How to use it

Send every request here, whatever server your key is on:

https://api.iqshard.com

Keep it in your own environment — a shell export, a secrets manager, an SDK argument. Never paste it into a page, including this one. No key yet? Create one from the dashboard.

Ask the server which models it runs:

curl https://api.iqshard.com/v1/models \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer <your API key>"

and use one of the ids it gives back:

{
  "object": "list",
  "data": [
    {"id": "glm-5.2", "object": "model", "created": 1730000000, "owned_by": "iqshard"}
  ]
}

created is a timestamp the response schema requires, not a real creation date.

The shape most OpenAI clients speak: POST /v1/chat/completions, key in Authorization: Bearer.

curl https://api.iqshard.com/v1/chat/completions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer <your API key>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "model": "<model id from above>",
    "messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "ping"}],
    "max_tokens": 10
  }'

The shape Claude Code and Anthropic's own SDKs speak: POST /v1/messages, against the bare origin above — not the /v1-suffixed one from the OpenAI side. Copying an example from one shape into the other is the most common way these break.

Anthropic's SDKs send the key in x-api-key and add an anthropic-version header. This gateway accepts Authorization: Bearer too, so either works.

curl https://api.iqshard.com/v1/messages \
  -H "x-api-key: <your API key>" \
  -H "anthropic-version: 2023-06-01" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "model": "<model id from above>",
    "max_tokens": 10,
    "messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "ping"}]
  }'

401 — the key is invalid or no longer valid. There's no fix on the same key; mint a new one.

402 — the key's fine, there's just nothing to spend: no Share on that server, an empty PAYG balance, or the server not taking PAYG right now. Buy, renew, top up, or wait for PAYG to reopen — the key never needs replacing.

503 — the gateway can't currently record what it does, so it refuses rather than risk losing track of a request. For a PAYG key, it can also mean a short gap in balance settlement; subscription traffic isn't affected either way. Retry — this clears on its own.