Usage limits

Helpino enforces a few simple limits to keep the service fast, reliable, and the costs predictable for everyone. Here's exactly what each plan gets and how the limits work.

Free — CHF 0/month

  • 10 AI requests per month, total across all features
  • Per-minute throttle: 5 requests/min on Ask and Document Reader, 10/min on Message Writer, 20/min on Meal Planner
  • No skill personas, no web search
  • Quota resets on the 1st of each month (UTC)

Plus — CHF 4.99/month

  • 100 AI requests per month
  • All six skill personas in Ask: Chef, Handyman, Gardener, Travel, Tutor, Tech
  • Web search inside Ask
  • Same per-minute throttle as Free
  • 14-day free trial included

Max — CHF 9.99/month

  • 400 AI requests per month
  • Everything in Plus
  • Same per-minute throttle as Free and Plus
  • 14-day free trial included

Unlimited — CHF 49.99/month

  • No monthly cap
  • Soft daily caps per module: Ask 30/day, Message Writer 50/day, Document Reader 30/day, Meal Planner 50/day
  • Same per-minute throttle as the lower tiers
  • 14-day free trial included
  • Designed for power users — daily caps exist to keep AI provider costs predictable

How limits are enforced

  • Hit your monthly quota → API responds with 429 quota_exceeded; resets at the start of the next month UTC
  • Hit a per-minute throttle → API responds with 429 rate_limited (scope: minute); retry after a few seconds
  • Hit a daily cap (Unlimited only) → API responds with 429 rate_limited (scope: day); resets after 24 hours from the oldest counted request
  • Errors include a Retry-After header so the UI can show "try again in N seconds"

Why these limits exist

Every AI request costs us money — premium models (Anthropic Claude) are roughly five times more expensive than standard ones (Groq Llama). Without limits, a single user could rack up hundreds of CHF in costs in a day.

Per-minute throttles prevent abuse and accidental loops; monthly and daily quotas keep the unit economics sane so we can keep the lower tiers cheap and the Unlimited tier sustainable.

Checking your usage

Open Settings → Usage to see today's and this month's count, broken down by module. Unlimited users also see their daily cap inline next to each module.