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How Inven credits work

Inven has AI and Contact credits. Learn how credits are used and tracked in this article.

Credit types at a glance

  • AI credits power Inven's AI chat and features, such as searching, enriching data, running analysis, and building deliverables
  • Contact credits are used when you unlock or export a key person's contact details, such as a CEO's or founder's email or phone number.

Every Inven subscription includes an allocation of AI and Contact credits, with the amounts depending on your plan.

AI credits refresh monthly on the 1st, while Contact credits refresh annually.


Track your credit balance in Settings

Admins can check your team's credit balance from Account > Settings > Credits.

If you're running low on AI credits, you'll see an in-app message with the option to request more. Admins can purchase top-ups directly, and are notified when team members request credits so they can approve the purchase.

To avoid running out mid-month, Admins can also enable overage for AI credits, which lets your team keep working past the monthly limit up to a cap you set.

Need more credits? Reach out to your Inven contact to explore plans.


AI credits

AI credits are used when Inven's AI works for you: researching companies, running analysis, and building deliverables. The amount used depends on the task and model.

These actions use AI credits. Click below to learn more:

      Enable overage for AI credits

      By default, once your team uses up the monthly AI credits included in your subscription, they can't use AI features until credits refresh on the 1st.

      Overage lets your team keep working even if monthly credits run out, so no one is blocked mid-month.

      You stay in control of spend:

      • Admins set the maximum overage limit for the organization. Your team's AI credit usage can continue up to that cap, and spend never goes over what you choose.
      • No manual top-ups. Your team can keep working without waiting for someone to buy more credits when they run out.
      • Pay only for what's used. Overage is charged only for credits your team actually uses above the included credits, up to your cap.

      Only Admins can enable overage: go to Account > Settings > Credits (a payment method is required). Adjust the overage limit any time from the same place.

      Tip: If your team regularly goes into overage, you might consider increasing the monthly AI credits in your plan. Reach out to your Inven contact to discuss more.


      How the chat uses AI credits

      Choose the right AI model for what you are working on:

      • Fast uses the least AI credits. Get quick answers for easy tasks.
      • Balanced uses a moderate number of AI credits. Reliable for everyday work.
      • Advanced uses more AI credits. Best for complex analysis and reasoning.
      • Max uses more AI credits. Best for building polished deliverables.

      Use Fast or Balanced for simpler tasks. Switch to Advanced for complex analysis, and Max to build slides and deliverables.


      Reference credit usage for each model:

       
       
      Prompt Fast Balanced Advanced Max
      Create a long list of UK Medtech companies 2-5 credits 5-10 credits 10-20 credits 10-20 credits
      Build a buyer list for WisprFlow, include only strategic acquirers 5-10 credits 20-30 credits 100-200 credits 100-200 credits

      Run competitor analysis for a company. Build a 2-6 page PPT deck with the analysis

      		 Not recommended Not recommended 250-350 credits 300-400 credits

      *Exact credit usage always depends on your prompt and the complexity of what you ask.


      How AI Enrichment uses AI credits

      Standard mode uses 1 AI credit for every 20 results enriched, per enrichment prompt.

      • Example: Running 2 Standard enrichment prompts for 20 companies uses 2 AI credits.

      Advanced mode uses 1 AI credit for each result enriched, per enrichment prompt.

      • Example: Running 1 Advanced enrichment prompt for 10 companies uses 10 credits.

      You will see how many credits are required before starting the enrichment.


      Contact credits

      Contact credits are used when you unlock or export a key person's contact details, like a CEO's or founder's email address or phone number.

      • 1 contact credit per person's contact information you unlock.
      • One-time charge: You are only charged once per contact the first time you unlock them, no matter how many times you access their contact info again later.


      Credit usage via MCP

      Using Inven MCP consumes different types of Inven credits, depending on what you do:

      Action Credits used
      Any interaction with Inven via your AI tool 1 AI credit per tool call*

      Get contact information (emails, phone numbers)

      1 contact credit per contact found

      Status check (e.g. Am I connected to Inven?)

      Free
      Credit check (e.g. How many credits do I have left?)

      Free

      What are tool calls?

      Tool calls are made whenever your AI tool interacts with Inven via MCP to run a search, retrieve data, pull a list, etc. A single prompt can trigger anywhere from 1 to many tool calls, depending on what it asks for.

      For example, "Do a market analysis of the European warehouse automation sector" might require running multiple searches and retrieving data on many companies to build its answer. The exact number of tool calls made also depend on the complexity of your prompt and what AI model you're using.