Alibaba Coding Plan API key setup

Get your key

1. Open the Alibaba Coding Plan API keys page: www.alibabacloud.com/campaign/ai-scene-coding?referral_code=A9248Z partner link
2. Create an account and generate an API key.
3. Paste it into the Dracon BYOK provider keys, stored encrypted (AES-256-GCM), used browser-direct, works in every Dracon tool.

Subscription setup walkthrough

Vendor plan information last checked 2026-10-27. Confirm current pricing and limits with the provider before purchase.

Official plan and documentation sources: www.alibabacloud.com/help/en/model-studio/coding-plan

Which key are you trying to get?

• Dedicated plan key is separate from the pay-as-you-go API key

Subscription-plan keys are typically distinct from pay-as-you-go keys: the plan key is what third-party tools (OpenAI-compatible or Anthropic-compatible) are pointed at when you want the subscription's rate limits instead of metered billing.

Tier options

Sign-up / new-customer: New Model Studio users typically receive 1,000,000 free tokens per eligible model for 90 days in the Singapore region; eligibility varies by model, region and account. After the free quota is exhausted you are automatically billed pay-as-you-go unless you enable the spending cap in advance.

Get the key and test it

1. Open the Alibaba Coding Plan API keys page: bailian.console.aliyun.com/ Create a key and copy the secret straight away.
2. Point your client at this provider's base URL: https://dashscope.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1 It speaks the OpenAI-compatible shape, so an OpenAI SDK client works against it with no adapter: only the base URL and the key change.
3. Prove the endpoint answers before you trust it. Send one call with no Authorization header: a live endpoint answers 401 Unauthorized, because it is waiting for a bearer key. The wording of that error differs by provider (some say invalid_api_key, others incorrect_api_key or Token is invalid), so read the 401 as the signal, not the error text.
4. Paste the key into the Dracon BYOK provider keys ; stored encrypted, used browser-direct, no relay.
5. Compare other provider plans when this subscription does not match your usage or budget.

Test the key

Both examples read the key from the DASHSCOPE_API_KEY environment variable, so the key stays out of the command line.

export DASHSCOPE_API_KEY="<YOUR_PLAN_KEY>"

curl https://dashscope.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1/chat/completions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $DASHSCOPE_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"model":"qwen-max","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"hi"}]}'

import os
from openai import OpenAI

# export DASHSCOPE_API_KEY="<YOUR_PLAN_KEY>" first
client = OpenAI(
    api_key=os.environ["DASHSCOPE_API_KEY"],
    base_url="https://dashscope.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1",
)
resp = client.chat.completions.create(
    model="qwen-max",
    messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "hi"}],
)
print(resp.choices[0].message.content)

Free tier

Yes. New Model Studio users get an automatic free quota on eligible Singapore-region models (help docs updated Oct 16, 2026, checked 2026-10-27); the product page markets the trial as 10 million tokens. Ongoing use is paid; overseas coding-plan quotas are separate. no credit card required

Rate limits: Coding Plan Pro: up to 6,000 requests / 5 hours, 45,000 / week, and 90,000 / month. New-user free quota is a 10M-token trial (see product page).

Paid plans compared

Every tier Alibaba Coding Plan publishes, with the price and the limit as the vendor states them, last checked 2026-10-27. Confirm with the provider before you buy. You pay them directly, no Dracon markup.

Official plan source: www.alibabacloud.com/help/en/model-studio/coding-plan

Connection details

Base URL

https://dashscope.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1

API shape

OpenAI-compatible

Env var

DASHSCOPE_API_KEY

Models

qwen-max, qwen-plus, qwen-flash

Model lineup

qwen3.7-plus (vision), qwen3.6-plus (vision), kimi-k2.5 (vision), glm-5, MiniMax-M2.5, qwen3.5-plus (vision), qwen3-max-2026-01-23, qwen3-coder-next, qwen3-coder-plus, glm-4.7

Gotchas

Browser-direct verified live 2026-08-23: dashscope.aliyuncs.com sends access-control-allow-origin:* on actual GET responses (not just preflight) and the host is in the dashboard CSP connect-src allowlist.

Our verdicts on this kind of provider

Independent comparisons we keep current as pricing and free tiers shift. A guide is setup; a verdict is whether it's worth setting up.

• 22 of the 45 AI providers have a free tier. Only 7 are actually useful.
• Free AI rate limits, compared: which free tiers can do real work
• The AI price war: who cut what in July 2026