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Novita AI gives you hosted model APIs, agent sandboxes, and GPU infrastructure. Follow the path that matches your task and verify a working result before moving on to the deeper guides.
If you have questions, please check our FAQs first or reach out to our support team on Discord.

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1. Sign in or create an account

Sign in to novita.ai. You can use Google or GitHub authentication, or sign up with your email address.

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2. Create an API key

Novita AI authenticates API requests with a Bearer API key. Open Key Management to create or manage a key, then follow API Keys to store it safely. Pass your API key only through the NOVITA_API_KEY environment variable in these examples. Do not put a real API key in source code, documentation, agent chats, analytics, screenshots, or logs.

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3. Confirm available credit

Check your available credit on Billing and Payments before sending a request. Product credit and model access can affect whether a request succeeds. For longer-running use, see Automatic Top-up.

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4. Send your first LLM request

Complete the account, API key, and credit steps above before running this example. It uses the OpenAI-compatible chat completions endpoint and the deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash model:
A successful request returns HTTP 200 and a non-empty choices[0].message.content value, such as "Hello!". The exact wording can vary by model. Add --include to the cURL command to inspect the HTTP status as well as the response body. An HTTP 200 alone does not confirm a valid model response. If the request fails, use the matching guide:
  • 401 Unauthorized: check the key format and API key configuration.
  • 403 Forbidden: the Novita gateway may return INVALID_API_KEY for a missing or invalid key; check the key first. For a model access error, check model access and whether identity verification is required.
  • 429 Too Many Requests: check rate limits.
  • 5xx: check common error codes and retry guidance.
For Python, JavaScript, streaming, and additional request options, continue to the LLM API guide.

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5. Use your agent

Your agent can help you create the request and integrate Novita AI. Complete the account, API key, and credit steps above, and make NOVITA_API_KEY available in the environment where the agent runs the code. Ask it to read the Novita AI skill:
If your agent supports skills, you can install it once:
View the skill on GitHub ā†’. After the agent writes the integration, run the request and verify HTTP 200 with non-empty choices[0].message.content. If the agent path does not work, return to the manual request.

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6. Troubleshooting

If you cannot complete the first request, check these in order:
  1. The NOVITA_API_KEY environment variable is set in the current shell.
  2. The key is active and has access to deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash.
  3. Your account has available credit and has completed any required verification.
  4. The endpoint, model ID, and request body match the example.
  5. The returned status code is covered by Common Error Codes.
For a complete list of endpoints and parameters, see the API Reference.
Last modified on September 17, 2026