How-to guides
Priority routing
Priority routing lets operators choose one or more provider accounts that receive traffic before the normal account pool. Use it to spend selected subscriptions, balances, or trials before spreading traffic to the rest of the provider.
Before you start
- Provider account exists Add and test the upstream account before marking it as priority.
- Account remains eligible Priority does not bypass disabled, failed, cooling-down, or quota-exhausted states.
- Scope is provider-local A prioritized Claude account affects Claude routing only, not Gemini, GLM, Codex, or other providers.
Enable priority
- 1Open a provider account card.
Use the dashboard provider section for the account you want to spend first.
- 2Open the account actions menu.
The priority control appears as the Use first action on eligible accounts.
- 3Choose Use first.
The account joins the provider priority set and receives traffic before normal accounts.
- 4Repeat for additional accounts.
Use this when several accounts should drain together before the rest of the pool.
Verify behavior
| Check | Expected result |
|---|---|
GET /admin/account-routing | The account appears in the provider priority list. |
| Dashboard account card | The card reflects the current priority state. |
| Usage history | Requests for that provider hit priority accounts before normal accounts while they remain eligible. |
| Disable account | The account is removed from priority and no longer receives traffic. |
Automatic removal
Priority is removed automatically when an account is disabled or deleted. IO Gateway prunes auths/account-routing.json so stale priority entries cannot keep routing to disabled accounts.
Use priority for deliberate account draining. For permanent tenant isolation, create scoped API keys or custom models with account rules.