Stop Burning Money
on AI API Calls

TokPinch is the cost proxy that sits between OpenClaw and your LLM provider. Track every token, enforce budgets, detect runaway loops, and route to cheaper models — automatically.

Get Started Free View Dashboard

Or skip the setup → join the Cloud waitlist

Trusted by OpenClaw developers worldwide★ Star on GitHub

~/.openclaw/.env
$

That's it. One line. Full cost control.

The Problem

OpenClaw Is Amazing.
The Bills Aren't.

AI agents are powerful — but without guardrails, they can drain your wallet faster than you can type a prompt.

$3,600/mo

Shocking bills from uncontrolled usage

Developers are reporting monthly bills they never saw coming. With no visibility into per-request costs, a single runaway agent can burn through your budget before you notice.

Reported by OpenClaw community on GitHub

$200 overnight

Budget burned while you slept

One heartbeat bug loop — a stuck agent pinging the API every second — burned through an entire monthly budget before the developer woke up. Zero alerts. Zero warnings.

Real incident reported on the OpenClaw Discord

Zero visibility

You can't control what you can't measure

Most OpenClaw users have no idea which agent is costing the most, which sessions are wasteful, or which models are being used. Without data, there's no way to optimise.

Common complaint in r/ClaudeAI and OpenClaw discussions

Real reports from the OpenClaw community on GitHub, Discord, and Reddit.

Features

Everything You Need to Control AI Costs

Built by developers who got burned. Every feature exists because someone, somewhere, lost money without it.

Real-time Cost Tracking

Every request logged with model, tokens, cost, and session. Dashboard updates via WebSocket in real time — no refresh needed.

Budget Enforcement

Set daily and monthly limits. TokPinch pauses requests at 100% and warns at 80%. Never get a surprise bill again.

Loop Detection

Detects runaway agents: rapid-fire requests, repeated content, cost spirals, heartbeat storms. Automatic cooldown with exponential backoff.

Smart Model Routing

Automatically routes cheap tasks — heartbeats, short messages — to Haiku instead of Opus. Save 10–50% without losing quality.

Multi-Provider Support

Works with Anthropic and OpenAI out of the box. Same proxy, same dashboard, unified cost view across all your models.

Security First

API keys pass through, never stored or logged. Docker hardened with read-only filesystem, non-root user, and no-new-privileges.

34%Avg. cost savings

99%Loop detection accuracy

<2msLatency overhead

100%Open source

How It Works

Up and Running in 3 Minutes

No SDK changes. No code modifications. Just a proxy URL and you're done.

Step 01

Install

Run TokPinch with Docker in under 30 seconds. Or install via npm for local development.

bash
docker compose up -d

Step 02

Connect

Add one environment variable to your OpenClaw config. That's the entire integration.

.env
ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL=http://localhost:4100/v1

Step 03

Control

Open the dashboard at :4100/dashboard. Set budgets, watch costs live, get alerts before bills surprise you.

browser
open http://localhost:4100/dashboard

docker-compose.yml

services
  tokpinch
    image ghcr.io/TobieTom/tokpinch:latest
    ports
      - "4100:4100"
    environment
      - DASHBOARD_PASSWORD=your-password
      - BUDGET_DAILY=10
      - BUDGET_MONTHLY=200
    volumes
      - tokpinch-data:/app/data
    read_only true
    security_opt
      - no-new-privileges:true
volumes
  tokpinch-data

Dashboard

Command Center for Your AI Costs

Everything you need to understand, control, and optimise your LLM spend — in one real-time dashboard.

TokPinch Dashboard — Overview

Live

Today

$0.83

This Week

$4.21

This Month

$12.47

Avg. Daily

$0.71

Budget StatusActive

Daily · $0.83 of $10.008.3%

Monthly · $12.47 of $200.006.2%

Cost — Last 12 Hours↓ 12% vs yesterday

00:0012:00Now

Recent RequestsLive ↻

claude-opus-4-52,847$0.0422s

claude-haiku-4-5512$0.0018s

claude-opus-4-54,201$0.06315s

claude-haiku-4-589$0.000222s

Sessions · Cost by session

Budget · Limits & gauges

Alerts · Warnings & digests

Security

Built for the OpenClaw Security Crisis

OpenClaw is a powerful attack surface. TokPinch was designed from day one with defense-in-depth.

42,000+Exposed OpenClaw instances

824+Malicious skills in the wild

5 CVEsIn just 3 weeks

0Keys stored by TokPinch

API Keys Never Touch Disk

TokPinch is a pure pass-through proxy. Your API keys are read from the incoming request header, forwarded to the upstream provider, and immediately discarded. The pino logger is configured to redact authorization, x-api-key, and 15 other secret field patterns before any log line is written.

What gets stored in SQLite

ColumnValue
modelclaude-opus-4-5
input_tokens2847
cost_usd0.0423
session_idsess_abc123
timestamp1706745600000
blocked0
api_key❌ never stored
message_content❌ never stored

Column	Value
model	claude-opus-4-5
input_tokens	2847
cost_usd	0.0423
session_id	sess_abc123
timestamp	1706745600000
blocked	0
api_key	❌ never stored
message_content	❌ never stored

Security checklist

API keys never stored or logged — redacted in all log output before writing

Zero message content on disk — only metadata (model, tokens, cost, session)

Docker hardened: non-root user, read-only filesystem, no-new-privileges

JWT auth with auto-generated 512-bit secrets, 24-hour expiry

Rate limiting on all endpoints: proxy routes, API, and login (5 attempts/min)

WebSocket token re-validated on every incoming message

Per-route CORS enforced with strict origin allowlist

Content-Type validation on all proxy requests — no request smuggling

Test endpoints auto-disabled in production (return 404)

Full SECURITY.md with responsible disclosure process

Pricing

Start Free, Scale When Ready

The core proxy is free and open source forever. Pro features coming soon for power users who need more.

Free

For individual developers

Full dashboard (Overview, Sessions, Budget, Alerts)
Real-time cost tracking via WebSocket
Budget enforcement (daily & monthly)
Loop detection with auto cooldown
1 TokPinch instance
Community support (GitHub Issues)
Smart model routing
Email / Telegram alerts

Download Free

Don't Want to Self-Host?

TokPinch Cloud is coming. Same powerful dashboard, zero infrastructure. Point your OpenClaw at our managed proxy and we handle the rest.

No Docker setupAutomatic updates99.9% uptime SLA

We'll only email you when Cloud launches. No spam.

100% Open Source. MIT Licensed.

TokPinch is free to use, modify, and self-host. No vendor lock-in, no telemetry, no surprises. Star us on GitHub to follow along.

View on GitHub Star on GitHub

Stars

Forks

MIT License

Built withTypeScriptFastifySQLiteReact 19Tailwind CSSFramer MotionDockerVitest

Stop Burning Moneyon AI API Calls

OpenClaw Is Amazing.The Bills Aren't.