Direct answer
The ten-market index: Kenya shows the widest checkout choice (M-Pesa, Airtel Money, card); Nigeria has the most internet users (109m); South Africa and Morocco suit enterprise-style procurement; Ethiopia and Uganda are high-friction, high-attention markets. Outside Kenya every market is card-only at this checkout.
Live numbers as of 2026-11-14
These figures come from the public stats snapshot generated on 2026-11-14 from backend ledgers. They show volume and reliability only; they do not prove any single route wins your workload. Run your own 50 prompts before you move budget.
| Metric | Value | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| All-time requests | 126,617 | 109 days since launch |
| All-time tokens processed | 5,460,329,009 | 2,299,586,240 served from cache |
| Requests, last 30 days | 116,189 | 5,437,162,745 tokens across 82 active routes |
| Registered developers (all time) | 424 | Self-serve accounts, prepaid |
| Live model routes | 31 | Catalogue at /models; machine list at /v1/models |
| DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017, last 30 days | 63,202 | cache-hit rate 12.94% |
| DeepSeek V4.1 Flash Economy (free), last 30 days | 8,741 | cache-hit rate 97.36%; free window, not an SLA |
| 30-day uptime | 98.95% | 88,390 health checks; status currently reports attention, re-check /status before production |
What the routes cost right now
Prices are USD per 1M tokens, taken from the live registry snapshot dated 2026-11-14. The KES columns use the checkout rate of KES 133 = $1; your bank or card issuer may add its own conversion margin on top.
The catalogue is authoritative at /v1/models (the OpenAI-compatible listing) and at /models (the public card with context windows and rate limits). Check both before a production commitment; prices move with provider terms.
See the live list from your terminal: curl -s https://api.fikraapi.co.ke/v1/models -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_FIKRA_KEY"
| Model ID | Input / 1M | Cached input / 1M | Output / 1M | Input KES / 1M | Output KES / 1M |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| deepseek-v4.1-flash-1017 | $0.05 | $0.0075 | $0.15 | KES 6.65 | KES 19.95 |
| deepseek-v4.1-flash | $0.05 | $0.0075 | $0.15 | KES 6.65 | KES 19.95 |
| qwen3.8-27b | $0.045 | $0.045 | $0.35 | KES 5.98 | KES 46.55 |
| glm-5.3-flash | $0.1875 | $0.0375 | $0.625 | KES 24.94 | KES 83.12 |
| glm-5.3 | $1.225 | $0.225 | $3.85 | KES 162.93 | KES 512.05 |
| kimi-k3 | $2.4375 | $0.24375 | $12.1875 | KES 324.19 | KES 1,620.94 |
The ten markets, side by side
| Market | Internet users | Penetration | Currency | Checkout | Guide |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kenya | 23.4m | 40.5% | KES | M-Pesa, Airtel Money, card | /kenya |
| Nigeria | 109m | 45.5% | NGN | card | /africa/nigeria |
| South Africa | 51.7m | 79.6% | ZAR | card | /africa/south-africa |
| Egypt | 98.2m | 82.7% | EGP | card | /africa/egypt |
| Ghana | 26.3m | 74.6% | GHS | card | /africa/ghana |
| Uganda | 11.4m | 22.0% | UGX | card | /africa/uganda |
| Tanzania | 20.6m | 29.1% | TZS | card | /africa/tanzania |
| Ethiopia | 29.5m | 21.7% | ETB | card | /africa/ethiopia |
| Côte d’Ivoire | 13.4m | 40.7% | XOF | card | /africa/cote-divoire |
| Morocco | 35.5m | 92.2% | MAD | card | /africa/morocco |
How to read this index as a buyer
- Kenya: only market with mobile money at checkout; KES 133 = $1; 23.4m internet users at 40.5% penetration.
- Nigeria: 109m internet users, 45.5% penetration; card-only; FX margin is the line item to model.
- South Africa: 51.7m users, 79.6% penetration; ZAR card; procurement-heavy buyers, pilot first.
- Egypt: 98.2m users, 82.7% penetration; EGP card; Arabic-script workloads are the common eval.
- Ghana and Uganda: expect mobile-money search demand but plan for card-only checkout.
- Tanzania and Ethiopia: lower penetration (29.1% and 21.7%); confirm card acceptance before team rollout.
- Côte d'Ivoire and Morocco: francophone and French+Arabic webs; docs in English, buyers bilingual.
What none of these markets get today
No local-currency invoicing, no mobile money outside Kenya, and no SLA on self-serve. If a sales motion promises any of those, get it in writing before you fund the wallet.
How to start in ten minutes
- Create the account at /account/signup and verify the email address.
- Copy the fk_live_ key from the dashboard; it is shown once.
- Fund the wallet with M-Pesa, Airtel Money or card in Kenya; elsewhere in Africa pay by USD card. Minimum top-up is $5.
- Set base_url to https://api.fikraapi.co.ke/v1 in your OpenAI client and model to deepseek-v4.1-flash-1017.
- Run 50 prompts from your own workload, then check /stats and the dashboard before scaling spend.
- Cap the key with a budget; expand only after cost per accepted task is where you need it.
curl https://api.fikraapi.co.ke/v1/chat/completions \
-H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_FIKRA_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"model":"deepseek-v4.1-flash-1017","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"Summarise this ticket in two lines."}]}'
Questions buyers ask
Which market should a pan-African team start in?
Kenya, if any team member is there: published rate, two mobile-money rails and the most checkout telemetry. Otherwise pick the market with the cleanest card path for your finance team.
Are the user numbers official?
They are DataReportal Digital 2026 figures republished on each market page with a source link; verify at the source before citing externally.
Will mobile money expand beyond Kenya?
Only when the checkout shows it for that market. Do not build against rails that are not live; /dashboard shows the options enforced at checkout.
Is this page legal or procurement advice?
No. It is operating guidance. Verify route eligibility, billing and provider terms at /v1/models and in the provider's own documentation before signing anything.
Does the catalogue list every model in the world?
No. It is a curated set of pinned routes. Availability depends on capacity, licensing and provider terms, and routes are added to the public catalogue as they clear review.