How a message is charged

Captain charges credits per message, once the reply is finished. The cost depends on how much work the AI model did for that message, not on a fixed price per message.

What the cost is based on

To answer one message, the AI model reads and writes text, often in several steps. The cost adds up over the whole message:

What the model reads: your message, the profile content it looks at, the recent conversation and the text of any attached documents.
What the model writes: its reply and the changes it makes to your profile.
Repeated content: content the model reads again in a later step of the same message.

Each of the three is counted at its own rate. The total is rounded up to whole credits. A message that ran costs at least 1 credit.

In practice, a short question costs less than a request that rewrites many entries, and a long conversation or a large attachment makes each message cost more.

When a conversation gets long, Captain folds the older messages into a short summary so the model does not re-read all of them. Writing that summary is part of the cost of the message it happens on.

Where you see the cost

While Captain is answering, the running cost appears under Captain’s name and goes up as it works.
When the reply is finished, it shows the final cost, for example “3 credits”.
The Credits page in the Captain app lists every message with its cost.

Credits are taken when the message ends: from your monthly allowance first, then from any extra credits you hold.

The most one message can cost

One message can spend up to a fixed number of credits, or your balance if that is lower. When it reaches that amount, Captain stops with “Captain ran out of credits for this message.” The changes it already made stay in your draft. Send a new message to carry on.

Captain also takes a limited number of steps per message. If it reaches that limit, it stops with “Captain reached its step limit for one message. Ask it to continue.”

You are never charged more than your balance.

When a message costs nothing

It never started. You were out of credits, an attachment was refused, Captain was still answering your previous message, or you had not yet agreed to the Captain terms.
The AI provider failed before doing any work.
It ended in an error with nothing to show for it: no reply and no change that succeeded. One example is “Captain tried to change too much in one go and was cut off.”
Your own model answered it. These messages show Your model in place of a cost.

When a message is still charged

You selected Stop. The work done up to that point is charged, and the changes already made stay.
It ended in an error after doing something: Captain had already replied or changed your profile.
You cancelled a confirmation. The model still did the work of reading your profile and preparing the change.

See Running out of credits for what happens at zero.