docs/Getting StartedOpenAI Compatible
Quickstart Guide
Start calling 17+ frontier AI models in under 60 seconds with universal OpenAI SDK drop-in compatibility.
Get Started with Unlocked AI Gateway
Unlocked AI provides a unified AI gateway giving developers single-API access to the world's frontier models — including Claude Opus 5.5, Claude Sonnet 5.5, GPT-5, OpenAI o3, Gemini 4 Argon, and DeepSeek R1.
Because Unlocked AI strictly implements the standardized OpenAI `/v1` wire specification, any application built with the OpenAI SDK, LangChain, LlamaIndex, or Vercel AI SDK connects by simply updating the `baseURL` and API key.
Universal Drop-In Endpoint
Base URL: `https://unlockedai.net/v1`
Authentication: Bearer `sk-unlocked-...`
All parameters, tools, structured JSON modes, and token streams work out of the box with zero code restructuring.
Supported Integration Approaches
Choose the integration method suited to your tech stack:
| Approach | Best For | Setup Time |
|---|---|---|
| Direct REST / cURL | Any programming language, bash pipelines, microservices, and Docker containers | 30 seconds |
| OpenAI Python SDK | FastAPI backends, data science, Jupyter notebooks, LangChain, and automation | 1 minute |
| OpenAI TypeScript SDK | Next.js, Node.js microservices, Hono, and Cloudflare Workers | 1 minute |
| Coding Agents (Claude Code, Cursor) | Terminal and IDE pair programming using your Unlocked AI key and credits | 45 seconds |
| Vercel AI SDK | Next.js App Router streaming chat interfaces with standard React hooks | 2 minutes |
Step 1: Obtain Your Secret API Key
Navigate to the **[Developer Command Center](/developers)** to generate your secret key. Keys are prefixed with `sk-unlocked-` and draw directly from non-expiring pay-as-you-go credits starting at $5.00 with zero monthly seat fees.
Step 2: Make Your First Request
Send a standard JSON POST request to `https://unlockedai.net/v1/chat/completions`:
curl https://unlockedai.net/v1/chat/completions \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-H "Authorization: Bearer <YOUR_UNLOCKED_API_KEY>" \
-d '{
"model": "claude-sonnet-5.5",
"messages": [
{ "role": "system", "content": "You are a senior distributed systems architect." },
{ "role": "user", "content": "Explain the Raft consensus algorithm in 2 concise sentences." }
],
"temperature": 0.7
}'Step 3: Streaming Tokens with Server-Sent Events
Pass `"stream": true` to stream partial token deltas in real-time. Unlocked AI delivers sub-millisecond initial chunk latencies across all models.
from openai import OpenAI
client = OpenAI(
base_url="https://unlockedai.net/v1",
api_key="<YOUR_UNLOCKED_API_KEY>",
)
stream = client.chat.completions.create(
model="claude-sonnet-5.5",
messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Write a high-performance HTTP pipeline in Rust."}],
stream=True,
)
for chunk in stream:
delta = chunk.choices[0].delta.content or ""
print(delta, end="", flush=True)Need an Unlocked AI Key or Credits?
Generate secret API keys backed by non-expiring pay-as-you-go credits starting at $5. No monthly minimums.