OpenRouter Quickstart Guide

OpenRouter provides a unified API that gives you access to hundreds of AI models through a single endpoint, while automatically handling fallbacks and selecting the most cost-effective options. Get started with just a few lines of code using your preferred SDK or framework.

Read https://openrouter.ai/skills/create-agent/SKILL.md and follow the instructions to build an agent using OpenRouter.

Looking for information about free models and rate limits? Please see the FAQ

In the examples below, the OpenRouter-specific headers are optional. Setting them allows your app to appear on the OpenRouter leaderboards. For detailed information about app attribution, see our App Attribution guide.

Using the OpenRouter SDK (Beta)

First, install the SDK:

$ npm install @openrouter/sdk

Then use it in your code:

TypeScript SDK

1 import { OpenRouter } from '@openrouter/sdk';
2 
3 const openRouter = new OpenRouter({
4   apiKey: '<OPENROUTER_API_KEY>',
5   defaultHeaders: {
6     'HTTP-Referer': '<YOUR_SITE_URL>', // Optional. Site URL for rankings on openrouter.ai.
7     'X-Title': '<YOUR_SITE_NAME>', // Optional. Site title for rankings on openrouter.ai.
8   },
9 });
10 
11 const completion = await openRouter.chat.send({
12   model: 'openai/gpt-5.2',
13   messages: [
14     {
15       role: 'user',
16       content: 'What is the meaning of life?',
17     },
18   ],
19   stream: false,
20 });
21 
22 console.log(completion.choices[0].message.content);

Using the OpenRouter API directly

You can use the interactive Request Builder to generate OpenRouter API requests in the language of your choice.

1 import requests
2 import json
3 
4 response = requests.post(
5   url="https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/chat/completions",
6   headers={
7     "Authorization": "Bearer <OPENROUTER_API_KEY>",
8     "HTTP-Referer": "<YOUR_SITE_URL>", # Optional. Site URL for rankings on openrouter.ai.
9     "X-Title": "<YOUR_SITE_NAME>", # Optional. Site title for rankings on openrouter.ai.
10   },
11   data=json.dumps({
12     "model": "openai/gpt-5.2", # Optional
13     "messages": [
14       {
15         "role": "user",
16         "content": "What is the meaning of life?"
17       }
18     ]
19   })
20 )

Using the OpenAI SDK

1 import OpenAI from 'openai';
2 
3 const openai = new OpenAI({
4   baseURL: 'https://openrouter.ai/api/v1',
5   apiKey: '<OPENROUTER_API_KEY>',
6   defaultHeaders: {
7     'HTTP-Referer': '<YOUR_SITE_URL>', // Optional. Site URL for rankings on openrouter.ai.
8     'X-Title': '<YOUR_SITE_NAME>', // Optional. Site title for rankings on openrouter.ai.
9   },
10 });
11 
12 async function main() {
13   const completion = await openai.chat.completions.create({
14     model: 'openai/gpt-5.2',
15     messages: [
16       {
17         role: 'user',
18         content: 'What is the meaning of life?',
19       },
20     ],
21   });
22 
23   console.log(completion.choices[0].message);
24 }
25 
26 main();

The API also supports streaming.

Using third-party SDKs

For information about using third-party SDKs and frameworks with OpenRouter, please see our frameworks documentation.