OpenRouter.ai

OpenRouter.ai is the API gateway I use when I want to try different LLMs without signing up for every provider separately. One API key, credit-based billing, and access to a bunch of models. That works nicely for tools like N8N or [[Opencode]], where I sometimes want to swap models without changing half the setup.

It is basically a middleman. You ask for GPT, Claude, Llama, or whatever else they support, and OpenRouter routes it to the right provider. I mostly like it for testing. Some models are great for coding, some are cheaper for boring automation, and some look good on paper but are annoying in practice.