Create a BYOK provider credential

Create a new bring-your-own-key (BYOK) provider credential. The raw key is encrypted at rest and never returned in API responses. Defaults to the authenticated entity’s default workspace; use the workspace_id body field to scope to a different workspace. Treat the raw key as write-only; it is never returned after creation. Management key required.

POST /byok

Create a BYOK provider credential

cURL

curl --request POST \
  --url https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/byok \
  --header 'Authorization: Bearer <token>' \
  --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  --data '
{
  "key": "sk-proj-abc123...",
  "name": "Production OpenAI Key",
  "provider": "openai"
}
'

import requests

url = "https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/byok"

payload = {
    "key": "sk-proj-abc123...",
    "name": "Production OpenAI Key",
    "provider": "openai"
}
headers = {
    "Authorization": "Bearer <token>",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}

response = requests.post(url, json=payload, headers=headers)

print(response.text)

const options = {
  method: 'POST',
  headers: {Authorization: 'Bearer <token>', 'Content-Type': 'application/json'},
  body: JSON.stringify({key: 'sk-proj-abc123...', name: 'Production OpenAI Key', provider: 'openai'})
};

fetch('https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/byok', options)
  .then(res => res.json())
  .then(res => console.log(res))
  .catch(err => console.error(err));

<?php

$curl = curl_init();

curl_setopt_array($curl, [
  CURLOPT_URL => "https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/byok",
  CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
  CURLOPT_ENCODING => "",
  CURLOPT_MAXREDIRS => 10,
  CURLOPT_TIMEOUT => 30,
  CURLOPT_HTTP_VERSION => CURL_HTTP_VERSION_1_1,
  CURLOPT_CUSTOMREQUEST => "POST",
  CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS => json_encode([
    'key' => 'sk-proj-abc123...',
    'name' => 'Production OpenAI Key',
    'provider' => 'openai'
  ]),
  CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER => [
    "Authorization: Bearer <token>",
    "Content-Type: application/json"
  ],
]);

$response = curl_exec($curl);
$err = curl_error($curl);

curl_close($curl);

if ($err) {
  echo "cURL Error #:" . $err;
} else {
  echo $response;
}

package main

import (
	"fmt"
	"strings"
	"net/http"
	"io"
)

func main() {

	url := "https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/byok"

	payload := strings.NewReader("{\n  \"key\": \"sk-proj-abc123...\",\n  \"name\": \"Production OpenAI Key\",\n  \"provider\": \"openai\"\n}")

	req, _ := http.NewRequest("POST", url, payload)

	req.Header.Add("Authorization", "Bearer <token>")
	req.Header.Add("Content-Type", "application/json")

	res, _ := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)

	defer res.Body.Close()
	body, _ := io.ReadAll(res.Body)

	fmt.Println(string(body))

}

HttpResponse<String> response = Unirest.post("https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/byok")
  .header("Authorization", "Bearer <token>")
  .header("Content-Type", "application/json")
  .body("{\n  \"key\": \"sk-proj-abc123...\",\n  \"name\": \"Production OpenAI Key\",\n  \"provider\": \"openai\"\n}")
  .asString();

require 'uri'
require 'net/http'

url = URI("https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/byok")

http = Net::HTTP.new(url.host, url.port)
http.use_ssl = true

request = Net::HTTP::Post.new(url)
request["Authorization"] = 'Bearer <token>'
request["Content-Type"] = 'application/json'
request.body = "{\n  \"key\": \"sk-proj-abc123...\",\n  \"name\": \"Production OpenAI Key\",\n  \"provider\": \"openai\"\n}"

response = http.request(request)
puts response.read_body

201

{
  "data": {
    "allowed_api_key_hashes": null,
    "allowed_models": null,
    "allowed_user_ids": null,
    "created_at": "2025-08-24T10:30:00Z",
    "disabled": false,
    "id": "11111111-2222-3333-4444-555555555555",
    "is_fallback": false,
    "label": "sk-...AbCd",
    "name": "Production OpenAI Key",
    "provider": "openai",
    "sort_order": 0,
    "workspace_id": "550e8400-e29b-41d4-a716-446655440000"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "code": 400,
    "message": "Invalid request parameters"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "code": 401,
    "message": "Missing Authentication header"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "code": 403,
    "message": "Only management keys can perform this operation"
  }
}

{
  "error": {
    "code": 500,
    "message": "Internal Server Error"
  }
}

Authorizations

Authorization · string · header · required

API key as bearer token in Authorization header

Body

application/json

key · string · required

The raw provider API key or credential. This value is encrypted at rest and never returned in API responses.

Minimum string length: 1

Example:

"sk-proj-abc123..."

provider · enum<string> · required

The upstream provider this credential authenticates against, as a lowercase slug (e.g. openai, anthropic, amazon-bedrock).

Available options: ai21, aion-labs, akashml, alibaba, amazon-bedrock, amazon-nova, ambient, anthropic, arcee-ai, atlas-cloud, avian, azure, baidu, baseten, black-forest-labs, byteplus, cerebras, chutes, cirrascale, clarifai, cloudflare, cohere, crusoe, darkbloom, decart, deepinfra, deepseek, dekallm, digitalocean, featherless, fireworks, friendli, gmicloud, google-ai-studio, google-vertex, groq, heygen, inception, inceptron, inferact-vllm, inference-net, infermatic, inflection, io-net, ionstream, liquid, mancer, mara, minimax, mistral, modelrun, modular, moonshotai, morph, ncompass, nebius, nex-agi, nextbit, novita, nvidia, open-inference, openai, parasail, perceptron, perplexity, phala, poolside, quiver, recraft, reka, relace, sakana-ai, sambanova, seed, siliconflow, sourceful, stepfun, streamlake, switchpoint, tenstorrent, together, upstage, venice, wafer, wandb, xai, xiaomi, z-ai

Example:

"openai"

allowed_models · string[] | null

Optional allowlist of model slugs this credential may be used for. null means no restriction.

Maximum array length: 100

Example:

null

allowed_user_ids · string[] | null

Optional allowlist of user IDs that may use this credential. null means no restriction.

Maximum array length: 100

Example:

null

disabled · boolean

Whether this credential should be created in a disabled state.

Example:

false

is_fallback · boolean

Whether this credential is treated as a fallback — used only after non-fallback keys for the same provider have been tried.

Example:

false

name · string | null

Optional human-readable name for the credential.

Maximum string length: 255

Example:

"Production OpenAI Key"

workspace_id · string<uuid>

Optional workspace ID. Defaults to the authenticated entity's default workspace.

Example:

"550e8400-e29b-41d4-a716-446655440000"

Response

201

application/json

BYOK credential created successfully

data · object · required

The created BYOK credential.

Show child attributes

Example:

{
  "allowed_api_key_hashes": null,
  "allowed_models": null,
  "allowed_user_ids": null,
  "created_at": "2025-08-24T10:30:00Z",
  "disabled": false,
  "id": "11111111-2222-3333-4444-555555555555",
  "is_fallback": false,
  "label": "sk-...AbCd",
  "name": "Production OpenAI Key",
  "provider": "openai",
  "sort_order": 0,
  "workspace_id": "550e8400-e29b-41d4-a716-446655440000"
}