What's free
Gemini 2.5 Flash, 2.5 Flash-Lite, 2.5 Pro (limited), embeddings, TTS models
Rate limits
Varies by model, roughly 5-30 req/min and 20-500 req/day depending on model
The catch
Free-tier prompts/outputs may be used by Google to improve its products when used outside the UK/CH/EEA/EU
Free models · sample
gemini-2.5-flashgemini-2.5-flash-litegemini-2.5-proA sample of models reachable on the free tier — the live catalog changes. Pull the current set with GET https://generativelanguage.googleapis.com/v1beta/openai//models.
Quickstart — chat completions
from openai import OpenAI
client = OpenAI(base_url="https://generativelanguage.googleapis.com/v1beta/openai/", api_key="<YOUR_FREE_API_KEY>")
resp = client.chat.completions.create(
model="gemini-2.5-flash",
messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Hello!"}],
)
print(resp.choices[0].message.content)…or with curl:
curl https://generativelanguage.googleapis.com/v1beta/openai//chat/completions \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $API_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"model":"gemini-2.5-flash","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"Hello!"}]}'