OrcaRouter FAQs
OrcaRouter is an AI gateway that routes prompts to 200+ models with zero markup. Features adaptive routing, guardrails, agent firewall, and observability.
FAQs of OrcaRouter
What is OrcaRouter?
OrcaRouter is an AI gateway that routes prompts across more than 200 language models through a single OpenAI-compatible endpoint. It evaluates each request at runtime, selects the most suitable model based on quality and cost targets, and provides built-in guardrails, an agent firewall, and observability tooling. The platform charges zero token markup on all tiers.
How does OrcaRouter pricing work?
OrcaRouter charges the upstream provider's published per-token rate with no per-token markup added. Revenue comes from optional paid subscriptions rather than inflating token costs. The free Hacker tier provides the full gateway including 200+ models, automatic failover, and basic observability. The Team tier costs $499 per month and adds up to 10 seats, compliance enforcement, audit reporting, unlimited API keys, and priority support. Enterprise plans offer private or on-premise deployment, a 99.99% uptime SLA, dedicated infrastructure, and custom pricing.
What models are available through OrcaRouter?
OrcaRouter provides access to more than 200 models from providers including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, DeepSeek, xAI Grok, Alibaba Qwen, Moonshot Kimi, MiniMax, and others. The model catalog covers both frontier and open-source options. All models are accessible through a single OpenAI-compatible endpoint, and the platform also exposes native Anthropic and Google Gemini protocol surfaces for direct access.
How does the adaptive routing work?
Each prompt is embedded and scored in real time against available models. A continuously learning model routes requests to the most suitable provider based on the workspace's configured objective. Users can choose between routing modes such as Cheapest, Balanced, Quality, and Adaptive. The router leads the public RouterArena leaderboard at 75.5% accuracy as of June 2026, ahead of GPT-5, Azure, Martian, and NotDiamond.
How does OrcaRouter handle provider outages?
When an upstream provider rate-limits a request or returns a 5xx error, OrcaRouter automatically fails over to a healthy model from its pool of 200+ options. This failover completes in under 50 milliseconds, before the client would see a timeout. The process is transparent to the end user and does not require any client-side retry logic.
What security and governance features are included?
OrcaRouter includes guardrails for prompt injection detection, sensitive data blocking, and topic enforcement on every request. The agent firewall provides API key governance and model access controls that restrict which models and capabilities each agent or service can reach. All plans run behind the same guardrails and agent firewall. Team and Enterprise tiers add compliance enforcement and audit reporting for regulatory requirements.
What is the difference between Hacker, Team, and Enterprise tiers?
The Hacker tier is free and includes the full gateway with 200+ models, automatic failover, basic observability, and a single workspace. The Team tier at $499 per month adds up to 10 team seats, unlimited API keys, compliance enforcement and reporting, and priority support. Enterprise includes everything in Team plus private or on-premise deployment, a 99.99% uptime SLA, dedicated infrastructure, and dedicated support. No credit card is required to start on the Hacker tier.
How to use OrcaRouter
- Sign up for an account at orcarouter.ai to create a new workspace and gain access to the routing gateway dashboard with all management options.
- Generate an API key from the dashboard settings page and use it to authenticate every request sent through the OrcaRouter gateway.
- Change the base_url in the existing OpenAI SDK client to https://api.orcarouter.ai/v1 while keeping all other client code and parameters unchanged.
- Set the model parameter to "orcarouter/auto" so the platform grades each incoming prompt and routes it to the optimal provider automatically.
- Configure routing objectives per workspace to prioritize the lowest cost, the highest quality output, or a balanced trade-off between both.
- Send requests using the standard OpenAI SDK format and the gateway handles intelligent routing, automatic failover, and guardrails out of the box.
