> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.ascii.dev/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Billing & Limits

> How Box billing works: per-second pricing, plans, credits, what is included, and what happens when you run out.

Box bills machine time by the second, only while a box is running.

* **\$1 buys 100,000 seconds** of machine time, about 27 hours. That is \$0.036 per hour, or about \$26 for a box running 24/7 for a month.
* **Stopped boxes are free.** Stopping snapshots the filesystem and pauses billing until you resume.
* One machine size: 4 shared vCPUs, 8 GB RAM. See [Machine Capabilities](/box/machines).

## Included with every box

* A dedicated IPv4 address
* Snapshots (the latest snapshot per box is kept, up to 50 GB)
* Egress, up to 2 TB per box per month
* Desktop streaming and hosted HTTPS ports

## Plans

Every plan converts its price into machine time at the same rate, and sets your concurrency and creation limits:

| Plan      | Included time              | Active boxes | Creations per minute |
| --------- | -------------------------- | ------------ | -------------------- |
| \$20/mo   | 2,000,000 s (\~555 h)      | 100          | 10                   |
| \$100/mo  | 10,000,000 s (\~2,777 h)   | 200          | 20                   |
| \$500/mo  | 50,000,000 s (\~13,888 h)  | 800          | 35                   |
| \$2000/mo | 200,000,000 s (\~55,555 h) | 1200         | 60                   |

Upgrade any time from [Dashboard > Billing](https://box.ascii.dev/box/dashboard?tab=billing). Need more than the largest plan? Contact us, higher limits are agreed case by case.

Every plan starts with a free 7-day trial. Trial accounts are limited to 4 active boxes, 5 creations per minute, and 20 creations per day until the first payment.

## Plan time vs credit packs

* **Plan time** resets every month and does not roll over.
* **Credit packs** (\$20 buys 2,000,000 seconds) never expire and carry over month to month. Plan time is consumed first.

Check your balance any time:

<CodeGroup>
  ```bash CLI theme={null}
  box limits
  ```

  ```bash curl theme={null}
  curl -sS "$BOX_API_BASE/limits" \
    -H "Authorization: Bearer $BOX_API_KEY"
  ```

  ```ts TypeScript theme={null}
  const limits = await box.limits();
  console.log(limits.canStart, limits.creditBalanceSeconds);
  ```

  ```python Python theme={null}
  limits = box.limits()
  print(limits.can_start, limits.credit_balance_seconds)
  ```
</CodeGroup>

See [Get Box limits](/box/api/reference/account/get-box-limits) for every field.

## Running out

When your balance reaches zero, running boxes are stopped with a snapshot. Nothing is lost; resume them after topping up.

To never hit that stop, enable **auto-pay** in the billing dashboard. It charges your saved card in small automatic increments when you run out. If a charge fails, boxes keep running for a 24 hour grace period and you are alerted by email.

If a monthly renewal payment fails while you still have credits, your boxes stay up until the credits run out.

## Related

* [Build a Platform on Box](/box/platform-guide)
* [FAQ](/box/faq)
* [Long-Running Tasks](/box/long-running-tasks)