Tiers & quotas

BCA ships one product — the 99-tool MCP server — across five access tiers. The tool surface is the same at every tier; what changes is rate limit, month-over-month quota, which tools actually return data vs tier_locked, and whether strip_attribution is honored.

Live pricing + sign-up: brain.blockchainacademics.com/pricing. The tables on this page are the dev-docs summary — pricing page is the source of truth for money numbers.

Quick reference

Tier	Monthly quota	Rate limit	Agent jobs	`as_of` time travel	`strip_attribution`
Free	2,000 calls	60 req/min	❌	❌	❌
Starter	20,000 calls	300 req/min	❌	❌	❌
Pro	200,000 calls	1,200 req/min	✅	❌	✅
Team	1,000,000 calls	3,000 req/min	✅	❌	✅
Enterprise	custom	custom	✅	✅	✅ (white-label)

Tool gating

Most tools are available at every tier — gating happens on what the response includes, not on whether the tool returns at all.

Tool category	Minimum tier	Notes
Content & corpus	Free	`get_as_of_snapshot` is Enterprise only.
Market data	Free	`get_ohlc` and `get_pair_data` hit Starter at high call volume.
On-chain	Starter	`get_wallet_profile` rate-limited aggressively on Free.
Sentiment	Starter	Free tier returns summary-only payload.
Proprietary indicators	Pro	Indicator composites are the core Pro value prop.
Agent-backed generation (async)	Pro	`due_diligence`, `tokenomics_model`, `summarize_whitepaper`, `translate_contract`, `monitor_keyword`.
Directories	Free	`list_vcs` and `list_jobs` extra metadata gated to Starter.
Fundamentals	Starter	Per-tool notes in Tool reference.
Chain-specific	Free
Microstructure	Starter	Order book / funding / OI feeds hit Pro at high rates.
Regulatory	Starter	SEC filings feed is Pro.
Security	Free	`scan_contract` rate-limited on Free.
Narrative / meta	Starter
Memes / degen	Free
Compute / AI crypto	Free
Services (revenue)	Starter	`book_kol_campaign`, `request_custom_research`, `submit_listing`.
History time-series	Starter
Corpus meta	Free
Memos / theses / social / currencies	Starter	Memo + thesis full text gated to Pro.

When a caller hits a tool above their tier, the server returns HTTP 403 with an error body: { "error": { "code": "BCA_TIER_LOCKED", "message": "Tool requires pro tier.", "request_id": "req_…" } }. Agents catch the 403, read error.code, and surface the upgrade path.

Attribution by tier

Tier	Attribution rule
Free	`cite_url` surfaced verbatim. Stripping gets the key rate-limited first.
Starter	Same as Free.
Pro	`cite_url` recommended. `strip_attribution: true` honored on applicable read tools.
Team	Same as Pro. Admin dashboard shows per-seat citation compliance.
Enterprise	Full white-label; `cite_url` may be replaced with a contract-approved scheme.

See Attribution & licensing for what “verbatim” means in practice.

Getting a key

Sign up at brain.blockchainacademics.com/pricing
Pick a tier (Free requires no card)
Copy the key from the dashboard (bca_live_…)
Drop it into BCA_API_KEY in your MCP config

A free-tier key issues immediately; paid tiers activate on first successful Stripe charge.

Rate-limit response

Over-limit calls return HTTP 429 with a JSON body the MCP server surfaces as a structured error:

{
  "error": {
    "code": "BCA_RATE_LIMIT",
    "message": "60 req/min exceeded on Free tier. Retry-After: 8s.",
    "retry_after_seconds": 8
  }
}

The bundled HTTP client honors Retry-After. Custom clients: sleep the indicated seconds and retry, or upgrade.

Attribution & licensing — contractual side of the cite_url rule.
Response envelope — envelope fields including the meta.status enum (complete | unseeded | partial | stale).
Tool reference — per-tool tier badge.

Attribution & licensing Tool reference (MCP)