How Usage & Credits Work
How Apogee meters AI usage - a monthly research allotment on Pro, tracked as a percentage rather than a dollar figure, with Unlimited removing the monthly cap entirely.
How Usage & Credits Work
Every plan includes a monthly allotment of AI research usage. This page explains what drives usage, how to read it, and what happens if a plan's allotment runs out.
How Usage Is Measured
Every time you interact with Apogee - through the chat client, via MCP, or when a scheduled briefing runs - an AI model processes your request. Usage is not a fixed number of requests: some requests use more of the monthly allotment than others. Two things drive how much a request uses:
- How much text the model processes - both the input (your question plus the context and sources pulled in) and the output (the response). Longer, deeper research uses more than a quick lookup.
- Which model runs - more capable models use more of the allotment per unit of text. Apogee selects the model for the task; there is no preset to choose.
Usage is tracked and reported as a percentage of your monthly allotment, not as a dollar amount. There is nothing to denominate in tokens or dollars on your side - the interface shows how much of the month's allotment is left and when it resets.
What Counts as Usage
Different activities use different amounts of the monthly allotment:
- Short factual lookups (e.g., "What's the status of HR 1234?") use very little.
- Detailed analysis (e.g., "Compare these two bills and summarize the differences") uses more, because the model reads and reasons over more text.
- Research queries that search across multiple data sources use the most - the research agent may call several internal tools in sequence, each adding to the total.
- Follow-up questions in the same conversation include earlier messages as context, so a long conversation gradually uses more per message.
Practical example: A quick question like "Who sponsors HR 5678?" uses only a sliver of the monthly allotment. A detailed research request like "Find all AI regulation bills this Congress and summarize their approaches" uses noticeably more, because the agent searches multiple sources and reasons over far more text.
Where Usage Comes From
Your monthly allotment is shared across every way you use Apogee. Each source draws from the same balance.
Chat Client
When you send a message in the chat client, the model reads your message plus the conversation history and generates a response. If the research agent calls tools while answering, those internal calls are part of the same request.
MCP Connections
If you connect via MCP (through Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, or another MCP client), tool calls and AI processing draw from the same allotment as the chat client. There is no separate allowance - all usage is pooled.
Briefings
Briefings (scheduled monitoring) draw from your allotment when they run. Each run triggers a research query on your behalf to search sources and generate a summary. Briefings run on a schedule and use the same allotment as the rest of your work, and they keep running even after the rest of your monthly allotment is used up.
Your Monthly Allotment
Pro is $29 a month and includes a fixed monthly research allotment. Usage is measured on the same relative scale as everything above, and it resets on your billing date. Unused allotment does not carry into the next month; it refreshes in full.
One price covers every organization type. There is no sector rate and no per-persona tier.
Apogee does not disclose usage in dollar terms. The billing page and the in-product usage indicator both show a percentage of the monthly allotment used, never a dollar figure. This is deliberate - a percentage is a stable signal regardless of how any individual request is priced internally.
Looking up public legislative and government records - bill status, sponsors, floor votes, and the like - never consumes any of the allotment. Usage is consumed by AI-generated analysis and, for a small set of licensed or proprietary data sources the product designates as premium, by access to that data. Most of what drives usage is generation, not lookup.
What Happens When Your Allotment Runs Out
Pro's monthly allotment is a fixed limit, not a starting point for pay-as-you-go billing. There is no spending cap to configure and no auto top-up to manage - reaching the end of the allotment simply means the allotment for that billing period is spent.
- Generation pauses until the allotment resets or you upgrade. Data lookups (bill status, sponsors, and the rest of the public record) keep working, since they never drew from the allotment in the first place.
- Your existing conversations and data are unaffected - previous chats, folios, files, and past briefings all stay readable.
- Briefings keep running on their schedule regardless of where your monthly allotment stands.
- The only way to raise your monthly ceiling is to upgrade to Unlimited. Unlimited removes the monthly allotment entirely - usage there is governed by a rolling session rate limit instead, sized so normal research is never blocked.
- The allotment resets with your billing date, giving you the full amount again for the new month.
Reading Your Usage
You can see your usage in two places:
- Billing page - apog.ai/billing shows what percentage of the month's allotment has been used, along with the date it resets. There is no dollar figure to check.
- Usage indicator - A compact indicator in the chat client turns red as the allotment runs low. Selecting it opens the full usage view.
Plans
Every plan includes every intelligence capability and every data source.
| Plan | Who it is for | Monthly usage |
|---|---|---|
| Pro ($29/month) | Everyone, whichever sector you work in | A fixed monthly research allotment, about 4x the free plan's, that resets on your billing date |
| Unlimited | Teams and individuals who regularly exhaust Pro's allotment | No monthly allotment to hit - usage is governed by a rolling session rate limit instead |
| Teams & Enterprise (custom) | Teams and organizations | Shared usage capacity across the organization, plus collaboration features |
See pricing for current numbers.
Tips for Getting More From Your Allotment
Be specific in your questions
Vague questions like "Tell me about healthcare policy" make the agent search broadly and write long answers. Specific questions like "What committees is the BIOSECURE Act assigned to?" use far less of the allotment.
Reuse what is already in context
When the agent retrieves data (bill status, news articles), that data stays in the conversation. Follow-up questions about the same data use less than starting a fresh search.
Start a new conversation for a new topic
Each message carries the earlier conversation as context, so a very long thread uses more per message. Starting a new conversation for an unrelated question resets that context.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does MCP usage count against my monthly allotment?
Yes. Whether you use the hosted chat client or connect via MCP (Claude Desktop, Claude Code, Cursor, and so on), tool calls and AI processing draw from the same allotment.
Do data lookups use up my allotment?
No. Simple data retrieval (searching bills, fetching news, checking status) never consumes any of the allotment. Usage comes from AI processing - generating analysis, summaries, and research synthesis - and from a small set of licensed premium data sources.
What happens to an unused allotment?
It resets on your billing date and does not roll over.
Can I set a spending limit or pay for extra usage past my allotment?
No. Pro's monthly allotment is fixed, with no configurable spending cap and no pay-as-you-go option past it. If you consistently need more than Pro's allotment, Unlimited removes the monthly allotment entirely in favor of a rolling session rate limit.
What if I need to keep working after my allotment runs out?
Upgrading to Unlimited is the only way to raise the ceiling - it replaces the monthly allotment with a session rate limit sized so normal research is never blocked. There is no way to add to or extend a Pro allotment mid-month.
Do briefings count against my monthly allotment?
Yes, briefings draw from the same allotment as a query you run yourself, but they keep running on schedule even after the rest of your allotment for the month is used up.
Why does a long conversation use more of the allotment over time?
Each message includes the prior messages as context so the response stays coherent. As the conversation grows, each new message sends more text. Starting a new conversation resets this.
Can I see exactly what I used, in dollars?
No. Apogee does not show usage in dollar terms anywhere in the product. The billing page shows the percentage of your monthly allotment used and the date it resets, which is the same information every plan is measured by.