[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"glossary-credit-expiry::en":3,"gloss-cluster-credit-expiry::en":20,"gloss-next-credit-expiry::en":9},{"slug":4,"category":5,"name":6,"definition":7,"meta_desc":8,"faq":9,"schema_markup":9,"related":10},"credit-expiry","saas","Credit Expiry","Credit expiry is the contractual rule that prepaid credits, tokens or usage units are forfeited if they are not consumed within a defined window — typically the billing month, the quarter or the contract year. It is the single most consequential line in credit-based pricing, and the one most often skipped, because the pricing page advertises the credit allowance while the expiry sits in the terms. Expiry matters because credits are prepaid: you have already paid for the capacity, and expiry converts anything you did not use into pure margin for the vendor. In consumer finance the equivalent phenomenon is called breakage, and it is forecast deliberately. The reason this now affects almost every AI tool buyer is that AI workloads are lumpy in exactly the way monthly expiry punishes. A team runs a large batch job to migrate a content library, then goes quiet for six weeks; a seasonal business generates most of its output in two months of the year. Under monthly expiry, the quiet months are wasted and the busy months hit overage rates, so the buyer pays twice for a mismatch that annual pooling would have absorbed entirely. Three questions settle the real cost of a credit plan. Do unused credits roll over, and if so for how long and up to what ceiling? Are credits pooled across the whole workspace or allocated per seat, which strands balance on inactive users? And are credits consumed oldest-first, so rolled-over balance is spent before the current period's? Compare plans on effective cost per unit actually consumed under your own usage pattern, not on the advertised credit count — a smaller allowance that rolls over is frequently cheaper in practice than a larger one that resets.","Credit expiry is the clause that voids prepaid credits at the end of a billing period, so unused balance is revenue the vendor keeps.",null,[11,14,17],{"slug":12,"name":13},"credit-based-pricing","Credit-Based Pricing",{"slug":15,"name":16},"minimum-commitment","Minimum Commitment",{"slug":18,"name":19},"overage","Overage",[21,25,29,32,35,38,41,45,48,51,54,57],{"slug":22,"category":5,"name":23,"updated_at":24},"activation","Activation","2026-08-24T02:46:36+00:00",{"slug":26,"category":5,"name":27,"updated_at":28},"aha-moment","Aha Moment","2026-08-24T02:46:37+00:00",{"slug":30,"category":5,"name":31,"updated_at":28},"annual-contract-value","Annual Contract Value (ACV)",{"slug":33,"category":5,"name":34,"updated_at":24},"api-first","API-First",{"slug":36,"category":5,"name":37,"updated_at":24},"arpa","Average Revenue Per Account (ARPA)",{"slug":39,"category":5,"name":40,"updated_at":24},"arr","Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR)",{"slug":42,"category":5,"name":43,"updated_at":44},"auto-renewal-clause","Auto-Renewal Clause","2026-08-24T02:46:38+00:00",{"slug":46,"category":5,"name":47,"updated_at":44},"build-vs-buy","Build vs. Buy",{"slug":49,"category":5,"name":50,"updated_at":28},"burn-multiple","Burn Multiple",{"slug":52,"category":5,"name":53,"updated_at":44},"burn-rate","Burn Rate",{"slug":55,"category":5,"name":56,"updated_at":24},"cac","Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)",{"slug":58,"category":5,"name":59,"updated_at":24},"cdn","Content Delivery Network (CDN)"]