# Concept: Spending cap (Labs)

Every Labs generation makes real, paid AI calls. The **spending cap** is the account's AI budget in USD: the sum of every ledger row (each paid step writes one — tokens, model, cost) is the account's lifetime spend, and when it reaches the cap, generation stops. The cap is checked at the door AND before every step, so a long run cannot blow through the budget on one check; a run stopped mid-flight parks as `failed` with reason `spending_cap_exceeded`.

The cap is per-account configuration on the Labs grant (platform default $0.10), raised by a platform operator. Raising it un-parks nothing by itself — regenerate the parked deliverable once headroom exists. The full money trail is the account's **Usage & spend** page.

Related: [Deliverable](/concepts/deliverable) · [Process](/concepts/process)