Claude Code Setup

If you already have Claude Code (Anthropic's terminal / IDE coding assistant) installed, follow these steps to connect Gate.AI.

1. Create a Gate.AI API key

1. Go to Dashboard → Settings → API Keys and create a key.
2. Copy the key that starts with sk-v1- and use it to replace the placeholders below.
3. For auto routing : go to Dashboard → Settings → Routing and enable Auto routing . When it is off, specify a model ID explicitly in each request.

2. Configure Anthropic Base URL and API key

Claude Code reads environment variables. We recommend following the official LLM gateway documentation and setting:

Option A: Current terminal session (temporary)

1export ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL="https://api.gate.ai/anthropic"2export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY="sk-v1-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"3claude

Option B: Shell profile

Append the following to ~/.zshrc or ~/.bashrc:

1export ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL="https://api.gate.ai/anthropic"2export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY="sk-v1-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

After running source ~/.zshrc (or opening a new terminal), run claude.

Option C: Claude Code settings.json (recommended)

In user-level or project-level configuration, add an env block (see Claude Code settings for paths), for example in your project directory .claude/settings.json:

1{2  "env": {3    "ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL": "https://api.gate.ai/anthropic",4    "ANTHROPIC_API_KEY": "sk-v1-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"5  }6}

Security note: Do not commit real keys to a public repository; use your OS secret store or CI secret injection, and keep local secrets in environment variables only.

Bypass the gateway and use Anthropic directly

To temporarily skip the gateway:

1env -u ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL -u ANTHROPIC_API_KEY claude

(You must already have Anthropic official credentials or another default provider configured.)

3. Configure models (Gate.AI model IDs)

In Gate.AI docs, model IDs look like provider/model-name (for example anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.6). They are not identical to Claude Code built-in aliases such as sonnet. Pick one approach:

3.1 Default model via environment variable

1export ANTHROPIC_MODEL="anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.6"

Or add the same key under env in settings.json.

3.2 Alias mapping

Map aliases to Gate.AI model IDs (Sonnet example):

1export ANTHROPIC_DEFAULT_SONNET_MODEL="anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.6"2export ANTHROPIC_DEFAULT_OPUS_MODEL="anthropic/claude-opus-4.6"3export ANTHROPIC_DEFAULT_HAIKU_MODEL="anthropic/claude-haiku-4.5"

Use the Gate.AI docs — Models list as the source of truth for IDs.

3.3 Custom entry in /model

To pick a gateway-backed model in the UI, use Claude Code's custom model option (see the official Model configuration - ANTHROPIC_CUSTOM_MODEL_OPTION):

1export ANTHROPIC_CUSTOM_MODEL_OPTION="anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.6"2export ANTHROPIC_CUSTOM_MODEL_OPTION_NAME="Sonnet (Gate.AI)"

3.4 Auto-routing model auto

If auto routing is enabled in the dashboard, you can try setting ANTHROPIC_MODEL to auto (same meaning as auto on the OpenAI setup page). If you see errors, switch back to an explicit model ID such as anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.6.

4. Verify the setup

1. In a terminal with the environment configured, run:

1claude

1. After the session starts, send a simple prompt, for example: In one sentence, introduce yourself.
2. If you get a normal reply with no auth or routing errors, requests are reaching Gate.AI and the selected model is responding.

5. FAQ