# Pricing and credits

Source: https://phonebox.dev/docs/billing/pricing

> $0.06 per phone-minute, billed per second with a one-minute minimum, paid from prepaid credits, with reservations and a monthly spending limit.



Phonebox has one price for every phone: **$0.06 per phone-minute**, which is $0.001 a second or $3.60 an hour. There is no subscription and no seat fee.

## What you pay for [#what-you-pay-for]

* A phone is billed while it is `creating`, `starting` or `ready`, per second, with a minimum of 60 seconds for each session.
* A parked phone costs nothing, and it keeps its apps, files and signed-in accounts.
* The clock starts when Phonebox accepts your create or start. It stops when you ask to park the phone, when Phonebox decides to park it, or when the phone becomes unavailable or fails. The time the device takes to stop after that isn't billed.
* A session that ends before the phone was ever ready costs nothing, unless you parked or deleted the phone yourself.

A session's charge is its seconds from start to end, rounded up, at least 60 and never more than it reserved, times $0.001. For example:

| Session                                     | Charge                        |
| ------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------- |
| Parked after 131 seconds                    | $0.131                        |
| Parked after 20 seconds                     | $0.06, the one-minute minimum |
| Idle-parked 5 minutes after a 5-minute task | $0.60                         |
| A new phone that failed before it was ready | $0.00                         |

The third example shows why parking matters: with the default `idle_timeout` of 300 seconds, a phone left alone after its work keeps billing until it parks itself. [Keep costs down](/docs/guides/keep-costs-down) collects the ways to avoid that.

## Credits [#credits]

Every new account receives $2 of starter credit automatically in its first project. No card is required. This buys about 33 total phone-minutes at the current rate. A new project in the same account does not receive another starter grant. Paid top-ups are on the [Billing](/app/billing) page.

* A purchase is from $10 to $1,000, and $10 is suggested.
* Credits don't expire.
* The starter grant is one-time. There is no subscription and no automatic top-up.
* Our payment provider runs the checkout and handles taxes and receipts. Credits appear once it confirms the payment, not when the checkout page closes.
* A refund removes the matching credits. If the remaining balance can't cover the reservations of running phones, the project is frozen and its phones are parked.

## Reservations [#reservations]

When a session starts, Phonebox reserves credit for its whole `max_duration`, at $0.001 a second: $0.90 for the default 15 minutes. The session's `reserved_usd` shows the amount, and the account's `reserved_usd` shows the total held by open sessions.

* With `max_duration` omitted, create and start automatically shorten the default to fit unreserved credit and the monthly spending limit. The returned session states the actual duration. If you request an explicit duration, a create or start fails with `402 insufficient_credits` when your balance minus what is already reserved can't cover the reservation. `details.max_affordable_seconds` is the longest `max_duration` you can afford at that moment.
* When the session ends, you're charged for the seconds it ran, and the rest of the reservation is released.
* Renewing a running phone with a start reserves only the extra time.
* Because every session is reserved in advance, your balance never goes below zero, and a running phone never stops for lack of credit.

A lower `max_duration` reserves less, which lets more phones start from the same balance.

## Monthly spending limit [#monthly-spending-limit]

Every project has a monthly spending limit, $100 by default, which you change in the console's Settings. A create or start fails with `402 spend_limit_reached` when this month's charges, plus every open reservation, plus the new reservation, would pass the limit.

* A limit of $0 stops every new session. Phones already running keep their reservations and run until they park.
* Months are calendar months in UTC. `spent_this_month_usd` in `GET /v1/account` shows this month's charges.
* The limit and your credits are separate. Buying credits doesn't raise the limit, and raising the limit doesn't add credits.

## See what you spent [#see-what-you-spent]

* `GET /v1/phones/{id}/sessions` lists each session of a phone with `billed_seconds` and `cost_usd`. See [Sessions](/docs/api-reference/sessions).
* `GET /v1/account` shows your balance, what is reserved, and what you spent this month. See [Account](/docs/api-reference/account).
* The console's [Usage](/app/usage) page shows your usage by day, and its [Billing](/app/billing) page lists every purchase and charge under Credit activity.

## Questions [#questions]

**Does Phonebox give my agent a phone number?** No. Phonebox gives your agent control of an Android device: its screen, apps, touch input and keyboard. It doesn't include a phone number, SMS or calling.

**What counts as running time?** The time from starting a phone until it parks, measured in seconds, with a one-minute minimum per session. Parked phones cost nothing.

**When does a phone park?** When you park it, when its session reaches its maximum length, which is 15 minutes by default and up to 3 hours, or when its idle timeout has passed since the last request that addressed it, about 5 minutes by default.

**Do apps and sign-ins survive parking?** Yes. A parked phone keeps its apps, files and signed-in accounts.

**Can I try it for free?** Every new account gets $2 starter credit, with no card required. Then top up from $10 when you need more. Credits do not expire.

**Where do phones run?** In cloud data centers.

**What happens if I run out of credits?** Phones already running keep the credit they reserved when they started, so they run until they park. An omitted maximum shortens to fit available credit. A new session needs at least $0.06 available for its one-minute minimum.