Hello! Unfortunately, OpenAI API credits expire 1 year after they are issued, as per our current policy.
You can find more details in our Help Center articles:
What is prepaid billing
Can I extend my credits Answer from OpenAI_Support on community.openai.com
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api
Are OpenAI credits expiring? - API - OpenAI Developer Community
November 18, 2023 - Since dashboard change, I see no warning about credit expiration date. They forgot to put it, they placed it somewhere else or credits are not expiring any more?
Reddit
reddit.com › r/openai › money expires in openai
r/OpenAI on Reddit: Money expires in OpenAI
March 1, 2025 -
Turns out the credits you buy for the OpenAI API expire after one year.
Today, I got a surprise - logged in to the platform only to find that my prepaid balance had expired.
Apparently, even money can have an expiration date.
Just saying - plan accordingly and don't put in what you will not spend.
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api
Paid credits expired wth? - API - OpenAI Developer Community
December 3, 2024 - Under German law, the expiration of prepaid funds is generally not permissible, as it constitutes an unfair disadvantage to the consumer (Section 307 of the German Civil Code - BGB).
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api › feedback
API Credits/Amount get expired - Feedback - OpenAI Developer Community
March 15, 2025 - I paid some amount for credits, and it shows that it has now expired. How can the pre-paid amount expire?? There was no email regarding this.
OpenAI Help Center
help.openai.com › en › articles › 12642688-using-credits-for-flexible-usage-in-chatgpt-freegopluspro-sora
Using Credits for Flexible Usage in ChatGPT (Free/Go/Plus/Pro) & Sora | OpenAI Help Center
Credits are valid for 12 months from purchase. Unused credits expire and do not roll over after the expiry date. What happens if credits are used due to a compromised account? If your account is compromised and credits are used without ...
OpenAI Help Center
help.openai.com › en › articles › 9047769-can-you-extend-my-credits
Can you extend my credits? | OpenAI Help Center
Unfortunately, we're unable to extend the expiration date of credit grants or purchased credits. ... Calls may be recorded to improve OpenAI services.
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api
Why did my credit expire? - API - OpenAI Developer Community
March 25, 2023 - I was working on codex api when i found out that my credit has been expired , can anyone help me why does this happen? and will I get free credit or not?
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api
My OpenAI API credits are about to expire - API - OpenAI Developer Community
December 3, 2024 - My OpenAI API credits are about to expire. If I purchase more credits, will they be added to the ones that are about to expire?
Reddit
reddit.com › r/openai › why would you set an expiry date on usage credits?
r/OpenAI on Reddit: Why Would You Set an Expiry Date on Usage Credits?
February 11, 2024 -
Per the latest change to billing from OpenAI, we now have to pre-purchase usage credits in order to use the API's. This is the same model as Anthropic as I understand it.
In order to ensure that my API usage isn't interrupted, I purchased some credits, but i notice there is an expiry date on the credits. It's 1 year, so plenty of time to use them, but i was just wondering why they'd have an expiry date at all? Seems strange to me.
Also, seperate question, I wonder what benefits a pre-payment model has over a monthly billing approach? The lazy part of me would prefer a monthly bill I think, but happy either way.
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › t › seeing-today-that-prepaid-credits-will-expire-why › 1016073
Seeing today that prepaid credits will expire.......WHY..?! - Community - OpenAI Developer Community
October 3, 2024 - I just saw today that prepaid credits will expire…WHY…?!! I paid 1000 USD on Dec 31, 2023 and still have over 800 USD left. Expire date is Jan 01, 2025. It is not fair at all to give prepaid credits an expire date, bec…
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api › feedback
Expiring API Credits - Please Make it Clear - Feedback - OpenAI Developer Community
October 14, 2024 - This has been mentioned in other threads, but strangely there is no ability to reply to them. First off, I’m not even sure I was aware there was an expiration of 1 year when I first purchased the credits (why that’s eve…
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api
API credits expired without any warning – request for transparency - API - OpenAI Developer Community
April 27, 2025 - Hello OpenAI team and community, I’m a small independent developer. On May 31, 2024, I topped up $10 in API credits. Over the course of a year, I only used about $2. When I recently logged into my dashboard, I was surprised to see my balance at $0, with no prior indication that the credits had expired...
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api › bugs
My credits show they have expired with little or no usage - Bugs - OpenAI Developer Community
January 14, 2024 - Unfortunately, most grants expire after a certain amount of time. I’m not sure if it’s currently possible to see which grants are currently assigned to you and when they expire. They’ve been overhauling the billing UI over the past couple of weeks and it’s possible that this information ...
OpenAI Developer Community
community.openai.com › api › feedback
You should notify users about expiring credit or how I lost 400 USD - Feedback - OpenAI Developer Community
March 26, 2025 - The EU institution I work for acquired 400$ worth of credits in late 2023. We’ve been creating a number of notebooks to teach the students how to use ChatGPT in their research. One day the API requests stopped working and it’s only after some search that I was able to find out the credits had expired.
OpenAI Help Center
help.openai.com › en › articles › 8264644-how-can-i-set-up-prepaid-billing
How can I set up prepaid billing? | OpenAI Help Center
Please note that any purchased credits will expire after 1 year and they are non-refundable.
Reddit
reddit.com › r/openai › psa: openai expires credits you buy automatically after 1 year if you haven't used them
r/OpenAI on Reddit: PSA: OpenAI expires credits you buy automatically after 1 year if you haven't used them
September 7, 2025 -
Basically what it says on the tin, I learned this the hard way
> Please note that any purchased credits will expire after 1 year and they are non-refundable.
https://help.openai.com/en/articles/8264644-how-can-i-set-up-prepaid-billing