Choose a router

A router is a model ID that chooses a concrete model for each request. Use it where an app asks for a model name, or as model in a Chat Completions request. The choice can change between requests as models and available routes change.

Cheap does not mean the cheapest model regardless of capability. Fast does not promise a latency or choose a model solely from a name: when sufficient recent measurements exist, it considers both time to first token and expected generation time. Actual cost and speed depend on the selected model and your request.

For a stable ID that follows reviewed releases within one family, use a Latest model alias, such as ~deepseek/deepseek-flash-latest. Unlike a router, it resolves to one reviewed model target rather than selecting across families.

Send a request

With a compatibility-enabled key, set the router ID as the model:

curl https://api.anonrouter.ai/v1/chat/completions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $ANONROUTER_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "model": "anonrouter/coding",
    "messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "Explain this TypeScript error."}],
    "max_tokens": 1024
  }'

In the private ticket flow, issue the ticket for the same router ID, then send that ID in the completion body with the ticket. Send the same provider policy and output limit at both steps. A paid router needs a positive available balance; its selected model is billed at the serving route's listed prices, including any applicable long-context prices. The router itself has no single fixed per-token price.

Privacy and saved settings

Paid routers honor your workspace privacy boundary, model pool, provider restrictions, request filters, and price constraints. They do not widen a workspace boundary to find a candidate. A router with no eligible member returns an error instead of silently choosing outside those settings.

Cheap and Fast favor price or speed for provider selection when you omit a request provider policy. Coding, Uncensored, and TEE use the workspace provider sort. You can narrow selection with routing.allow, routing.exclude, routing.privacy_classes, or a provider policy, subject to the workspace's restrictions. An explicit routing.strategy does not change a named router's purpose; use /auto to choose between cost, balanced, and quality strategies.

The TEE Router sends ordinary plaintext requests to TEE routes. It does not perform client-side encryption or make a stock OpenAI client verify attestation. E2EE uses an explicit model and a separate verification and encryption flow. Read TEE verification and E2EE inference before relying on those guarantees.

For the Free Router, enabling free models on the account is consent to Anonymous routing: the provider can see and may retain prompts. A request or workspace that requires stronger privacy is refused. Free requests never become paid requests when capacity runs out.

What served the request

The response's model is the concrete model that served the request, not the logical router ID. Response headers identify the selection:

• x-anonrouter-selected-model: the selected model.
• x-anonrouter-routing: auto: a model was selected automatically.
• x-anonrouter-provider: the serving provider.
• x-anonrouter-privacy-class: the serving route's privacy tier.

Provider fallback for a paid router stays on the chosen model and within that router's eligible routes. It does not change to another model. Explicit cross-model fallback lists in compatibility mode have their own fallback contract.

Constraints and errors

Paid named routers are for plaintext chat. Use an explicit model for reasoning controls or E2EE. Tools, streaming, and image input narrow the eligible pool to routes that can serve the request. See context limits for output caps and context errors.

For free access and capacity errors, use the separate free-model error table.