What Alibaba Cloud Model Studio's free tier allows
Rate limiting is applied at the Alibaba Cloud root account level and aggregates usage across all RAM users, workspaces and API keys under that account. Each model carries its own RPM and TPM limit published in per-model tables, and free quota is granted per model rather than as one account-wide allowance, so no single free-tier number applies.
- Published limits
- Published per model
- Free access type
- Provider free tier
- Credit card
- Not required
- Protocol
- OpenAI-compatible at
https://dashscope-intl.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1 - Lifecycle
- Active
- Sources reviewed
- 2026-07-25
Requests are rejected when a limit is hit and typically recover within one minute; the error text tells you whether RPM or TPM triggered.
Where Alibaba Cloud Model Studio sits in this catalog
Alibaba Cloud Model Studio is one of 15 provider free tier entries among the 25 providers detailed here. It asks for no credit card, which is true of 23 of the 25. It publishes no fixed request count, as 16 of the 25 do not.
| Compared with | Published limits | Card | Endpoint |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alibaba Cloud Model Studio (this page) | Published per model | Not required | dashscope-intl.aliyuncs.com |
| Moonshot AI (Kimi) | Published per tier | Not required | api.moonshot.ai |
| Pollinations.AI | Enforced but not published | Not required | text.pollinations.ai |
| Ollama Cloud | Enforced but not published | Not required | ollama.com |
Models Alibaba Cloud Model Studio lists as free
qwen-plus— Qwen, also free at 8 other providers hereqwen-turbo— Qwen, also free at 8 other providers hereqwen3-coder-plus— Qwen, also free at 8 other providers here
8 other providers here also host the Qwen family on free terms, and the terms are not the same: Cloudflare Workers AI, SiliconFlow, Ollama Cloud, Together AI, Nebius Token Factory, DeepInfra, Chutes, Scaleway Generative APIs.
Checking a Alibaba Cloud Model Studio key
The CORS preflight allows any origin to send an Authorization header, so a browser can call this endpoint directly. That was measured against https://dashscope-intl.aliyuncs.com on 2026-07-25.
So a key can be checked in the browser checker without installing anything. If you would rather not paste a key into a web page, this does the same thing:
#!/usr/bin/env sh
set -eu
: "${DASHSCOPE_API_KEY:?Set DASHSCOPE_API_KEY to a key you created yourself at the provider console}"
# Prints the models this key can reach, then the HTTP status on its own line so
# 200, 401, and 429 stay distinguishable.
curl --silent --show-error \
--write-out '\nHTTP %{http_code}\n' \
--header "Authorization: Bearer $DASHSCOPE_API_KEY" \
'https://dashscope-intl.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1/models'
Using a Alibaba Cloud Model Studio key
Alibaba Cloud Model Studio serves the OpenAI chat completions protocol at https://dashscope-intl.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1. Point any client that accepts a custom base URL at it, and let the client read the key from DASHSCOPE_API_KEY so the value never lands in a config file:
# Merge this snippet into ~/.codex/config.toml.
# Project-level config cannot select a custom model provider.
model = "qwen-plus"
model_provider = "dashscope"
[model_providers.dashscope]
name = "Alibaba Cloud Model Studio OpenAI-compatible gateway"
base_url = "https://dashscope-intl.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1"
env_key = "DASHSCOPE_API_KEY"
wire_api = "responses"
Questions about the Alibaba Cloud Model Studio free tier
Does Alibaba Cloud Model Studio ask for a credit card?
No. Alibaba Cloud Model Studio is one of 23 providers here that hand out free access without a card, so the only cost of trying it is the signup.
What are Alibaba Cloud Model Studio's free-tier rate limits?
Alibaba Cloud Model Studio publishes no single free-tier number: its limits are published per model. This catalog leaves that blank rather than guessing a figure.
What happens when a Alibaba Cloud Model Studio key hits the limit?
The endpoint answers 429. That is a statement about the request that was refused, not about how much quota is left; only a reset header from the provider tells you when it clears.
Is the Alibaba Cloud Model Studio free tier going away?
Nothing in Alibaba Cloud Model Studio's own documentation says so as of 2026-07-25. Requests are rejected when a limit is hit and typically recover within one minute; the error text tells you whether RPM or TPM triggered.
Can Alibaba Cloud Model Studio be used with Codex, Cline, or Continue?
Yes. Alibaba Cloud Model Studio serves the OpenAI chat completions protocol at https://dashscope-intl.aliyuncs.com/compatible-mode/v1, so any client that accepts a custom base URL can use it. Claude Code is the exception, because it speaks the Anthropic protocol instead.
Official sources
- Model Studio rate limitinghttps://www.alibabacloud.com/help/en/model-studio/rate-limit
- Model Studio OpenAI compatibilityhttps://www.alibabacloud.com/help/en/model-studio/compatibility-of-openai-with-dashscope
- Model Studio modelshttps://www.alibabacloud.com/help/en/model-studio/models
Every figure above was read from those pages on 2026-07-25. Where a provider states a limit only inside a console, this catalog records that fact instead of a number. See the methodology for how an entry gets in and how it gets corrected.