Nansen launches a pay-per-use model, settled in USDC on Base or Solana blockchain.

Crypto news, April 21, blockchain analytics firm Nansen announced a comprehensive upgrade to its on-chain data API, introducing a pay-per-use model based on the x402 protocol and PayAI infrastructure.
Users can now make small USDC payments for instant access to wallet profiles, token flows, and smart money signals, without being restricted by monthly subscriptions, mandatory approvals, or long-term contracts.
Nansen pointed out that traditional subscription models are very unfriendly to AI agents and developers—AI agents often need to query intermittently and then become idle, prototype testing phases for developers have uncertain future needs, and researchers are locked into unnecessary fixed costs.
The new solution is built around the open-source payment standard x402: when requesting access to a paid endpoint, the server returns a 402 Payment Required status code indicating the amount, currency, and chain information.
The client completes an on-chain USDC transaction and attaches a payment proof to receive the data.
The entire “request-invoice-payment-delivery” process is fully programmable, allowing AI agents to autonomously complete payments.
Nansen’s API is offered in two pricing tiers, both settled in USDC on the Base or Solana chain:
The basic tier charges $0.01 per call, providing core data such as token filtering, wallet balances and history, DEX trades, and profit/loss summaries;
The premium tier charges $0.05 per call, unlocking proprietary signals like smart money net flows, position distribution, and profit/loss rankings.
In practical applications, a smart money alert system costs about $0.15 per run, wallet profile analysis costs approximately $0.07, and token research costs around $0.07.