Get a Groq key
Who this is for: anyone who wants fast open models through SpiderGate on their own GroqCloud account.
What this does: walks you through creating a gsk_ API key in the GroqCloud console and adding it to your SpiderGate vault.
Before you begin
A GroqCloud account. Groq's Free tier needs no payment method; a card is needed only to upgrade to the Developer tier.
You must be 18 or older, per Groq's Services Agreement.
About 3 minutes.
Limits and terms to know first
Groq's Free plan limits are per model and per organisation. From Groq's own rate-limits page:
Model | Requests per minute | Requests per day |
|---|---|---|
openai/gpt-oss-120b | 30 | 1,000 |
openai/gpt-oss-20b | 30 | 1,000 |
qwen/qwen3.8-27b | 30 | 1,000 |
whisper-large-v3 | 20 | 2,000 |
meta-llama/llama-prompt-guard-2-86m | 30 | 14,400 |
Groq notes "there may be exceptions to these limits". The Llama chat models are not on the Free plan: Groq lists Llama 3.1 8B and Llama 3.3 70B as Enterprise, "Contact Sales".
Groq's agreement says it may not use your inputs or outputs for training unless you allow it.
Warning: Groq's Services Agreement says you "may not resell or lease access to" your account. Keep this key to your own brand.
Steps
Step 1 — Create the key
Sign in at console.groq.com and open console.groq.com/keys. Create a new key and copy it. Groq keys start with gsk_.
Step 2 — Add the key in SpiderGate
Open Gate → Vault (/dashboard/gate/vault) and click Add Provider. Type Groq in Search providers... and pick it from the Free keys group.
Fill in the dialog:
API Key — paste the
gsk_keyLabel — a name you will recognise later, for example the account it came from.
Under Routing, turn Share with SpiderIQ key pool off. It is on by default, and while it is on, other brands can draw on this key's free quota. Your provider's terms tie the key to your account (see the warnings above), so keep it to your brand.
Click Add key. The button reads Saving... while SpiderGate checks the key.
Verify it worked
When you click Add key, SpiderGate sends one request to Groq with the key before it stores anything: it lists your models at https://api.groq.com/openai/v1/models.
If Groq accepts the key, the dialog closes and the key appears in your vault list.
If it does not, the dialog stays open and shows:
The groq key did not pass its check: <reason>. Nothing was saved.The reason is SpiderGate's own wording, never Groq's error text. The usual ones are Invalid API key (401 Unauthorized), Access denied (403 Forbidden) and The account behind this key has no credit left (402).
To see the key serve a request, give it a slot in one of your own routing aliases and send a request to that alias. The trace shows which provider answered.
Troubleshoot
The check fails with Invalid API key (401 Unauthorized). Groq's 401 means the key is not valid. Copy it again from the keys page; if you no longer have it, create a new one.
Requests fail later with a 429. You went over a per-minute or per-day limit for that model (table above). Groq returns a retry-after header in seconds.
Requests fail with a 498. Groq's 498 means "Flex Tier Capacity Exceeded". Retry later.
Too many keys checked for this workspace; try again in …s. SpiderGate runs at most 20 key checks per brand in any 10 minutes. Wait the number of seconds it gives, then click Add key again.
Request timed out (15s) or Could not reach … to check the key. Try again later. The provider did not answer in time. Nothing was saved. Try again in a minute.
The provider is rate-limiting us (429). Try again in a minute. The provider throttled the check itself. Wait a minute and retry.