Kenya · comparison

Fikra vs Tchavi in Kenya

Kenya M-Pesa checkout against a West African mobile-money-first gateway.

Direct answer

Choose Tchavi when you need exactly what it offers: 130+ models behind one OpenAI-compatible key; mobile-money top-up in Kenya and 11 other countries. Choose Fikra when you want one prepaid USD wallet, pinned routes, and M-Pesa or Airtel Money at checkout in Kenya. Both are legitimate choices.

Fikra vs Tchavi: checkable facts (checked 2026-11-14)

Every Tchavi cell above came from https://tchavi.com/en on 2026-11-14. Where the official source does not state something, the cell says so.

Dimension	Fikra API	Tchavi
Payment path	Kenya: M-Pesa, Airtel Money, card. Wallet credits in USD.	Mobile money (M-Pesa, Orange Money, MTN MoMo and more) in 12 African countries; from 1,000 FCFA; no card required
What it is	OpenAI-compatible gateway, pinned routes, prepaid wallet	African API gateway, mobile money
Catalogue	DeepSeek, Qwen, GLM, Kimi, Gemini-family. See /v1/models.	130+ models behind one OpenAI-compatible key; mobile-money top-up in Kenya and 11 other countries
SLA	No SLA on self-serve. Uptime at fikraapi.co.ke/status.	See https://tchavi.com/en
Support	Self-serve at /support	See https://tchavi.com/en

When Tchavi makes more sense

You already have a funded Tchavi account.
The specific route or model you need is only available on Tchavi.
Your billing path works better with Tchavi's payment method: Mobile money (M-Pesa, Orange Money, MTN MoMo and more) in 12 African countries; from 1,000 FCFA; no card required.
Your compliance review has cleared it and not Fikra.

When Fikra makes more sense

You are in Kenya and want M-Pesa or Airtel Money at checkout.
You want one base_url — https://api.fikraapi.co.ke/v1 — for DeepSeek, GLM, Qwen, Kimi and Gemini-family routes.
You want pinned route IDs you can reproduce identically in staging and production.
You want per-key budget caps so no route can overspend.

How to test both in one afternoon

Fund $5 on Fikra. Run the same 50 prompts through deepseek-v4.1-flash-1017 and your Tchavi route. Log cost and accepted tasks. The route that wins on accepted-task cost per dollar is the one to keep.

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."}]}'

How to get started in Kenya

Create an account at fikraapi.co.ke/account/signup and confirm your email.
Copy your fk_live_ key from the dashboard. It is shown once; store it safely.
Open the dashboard and choose M-Pesa, Airtel Money or card. Enter $5 or more. The screen shows the KES charge before you approve: KES 136.99 is charged, KES 133 credits to your USD wallet. M-Pesa and Airtel Money send a prompt to your phone; approve it and the wallet credits within seconds.
In any OpenAI-compatible client, set base_url to https://api.fikraapi.co.ke/v1 and model to deepseek-v4.1-flash-1017.
Run your first call. The dashboard shows your balance and each request's token cost.
Set a budget cap on the key before sharing it with teammates or deploying to production.

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."}]}'

Common questions

Can I pay from Kenya without a foreign credit card?

Yes. The Kenya checkout offers M-Pesa, Airtel Money and card. M-Pesa and Airtel Money send an STK prompt to your Safaricom or Airtel phone; approve it and the USD wallet credits. Minimum top-up is $5, charged as KES 136.99 (KES 133 credited at the KES 133 = $1 checkout rate). Mobile money is only available on the Kenya checkout.

How much do I need to start?

Minimum top-up is $5. Plans are prepaid per 30 days: Lite $10, Pro $25, Max $60. All plans include 3,000 requests per minute and 250,000 per day. The wallet balance is a hard cap — you cannot overspend it.

Which model should I use first?

Start with deepseek-v4.1-flash-1017 for text, code and summaries. It is the most-used route on the platform. Confirm it is listed at /v1/models, then compare against qwen3.8-27b (structured output) and glm-5.3-flash (high-volume code) on your own prompts before committing budget.

Does Fikra offer an SLA?

No. Self-serve plans are prepaid with no contractual SLA. Uptime is published at fikraapi.co.ke/status. If your project requires a committed uptime guarantee, contact support before you sign up.

Where do I see my usage and spend?

The dashboard shows your balance and per-key usage. Platform-wide stats are at fikraapi.co.ke/stats. Keep the request ID from each call if you need to reconcile a charge.

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