK API key isn't OAuth — it's a long-lived key — so no refresh needed. You're responsible for rotating it when your provider asks.

## Limits

- **One key per provider.** Anthropic + OpenAI = two keys.
- **Anthropic models supported**: Sonnet, Opus, Haiku (all 4.x generations). Apex (Fable 5) is BYOK-only.
- **OpenAI models supported**: gpt-4.x, gpt-5.x, embeddings. Voice models also wired up.
- **No third-party providers via BYOK yet** (no Together, Groq, etc.). Use a Niyra-hosted tier instead.

## Troubleshooting

- **"Key invalid"** — Paste it without quotes. Anthropic keys start with `sk-ant-`, OpenAI keys with `sk-proj-` or `sk-`.
- **"Rate limited"** — Your vendor limit was hit. Wait or upgrade your tier with the provider.
- **Quota exhausted** — Same — top up your provider account.
- **Apex doesn't appear** — Apex is alpha-gated. Email hi@niyra.ai for access.