OpenAI API Error insufficient_quota: You exceeded your current quota

Identify: does your log match?

openai.RateLimitError: Error code: 429 - {'error': {'message': 'You exceeded your current quota, please check your plan and billing details. For more information on this error, read the docs: https://platform.openai.com/docs/guides/error-codes/api-errors.', 'type': 'insufficient_quota', 'param': None, 'code': 'insufficient_quota'}}

1. High

   Prepaid credits used up

   Pay-as-you-go accounts stop serving requests when the credit balance reaches zero, unless auto-recharge is on.

2. Medium

   Project or org budget reached

   A monthly budget set on the project or organization blocks further usage until it is raised or the month resets.

3. Medium

   Key belongs to a different project

   The key comes from a project with no billing attached, while the dashboard you checked shows another project.

Fix

catch (e) {
  if (e.status === 429) return retryWithBackoff(req); // loops forever on insufficient_quota
}

import OpenAI from "openai";

catch (e) {
  if (e instanceof OpenAI.RateLimitError && e.code === "insufficient_quota") {
    alertBilling(e);            // page a human; retrying cannot fix billing
    throw e;
  }
  if (e instanceof OpenAI.RateLimitError) return retryWithBackoff(req);
  throw e;
}

Verify: reproduce it on purpose

$ # Use a key from a project with no credit balance
curl -s https://api.openai.com/v1/chat/completions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $OPENAI_KEY_UNFUNDED_PROJECT" -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"model":"gpt-4o-mini","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"hi"}]}' | jq .error.code

Prevent

• Turn on auto-recharge for production projects.
• Set a budget alert below the hard limit so you hear about it before requests fail.
• Alert on code, not status: insufficient_quota is a billing incident, rate_limit_exceeded is a capacity one.